Would Joscho be considered a legend?

littlemark · April 2023

Ahhh. This makes sense now. I am guessing you are newish to the style. Was he the gateway artist for you? Did he get you into the genre? You are clearly inspired by him. That's great! Whatever keeps you playing is good. Keep it up! But you drank the Kool aid do to speak. You have blind spot. Giving money to someone makes it hard to be objective about them.

"I think a better wording I should have used how come Joscho isn’t considered one of the greats of this genre?" Yes, a way better and clearer question.

"...what I was trying to state is that actually what people are saying was incorrect to joschos more recent work."

The two songs I posted are hopefully recent enough to qualify.

"I was actually putting a point across in a more objective fashion..." I am making the assumption you are new to Gypsy Jazz; it is very hard to be objective if you don't know the history or context.

"In reality we could pick apart django recordings because the quality aren’t great either." What quality? The recording technology? Or his playing? I would think Joscho has quite the advantage in having his own studio and and recording equipment. Nevermind the costs and disparate recording environment, industry and philosophy. In the 30s artists were often payed by the song.

"But I also strongly disagree with standing one a legends shoulder statement." I think you misunderstand what I was saying. Maybe because I don't really know much about sports. Standing on the shoulders of giants is how advancements in any field work. Hawkins stands on Einstein who stands on Newton who stands on Archimedes or Pythagoras etc. Django stood on the shoulders of Armstrong who was on Buddy Bolden. Who was Buddy on? I don't know. Elon Musk stands on Ford.

"I think your points are more towards his character rather than his actual playing." I didn't mention his character in reference to the rattlesnake reggae performance. But unfortunately, audiences often hear with their eyes.

The reason I put the Hungaria performance in a separate post was because it didn't focus on his playing. I was trying to separate the two ideas somewhat.

"But to insist that Joscho’s lines are rehearsed to me is a ridiculous point..." Improvisation is a large part of Jazz and is elevated in importance compared to other genres like classical, pop or rock.

"...of course people have fall back lines, I think most people in jazz have their go to lines that they play. Django is included in this." Of course you are correct. EVERYONE has a bank of licks. Parker, Coltrane, Armstrong. Django and Gypsy Jazz more generally is often criticized by straight ahead jazzers by the over use and reliance of licks. Joscho I think is particularly reliant on this. Hence why I am not interested in his music as it doesn't feel spontaneous to me. I can see through what he is playing to what he is thinking.

In Jazz, licks are supposed to be used as a mental pause/place holder in-between musical ideas. In the performance of Rattlesnake Reggae it appears to be cliche linked to cliche. I was playing it for my GF and paused after the James Bond quote, and I said guess what is next. "Ugh, I don't know! The pink panther? " So predictable my non musician GF guessed what he was going to do next.

I don't think it is controversial. As you said he is not mentioned often on the board. "when people are talking about the greats of this genre how come people state lots of names yet Joscho Stephan is never brought up". In art, having great technique is not AS important as what you do with it.

Another thing that marks Django important compared to some others in the genre are his compositions. He wrote a number of beautiful pieces. And some fun ones. And some heads that are just there to start a song (Daphne, minor swing). I'm not going to compare.

littlemark · April 2023

"I would also like to point out that on that bireli recording with Joscho playing Hungaria, he makes a mistake playing a 16th note lick at a tempo that I’m guessing is over 200bpm. Think about that and he attempts is twice in the recording one with a mistake and one without, he played that chromatic lick cleanly."

I don't know what you are trying to say.

"To me gypsy jazz is about being flamboyant, in a way showing off, and impressing an audience." 😰

"In contrast to what many people who play jazz think I believe we should aim to impress an audience" 😞 why do you want to be impressed? This really makes me sad. I don't listen to music to be impressed.

"Django was the same" 😳 Joscho is definitely NOT the same as Django. If for only one reason, Django did it first.

"find that so many players will play ideas like modal ideas or maybe something that is out there rhythmically. " how often do you hear modal jazz in this genre? Rarely I hope! Joscho frequently plays odd rhythmic patterns with chords. Annoyingly frequent. So does Bireli IMO.

