Bebop vs. Hard bop?

[rhillhows]

Hi all,

I may be showing my ignorance here, but I'm curious about this and I won't get the answer unless I ask the question. So here goes: What's the difference between hard bop and bebop. I know hard bop came after bebop, but what musical clues do I listen for when trying to categorize a tune? I really enjoy listening to jazz and particularly enjoy listening to Blue Mitchell, Clifford, Dizzy, Kenny Dorham, and James Moody to name a few. I want to learn more about the sorta "sub-categories" of jazz.

Thanks for all the information. I really appreciate it.

Shed Hard!

-Robert

[etownfwd]

Ok,
musically Hard Bop is more melodic. Bebop is more of a performers art-form, while Hard Bop is more of a listeners art-form. By performers artform I mean to say that players like Diz, Bird, and Monk would play through a tune without playing the "head" first. They approached the music thinking that the listener had already digested the standards of the day and would recognize them by their chord structure. Hard Bop is based more around the melody in that you usually hear the melody atleast one time, then the performer(s) will start in on a (usually) technically challenging solo. Yes, Hard Bop post-dates Bebop, but without Bebop Hardbop would not really exist. The best example of this is probably listening to Charlie Parker's Embraceable You, then listening to a recording onf Wynton playing the same tune. You will hear the difference immdediately. Also, keep in mind that Wynton is a disciple of Art Blakey, who pioneered the Hard Bop genre.
That's my best explaination..
-efwd

[etownfwd]

Also..
try listening to Clifford playin Stardust on Clifford Brown w. Strings and then listen to Diz doing the same tune.. The difference is usually tremendous.
-efwd

[Larry Smithee]

I'll try this by mentioning that there had began a movement sometime during the 1950s on the East Coast to restore the old vitality to jazz music that had been lost as a result of the commercialization of cool jazz. This movement was, in part, a reaction to the cool jazz established on the West Coast. The main proponents of the hard bop movement included Horace Silver and Art Blakey. Silver, in particular successfully fused blues and contemporary Black gospel music into bop music resulting in a music that is highly volatile and emotional. Some describe these influences or qualities as "funk". By the way, it was not long before the style underwent simplification and commercialization and would later be known as "soul jazz". Some of the devices noticable in Silver's style include little interludes, similar to short introductions for each soloist to relieve the monotony of a form that had become basically, head-solos-head. For the horns Silver often wrote riff patterns and rhythms patterns as accompaniment material, similar to sax and brass sections of big bands of an earlier time. The main players of the hard bop school can be heard through the music of Silver, Blakey, Bobby Timmons, Les McCann, and Cannonball Adderley. Seek out these players and you will discover the best of the hard bop school.
Larry Smithee

[jazz_trpt]

Larry hit the nail on the head.

Hard bop has a blues/gospel component. Listen to anything with Horace Silver or Bobby Timmons and you're in the ballpark. Most of the early Blue Note catalog is hard bop stuff.

I'd put Lee Morgan, Blue Mitchell, Donald Byrd, Bill Hardman in that category.

I'd hesitate to call Clifford Brown a hard bop trumpet player. He certainly played some of that stuff (e.g., the Blakey "Live at Birdland" recordings), but I think of him more as a protean post-bop player. Certainly the bulk of his recorded material is not hard-bop stuff (more west coast, IMO).

Some people think of Freddie or even Woody Shaw as hard bop players, but I think this is guilt by association. Again, it's not like their association with Blue Note hard bop in the early 60s reflects the kind of music they ended up recording once they got their own recording contracts as leaders. Kenny Dorham is another one who played hard bop, but also played alot of bebop (w/Bird) and post-bop (w/Joe Henderson).

Of course, my objection probably infers an approach that you can pigeonhole a player into a particular style. It's probably more like a venn diagram -- recordings representing styles, where a player's participation and approach overlap into different genres...

I can't figure out how to respond to the suggestion that Clifford's ballad playing is somehow an example of hard bop playing. That somehow seems like it overreaches the stylistic components of hard bop. (That is, I've never heard someone make a case for there being a ballad style of hard bop.)
_________________
Jeff Helgesen
Free jazz solo transcriptions!

[AverageJoe]

Where would Trane fit into the scheme? I am interested in hearing your opinions...

