Transcribing tunes - what does it mean?

[skeith]

I was listening to one of my favorite Joe Henderson cds "The State of the Tenor" vol 2 and was reading Michael Cuscuna's liner notes in which he says "...Don Sickler began transcribing the tunes and adapting them to this spartan instrumentation."

I find this statement curious.

For the record, the tunes on this cd (Vol.2) are either Joe's own ("Y Yo La Quiero" "The Bead Game") or else classics by Monk (Boo Boo's Birthday) Bird (Cheryl) Horace Silver ("Soulville") Mingus ("Portrait") Kern ("All the Things you are")

Wouldn't Henderson and Ron Carter have likely to have been very familiar with these tunes? And the versions here of the "heads" don't sound different from countless other versions of these tunes.

I had just assumed the guys knew the tunes already, played the head at the beginning and end, and in the middle do their improvisations.

So I am not trying to knock Don Sickler here, but I really am curious as to what his "transcribing" was supposedly doing?

PS. I should point out that I do understand what is meant by transcribing tunes off of records - that you are listening and then writing down the notes, but again I would be surprised if these guys needed this to be done for these tunes.

Edited December 19, 2007 by skeith

[Free For All]

I would guess the purpose of the "arrangements" was to basically provide a "roadmap" so all the musicians would know how the tunes were to begin and end (minimizing discussion between tunes), and also to provide a common set of chord changes (sometimes players know different changes for common tunes).

More of an organizational "producer" thing on Sickler's part than a re-interpretation of the material.

Edited December 19, 2007 by Free For All

[skeith]

Probably a good guess - thanks FFA.

[Patrick]

I recently ordered the doubletime version of this from Amazon as a gift to myself ($13). Placed on the 15th, hasn't yet shipped, advertised to arrive by the 24th. We shall see if it materializes on time...

[AllenLowe]

well, a lot of times you know a tune but you don't exactly know it - chord changes, transitions, the bridge - or different musicians might play it differently - so this would probably be a way of assuring that everybody on the session is on the same page -