Understanding Ran Blake

an inside look at a legendary, yet enigmatic musician

Last weekend I was performing in Boston and had the chance to visit with one of the most legendary, yet mysterious musicians—Ran Blake. I feel fortunate to know him well and to understand his methodology for teaching and performing.

Ran Blake, now 87 years old, is a well-known pianist and educator based in Boston. His career began in the late 1950s with a legendary collaboration with the vocalist Jeanne Lee. He credits pianist John Lewis, Gunther Schuller, and Oscar Peterson as his primary teachers but he also studied with pianist Bill Evans, Mary Lou Williams, and others. Gunther Schuller, then-President of New England Conservatory, tapped Ran to be chair of the newly formed Third Stream Department at NEC in 1972 and he lead the department until 2005. Ran was awarded the Guggenheim Fellowship in 1982 and the MacArthur Genius Grant in 1988. Note: there is nothing that Ran loathes more than the word “genius.”

WHY HE’S IMPORTANT
In short: Ran turned jazz UPSIDE DOWN. Generally, in jazz, we improvise melodies over a given form and chord changes. Ran does the opposite—he prefers for the melody to mostly remain intact while he improvises underneath. He is a chord guru who is obsessed with harmony. It is not just jazz harmony, but it is also harmony influenced by classical music (he loves Prokofiev Scythian Suite) or gospel harmony (he loves Mildred Falls, who was the pianist with Mahalia Jackson). The added layer of harmony is his love of film noir movies. These vintage movies shape a narrative that he likes to use to structure his music—he strives to impose a logical order to his musical improvisations in the same fashion that a film director would oversee events to unfold on the screen. His favorite directors include Fritz Lang, Robert Siodmak, Jacques Tourneur, and others. The end result is a live concert of Ran Blake that is often somber, contemplative, dark, theatrical, and dramatic.

THIRD STREAM - UNDERSTOOD AND MISUNDERSTOOD
One thing that is frustrating is the misuse and misunderstanding of the term third stream. When Gunther Schuller coined the term in the 1950s, it was generally simply understood as a convergence of classical and jazz music. Today, third stream music is the mixing of genres and styles to create something fresh. For example, using instruments that are seldom heard together or using rhythmic grooves not generally heard with a specific instrumentation. Ran’s favorite third stream restaurant would be something like a Vietnamese/Italian fusion or something rarely tasted.

Ran Blake and Jared Sims with Sage (RIP)

HOW I KNOW HIM
I opted to attend New England Conservatory for my master’s degree because I knew at the time that I was seeking something different than a typical jazz program. I love jazz music but I was not sure if there was a place for me in jazz and I also was intrigued by Ran and NEC. I had other viable options for places to go to study for my master’s, but the alumni of the Third Stream program (then known as Contemporary Improvisation and now known as Contemporary Musical Arts) were musicians that I admired and I liked the idea of developing a personal sound. Ran was my first point of contact at New England Conservatory and I appreciated that he was a mentor figure that was invested in his students. I studied privately with him for three semesters but I might have learned just as much working as his personal assistant. Outside of lessons, I would do mundane things like buy him groceries, but I would also jockey books to and from the library for him, so I would know what he was reading and studying. I was his teaching assistant for the Film Noir course and the Ear Training course as well.

After I finished school, I toured and freelanced as a musician for two years before working as an assistant in the office at NEC for Ran. At that time, I assisted with his Ornette Coleman summer course. This was a deep dive into the music of Ornette, and it included many hours of listening to Ornette’s music with Ran, creating a master playlist of the music of Ornette, and compiling a book of hundreds of pages of news clippings and articles about Ornette. The intensity of listening and study was absolutely astounding and given that Ran studied Sarah Vaughan, George Russell, Abbey Lincoln, Stevie Wonder, Horace Silver, and other musicians with that same type of ferocity is a great indication of where Ran has further developed both his depth of musicality and his inspiration to perform.

