Roots to Branches: Broadway, Jazz, and David Bowie?

In 10th grade, I had a classmate in my French class named Morvan, whom I didn't know at all (in fact, I doubt I ever ever talked to her). She was quiet and introverted but also somewhat defiant and aloof. She always dressed in what was quite outlandish fashion at the time. She was somewhere in between glam and punk, the latter of which was still largely undefined in 1975. One thing stood out to me—she often wore David Bowie t-shirts. I can picture her sitting in the row by the window wearing one of the t-shirts from her seemingly limitless supply of wild and provocative Bowie t-shirts. I wasn't aware of Bowie's music beyond a handful of hit tunes that were in rotation on the FM rock stations in Detroit at that time, but Morvan's singular devotion to the man made me more curious about his music.

On Morvan's non-verbal suggestion, I started listening to Bowie's music and quickly became a fan. I have kept up with his career ever since. Since his death in 2016, so many articles have appeared, all lauding his genius, vision, and consistently remarkable and varied creative output since the 1960s (all of which I agree with wholeheartedly). What is it about the man, his music, his career, that made him so unique?

He was undoubtedly a pop star with a string of major hits throughout the decades, but he was much more than that. He was able to do something quite remarkable and very rare in the world of popular music—he transformed musical forms from a variety of different genres and blended them in a wholly authentic and convincing manner to serve his artistic vision and, in doing so, created a body of work that is overwhelmingly unique and instantly identifiable.

The standard line about Bowie is, at this stage, somewhat of a trope—"Bowie reinvented himself"—a cliche that is used far too often in pop music criticism. ("Reinvention" is not a value in and of itself—many have tried it and most have failed because the resultant artistic product was not very good.) After listening to Bowie's music over many decades, I didn't hear "reinvention" at all. I hear what I hear in most of the great musicians in any genre—a singular artistic vision sustained and nurtured over decades of creative activity by exploring different conceptual frameworks. This is most apparent in the first 15 years of his career, which is, incidentally, when most of the "personas" are found as well. He found inspiration for those conceptual frameworks in literature, particularly writers in the science fiction/futurist realm like Philip K. Dick, Robert Heinlein, George Orwell and Edgar Rice Burroughs and, of course, the infamous Beat Generation writer, William S. Burroughs. Bowie was so successful in his musical adaptations that he was inducted into the Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame¹ in 2013, the only musician to receive this honor.

As the renowned musicologist and philosopher Roger Scruton points out, music needs philosophy, ² and, unfortunately, most popular music just doesn't have a philosophical framework, which explains, in part, what makes so much of it forgettable and disposable. Without that element, the lyrical content tends to be autobiographical, focussing on personal events and experiences. That works well for a short time, but the stories culled from a single life are soon limited, and new topics, broader topics, are needed to sustain a career as an artist. Most pop musicians cannot make that leap from the concrete to the conceptual. Bowie, on the other hand, succeeded marvelously in making that leap. Almost from the very beginning of his career, his music has a conceptual and, yes, often a philosophical framework, which stands in stark contrast to most of his peers from any of the eras in which he was active.

I do, however, understand how Bowie earned his reputation as a "changeling." Simply put, he was spectacularly gifted at breathing life into his inspirations and offering himself as the living canvas for his art. In fact, he was so convincing, at the beginning at least, that one wondered if there really was any separation between Bowie and his host of personalities. This has been an endless source of fascination for the media, with Bowie's various "looks" being chronicled repeatedly in major entertainment publications,³ including a vertigo inspiring gif⁴ that was similar to one featured in Time magazine at the time of his death as well as on Germany's "Tagesschau" news network, who called Bowie a pop music "chameleon."⁵ Bowie's years in Berlin in the late 1970s made him an icon and adopted son for many Germans, not only for his music but also for his outspoken opposition to the Berlin Wall in his anthemic hit from that era, "Heroes."


Bowie's many identities and style periods are also a source of some consternation for many, including one critic, Chris Barton (LA Times), who claims that Bowie is "impossible to capture"⁶ from a stylistic perspective. I disagree. Speaking from a musical perspective, Bowie's music certainly evolved and changed throughout the almost half-century in which he was active. Still, to me, as I listened to his music en masse as I did during the weeks after his death, it seemed, on a structural level, remarkably unified. In particular, one hears the tremendous influences from his youth—Bowie was born in 1947, which means he grew up in an era in which blues and gospel music gave birth to early rock and roll. It was also the golden age of jazz, jazz vocalists and of Broadway musicals and show tunes. Bowie⁷ used and fused these styles into a body of work that reflected his voice and his vision, that was rooted in the music from his youth, but was at the same time never (for the most part) derivative or imitative—it was Bowie from start to finish.

