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 This is an interview with Jon Raney, son of legendary guitarist, Jimmy Raney, and also an outstanding musician in his own right, who was kind enough to let me reproduce his 'Brief Essay On Musical Originality'Does original in music exist outside the commercial and can the mainstream ever be truly original? If not, why not? Mainstream implies the viewpoint of the masses, which often boils down to the lowest common denominator of understanding and appreciation. Profundity is usually in inverse proportion to acceptance and understanding from the masses. If everybody could get the message right away, then it wouldn’t be so special. So that’s probably ok. They were born at the same time if time is the fourth dimension. Through the wormhole they are asking it this way:
Who is the most successful unoriginal artist you can think of today? I can’t think of anybody at the moment but that might be the crux of it. You can’t remember someone who is not original unless you were to hear them again and then forget who they were right away : ) One guy comes to mind. Harry Connick, Jr. We were acquaintances when he was living in NYC. He was like Woody Allen’s Zelig at 17 years old. He could imitate any vocalist or pianist before settling into the Sinatra paradigm and playing a fierce piano roughly in the style of Monk. In fact his first piano record has a swing bass style and exact trill riffs used by Monk’s on “Solo Monk” He enjoyed the parlour trick of being a mimic and he wanted to be famous. I think he’s a tremendous talent but his motives were more about being an entertainer. He goes back and forth about wanting to do it all. Who is the most original, unsuccessful artist? The reverse argument. If they are unsuccessful I probably won’t get the opportunity to listen to them. I would have to seek them out. That one’s on me. Geetan; clone or chameleon or none of the above? A work in progress : ) When I heard your demo I heard a quality there - that was the result of an interesting amalgam of influences that had commercial potential - in a good way : ). Your quest would be how to put them all together under one roof cohesively. What do you think of the influence of drugs on originality in musical development? That’s a funny question because of the “politically correct” vs. “observable reality” debate. I’m not sure about the question of originality but certain drugs can give you a heightened sense of focus that is necessary for heightened artistic awareness. And there are great records where some of the personnel are under the influence. Perhaps through a heightened sense of quality, originality may be birthed, I don’t know. This reminds me a bit of this horn player I knew who was struggling with a smack addiction. Before I knew about this issue, I found his playing kind of boring. Then one day I did a gig with him and he was just playing like a house a fire and he also pointed out to me that I had subtracted a beat on a solo break. Whoa! He then nodded out on the next set so that clued me in to his sudden razor sharp skills. I would never do it myself though because drugs frighten me. On the politically correct side, I like to induce focus through different means. Have we not gone beyond originality? There is nothing new under the sun as they say. Is originality not just another word for amnesia? Each generation forgets the achievements of the one before, and the generation after that rediscovering what the grandfathers did? If I understand this correctly, you are trying to ask, “Is originality dead?” Although it’s hard for us to fathom, each generation has had these periods of somewhat low innovation. It’s difficult for us to have perspective on it, living within a period of relatively high musical saturation, but I think I see signs of movement if I were to compare for example, the jazz period of (let’s say) the 80’s with now. I think the most successful artists are generally those who have mastered a particular idiom but also have a restless, searching quality in them. They might be inclined to investigate wholly different music’s and integrate them within their style. Although the less conscious this process the better. Not all artists’ experiments are successful, but we sometimes forget that artists are human beings. Another artists’ unsuccessful experiment might be perfected by someone else and the time may be more ripe for it to flower. Does song writing as an art form become more devalued, as the tolls become available for more people to indulge in it? Meaning the more people indulging in song writing, the less valuable it is? Could be. This may simply be a matter of statistical math probability. The more potential crappers the more potential crap that can be created. But this has nothing to do with the potential songwriter’s ability being lowered because more people are doing it. You could make the argument that the more crap there is, the  harder it is to see your way out of it; but a case for the opposite argument could also be made, that is, the more crap there is, the more potential for something of quality to be seen more plainly amongst the mediocrity.Can you tell us a little about yourself? I may have been holding out a bit. I actually come from a quite well known jazz lineage. My father is the great jazz guitarist Jimmy Raney (picture left). And my brother is Doug Raney (picture below) who is also highly respected. Read what Wes Montgomery had to say about my Dad. My brother played with Chet Baker when he was only 23 and the four albums he made with him are highly regarded. I got a very late start in music. According to my father, I could pick out melodies on the piano by ear without knowing how to play when I was a youngster, but this ability went undeveloped for various reasons until I was about 16. My first real lessons were at age 17 with the jazz pianist and actor, Lee Curreri who had his literal 15 minutes of fame (he was in the movie 1980 movie, “Fame”). In college I really started getting into music by junior year. I did an apprenticeship of sorts by being a street musician and met and played with some guys that are pretty well known now. I studied with Michael Wolff and Kenny Barron and had a few lessons with Cedar Walton, Larry Willis and Don Friedman. I was becoming more and more involved in the jazz scene and developing as a musician but that kind of got put on hold when I