One of the most unique things that I did for Ran was to book him at the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris. It was the first jazz ever heard at this venue, which is perhaps best known as the venue where a “riot” ensued as Stravinsky premiered his Rite of Spring.

THE FACADE
Most people know the caricature of Ran Blake—the man wearing a trench coat, a suit jacket in a style of the 1960s, unkempt hair, and a shaggy beard. Before the internet was full of emojis, Ran had his personal emoji, which is a black bag (a briefcase), that he liked to use in the same way that Prince abandoned his name for an insignia.

A lot of students notice his frustrations, which include students playing too many gigs instead of studying and building their own skills and students only attending college to network instead of learning. Ran was an avid concert goer into his late 60s and has been agitated by the number of well-known artists that never go out to support other musicians’ performances.

MISCONCEPTION
There is a very common misconception that Ran is not aware of what is happening in a given social situation. The opposite is true because he is actually often hyper-aware of facial expressions, tone of voice, and general behavior. One funny memory I have is Ran doing an impression of a student doing an impression of Ran. Hilarious!

REALITY
Ran is deeply emotional about people, events, and tragedies. His emotional health is adversely affected by tragedies and deaths that he views from afar (wars in other countries, genocides, etc.). Much of his music and his musical vision is greatly influenced by world events and the human feelings that are attached.

He is very loyal to people who have shown loyalty to his artistry and teaching. This could be a concert promoter in Spain or former student teaching 5th graders.

Ran struggles with organization perhaps because he is so hyper-focused on the details of what he is doing. He is a BIG thinker and that leaves no time for mundane tasks.

WHAT I HAVE LEARNED FROM RAN BLAKE

• How to Listen to Music
  The third stream method of listening can have a profound effect on a musician’s ears and artistry. In short, a minimum of 20 minutes a day is spent actively listening. Just knowing the difference between active and passive listening is important for a musician, but the depth of listening required for the study of third stream music is mind-numbing. Being a jazz players and just learning from lead sheets might be quicker, but playing by ear is a much deeper and rewarding experience.
  

• Contemplating Virtuosity
  My doctoral study was an exploration of the Italian composer Luciano Berio’s Sequenza pieces and I think that Berio’s views about virtuosity are one of the most intriguing aspects of his philosophy. Berio composed some passages in his Sequenza VII that are a display of virtuosity that are meaningful to the performer but are otherwise meaningless to the listener. The end result is the virtuosity on display in Berio’s Sequenza VII is rendered meaningless! Ran Blake challenges the notions of traditional virtuosity as a jazz pianist because instead of displaying a blistering fast right-hand finger technique, he opts to instead create a musical soundscape that is generally void of any bebop types of rapid motion. I let my students know that virtuosity in jazz is far beyond just being able to play our instruments or to be able to play fast—the virtuosity also includes knowing repertoire, chord voicings, how to construct bass lines, arranging, chord substitutions, and the ability to hear other instruments well during a performance.
  

• Harmonic Explorations
  When I studied privately with Ran, we worked on hearing and composing with triad progressions. Much of traditional jazz is rooted in the iii-VI-ii-V progression or blues progressions. Ran opened my ears and mind to the possibilities of using distant triad motion. For instance, a F major moving to a Db major is a very drastic motion and change in color.
  

• How to Balance Teaching and Administration
  Working in the office for Ran prepared me for my current job as director of a jazz program. I heard the phone calls and saw the emails that came to him from prospective students, current students, faculty, and administrators and I witnessed how he navigated everything on a day-to-day basis. I learned how to run auditions and juries, some of the basics about budgets, publicity, and the production of concerts. One question I asked Ran for years has been how to find time for artistry with all of the teaching and administrating duties. He never gave me a clear answer, but I know that is not an easy balance.

There are many people who have been in Ran Blake’s life and there are very likely perspectives that are different than my own. I humbly ask that friends are welcome to share their own thoughts as well. I feel fortunate to have been able to learn from a towering figure in music and education and am greatly indebted to Ran Blake for his music and his teaching.

Here are a few selected Ran Blake albums that everyone should hear: