West End Eruption

On the surface, a 1928 jazz record by Louis Armstrong and a 1978 hard rock track by Eddie Van Halen seem to inhabit completely different universes. But musically and historically, "West End Blues" and "Eruption" are practically sibling recordings.

They are arguably the two most influential instrumental performances in 20th-century American music, and they share a striking amount of DNA. Here is what connects them:

1. The Revolutionary, Unaccompanied Opening (The Cadenza)

Both tracks shattered the existing rules of their genres by starting with a jaw-dropping, unaccompanied solo that served as a showcase of pure virtuosity.

• "West End Blues": Armstrong begins with an incredibly complex, 12-second unaccompanied trumpet cadenza. It features rhythmic freedom, rapid-fire arpeggios, and a cascading descent that was light-years ahead of anything anyone had ever heard on a brass instrument in 1928.
• "Eruption": While technically a standalone track (though it famously segues into "You Really Got Me"), "Eruption" is essentially a 102-second unaccompanied guitar cadenza. It begins with an explosive, unaccompanied flourish that instantly signals a new era of guitar playing.

Both intros function exactly like a classical cadenza-an ornamental, highly improvisational passage played by a soloist to show off their technical mastery while the rest of the band stands aside.

2. They Shifted the Focus to the "Soloist"

Before these recordings, both jazz and rock relied heavily on ensemble dynamics and structured, rhythmic accompaniment. These two performances permanently shifted the spotlight.

• From Ensemble to Soloist: Armstrong’s work on "West End Blues" single-handedly transformed jazz from a collective, New Orleans-style ensemble improvisation into an art form centered on the brilliant, individual soloist.
• The Dawn of the "Guitar Hero": "Eruption" did the same for rock. It didn't just popularize two-handed tapping; it established the guitar solo as an independent, sovereign piece of art, setting off the entire 1980s "shredder" movement.

3. Classical DNA Sneaking into Pop Culture

Both players used classical structures and techniques to revolutionize "street" music (blues and rock).

• Armstrong utilized operatic drama, classical phrasing, and a perfect, dramatic arc in his opening run, elevating the blues to a high-art form.
• Van Halen drew directly on classical violin and keyboard etudes (specifically borrowing a chord progression from Kreutzer's violin etudes) to create the lightning-fast, fluid arpeggios that anchor the tapping section of "Eruption."

4. The "Year Zero" Effect

There is a distinct "before and after" line in music history drawn by both of these tracks.

"The opening cadenza of 'West End Blues' is the most influential instrumental introduction in jazz history. After it was released, every trumpet player and indeed every jazz musician had to change how they played."

The exact same can be said of "Eruption." After 1978, every rock guitarist had to learn how to tap, rewrite their solos, and completely rethink what the electric guitar was capable of expressing.

In short, both Armstrong and Van Halen took their respective instruments, blew up the existing boundaries of what was physically thought possible to play on them, and laid down a blueprint that defined the next fifty years of music.

 

Commitment

 Heavy Levity readers, you may know I play a little guitar. 

Here's a recent sojourn into chord melody. 

I used AI (Gemini specifically) to explain the basics and took my guitar to my son's swim practice and kept at it until I came up with the diddy.

Fast forward a couple months and I'm looking for backing tracks to help with my swing feel - as if I have any swing feel at all - and google directs me to Smokin' At The Half Note - Wynton Kelly Trio with Wes Montgomery. 

Fair enough. But as I'm scanning the search return, I come across the factoid that Pat Matheny memorized the album and considers this the album that taught him how to play guitar. 

Commitment.

What have you committed to dear Heavy Levity reader? 

Birth via AI

If you haven't heard, this trumpet intro constitutes the birth of jazz. Of course it's Louis Armstrong's West End Blues:

Historians, upon analysis of musical styles, genres, innovations, feel that this is the moment...when jazz, as a separate and distinct musical genre, was born. 

Yours truly has been doing a lot of experimenting/communicating with AI of late, namely Gemini, Deep Seek, and Grok (via X), and it has been fascinating the level of depth I get in return from conversations about theology and philosophy. So on my lunchtime run I began thinking about Louis Armstrong and the birth of jazz, probably prompted by a Conversations With Christian (McBride) - a kindof History of Jazz in real time - where a veteran jazzer talked freely about Charles Mingus and his exploits. I still love the part in Ken Burns' Jazz, where one historian tells the story of Sydney Bechet pulling out a pistol during a gig...something akin to cutting your losses..."But not Bechet!"

I could go on.

Anyhoo, I ingeniously (he said with a sheepish grin) combined the two: let us try to see if AI can find the moment in time when something is born. In this case, let us not go with a genre, but with an artist. 

The question would be something like this: based on your analysis of music, when, at what musical moment in time did, let us use Eric Clapton to start, Eric Clapton stop emulating other players and idols and create the first musically Eric Clapton moment? 

So now, I'll go over to Gemini and ask and report back. 

Check it out: https://g.co/gemini/share/353200f3675e

Ice Cream and Trane

I took two of my kids for ice cream yesterday and on the way home John Coltrane's My Favorite Things came on Sirius Radio. I said something akin to, "It really gets going on his second solo."

My eldest, who plays piano and viola game me an inquisitive look. 

So I decided to drive around so we could hear it - the song is around 13 minutes. 

My son got into listening, even to the point of humming parts of the solo after hearing a passage. 

AWESOME.

It gets better.

During COVID, I would often take the kids to nearby Goddard park just to get out of the house...but we did it so often it got to be a "Not Goddard again!" kinda thing.

I could think of nowhere else to drive so we could hear the tune so I drove to Goddard. The song was ending just as I pulled up so I was just going to turn around and head home but get this: they wanted to go to Goddard and just pick up shells and skip rocks. 

AWESOME.

I don't have to many parenting wins but this was one. I'll take it. 

Just A Really Nice Moment

 I was driving the tots to their respective schools this morning -the 8 yr old goes early for gymnastics, and the 3 yr old can be dropped off at daycare at 8m -when they started singing a song from the recent Disney movie, Turning Red. Well I hopped on board and started singing and they started booing me which only made me sing louder...when George Benson's version of This Masquerade came on the radio. So I turned it up and sang along despite their protestations. 

And for some reason it was just great. The kidding with the kids and the great guitar and voice of Benson on that opening two chord vamp was...just great.

And while I usually hold myself in low regard, I started to think about when I first got into that song, probably around 1996. I remember renting a cassette from the School of Music library at Ohio University and trying to play from the sheet music. And while I'm no jazzer of any repute, I listened enough to be able to appreciate it, and dammit that oughta count for something.

If You Gotta Ask..

Remember when I wrote about art here and asked what is the process that is necessary and sufficient for someone to be called an artist? 

Then I read this (and these lines... 

When you’re truly creating you don’t have time to think about what to call it.

Who thinks of what they’ll name the baby while they’re fucking?

&

Too many musicians and not enough artists.

&

You can’t practice art.

In order for it to be true, one must live it.)

On Why Jazz Isn’t Cool Anymore . . . .

Posted on November 27, 2011 

Jazz died in 1959.

There maybe cool individuals who say they play Jazz, but ain’t shit cool about Jazz as a whole.

Jazz died when cool stopped being hip.

Jazz was a limited idea to begin with.

Jazz is a label that was forced upon the musicians.

The musicians should’ve never accepted that idea.

Jazz ain’t shit.

Jazz is incestuous.

Jazz separated itself from American popular music.

Big mistake.

The music never recovered.

Ornette tried to save Jazz from itself by taking the music back to its New Orleanian roots, but his efforts were too esoteric.

Jazz died in 1959, that’s why Ornette tried to “Free Jazz” in 1960.

Jazz is only cool if you don’t actually play it for a living.

Jazz musicians have accepted the idea that it’s OK to be poor.

John Coltrane is a bad cat, but Jazz stopped being cool in 1959.

The very fact that so many people are holding on to this idea of what Jazz is supposed to be is exactly what makes it not cool.

People are holding on to an idea that died long ago.

Jazz, like the Buddha, is dead.

Let it go, people, let it go.

Paul Whiteman was the King of Jazz and someday all kings must fall.

Jazz ain’t cool, it’s cold, like necrophilia.

Stop fucking the dead and embrace the living.

Jazz worries way too much about itself for it to be cool.

Jazz died in 1959.

The number one Jazz record is Miles Davis’ Kind Of Blue.

Dave Brubeck’s Time Out was released in 1959.

1959 was the coolest year in Jazz.

Jazz is haunted by its own hungry ghosts.

Let it die.

You can be martyrs for an idea that died over a half a century if y’all want.

Jazz has proven itself to be limited, and therefore, not cool.

Lot’s wife turned to a pillar of salt from looking back.

Jazz is dead.

Miles ahead.

Some may say that I’m no longer the same dude who recorded the album with Doc Cheatham.

Correct: I’m not the same dude I was 14 years ago.

Isn’t that the point?

Our whole purpose on this planet is to evolve.

The Golden Age of Jazz is gone.

Let it go.

Too many necrophiliacs in Jazz.

You’re making my case for me.

Some people may say we are defined by our limitations.

I don’t believe in limitations, but yes, if you believe you are limited that will define you.

Definitions are retrospective.

And if you find yourself getting mad, it’s probably because you know Jazz is dead.

Why get upset if what I’m saying doesn’t ring true?

I can’t speak for anyone else, but I don’t play Jazz.

I play Postmodern New Orleans music.

Louis Armstrong and Danny Barker play Traditional New Orleans Music.

Ellis Marsalis and James Black play Modern New Orleans music.

Kidd Jordan and Clyde Kerr play Avant-garde New Orleans music.

Donald Harrison plays Neoclassical New Orleans music.

I play Postmodern New Orleans music.

I am a part of a lineage.

I am a part of a blood line.

My ancestors didn’t play Jazz, they played Traditional, Modern and Avant-garde New Orleans Music.

I don’t play Jazz.

I don’t let others define who I am.

I am a Postmodern New Orleans musician.

I create music for the heart and the head, for the beauty and the booty.

The man who lets others define him is a dead man.

With all due respect to the masters, they were victims of a colonialist mentality.

Blacks have been conditioned for centuries to be grateful for whatever crumbs thrown to them.

As a postmodern musician, it’s my duty to do better than my predecessors.

To question, reexamine and redefine what it is that we do.

They accepted it because they had to.

Because my ancestors opened the door for me, I don’t have to accept it.

Louis bowed and scraped so Miles could turn his back.

It’s called evolution.

It’s the colonialist mentality that glorifies being treated like a slave.

There is nothing romantic about poor, scuffling Jazz musicians.

Fuck that idea.

It’s not cool.

Jazz is a lie.

America is a lie.

Playing Jazz is like running on a treadmill: you may break a sweat, but ultimately you ain’t going nowhere.

Some people may say we are limited.

I say, we are as limited as we think.

I am not limited.

Jazz is a marketing ploy that serves an elite few.

The elite make all the money while they tell the true artists it’s cool to be broke.

Occupy Jazz!

I am not speaking of so-called Jazz’s improvisational aspects.

Improvisation by its very nature can never be passé, but mindsets are invariably deadly.

Not knowing is the most you can ever know.

It’s only when you don’t know that “everything” is possible.

Jazz has nothing to do with music or being cool.

It’s a marketing idea.

A glaring example of what’s wrong with Jazz is how people fight over it.

People are too afraid to let go of a name that is killing the spirit of the music.

Life is bigger than music, unless you love and/or play Jazz.

The art, or lack thereof, is just a reflection.

Miles Davis personified cool and he hated Jazz.

What is Jazz anyway?

Life isn’t linear, it’s concentric.

When you’re truly creating you don’t have time to think about what to call it.

Who thinks of what they’ll name the baby while they’re fucking?

Playing Jazz is like using the rear-view mirror to drive your car on the freeway.

If you think Jazz is a style of music, you’ll never begin to understand.

It’s ultimately on the musicians.

People are fickle and follow the pack.

Not enough artists willing to soldier for their shit.

People follow trends and brands.

So do musicians, sadly.

Jazz is a brand.

Jazz ain’t music, it’s marketing, and bad marketing at that.

It has never been, nor will it ever be, music.

Here lies Jazz (1916 – 1959).

Too many musicians and not enough artists.

I believe music to be more of a medium than a brand.

Silence is music, too.

You can’t practice art.

In order for it to be true, one must live it.

Existence is not contingent upon thought.

It’s where you choose to put silence that makes sound music.

Sound and silence equals music.

Sometimes when I’m soloing, I don’t play shit.

I just move blocks of silence around.

The notes are an afterthought.

Silence is what makes music sexy.

Silence is cool.

- Nicholas Payton

Merica

Well it’s the Friday of Memorial Day weekend.

President Trump is going to honor the fallen by correcting his bone spurs or calcium prods or whatever it was that kept him out of Nam and enlisting as Agent Orange.

Per law, everyone else if going to grill animal flesh and watch Saving Private Ryan.

It’s Miles Davis’ birthday today so we can all pretend to like jazz for ten minutes.

Harvey Weinstein turned himself in to authorities. Which make one wonder, was he even on the lam? Didn’t someone slap him in a restaurant in Arizona? Yet the police can’t find this guy? Too busy tazing people with more melanin in their skin for parking violations I guess.

Lots of sales going on this weekend to help us remember the brave men and women of the armed forces. I know when I think about honoring a guy that died face-down in Guadalcanal for my freedom, I think about using that freedom to buy a new car and a mattress and a washing machine with bluetooth.  

Merica.

They are going to make an entire movie about Boba Fett. You know, the character in Star Wars movies that said all (AND ONLY!) these lines:

                As you wish.
                He’s no good to me dead.
                What if he doesn’t survive? He’s worth a lot to me.
                Put Captain Solo in the cargo hold.

Somebody ram the splintered end of a baseball bat into my adam’s apple please. Let me guess he’s a good kid in the beginning and only turned to bounty hunting to save his dying mother who turns out to be a droid that got knocked up after a bender at that bar in Tatooine.

It’s also Mike Myers’ birthday today. It’s rumored he’s going to make Austin Powers 4. Do we really need a whole ‘nother movie? Can’t we all just buy the teeth from amazon and get on with our lives?

The NFL is NOT doing enough by fining players that kneel during the anthem. Hasn’t anyone read anything about conditioning? Besides Pantene Pro being the best, you also have to reward the behavior you want to see. Soooo all players that stand proudly with their right arm over their heart and their left hand gently rubbing their balls will get an AR-15.

Merica.

Busker Wants You To Appreciate Jazz and Rats on Your Run - This Is Your Nation's Capitol

Visited the nation's capitol this past week with the fam.

Good trip: the boys loved the zoo and the museums and the hotel pool.

I thought the National Gallery of Art was outstanding - on a par with Getty.

Two highlights (or lowlights depending upon your prerogative):

1. Upon leaving the National Museum of American History we strolled by a busker blowing his sax. My ears did not deceive me when I heard jazz. My eldest pokes his head out from the bottom tier of the stroller and says "You're doing great!"

Mom and I laugh and walk on but a couple of steps when I hear the busker say:

"Yeah I'm doing great. But none of you have the common sense to give me a dollar!"

He was truly upset but I rolled laughing. Johnny Jazz blowing diminished scales is irate because the tippers want to hear Brittney Spears and Mmm Bop.

2. Sunday morning at 5am I stroll out of the hotel for a run. It was still dark out as I ventured down 10th street for the National Mall when I quickly learned I would have to dodge fat, bulbous bottomed, greasy tailed rats on most of 10th -at least until E street.

On the plus side, my pace was a little faster than usual.

I Think It Was Van Morison Who Said La La La La, La La La

La La Land

Watched La La Land Saturday Night. I know I know, a little late to the party. Don’t yell at me, I’ve got two kids and a two hour commute.

It is a great movie. And while the ending is harshly bittersweet, the overarching reaction I had to the movie was laughing.

I thought it was very funny.

Ryan Gosling’s comedic timing is superb. It’s really kind of annoying how talented he is what with the singing and the dancing and the acting but, humor too! Not exactly fair.

He and Emma Stone are terrific actors. Her scene where her audition is interrupted when she is crying is beyond good. 

The home run for me was the explanation of jazz scene. As a, I wouldn’t call myself a musician, person who gained some facility on the guitar (enough to be considered a pro-am playing some larger venues in smaller towns) who gained an appreciation for jazz, this scene was, while written very concisely yet powerfully, acted such that one can’t help appreciate both at once – acting and jazz. 

Our tots love to watch movies in Mom's Honda Pilot and have commandeered the vehicle's sound system. On sunday morning drives to swim lessons though, they have succumbed, been won over, and have come to expect their little hearts and minds to be filled...by jazz.

The Conditions for Altruism

Listening to a live performance (on one of my favorite Rhode Island Radio Stations-WRIU) of Gregory Porter’s No Love Dying and the crowd’s reaction at the end of the song, I came upon the thought that this idea of feeling a part of “something greater than ourselves” and how important it is for the success of our species, is rather easy to manufacture. If it needs manufacturing at all.

Aren’t the people cheering at the conclusion of a song, moved beyond something other than themselves? Haven’t they engaged in a song/music community? Have they not left their own head –between their own two ears to be a part (the very word necessitates “other”) of something beyond their individual body/mind? Haven’t they served witness to the engagement with the surroundings? But, it may be retorted, is this communal experience enough to facilitate this greater than ourselves feeling? Could the community experienced at a music concert be considered equal to ourselves and not solicit the kind of altruism associated with the greater than ourselves sentiment?

No. To exist is to exist as a being-in-the-world. Surrounded. Always. By the world, by others. And this environment (umwelt) is not experienced atomistically, moment by moment needing to be accumulated ex post facto; no, the environment is experienced in a totality, as a gestalt, as a figure-ground, with the figure and the ground forming the phenomenological, perceived world that is always greater than and always a part of the perceiver, always a member of the team, always an inescapable family member, tribe member, nation member, species member, universe member. 

So, this feeling doesn’t need manufacturing for altruism. Feeling a part of something greater than ourselves is the default setting. 

The question at hand is why there isn’t more altruism. Another point to ponder is if this inescapable feeling a part of something greater than ourselves is in fact, the very reason there isn’t more altruism.