Wash Away The Dust (2012)

Genre: Jazz—Hard Bop

Over the course of several decades, I’ve had the good fortune to be instructed by some of the best local jazz musicians and educators on the Front Range of Colorado. I was a regular at the Saturday morning jazz education classes at Dazzle Restaurant in Denver sponsored by the non-profit Gift of Jazz. Every semester our lessons focused on a new sub-genre in jazz and in the Spring of 2012 the topic was “hard bop.” Our instructor again was saxophonist Josh Quinlan.

This time I was one of eight aspiring composers. As usual, the format was eight weeks of Saturday morning classes with individualized feedback on compositions we were working on, culminating in an evening concert at Dazzle, during which our original works were performed by outstanding local jazz artists.

I completed one arrangement and one original composition in the hard bop vein for the class. The first was a a calypso jazz arrangement of Johann Sebastian Bach’s “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring” in the style of Sonny Rollin’s classic “St. Thomas.” I called the arrangement “Joy Bop” (subtitled “Sonny Meets Johnny.”)

My original tune (featured here) was inspired by Art Blakey’s oft-quoted words of wisdom about jazz:

“Music is supposed to wash away the dust of everyday life…That’s what jazz is about.”

The A section states a very typical hard bop figure tossed between trumpet and tenor sax, followed abruptly by a relaxed B section, interspersed with an angular theme in waltz time that also functions as an intro and outro.   

My composition “Wash Away the Dust” was performed at Dazzle in Denver on Tuesday, June 19, 2012 by the Josh Quinlan Quintet featuring Josh Quinlan (tenor sax), Shane Jonas (trumpet), Ben Markley (piano), Patrick McDevitt (bass), Alejandro Castaño (drums).

For this home studio version, I’ve expanded on the juxtaposition of abrupt mood and time changes, adding additional percussion, a closer interplay between the horns, and a restatement of the main theme in 3/4 time at the end.