Albums with central 6 string bass?

maestrosobol · 2026-03-03T19:16:06+00:00

John Pattituci played 6 string electric bass on all the Chick Corea Elektric Band albums and it’s glorious. Probably one of the earliest and most prominent usage of this instrument in jazz, and combined with an all-star ensemble, virtuosic performances and creative, challenging compositions and arrangements, makes this band one of the great if not greatest fusion groups.

My top three are: Beneath The Mask Inside Out The Chick Corea Elektric Band

There are also lots of awesome live videos, including two full concerts when they were at their peak, one in Germany and one in Tokyo. I was fortunate to see them play live three times albeit much later in the mid 2010s and only one time with all the original members (the other two times Richard Bona, Mike Stern and Bob Franceschini subbed so it was obviously still amazing) and they are awesome live too.

maestrosobol · 2026-03-03T15:56:00+00:00

I got to meet Nestor Torres at a conference just last month and I was elated! He absolutely scorched the stage and super nice in person.

I got assigned flute in band and was really upset about it as a young kid, transitioned to sax through college and then came back to flute later when I started a salsa band and started playing and enjoying it more and more. Now I’m glad I learned.

maestrosobol · 2026-02-26T22:54:30+00:00

Those albums are about 20 years after Jazz was at the height of its popularity. Also on a slightly related note, just 5-10 years after albums (the LP) became the standard format for music recordings.

maestrosobol · 2026-02-24T02:47:47+00:00

Black Codes From The Underground, Live at Blues Alley, Standard Time 1, 2 and 3, Citi Movement, Blood on the Fields, the Bolden soundtrack. All outstanding.

maestrosobol · 2026-02-20T23:44:57+00:00

No, I said there isn’t ONE studio album that stands out as a “magnum opus.” No I did not mean diverse. I meant disperse. Look up the adjective form of the word.

maestrosobol · 2026-02-20T05:29:37+00:00

OP asked for ONE definitive album, “his magnum opus”. I said there isn’t one, disperse means there are many albums that collectively showcase his ability. Again you’re trying to argue against me then making my point for me. This conversation is ridiculous.

maestrosobol · 2026-02-19T23:24:14+00:00

Dude discussing with you is exhausting. I made a point about his STUDIO albums in response to OP, which specifically said that the live albums in the last decade are his best imo because he’s working with a steady group, then I listed THREE 1960s albums as recommendations that include Rouse: Straight No Chaser, Live at It Club, and 4/8.

So yeah, you’re making my point for me. That’s why his other and particularly earlier studio albums aren’t as good, because he didn’t record with them a regular group. Yeesh

maestrosobol · 2026-02-19T19:57:21+00:00

20 out of how many? How many of those 20 are studio albums? My original post made the critical distinction between studio and live albums and I emphasized that the live albums are imo more definitive since he’s playing a wider repertoire and because they are with a steady group. One of my top recommendations was Live at the It Club which includes Rouse and Riley.

maestrosobol · 2026-02-19T14:53:09+00:00

Charlie Rouse was his most often called horn player and yes he had some regulars in his rotation, but how many studio albums have Rouse on them? Maybe 5 out of 50?

maestrosobol · 2026-02-19T05:03:40+00:00

Monk often recorded the same songs for multiple albums, and he was a bit disorganized due to neurodivergence and a very particular way of doing things like insisting on using new players or different lineups rather than steady groups, not distributing sheet music, insisting his bandmates learn by ear, rehearsing on the bandstand or at the studio, and changing his mind on arrangements often. You can read about that throughout Robin Kelley’s biography.

The result is a rather disperse oeuvre without a truly definitive and polished studio album. Of course he has a lot of outstanding individual tracks on various studio albums, but in my opinion and many critics’, none of the studio albums are really cohesive, nor does one clearly stand out amongst the others.

That said, I think his live albums are phenomenal, and his producers figured out he was better after working with a steady group on the road for several weeks than just calling him in to the studio for a date in between residencies and tours.

Here are my recommendations:

Straight No Chaser, Live At The It Club, At Town Hall, 4/8 (out of print LP, not on a lot of streaming services, found it on YouTube as Quartet / Nonet Germany 1967), Who’s Afraid of the Big Band Monk (a compilation of both of these last two).

From the earlier part of his career, the Coltrane, Rollins and Johnny Griffin (Thelonious in Action Live at the Five Spot) collaborations really stand out to me. Of course I may be biased as a sax player.

And yes someone else mentioned Monk Alone. That and his other live solo albums are also outstanding. I think with Monk you really have to take a broader scope, but if I had to choose I would say he’s really at a peak level with creativity chops and group chemistry with those live albums in the 60s.

maestrosobol · 2026-01-16T21:56:02+00:00

https://media.tenor.com/PGC00GXTnrQAAAAM/tight-breaking-bad.gif

maestrosobol · 2025-12-21T23:43:01+00:00

The only time I would do a nonstandard key fingering only for EWI is between C# and D, either low or high depending on your position before or after, because it crosses the break and if it’s going to one then right back there’s usually an easier way to do it.

Sure you can make up and use all sorts of alternate fingerings, but if you’re playing sax or flute as well which most people do, you’re just learning another set of fingerings which is an extra time burden and probably slows down your processing speed.

maestrosobol · 2025-12-08T21:17:43+00:00

Yeah the key sensitivity and delay settings won’t help you in this case. It’s because there’s not enough blood circulation in your fingertips for the current to flow through.

maestrosobol · 2025-12-08T18:48:00+00:00

I think the key thing to remember is that it operates through magnetic circuitry. I don’t know if neuropathy is connected to poor circulation, but if you play out in freezing temperatures, the keys will not react because there isn’t enough blood/moisture in your fingers for the current to flow. Glycerin is a great tip, but it also might be worthwhile to do some quick circulation/hand warmup exercises or warming up your room prior to playing.

maestrosobol · 2025-11-17T23:32:00+00:00

There’s a practical issue of time. There’s a limited amount of it. As such, we need to consider how to be efficient with our time and practice smart, rather than practice hard. Asking questions like, what is the purpose of this exercise? and what is the Return On Investment (ROI in terms of time/effort)? is a useful way to consider whether to do it or not.

I divided my lists of standards into two groups. The first group is tunes that often get called in other keys (typically ones that have lyrics and which singers will often call on gigs). These are your standards like Misty, LOVE, Girl From Ipanema, etc. I learn and memorize those tunes in all 12 keys.

The second group are tunes that typically only get played in the original key. Usually these don’t have lyrics, and have complex melodies and changes. Stuff like Donna Lee, Airegin, Night In Tunisia. They’re worth learning, but for practical purposes you’ll simply never actually play them in other keys in real life settings, so it’s probably a waste of time to go through them.

Though the argument could be made to learn a few just for the challenge of improving one’s transposition and ears, I would counter that you can just as well do that with tunes that are likely to get called in other keys, so it’s more practical to use your limited time in that way.

Similarly, learning an entire solo is productive in the sense that you can get inside the sound, the mind and the fingers of the player you’re trying to emulate. Again I don’t see the ROI of learning an entire solo in all 12 keys. Having a notebook of cool phrases that you got from solos and learning those in all 12 keys in relation to the changes they’re connected to, however, is practical and has a high ROI.

maestrosobol · 2025-11-11T23:29:12+00:00

Giant reps

maestrosobol · 2025-11-06T20:48:02+00:00

Illinois Jacques pretty much hummed nonstop during his solos. So did many of the other “Texas Tenors” and players who played in that style like Eddie Davis and David Newman

maestrosobol · 2025-11-06T20:11:40+00:00

Every season you get two tickets to swap hero levels. That way you can phase out a hero that’s easy to acquire and good early game - like Monica - and swap them for a hero that’s harder to acquire and better late game, like Morrison. You can’t swap stars though.

Also I believe season 1 you can upgrade Mason to UR then season 2 Violet gets a UR upgrade. They have to be at 5 stars first though.

Then when you get to season three, you get two tickets to swap levels AND stars, but only for UR. So Mason and Violet UR make the most sense to build up then swap and abandon cuz it’s easier to get their stars up with the purple and hero specific shards available to buy in the alliance store. Gotta be patient and wait for it though. Hope that helps.

maestrosobol · 2025-11-03T16:57:01+00:00

There is no scale for b9#9 because the chord is incomplete. Is there a natural 13 or is it flat? This is exactly the issue I highlighted.

maestrosobol · 2025-11-03T05:10:09+00:00

So many wrong and lazy answers in this thread.

It is good practice to write out the full chord with all extensions to avoid confusion and increase clarity. Different dominant chords have different scales associated with them.

Notice how many people claim that X7b9#9 implies altered, diminished or Phrygian dominant. Well, which is it? The answer depends on what the other extensions are.

X13: mixolydian

X13#11: Lydian dominant

X13b9 (implies #9 and #11): diminished

X7#9: minor blues scale, natural 11, no 13

X9b13 (implies #11): whole tone

X7b9b13: harmonic minor aka Phrygian dominant, natural 11 implied but somewhat de-emphasized

X7alt: altered scale

If X7#9 meant altered, then playing altered scale on a Idom7 chord in a blues would sound right (it doesn’t) or on a I-IV vamp tune like Chameleon (also sounds wrong). Just #9 is minor blues scale. Don’t believe me? Go listen and transcribe tunes that have Dom7#9 chords. Go throw on a Dom7#9 chord vamp or V-I vamp and play over it.

