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I just listened to the 'Hallelujah Chorus of Handel's Messiah. Wow! I'd sort of forgotten about that one. Good call.





If you can ever get your hands on a complete CD of the entire thing... Just. Do. It.

I still, at the age of 60, repeat something I've done since maybe around high school age with The Messiah, and recommend it to all practicing musicians, composers, arrangers, whatever -- also obtain a copy of the score, or at least one of the transcriptions for voice and organ, etc. -- and follow along with the performance as it plays.

There are two Classical works that I think *every* aspiring jazz musician should know inside and out, The Messiah is one of them and Bach's Well Tempered Clavier is the other.

By "know" I don't necessarily mean being able to play these pieces, although that would certainly be a goal as well, but there is so much to learn about the art and science of MODULATION, methodology of SEQUENCING, VARIATION that makes sense, so many things that are readilhy transferrable to Modern Jazz as well as all other modern musics that the experience is well worth the effort and slight expenditure. IMO

Analyze 'em. Then see what you might come up with when substituting the tension chords in there, b5, #5, b9, #9 and so on. Lift the Sequence runs in entirely, practice 'em and have a pallette ready to inject at any time during a solo, instead playing the 8ths with Swing feel, of course.

Vince Guaraldi's famous, "Linus and Lucy" piano piece comes to mind. I realized the first day I tried to transcribe that stuff that it had its roots in Handel's Messiah, there's a lick in there that the violins play in orchestral presentation that was a necessary to have in the organ transcription -- and involves the use of 1-3, 2-4 and 3-5 fingering of the RH that is virtually identical to Vince's "signature" line in the Melody of that piece, just a different keysig (Handel did it in D, Vince used Ab, actually an easier device for the pianist, as well as placing it in one of the "jazz horn keys"). Mr. Guaraldi certainly knew where to go to say, "Merry Christmas" indeed.

"Comfort Ye"

Okay, I'll stop now.


--Mac

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