So we are on to the
new Sound Science Music
Discussion Thread format.
First, here is the music, with a transcription to follow along. It's Pat Martino's version of
Both Sides Now:
This is a song I'm sure all of you have heard, Joni Mitchell's Both Sides Now, as made famous by Judy Collins during the time of the composition. The tune is as remarkable for its lyrics as it is for its music, but the tune is beautiful in and of itself, so I will leave it to you to ponder the lyrics. I'll post the lyrics at the end of this. Joni Mitchell has two versions of this song--the original on the album
Clouds, I think (I don't really have time to go around fact-checking myself), with just her and an acoustic guitar, in her youth. And then there is a version of hers after many years had passed, on the album "Both Sides Now," and her voice was greatly altered over the years by age and smoking cigarettes, and it takes on quite a different tone. The two Joni Mitchell versions are really worth checking out, both are works of art to me. The newer Joni Mitchell version gives me goose bumps. It has strings and beautiful jazz sax and bass/synth and the singing is much more expressive, despite the change in voice, and has the wisdom of years in it.
The Judy Collins version is much more pop puffery but it's still nice. While I'm on things that are just sort of okay, I really dislike tab notation (see the stuff included below the treble clef notations). I have had people try to teach my kids stuff by tab notation, and I'm like no, write out the notes. I want them to learn to read music. There was a guy at my college who was great at bass and he got into the jazz band on the condition that he learn to read music pronto, and he did not, and so he was asked to leave, even though his talent and skill levels were really great.
Another thing about this piece to note is that what Pat Martino did here is not
that hard to play for a good amateur guitarist. Playing it
well is another story
. There are versions on YouTube where people are playing it like, hey! I can play this the same way Pat Martino did! And my gut reaction is, go back and work on it some more! But Pat Martino's version here is original and beautiful by any standard, relatively easy to play or not. And his classic signature dark tone was part of his creative process, I'm sure. I've sat down and figured out my versions of songs I like from scratch (long lost in the mists of time I'm afraid) and then you're like, wow, I did that! The creative process for something like this isn't really about the musical technicalities, at least for me. It's about what do I want this to sound like.
My idols as guitarists were Pat Martino, Kenny Burrell, and Wes Montgomery, in no particular order, so here is one of them. One of Pat Martino's great influences was Wes Montgomery, but Pat Martino developed plenty of his own original techniques and sounds. Kenny Burrell was a peer of Wes Montgomery with a very beautiful tone and great chops. Duke Ellington said that Kenny Burrell was his favorite guitarist. So I will leave it to you guys to check out Kenny Burrell and Wes Montgomery at your leisure.
Pat Martino dropped out of music for a while and I had wondered where he'd gone. It turned out he had a brain aneurysm, lost a ton of his memory, and learned to play guitar again from listening to his own older recordings. This recording is pre-CVA performance. I think he sounds a little different now, as you might expect from someone who built back up from the ground up. But he is definitely back to being a world-class jazz guitarist. So if you think raw innate talent has nothing to do with this stuff think again. He has a post cerebrovascular event version of Both Sides Now as a duet with Cassandra Wilson which you can check out. To me his pre-CVA work was more sad. Now that's totally subjective. I wouldn't know how to describe why.
So with all of that background out of the way, I will turn to the transcription that is part of the YouTube video. As always, the transcription leaves out or cannot depict some of the subtleties of the performance. I would bet the house that Pat Martino made this arrangement up by ear in a period of deep inspiration and other people figured out how to write it down, because to me that is how the creative process for something like this goes on a guitar, at least as I relate to it.
So I won't go through the transcription page by page. The notes as written are orderly enough that I think maybe even someone who couldn't read music could follow along. You can get to hear what some jazz tones sound like. On page one you can hear what an A Major chord with a G in the bass sounds like (the pedal point G is not in the transcription but it's recognized in the notation "A/G"). That's the flatted 7th of the major chord in the bass. Dissonance but very pretty. He plays the A root in the bass in the first two measures and then descends the bass down to a G in the next measure to beautiful effect, as I remember hearing it. And then you have an F6 next, so you have the bass descending down one more whole step, which is a very soothing sound. You can get a couple measures of what a major 6th chord sounds like on the second page and then for several measures later in the piece, hanging on an F6 I think (I closed the transcription and am cleaning up my writing). In the last measure of page 3 you can get a quick glimpse of what a minor 7th chord sounds like and a A suspended 4th (A-C#-E-D) chord sounds like. On the fourth page at the beginning you can her another minor 7th chord (a minor chord with the seventh note of natural minor scale thrown in--a very basic chord in jazz and used in pop and R&B and jazz fusion a lot too) and then a more complex chord, an A7flat-9, the tones of the chord being A-C#-E-G-G#. So here you have three consecutive notes a half step apart (G-G#-A) (but spaced out). Lots of dissonance but very beautiful in the right setting, and great for the chance to modulate keys.
With all of that said, I think what you have is an extremely beautiful tune written by Joni Mitchell and an extremely beautiful arrangement by Pat Martino, and I doubt either was thinking too much about the musical technicalities of what they were doing while they were in the creative process, if at all.
And so ends my first post in the
new style of the Sound Science Music Discussion Thread!
Corrections, clarifications, elaborations, disagreements, etc., are always welcome!
Both Sides Now
Joni Mitchell
Rows and flows of angel hair
And ice cream castles in the air
And feather canyons everywhere
I've looked at clouds that way
But now they only block the sun
They rain and snow on everyone
So many things I would have done
But clouds got in my way
I've looked at clouds from both sides now
From up and down and still somehow
It's cloud's illusions I recall
I really don't know clouds at all
Moons and Junes and ferries wheels
The dizzy dancing way you feel
As every fairy tale comes real
I've looked at love that way
But now it's just another show
You leave 'em laughing when you go
And if you care, don't let them know
Don't give yourself away
I've looked at love from both sides now
From give and take and still somehow
It's love's illusions I recall
I really don't know love at all
Tears and fears and feeling proud,
To say "I love you" right out loud
Dreams and schemes and circus crowds
I've looked at life that way
But now old friends they're acting strange
They shake their heads, they say I've changed
Well something's lost, but something's gained
In living every day.
I've looked at life from both sides now
From win and lose and still somehow
It's life's illusions I recall
I really don't know life at all
I've looked at life from both sides now
From up and down, and still somehow
It's life's illusions I recall
I really don't know life at all