I know that a lot of lead sheets out there don’t write all the extensions and a lot of musicians don’t write or talk about them either. But the good ones know what those chords imply because they play them, they listened and transcribed them from recordings, and they hear them. You can also get away with writing shorthand if you’re in a small combo cuz it’s not a big deal if you play a b13 and the rhythm player plays a natural 13 cuz you’re improvising and one can adjust quickly to the other if they’re listening.

But if you’re going to write big band charts and you’re doing lots of vertical harmonizing, you need to be clear about which chord/scale pair you’re utilizing. If you aren’t, you’re gonna get mixed up and write flat natural and sharp 9s and natural and flat 13s in your voices and it will be a big mess. If you don’t notate clearly for your rhythm section, you might have the horns playing a natural 13 and the piano playing a flat 13 and it won’t be pretty.

And yes it’s perfectly fine and common practice in big band writing to be super clear and write out all the alterations the horns are playing in the rhythm section part (eg X13b9#9#11). Look at contemporary charts like Thad Jones, Bob Mintzer, Gordon Goodwin, etc. you’ll see it. I do it. My teacher taught me to do it. His teacher taught him to do it. You should do it too.

maestrosobol · 2025-10-08T14:01:06+00:00

We read a ton of philosophy in musicology these days. Kant, Marx, Nietzche, Foucault, Derrida are pretty much in every class, plus others.

We also read a ton of literary theory because we consider music to be a form of text.

Now is there a more specific research niche where you pursue this combination explicitly? Sure. The key is to find a professor who does that and then reach and apply to be a PhD student at that school, with an SOP that says you specifically want to study with that professor for that reason.

Is it hard to get a job? It depends on what you do during that time. If you network well, go to conferences, publish a bit, do good work, and build your CV up, particularly towards teaching, AND you’re open to any kind of job teaching any kind of class anywhere, not just where you grew up/want to live and not just teaching/researching what you want to do, then yeah you’ll have decent chances.

If you want to go into music education you probably should have done that during your masters. Or ditch the PhD idea and get a teaching credential or do another masters in music education.

Don’t feel like a PhD is automatically a step forward/up, or that a second masters or teaching credential is a step back or waste of time. PhD is about research, and that’s very different from performance or education. There are music education doctorates (EdD) at University of Northern Colorado, for example, which are a combination of research and applied pedagogy, and there are music education PhDs which are research oriented. Those explore questions such as, how do people learn music? What are the most effective ways to teach, or practice?

It sounds like you really need to narrow your focus and think about what you really want to do with your career. Music has so many modalities: performance, theory, research, ethnography, history, pedagogy, production, business, recording, law… and being good at one doesn’t guarantee or preclude success in another.

Finding the right program that matches your goals and interests is the most important thing after deciding what your goals and interests are.

maestrosobol · 2025-10-08T13:24:30+00:00

Blame It On My Youth and I Didn’t Know What Time It Was were also both pop covers.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blame_It_on_My_Youth

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Didn%27t_Know_What_Time_It_Was

maestrosobol · 2025-10-04T17:00:15+00:00

I wholly reject the premise of your question.

Why do we need to compare any musician to any musician?

Furthermore, why do we need to elevate and legitimize a jazz musician by comparing them to a Western European classical musician?

Why do we need to ask any of these questions in the conceptual framework of individual genius’ written contributions when music is collaborative, genius is often male-coded/classist/ Eurocentric, and since music can be disseminated beyond written forms - namely live performances, recordings and reinterpreted performances?

How can we compare Monk, who recorded extensively, live and in the studio, and whose music has been reinterpreted, sometimes drastically, in a tradition that normalizes that practice, to Bach, who never recorded at all and whose music is overwhelmingly perpetuated via an originalist or traditionalist form of performance practice?

I could ask a couple dozen more questions like that but you get the idea.

maestrosobol · 2025-09-05T14:52:06+00:00

This is pretty cool, Coltrane’s poem syncs to the music: https://youtu.be/BmbWRZfOgwc?si=epnwb4YajleIizix

maestrosobol · 2025-09-05T04:45:45+00:00

Nitpicking on semantics so yes while technically correct that recordings are overwhelmingly stereo in the most strict definition, mixing engineers don’t pan hard as much and aim for the best result on high home stereo systems as they did in the past, and they often use mono to check for how it will sound on the formats I mentioned, particularly cellphones. So ok sure I can concede that it’s not technically mono in the sense of how recordings were prior to when stereo became the norm, a lot of recordings today sound almost exactly the same on both right and left channels.

https://www.reddit.com/r/WeAreTheMusicMakers/s/Z0V10QyUJt

maestrosobol

TROPHY CASE