Greg Osby
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Here's a track produced for me by Ali Shaheed Muhammad from A Tribe Called Quest a while ago. One of my favorites. It's just the right tempo and not too busy.
I just finished doing a 2 week visiting artist residency in Boston at the Berklee College of Music. Apart from doing lectues and masterclasses on a broad variety of subjects, I was also obligated to sit in on selected classes, chime in and to give my points of view as much as possible. One of the classes that I attended was the History of African American Music, taught by my friend, Dr. Bill Banfield. My knowledge of that music was marginal at best, but I have to admit that it was one of the most enlightening 2 hours I have ever spent. I learned so much that I actually felt like a student again! We covered a great deal of artists and groups from periods leading back to the original field/work songs, celebrations songs, early spiritual and hymns to the first blues forms. The abundance of information that those performances hold is enormous. What I learned most was that there were a lot of coded messages hidden in the lyrics of those early songs. I highly reccommend that any true lover of American music familiarize themselves with The Fisk Jubilee Singers as well as other music of that nature. True American music at it’s best.
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I took a few classes that discussed the influence of the African diaspora in the Americas on music, and I thought the influence on the culture in the US was so dominant yet so few people today understand it. Blues to jazz to R&B to soul to funk to hip hop--do kids today realize the connection of putting their subwoofer in their trunk to make it buzz and some African instrument? Is there a connection or is this some crap a musicologist came up with to create a class?
Anyway, what do you think Greg? I've always dug your sound and music. I wish I could have sat in one of your lectures, but I'll settle for reading your Mog...
There is a a marked and profound difference in the way people of certain backgrounds, cultures or even ethnicities respond to specific frequencies, waveforms and audio stimuli. This is a fact. I go through it all the time in the studio with some of my favorite (non-black) recording engineers who cringe at my requests for "more bass" or "dirty it up a bit". It's also a matter of familiarity and conditioning. Suburban Black folks reactions vs those of urban or rural Blacks. Each demographical subletiy makes a difference
I certainly won't go so far as to say that Blacks are exclusive in their preferences to sonic particulars in music. That would be foolish. Most can't even accurately detail what it is that they actually do like in a piece, but many are immediate in their reactions when those undefined elements are missing or under-mixed.We also tend to respond to rhythm much more readily than other ethnicities (as was hilariously noted in a brilliant Dave Chappelle sketch). Drums were a staple of communication of daily life in old-world Africa and even today, they play an important role in the definition of class, ceremony, status and territory.
Basically speaking, we need everyone AND everything to complete the picture.
I just finished doing a 2 week visiting artist residency in Boston at the Berklee College of Music. Apart from doing lectues and masterclasses on a broad variety of subjects, I was also obligated to sit in on selected classes, chime in and to give my points of view as much as possible. One of the classes that I attended was the History of African American Music, taught by my friend, Dr. Bill Banfield. My knowledge of that music was marginal at best, but I have to admit that it was one of the most enlightening 2 hours I have ever spent. I learned so much that I actually felt like a student again! We covered a great deal of artists and groups from periods leading back to the original field/work songs, celebrations songs, early spiritual and hymns to the first blues forms. The abundance of information that those performances hold is enormous. What I learned most was that there were a lot of coded messages hidden in the lyrics of those early songs. I highly reccommend that any true lover of American music familiarize themselves with The Fisk Jubilee Singers as well as other music of that nature. True American music at it's best.
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I wonder if the coded messages had anything to do with slavery and secret communications that only african american people would understand.
The messages in some of the songs sometimes contained not-so-obvious locations or "stops" on the underground railroad - places where the runaways could find shelter, supplies and assistance. Since the lyrics were repeated in seemingly meaningless cycles and sometimes contained remnants of various African dialects, they were often dismissed as simple, futile songs of hope and freedom.
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Love the track. Is the piano part a sample? They way it floats around the speakers is very cool. Thanks
There is a piano loop in there taken from the piano solo, which was played live by pianist Geri Allen. She improvised for the entire length of the track, as I did on saxophone. The whole point of this recording was to have jazz artists join forces with creative hip hop artists and to meet each other in the middle, not to attempt to force folks into doing things that ran against their natural tendencies. I toured with this configuration for almost 2 years and it had evolved into something really special at that point but I was ready to change directions, as I often do. This was released in 1993, so we're going back a bit. Some of it worked and some of it fell short of the mark, as many experiments do but I'm still very proud of the efforts of all the participants.
I was always drawn to hip hop/jazz stuff, but to split it down the middle with out it being forced must be tough. There seemed to be a lot of stuff coming out of the "alternative rap" post De La Soul era (early- mid 90's) that was shooting for that balance, but usually from more of a hip hop perspective. I have some remedial listening to do, but are there other fusions you've heard that you feel have struck the balance? Hip Hop live seems to need so much structure, was that a problem when you played with this group? In terms of being restrictive of the freedom you might have in a straight jazz setting. I appreciate you taking the time and giving the jazz players thinking on this.