Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The Real Book

99percentinvisible.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

101–110 of 143 posts

Re: The Real Book

#101

Post by bori5 »

biggieshellz wrote: post #42
pthreads wrote: post #4

When I was learning to play the saxophone my instructor had an old copy of the Real Book. The transcriptions of songs by some of the jazz legends would blow my mind. I thought the people being able to transcribe those were geniuses (still do). They had no sophisticated software to help them. It was all done manually by listening to countless hours of recordings over and over again. All those chord changes, harmonies,…

No sophisticated software, but you could take a turntable and play a 33 1/3 RPM record at half speed (16 2/3 RPM) and that would drop the recording by an octave but keep the notes the same.

Another way was put stacks of coins on the LP to slow it down

Re: The Real Book

#102

Post by lupire »

ed25519FUUU wrote: post #50
hoytech wrote: post #36

Fascinating! It's sort of similar to "bootlegged" guitar tabs on alt.guitar.tab newsgroup and OLGA. There was lots of legal action by publishers and a lot of the content is now lost, or at least not easily accessible online anymore. ...except for an archive of the classical tabs, selflessly maintained by one guy: https://www.classtab.org/index_old.htm Don't tell anyone!

I’m feeling uneasy because I know there’s a whole generation of “one-person” shops which run these important websites. I hope they have a transition plan in place for the inevitable.

Archive.org to the rescue

Re: The Real Book

#103

Post by mtalantikite »

bonthron wrote: post #41

When I was a teenager, my music teacher always had a copy of the Real Book around. I went to a local music store and was looking through their music books when one of the employees asked, 'is there something I can help you find?' When I said the Real Book, he said, 'oh, we don't keep that out here'... he disappeared for a minute and came back with a copy from the back room. At the time, I felt like I had been admitte…

I have a very clear memory of taking the subway to a random music shop in Boston near Berklee as a teenager that an older musician friend had told me about that had Real Books in the back. Went up to the counter and when I asked for it the person working there got real quiet, asking me what key I needed it in, and then ducked into the back to grab it. I think it was something like $45, which was a lot for 15 year old me in the 90s at the time. It definitely felt like a secret club! I loaned it out to a drummer friend in college and never got it back, I should ask him if he still has it.

Re: The Real Book

#104

Post by Udo_Schmitz »

Didn’t know about the legal implications. A bunch of Real and Fake Books were readily available at the music library in Germany I frequented in the 80s. I’d bet they’re still available now.

Re: The Real Book

#105

Post by bewareandaware »

mtalantikite wrote: post #103
bonthron wrote: post #41

When I was a teenager, my music teacher always had a copy of the Real Book around. I went to a local music store and was looking through their music books when one of the employees asked, 'is there something I can help you find?' When I said the Real Book, he said, 'oh, we don't keep that out here'... he disappeared for a minute and came back with a copy from the back room. At the time, I felt like I had been admitte…

I have a very clear memory of taking the subway to a random music shop in Boston near Berklee as a teenager that an older musician friend had told me about that had Real Books in the back. Went up to the counter and when I asked for it the person working there got real quiet, asking me what key I needed it in, and then ducked into the back to grab it. I think it was something like $45, which was a lot for 15 year old…

I thought they were all in the same key! I got mine because someone gave it to me. Then later I gave it to someone.

Re: The Real Book

#106

Post by MrGando »

The real book is actually full of egregious mistakes and philosophically speaking is quite questionable. There’s a significant body of great Jazz musicians (eg: Yotam Silberstein) who avoid the book at all costs. My teacher -who’s part of Yotam’s quintet- is also very careful with the book and tries to avoid it.

Re: The Real Book

#107

Post by cjohnson318 »

MrGando wrote: post #106

The real book is actually full of egregious mistakes and philosophically speaking is quite questionable. There’s a significant body of great Jazz musicians (eg: Yotam Silberstein) who avoid the book at all costs. My teacher -who’s part of Yotam’s quintet- is also very careful with the book and tries to avoid it.

On any list of "Jazz for Beginners" you'll see Blue Bossa, and right off the bat, in the fourth measure, The Real Book has an unlikely Bb7 chord. Most jazz musicians I've spoken with use the changes Cm7 / Cm7 / Fm7 / Fm7 for the first four measures, instead of The Real Book's Cm / Cm / Fm7 / Bb7. I'm not sure how that Bb7 got there, or how it's stayed there after 50 years, but there it is.

Re: The Real Book

#109

Post by analog31 »

I'm a bassist. I got my Real Book in 1982. I was already playing in the high school jazz band, but as a suburban kid, I had zero exposure to things like jam sessions and live jazz performances. Nobody had taught me how to learn harmonies from recordings, so I was kind of lost. The Real Book gave me a way to follow recorded tunes and grasp what the players were doing. Later on, being able to play from "lead sheets" enabled me to play with musicians who were a lot better than me, and was really how I learned to play.

But eventually, I was hauling a ton of fake books to every gig. About 20 years ago, I was running late, and decided to leave my fake books behind. And I survived. I had memorized most of the tunes that were played regularly in my locale, and forced myself to learn the rest by ear, on the bandstand.

So I tell people that the two best things I've done for my jazz playing were: Getting a Real Book, and getting rid of my Real Book. Today, those tunes are hopelessly overplayed, and I prefer finding bands to play with, who are willing to venture off the beaten path, with less familiar tunes or especially original material.

Re: The Real Book

#110

Post by analog31 »

barrenko wrote: post #86

Since this is HN, any advice for someone wanting to get from basically zero music knowledge to reading and playing jazz stuff? Let's say keyboard or guitar. I do know some music theory from elementary / high school.

I'm a part time working jazz bassist. Agreeing with the others, my advice is to first just learn to play, but make sure you experience both reading and playing by ear. The latter you can start at any time by listening to recordings and trying to sing the tunes. In fact, when someone says they are struggling with playing a tune, a teacher will often ask: "Did you try to sing it first?"

You can find teachers who focus on jazz. Let them know your intentions. Make sure they force you to play melodies in addition to chords, and to read from standard notation in addition to tabulature.

Eventually you should look for a beginner jam session. In my locale, before the COVID, there were multiple jam sessions at different times and places, but one of them was deliberately organized as a learning session for beginners. It was hosted by some local jazz educators, and they may even have gotten some sort of grant for it.

A good thing about guitar or piano is that you can function in a rhythm section before you are fully up to speed as an improv soloist. The same is true of the bass.

Post reply on HN