essay about Curtis Fuller/JJ/mid-century brass playing/acoustics

[jacobgarchik]

I have been mulling over these thoughts since Curtis Fuller passed a few years ago. Seemed like a good way to kick off my new substack. Read on for a discussion of electronic envelopes, mid-century aesthetics, & hard bop brass playing. It's free to subscribe. This one happens to be very trombone-centric, although most future posts will be more wide ranging.

https://open.substack.com/pub/jacobgarc ... Share=true

[Posaunus]

Jacob,

This is fascinating. Thanks for digging into this interesting subject.

[Burgerbob]

Very interesting.

[baileyman]

Nice discussion!

These "blocks of sound", which I've long thought resemble organ notes, could be thought of as simplified, modernized (as in removing ornament) or dumbed down. To my ear they are just plain uninteresting, and I would like to hear the pendulum swing back before my hearing is entirely gone.

JJ's style resembles this orchestral received school style but with a rhythm section that provides swing. (Could JJ have been leading the brick revolution?) The word that comes to mind is "square". Fortunately other modern players rarely played rectangles and were way more hip.

[jacobgarchik]

I'm a fan of all kinds of approaches...the more the merrier. Make pretty stuff with blocks or work your clay by hand.

This was a paragraph I cut out of the essay:

To hear a bit of the forgotten world of pre-war brass styles that managed to survive into the later 20th c, listen to Soviet player Viktor Batashov on the 1972 recording of Shostakovich’s 15 Symphony. The trombone solo is about 15’ in. Here is a dramatic, vulnerable, emotional style of brass playing, It sounds like neither jaw/lip vibrato nor slide but diaphragmatic vibrato. Every long note has a gradual rise in brightness and fullness to its peak. The vast majority of brass teachers in the US would cringe upon hearing this.

[Posaunus]

I'm a fan of all kinds of approaches...the more the merrier. Make pretty stuff with blocks or work your clay by hand.

To hear a bit of the forgotten world of pre-war brass styles that managed to survive into the later 20th c, listen to Soviet player Viktor Batashov on the 1972 recording of Shostakovich’s 15 Symphony. The trombone solo is about 15’ in. Here is a dramatic, vulnerable, emotional style of brass playing, It sounds like neither jaw/lip vibrato nor slide but diaphragmatic vibrato. Every long note has a gradual rise in brightness and fullness to its peak. The vast majority of brass teachers in the US would cringe upon hearing this.

I must admit that I (not formally trained as a trombonist) also cringed when I heard this solo.

• Is it just the style of playing that was in vogue in the Soviet Union at the time?

• Was it only Batashov who played this way?

• Is it the sound that Dmitri Shostakovich imagined?

• Did Shostakovich (by that time very ill, and near the end of his life) have any influence over this performance (conducted by his son Maksim)?

Let's just say that I am NOT a fan of this approach; I've heard this solo played in a way that was more meaningful to me.
(e.g., London Philharmonic/Mariss Jansons, EMI CDC556591)

[jacobgarchik]

as I tried to illustrate in the essay, this is very much a European style, which lived on in early American players (the symphony players were mostly European!) until the mid 20th c when it fell out of favor.

Batashov has some solo recordings too.



I think he sounds quite lovely.

You can hear this approach, albeit to a lesser extent, in American players like Davis Shuman (Dave Taylor's teacher at Juilliard). Not a "blocks of sound" type player. Great player!



I love all this stuff.

[jacobgarchik]

just as a side note I am always tickled when I hear one of those "period" orchestras - there is a great one of the BBC proms playing the Rite of Spring.
They might be playing period appropriate instruments but they sure aren't playing period appropriate articulations, vibratos and note shapes!

[Posaunus]

I have been mulling over these thoughts since Curtis Fuller passed a few years ago. Seemed like a good way to kick off my new substack. Read on for a discussion of electronic envelopes, mid-century aesthetics, & hard bop brass playing. It's free to subscribe. This one happens to be very trombone-centric, although most future posts will be more wide ranging.

https://open.substack.com/pub/jacobgarc ... Share=true

Thanks Jacob. I always like to listen to Jack Teagarden.
It's also interesting to see the trombone he was apparently playing in 1928 - quite small, highly decorated bell; large semicircular counterweight.

[Trombo]

I'm a fan of all kinds of approaches...the more the merrier. Make pretty stuff with blocks or work your clay by hand.