"I personally don’t think that a member of the public would enjoy this sort of stuff and only really a musician can appreciate it. " I mean, arguably why Jazz is out of favour with the public is because it ceased to be dance music in the 40s and became more art music.

But, I would hazard a guess that everyone on this board is a musician thus are more impressed and interested with interesting ideas from the other greats. What makes them great compared to say me, is how well they incorporate interesting ideas.

"...my mum said to me I don’t like jazz because it just sounds like random notes to me..." I don't know your mum but that is likely her response because she is uninitiated. She might only hear out of tune screaming in Chinese opera. She might see just a canvas painted white. Art is often challenging and takes time to understand and appreciate it.

"I showed her some gypsy jazz she liked it and I’m guessing it’s because of the showmanship and the simple melodies." Yes, absolutely. Gypsy Jazz is generally more palatable to the uninitiated than any Jazz post Bebop.

I think Joscho strays too far from Gypsy Jazz. Wonderwall and On Broadway are not part of the repertoire. Like Robin Nolan, he brings in too many other influences. So much, that he is no longer playing in the same genre of music. Audiences seem to like it. That's good for him.

I strongly suspect, because of these artistic choices he is not a favourite on this board.

EmilBirk · April 2023

The modal comment was regarding the bepop style than the gypsy style. To be honest I can see where you are coming from, some people enjoy the old school style more than the modern style (bringing in other genres as influence). In this way I could assume that you would prefer a player like duved over a player like Joscho?

It is also interesting to think about what influences players have outside of Django. I think Stochello said past django he transcribed a few Jobim records which might be how he popularised the gypsy bossa. From what I’ve heard Angelo debarre has an Eastern European influence, Bireli said that he transcribed a lot of George Benson. I think it’s quite clear to me that Joscho is greatly influenced by Bireli, this is in terms of expanding to different styles and bringing different styles in. This to me is something I enjoy, my thinking behind this is if I wanted to listen to the same standards over and over again I would just listen to django and to me there would be no point in other people playing this music because we would just be recycling the same material

opus20000 · April 2023

https://www.djangobooks.com/forum/discussion/comment/113888#Comment_113888

True, many music college jazz departments and teachers, snub Django and gypsy jazz all together.

Bones · April 2023

Wow, well obviously Joscho is one of the contemporary greats in this genre. Sheesh guys. Seriously?

opus20000 · April 2023

https://www.djangobooks.com/forum/discussion/comment/113902#Comment_113902

Like I originally wrote, people nowhere near Joschos level, are all "experts" now

EmilBirk · April 2023

https://www.djangobooks.com/forum/discussion/comment/113904#Comment_113904

Yeah I agreed a lot with what you said. Unfortunately, I feel this thread shows a lot of what is wrong with jazz nowadays, a lot of people know how to talk about the music but not play it. It’s strange in a way because really gypsy jazz is based off theatrics and a certain level of rawness which is contrary to what many people on this thread enjoy. The main thing I thought about is if you put Joscho in a gypsy fair performance or busking on a street, I wonder how big of a crowd would gather? Isn’t this the roots of gypsy jazz or even gypsy music in general? Maybe my history is incorrect but I’m almost certain that django started out busking.

scot · April 2023

Well, like most people, I can't play at Joscho's level when it comes to playing long strings of 64th notes or anything else. But I have many hundreds of recordings of this music from all kinds of players and a large library of text on the subject collected over 30 years. If I never played solos, I played rhythm for a number of pretty good guitarists over those 30 years without embarrassing myself too badly. I know what I like, and it isn't an endless barrage of notes played as fast as possible. Here at this forum, it seems that a lot of people are drawn in by players like Jimmy R or Joscho, shredders whose focus is on technique, speed and flash. Others are drawn in by players like Django, and those modern players who have some of the poetry and romance that so defined Django's playing and composing. Some others split the difference. Many forms of folk music have fragmented in this way, and as gypsy jazz has been transitioning from jazz music into folk music, and if history provides us any guidance, I suppose that we have another 20 or 30 years of this kind of squabbling to look forward to. Onward through the fog!

voutoreenie · April 2023

Django most certainly busked but his talent was so prodigious he was hired pretty quickly in his teens to gig, albeit on the banjo guitar playing Musette (iirc).