The source of rock and roll and pop music is American rhythm and blues, which is found in Bowie's music throughout his entire career. As opposed to a lot of rock, however, Bowie's music retains vestiges of the sounds he must have heard in his adolescent years when his tastes were forming—these appear consistently as a fundamental part of his sound. For example, it is hard to find an album that doesn't feature brass and winds as might be found in a big band, as in "Blue Jean," from Tonight (EMI, 1984).


Others, like "Diamond Dogs," from Diamond Dogs (RCA, 1974), feature the brass and winds chugging along in the accompaniment with blues riffs that would be quite at home in Basie's Kansas City bands.


There are other times when the sounds of late '50s doo-wop appear, although in some instances it does seem to be used ironically, as in "The Prettiest Star," from Aladdin Sane (RCA, 1973)


Or how about the how about the silly reference to Danny and the Junior's sock hop hit "At the Hop" as the introduction to "Let's Dance"?




Also notable is the presence of jazz elements in his work. The saxophone as a solo instrument is featured prominently, played by Bowie in the early years and occasionally in later years, but it is hard to qualify it as "jazzy" given Bowie's limited skills on the instrument. He did, however, often turn to professional saxophonists, like saxophonist David Sanborn whose flanged alto saxophone helps to define Bowie's Young Americans (RCA, 1975) recording, to provide jazz-inflected improvisation to his music. While solo saxophone in rock or pop is not uncommon, what stands out in Bowie's music is how often he features saxophone, piano, and even trumpet that utilize the more dissonant and difficult sounds of avant-garde jazz from the '60s and '70s. For example, listen to the piano solo by long-term Bowie sideman and classically trained jazz pianist Mike Garson on the title track to Aladdin Sane (RCA, 1973), which could easily be mistaken for a solo by avant-garde jazz pianist Jaki Byard. However, the humorous quotation of The Champs' "Tequila," which would become PeeWee Herman's theme song 13 years later, is probably not something Byard would have done!


There is a great deal of saxophone playing that is similar in displaying an avant-garde temperament—and this is not limited to more obscure tunes. For example, listen to the avant-garde trumpet and saxophones in his '80s comeback hit "Let's Dance" (video above), which coexist happily with the Texas blues guitar of Stevie Ray Vaughn. Another example is his collaboration with the famous avant-garde jazz trumpeter of the same last name, Lester Bowie. Bowie (Lester) is featured prominently on Black Tie White Noise (Arista, 1993), improvising freely over funky electronic soul grooves, while the other Bowie plays some wonderfully tortured and slightly out-of-tune improvisations on saxophone.


The jazz influence is not limited, however, to rock and avant-garde solos—it goes much deeper than that, using jazz chords with colorful extended harmonies and even the occasional jazz chord patterns quietly inserted into the pop music texture. Consider, for example, his hit "Changes" from Hunky Dory (RCA, 1971), which starts with a surprisingly chromatic chord progression (i.e., "changes" in jazz parlance) that are quite jazzy. This is followed seconds later by the tune's instantly recognizable driving blues riff as the rhythm section appears briefly. Then, the verse begins, and the rhythm section disappears, returning to the strings and piano with voice. A few measures in, we find a series of jazz chord changes that every jazz musician knows and uses when playing standard jazz tunes from the Broadway songbook. (They occur when Bowie sings: "And these children that you spit on"—Cmaj7, Dmin7, Emin7, E??min7, Dmin7.)


This stock chord progression is found almost verbatim in the title song from the 1965 musical "On a Clear Day You Can See Forever" by Alan Jay Lerner. It is also commonly used, for example, in the first two measures of Duke Ellington's "Take The 'A' Train." In any case, these are rudimentary jazz chords that are generally not found often in pop music. (As an aside, note how the form of this song, with the abrupt changes of texture, match the title—in particular, notice that when Bowie sings, Time may change me, the time signature immediately changes from 4/4 to 3/4, which is just one instance of clever text painting in his music!)

Or consider the songs "Bring Me The Disco King" from Reality (Columbia, 2003) and "Dead Man Walking" from Earthling (Arista, 1997), both of which feature jazz elements, and, in the case of the latter tune, some overt jazz improvisation by Mike Garson, while Bowie croons overtop.




There are many similar examples to be found in his body of work, but perhaps the one that makes me smile the most is on Diamond Dogs (RCA, 1974), his dark and dystopian rumination on George Orwell's "1984" (which is, I think my personal favorite Bowie recording). The opening track, "Future Legend," features Bowie theatrically reciting the Burroughs' inspired text, And in the death, as the last few corpses lay rotting in the slimy thoroughfare..., which sets the grim tone for the album's dystopian thematic material. The music under the text begins ominously, but when Bowie arrives at the text, No more big wheels, fleas the size of rats sucked on rats the size of cats..., the music underneath changes to the jazz standard, "Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered," from the Rodgers and Hart musical "Pal Joey" from 1940, seven years before Bowie was born. The juxtaposition of this lovely jazz ballad with the bleak imagery is dark and disturbing. This is another instance of clever text painting from Bowie—he masterfully conjures up a musical reminder of what life was like in the idyllic (but perhaps illusory?) world before the apocalyptic collapse that echoes eerily through the now barren streets and concrete canyons of "Hunger City."