fell in love, got married and my wife Yajaira and I had a child. To a certain extent, I knew I was backing out of the music field because I have a love/hate relationship with music that’s difficult to explain; it may have to do with feeling the burden of being the son of a great musician whose life starting going down the tubes by the time I was born. What other forms of music do you like? Hate? I like salsa music. I like classical music: Ravel, Debussy, Beethoven, Bach, Bartok, and Stravinsky for example, although I have fallen out of listening to it regularly. I admire certain pop singers’ talents for example, Luis Miguel, Mariah Carey and Avril Lavigne - although she ha  s spawned a whole flock of blonde sound alike bubble gum rockers like Hillary Duff and Lindsay Lohan. I like Sting. I grew up enjoying the Beatles, James Taylor, Led Zeppelin, Hendrix and Eric Clapton. Paul Simon is good. Can’t stand Bruce Springsteen-he’s such a snore. I think I hate techno-dance music the worst. That’s made by machines and is as monotonous and stupid as music can get.I’m not a fan of rap and I have a lot of negative feelings about it. Some of it might be a function of my race and perhaps even a generation gap. I recognize there is an undercurrent of jazz in it that is somehow there. But much of the potential creativity has gone unrealized in commercial rap- which is often about the rapper boasting about himself, getting money, shooting cops and f**king as many girls as possible and then ditching them. It’s just complete disrespect. Many rap songs are testimonies to a youth’s need to feel important. I think this a motivation for many of them. Many just take that route and give up on the world before trying. They figure that a rap record is their way around school, the system and authority. This is the folly of youth. This is a reflection of our over-the-top culture: one mediocre, jiggling ass, gun-toting rap song after another. A humorous cultural parallel might be white people’s “Beach Blanket Bingo” days. It was much more benign but people didn’t think so then. The bottom line is I feel a lot of aggression from the music especially gangsta rap and I feel like its nature is to incite these negative feelings in youth and to be saying “f##k off” I’ll kick your ass motherf**cker. I see it in the street behavior. I think the rap culture does much to perpetuate this violent nowhere culture. It gives the youth an outlet and legitimacy at expressing their rage at disenfranchisement but little else in terms of seeing the larger picture and resolving the issues. And much of it is marketed to them like cigarettes. “It feels good to be bad”. I think many of these youths have no legitimate reason to be so pissed; it’s simply part of the macho persona they wish to project. For the art of song writing, what has been the greatest step forward for the artist in recent times? What has been the biggest step backwards? Technology. For both answers. You mention ‘narrow in scope and infinitely dense…’ does this refer to the likes of MTV? Boy band etc? Crappy music and music video as its agent are definitely part of the problem in music, yes. The analogy really refers to loss of energy and cultural death rather than the expansion of energy and life. But the gravitational pull of this negative force and the self-collapsing infinite density of it was the important part of the analogy; in addition to that light (i.e. life, ideas, etc) doesn’t emit in this scenario. I sometimes feel a malaise or ambivalence in a musical culture where countless regurgitations and requotations of music that is insincere, unchallenging, uninnovative and repetitive is the norm. This may be part of a larger social issue of a media driven society that is pointlessly negative, unresolvably complex and bent on reproducing itself ad naseum. Or it may simply be a trade off resulting from the increasing means and immediacy of all forms of expression (good and bad) as a result of technological advances. I'm not sure. With Stan Getz, you mention a core difference. Do you think everybody has this within them to develop? That’s hard to answer. I’m not sure everyone has the talent to express his or her individuality within music. Every talented sensitive, diligent artist should be able to express that individuality but I don’t see it happening enough, which means that it might be harder to do than people think. · Is the potential to be truly original now down to technology rather than soul? I don’t think I understand this one. Originality and soul are inextricably tied in my mind - regardless of the means of achieving it. A master technologist may manifest his soul in technology and master scientist in science. An artist who masters technology may be aided by technology but if he is a shallow artist, his art will fall of its own weight, technology or no. You mention the transformative power of music; do you think music can change the world?  Yes. I’m an idealist. When you have the ability to be in touch with yourself it affects everyone around you and in turn affects everyone else they come in contact with. I can recall countless times having engaged in spontaneous lucid conversations with strangers after an intense, successful practice. That person carries the conversation with him and shares it with another person. That brilliance is then brought to bear on all the other things you do. This borders on the pseudo-religious, but it has a basis in fact. Music is tangible and arouses passions, just like a good speech which can move a nation to action.Can you name something acting as a block to individual creativity today? No. That would be scapegoating some type of monolithic being. Although George Bush comes pretty close : ) Jon, it's been an pleasure.
And if I may say so, you look very comfortable in your skin leaning against that post. Thank you. Geetan Click here to visit Jon Raney |
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You should read this, while listening to Jon do his thing do the following: (A). Right click on his picture,to the left there (B) Choose open in new window, (C) You can then listen to some wonderful excerpts from his excellent album (D) Burn your piano 'cause you ain't ever gonna be this good WALTZ FOR TALIA Read the article, listen to the music and then write to your Congress man and tell him you just heard something sublime. Tell them Geetan said so... YOU CAN LINK TO |