I have always thought of the mid-section (late 50's - early 60's) of Trane's vast musical career as being, in part, one of the evolutionary steps from bebop to hard bop.... to me, Giant Steps (the album as a whole) is a departure from the traditional bebop idea of creating a new head based on existing chord changes... in many ways, he is kind of a "Beethoven" type of figure, with his feet planted in the past while stretching towards the future. I am not trying to pigeon-hole Trane...it is impossible to do that when you look at the diaspora of music he created over his career. Do you guys think there is some validity to my assertion here?

Let's work on a definition of bebop and hard bop. I realize that the very nature of this discussion is inviting flames like nobody has seen to date on this forum. If you consider that the whole of jazz is highly individualistic in nature, there will certainly be passionate opinions and disagreement on many issues. I will admit to being a novice when it comes to jazz knowledge. I am interested in sitting back and reading/learning from all of you folks who have lived it passionately for a long time.

Sorry about the can of worms, guys...it just slipped out of my hands...er, mouth...er, keyboard!

Thanks in advance for your input!

Paul Poovey

[dales]

Larry and Jeff explain it well. I'll just add that hard bop evolved from bebop independently of John Coltrane -- it'd already happened by the time Coltrane joined Miles Davis in 1955, and the _Workin'_, _Steamin'_, _Cookin'_ and _Relaxin'_ albums they made epitomize the hard bop style.

Basically, the great original hard bop records were mostly made in its heyday in about 1954-58, and they include the Davis titles; Horace Silver's _Horace Silver and the Jazz Messengers_; Art Blakey's _At the Cafe Bohemia_ and _A Night at Birdland_; and the Clifford Brown/Max Roach Quintet records. The entirety of Coltrane's records for Prestige in the 1950s were hard bop, and his Blue Note album _Blue Trane_ was one of the last great hard bop albums from this original period. After that, Coltrane started playing more harmonically complex music. On _Giant Steps_ and the great live records from his last Miles Davis tour in 1960, he tries to jam it all in on top of hard bop rhythm sections. After that he went modal and it wasn't really hard bop anymore. Silver and Blakey more or less continued developing hard bop for the rest of their careers; Brown died; Davis, Roach and Coltrane moved on.

Many Blue Note records of the 1960s could be called hard bop, but were colored by free jazz and modal jazz, too.

[Larry Smithee]

Dales is correct regarding Trane. Shortly after the recording of Giant Steps in 1957 (I think) he would quickly move on toward a style that he is best remembered for and sometimes characterized as his "sheets" of sound conception. For this style he needed material with very few chords and within this framework he often attached a mass of dense melodic ideas that were nearly devoid of traditional phrasing. This too was a time when he become intensely interested in Eastern music philosophy. This is the style that represents his bread and butter musical heritage and what he is best remembered for, aside from his association with Miles. I would recommend listening to his recording of "Alabama" and "A Love Supreme" for really outstanding examples of Trane's mature style.
Larry Smithee

[jazz_trpt]

Scott Yanow of Allmusic.com offers the following on bop:

[rank_amateur]

Jeff, thanks for posting that enlightening and informative synopsis. I've never seen it all explained so clearly before.
_________________
Brent Edwards

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[bluenote]

I would add that how one approach's a 'hard bop' tune is quite different than a straight bebop tune. If you want a GREAT example of the hard bop genre, get the newest Abersold "Lee Morgan." Much of the tunes are based on either a vamp or 4-8 bars of a dominant chord. The bridge is often a sequence of ii-v progressions or 4-8 bars of a augmented chord (they really seemed to like that). Another master of 'hard bop' writing is Hank Mobley. A regular be-bop tune (Confirmation comes to mind) is mostly based bar ii-v's that fit into a harmonic scheme.

Someone earlier stated that "hard bop was more of a listeners art form while bebop was more of a performers art form", and I would very respectfully disagree with that. I actually find the hard bop style not only more interesting, but more challenging to play. You have know how to play over extended one bar chords, run chord changes, play altered chords (such as playing over eight bars of an augmented chord), and progressions that don't always fit into a harmonic scheme. Plus, the tunes are often in different time signatures. 'Valse Hot' is the only bop tune I can think of in 3/4.

[ This Message was edited by: bluenote on 2003-07-07 16:54 ]

[AverageJoe]

Thanks to all -- I have enjoyed reading and learning from you! Looks like I have some recordings to go buy!

Paul Poovey

[jazz_trpt]