Posted by Anthony on April 24, 2003 at 08:11:27:
In Reply to: Re: MJT "Live at the Bottom Line".discuss? posted by Richard Perry on April 21, 2003 at 16:00:45:
Richard,
Thanks for the comments and background info! Very enlightening. I'm particularly intrigued by the recording techniques- the fact that no audience noise got through is impressive to say the least. Personally, I don't mind a small ammount of audience noise on live recordings, provided it doesn't interfere with my ability to hear the music. In fact, I'd say I prefer it(applause after solos, for instance). I don't know how others feel on that though.
The fact that you guys were only playing together for 48 hours also blows me away.. I had assumed as much with the rhythm section- but the horn parts were so polished! wow. I do look forward to future recordings.
As for tuba walking basslines- my group is a bit different in that we're not quite as tuba-centric. We have two tubists, and two reed doublers. I'll also play trombone from time to time. (We also have a guitarist or two in our rhythm section). The heads of all of our tunes have been fully orchestrated right down to the bassline, to prevent us from muddying things up, or stepping on each other's toes(which is very easy to do when you give a bunch of tuba players free reign!)... as for the solos, it's been a process of trial and error as I mentioned earlier. One thing that works well is stop-time comping on some of the more upbeat tuba solos... although this obviously wouldn't work in a horn section made up solely of tubists. Generally, we've had a tuba lay down the bassline for the other soloists, then had to do something special for the tuba soloist(piano bassline, guitar comp, etc).. though with only two tubists, and particularly good musical communication, we've still had some success laying down an accompanying groove without getting in the way.
I don't have any recordings as of right now, but we will be playing a jazz luncheon this Wednesday, and hopefully several gigs this summer- I'd be happy to post you whatever recording we come up with. Thanks again!
Anthony