Jazz for aficionados

****Miles went to Juilliard*** His first mistake. I knew there was something wrong there.****

Hmmmm, so did Wynton.

Acman, that CS Lewis quote is fantastic! Do you happen to know where that is from exactly?

Rok, Frogman as usual answered your questions very well. The only thing I would add about differences between different orchestras is that obviously budget size/season length comes into it, which of course has a tremendous effect on the quality of musician that would audition when there are openings. The Berlin Philharmonic and the Austin Symphony are in no way comparable in this sense, they are very different animals indeed. The Berlin Philharmonic is a very well paying full time job (and in this case by full time I mean a 52 week orchestra). The Austin Symphony is a part time orchestra - many of the players in it are the professors at UT Austin and their students. I would have to look up how many weeks the season is, but I doubt they play more than 8 or 10 concert sets in a season - what we call a "gig" orchestra. Perhaps they are one step up from that, but no one is making their living solely as a member of the Austin Symphony. They would be supplementing it with another job. This type of orchestra does not attract anywhere near the best musicians, in fact there wouldn't be very many people show up from outside the central Texas area for one of their auditions - it simply doesn't pay enough for anyone to justify moving to Austin to be in it. Central Texas, by the way, does not even have much of a free-lance classical music scene - this is the main reason why the Austin Symphony relies so much on the University of Texas.

Learsfool:

HOOK'EM HORNS!!

Cheers

****Hmmmm, so did Wynton.*****

Wynton also plays Classical music. He probably went to Juilliard to keep up on his nut&bolts. Or he could have been getting his "ticket punched" for the gig at Lincoln Center. Since NYC is completely under the control of N&Bism.

Cheers

Rok, I have read through this whole last week's posts on this thread and I still have no idea a) just exactly what you think you mean by "nuts and bolts" and b) why you apparently set no value on it. Frogman made a valiant attempt to explain, and I'm not sure I can add to his.

The thing that puzzles me the most is when you say you don't buy it that artists have great appreciation for others in their field who do things very differently from them. Frankly, your position and arguments make no sense. Why wouldn't Renee Fleming appreciate Ella Fitzgerald? Why wouldn't Wynton appreciate Miles? Why wouldn't Picasso appreciate Matisse? Why wouldn't Shakespeare appreciate Joyce? Or the other way around in any of these examples?? Great artists will always respect the craft of others (is this term more acceptable to you?), even if they dislike what is being created with that craft. You can substitute the violin examples earlier instead, but as a brass player it is more natural for me to bring up the trumpet ones - absolutely no one, even the people who hate him, would ever say that Wynton could not play, or disrespect his craft. He has this in spades, more than any other jazz trumpeter ever, and all the others greatly appreciate it, even if they don't care for the music he makes with it. Everyone who is any good at all has worked very hard at their craft, and appreciates others who have done the same. Same thing in the world of athletics. When two of the best are battling it out, whether it be individual or team sports, the opponents have to have the utmost respect for each other's game, even if they are very different styles, and they don't like each other's style, or don't like them personally, or whatever.