To hear a bit of the forgotten world of pre-war brass styles that managed to survive into the later 20th c, listen to Soviet player Viktor Batashov on the 1972 recording of Shostakovich’s 15 Symphony. The trombone solo is about 15’ in. Here is a dramatic, vulnerable, emotional style of brass playing, It sounds like neither jaw/lip vibrato nor slide but diaphragmatic vibrato. Every long note has a gradual rise in brightness and fullness to its peak. The vast majority of brass teachers in the US would cringe upon hearing this.

I must admit that I (not formally trained as a trombonist) also cringed when I heard this solo.

• Is it just the style of playing that was in vogue in the Soviet Union at the time?

• Was it only Batashov who played this way?

• Is it the sound that Dmitri Shostakovich imagined?

• Did Shostakovich (by that time very ill, and near the end of his life) have any influence over this performance (conducted by his son Maksim)?

Let's just say that I am NOT a fan of this approach; I've heard this solo played in a way that was more meaningful to me.
(e.g., London Philharmonic/Mariss Jansons, EMI CDC556591)

This style with diaphragmatic vibrato was invented by Professor Vladislav Blazhevich (1881-1942) at the Moscow Conservatory and Professor Pyotr Volkov (1877-1933) at the St. Petersburg Conservatory. They are considered the founders of the Soviet school of trombone playing. They proceeded from the fact that the trombone should imitate the Russian opera school of that time (Fyodor Chaliapin, etc.) with abundant vibrato, since Blazhevich played at the Bolshoi Theater, and Volkov played at the Mariinsky Theater.
Jacob Reichman, soloist of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, was Volkov's student at the St. Petersburg Conservatory. He probably spread this style in America before World War II.

Victor Batashov (1937), winner of the international competition in Geneva (1958) and laureate of the competition in Prague (1962), was a student of Professor Vladimir Shcherbinin (1896-1963) at the Moscow Conservatory. And Shcherbinin was a student of Blazhevich.

[jacobgarchik]

This style with diaphragmatic vibrato was invented by Professor Vladislav Blazhevich (1881-1942) at the Moscow Conservatory and Professor Pyotr Volkov (1877-1933) at the St. Petersburg Conservatory. They are considered the founders of the Soviet school of trombone playing. They proceeded from the fact that the trombone should imitate the Russian opera school of that time (Fyodor Chaliapin, etc.) with abundant vibrato, since Blazhevich played at the Bolshoi Theater, and Volkov played at the Mariinsky Theater.
Jacob Reichman, soloist of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, was Volkov's student at the St. Petersburg Conservatory. He probably spread this style in America before World War II.

Victor Batashov (1937), winner of the international competition in Geneva (1958) and laureate of the competition in Prague (1962), was a student of Professor Vladimir Shcherbinin (1896-1963) at the Moscow Conservatory. And Shcherbinin was a student of Blazhevich.

Fascinating, thank you for this!

[Kbiggs]

This style of playing and vibrato remind me of Kiril Ribarski. Here he is playing a late 19th C solo arr. by Hunsberger:



Speculation on my part: I think part of the sound is influenced by equipment. A mouthpiece with a small rim (that is, compared to a lot of 21st C orchestral trombonists; think less than 6 1/2 size) combined with a somewhat deeper cup that is more V-shaped. It’s more along the lines of what was used in some German and east European players well into the 20th C. Put that into a medium to large bore horn, and you have an instrument with brilliance and depth.

Of course, 90% or more of the sound is the player and the lineage.

[VJOFan]

The changes in the pervasive sound seem to parallel the development of recording technology.

The easier it is to hear back what’s being produced, the more chance of fixing wild tuning, fractured anrticulation and overshoots of emotive playing.

[Trombo]

This style of playing and vibrato remind me of Kiril Ribarski. Here he is playing a late 19th C solo arr. by Hunsberger:



Speculation on my part: I think part of the sound is influenced by equipment. A mouthpiece with a small rim (that is, compared to a lot of 21st C orchestral trombonists; think less than 6 1/2 size) combined with a somewhat deeper cup that is more V-shaped. It’s more along the lines of what was used in some German and east European players well into the 20th C. Put that into a medium to large bore horn, and you have an instrument with brilliance and depth.

Of course, 90% or more of the sound is the player and the lineage.

Yes, the Yugoslav trombonist Kirill Rybarsky reminds me of Batashov. I think that Ribarsky's teacher probably studied in the USSR, when relations between the USSR and Yugoslavia were good. But Ribarsky did not win international competitions, and Batashov did not play pop or jazz music. And Batashov had a fantastic lower register, which Rybarsky did not have (although Batashov played on a custom mouthpiece of size 6 1/2). Rybarsky played on a very large custom mouthpiece with a shallow cup.
Here is a Rimsky-Korsakov concerto performed by Batashov (Bach 36 and 6 1/2 mouth):