I like that Diz quote. Good advice. I was doing a session once long ago, playing my stuff, and the producer came on the phones and said "You're playing some great ****....... now could you please cut about half that **** out!" That stuck in my mind. Self editing....
Richard.... I've spent a bunch of time playing mostly jazz...coming up on 40 years now. Yikes. In that time, I've looked at a LOT of real books, fake books, done a boatload of transcribing, wrote originals, and blew through a lot of my folk's $$$ as a "music major". Looking back, two things advanced my playing as a jazz bassist the most.
-The first one was playing jazz at a really young age with my dad, who immersed me in live work as soon as he discerned that I was into it. There's no replacement for the hard knocks school. It just takes time, a lifetime in my case, and it leads to the second thing, which is;
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incessant listening to the Masters. And what a pleasurable way to absorb great information. It's really all I had as a very young kid, before I even picked up a bass as an adolescent. Dad's vinyl, thank god for that! As nice as it it is to have all the real books and media available for clarification, I think that the only way to play jazz is to learn it as an aural tradition. I'm not sure jazz can be taught without the student having some sense of the language, gleaned from listening to a whole bunch of live and/or recorded music. It's hard to teach someone to swing!
For me, that would involve a lot of stuff that isn't bass music..... Dexter Gordon, Billie Holiday, Max Roach, Miles, and so many more.... all have been an immeasurable influence on the way that I play the bass. I'm really thankful that, even though I play jazz bass just about every night, I'm still a student and a fan of greatness.
I hope your studies are going well, bro. Great thread.