From: Gerald.Malan@cs.cmu.edu
Newsgroups: rec.music.gdead
Subject: Re: The Grateful Dead and the Mixolydian Mode...
Date: 14 Aug 92 16:58:17 GMT
	<1992Aug13.221037.10907@sunspot.noao.edu>
Organization: Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA

In article <1992Aug13.221037.10907@sunspot.noao.edu> Todd Brown responds:

>>>In article <1992Aug13.200248.4240@murdoch.acc.Virginia.EDU>
>>>rwd4f@poe.acc.Virginia.EDU >(Rob Dobson) writes:
>>> brown@sunspot.noao.edu (Todd Brown) writes:
>>>Question, is this or is this not a recreational
>>>newsgroup(rec.music.gdead)? So we need this highly technical
>>>disscusion on how it is the Dead manage to Jam so well.
>>
>>Youre right, Todd, it would be much better to have more subject lines
like
>>"assholes" and "dickheads and valium" than actual discussion of the
music.
>>>
>>
>
>Guess I wasn't clear here, I'm not against discussions of music at
>all, just as I'm not against discussions of Art and Photography
>subjects I'm more schooled in, but even in those areas I find
>discussions of this sort nonessential to the essense of the
>subject. Guess you could say I'm somewhat of an anti-technician,
>or anti-establishment sort of person.
>
>During the rise of impressionism and cubism, the traditional schools
>of "Offical" art looked upon such artists as Matise, Van Gough,
>Picasso, and many other who comprise most of the great modern artists
>as uneducated, and not artists.
>
>Possibly it was there lack of training in the nontraditional asspects
>of art that eventualy created something though, and emotionally
>provocitive.
>
>By this I find it hard to belive as Jerry and the Dead are playing
>they are thinking of modal jams, and all the various scales possible,
>I hope they have more of an intutional feel for where they are and
>where they go, possibly it is more emotion that dictates the actual 
>music, which is why it is so well recieved by many types of people.

I think you are rebelling a little too much.  Maybe you don't think
about this when you're dancin' up on the lawn, but I think the dead
are, in fact, thinking and concentrating very hard on what they're 
doing with their instruments.

A couple of years ago I took about four music lessons and learned
about the different modes.  It's not hard at all. Especially when it's
explained on the fretboard of your guitar.  To this day (even this
morning I was playing along with Birdsong) I think of the different
modes and where I am on the fretboard when I play.  It's intuitive
and very fluid.  Just because it deals with sounds, it has to be
described in words and letters in a "technical" way.

If I can pick this up in a month, I can't even imagine what the
dead know about music after 25 years of playing.  You can't
tell me Bobby doesn't know exactly what he's doing with the
fretboard.

From an interview with Branford he said:

"Those guys can play *music*," says Marsalis.  "They're mych better than
most 
people give them credit for.  They have big ears and real chops, and
they've 
got 18,000 tie-dyes dancing along.  I'd never seen anything like it. 
Most 
rock shows are just live versions of MTV, but not the Dead--they're into
jazz, 

they know Coltrane, they're American mucical icons."  Marsalis is
starting to 
bubble over.  "They're *fantastic*," he says at last.  "As a matter of
fact, I 

just bought their records.  I went out and copped 'em all."

I like hearing (and reading) people talk about music.  This group
needs a good discussion and this fits the bill.

Take care,
Rob
Newsgroups: rec.music.gdead