There is also quite a bit of minimalist and ambient influence, most prominent in his work with Roxy Music alumni Brian Eno and the founder of the enormously influential progressive rock band, Robert Fripp in the late '70s. What's surprising is that some of this music also has a jazz flavor, albeit in a more European vein, in its harmonic structure. Consider the song "Some Are" from Low (RCA, 1977), which was recorded during his Berlin period (1977-1979). The song could easily be mistaken as a European-style jazz ballad in the tradition of Kenny Wheeler, Bobo Stenson, or Tomasz Stańko.


His giant footprint in pop music and pop culture often overshadows the fact that he was an incredibly gifted singer who came of age in the era of the great song stylists of the jazz era and brought that approach, with his rich baritone voice and his powerful command of that remarkable instrument, into his music in a seamless manner. This makes it difficult to describe his style—alongside his R&B-based tunes, there exists a wide variety of other styles in his work. There are a few genres that Bowie touched on but appeared to abandon quickly—for example, listen to the reggae-inflected smooth jazz in "Don't Look Down," from Tonight (EMI, 1984), or the cheeky drama of the tango-flavored harmonies in "Lady Grinning Soul" from Alladin Sane (RCA, 1973).

What stands out, however, is the regular appearance of songs that show another side of Bowie's personality, a side whose roots lie in the broadway/jazz songbook. His Broadway songbook roots can be heard most overtly in his singing style—his approach is theatrical, using an intentionally pronounced vibrato (that would not be out of place on Broadway) and a variety of other vocal techniques, including his sophisticated rhythmic placement, which is often subtly behind the beat; in other words, pop music phrased with jazz stylings. There are many times, however, when Bowie completely embraces his musical theatre roots and flies his Broadway flag unabashedly. "Sunday" from Heathen (Columbia, 2002) and "Life on Mars" from Hunky Dory (RCA, 1971) are two examples of this from his early and late career.

Both feature some sophisticated harmonies and harmonic movements not often found in pop music, with the melodies highlighting those movements in a way that is entirely in line with musical theatre practices. With simple re-orchestration, both of these tunes (and many others in Bowie's catalog) could easily be transplanted to the Broadway stage. To wit, "Life on Mars" was recorded by Barbara Streisand on her album Butterfly (Columbia, 1974), which speaks to the song's authenticity as musical theatre. (Bowie, however, thought it was "atrocious.")

Another song that comes to mind is Bowie's recording of the Beach Boys' "God Only Knows" which he recorded on Tonight (EMI, 1984).

Somehow, Bowie reimagines this saccharine '60s war horse without crossing over into kitsch, which is, I think, quite remarkable, but perhaps not as remarkable as his duet with legendary crooner Bing Crosby. In 1977, he joined Crosby in a clever montage of "The Little Drummer Boy" and "Peace on Earth" on Crosby's "Merry Olde Christmas" holiday special. Here we have Bowie, in his Berlin period, with "Low" and "Heroes" percolating in the background, singing a Christmas song with Bing Crosby, and showing that he has the consummate musicianship needed to successfully sing alongside a towering icon of the golden era of the American songbook. Bowie easily rises to the occasion and shows, once again, that he is not just a "pop star" but rather an accomplished singer and musician with incredible sensitivity, technique, timing, and taste.

For his final recording, it is noteworthy that he chose, for the first time, to use an extant group of jazz musicians, including saxophonist Donny McCaslin and his band, along with jazz composer, Maria Schneider, "??" (Columbia/Sony, 2016), which was released two days before his death. The album is pronounced "Blackstar," a term used in oncology that refers to the dark spot on the X-ray that denotes a cancer diagnosis. Given that ominous namesake, it is a difficult recording to listen to. Bowie is no longer taking on a role for inspiration—his story here is his own as he contemplates and reflects on his imminent passing. It is heartbreakingly intimate and personal. Still, it has been tremendously successful, topping the Billboard chart immediately upon release and, since then, selling over 2 million copies. It is, of course, not a jazz album by any stretch, but with these musicians collaborating and bringing their modern jazz aesthetic to Bowie's vision, it is imbued with that flavor and energy.

With this last gesture, Bowie returned directly to the source of so much of his music: jazz and the popular music of his youth. His genius was to take those timeless values of excellent songwriting, singing, and theatre and to reinterpret and reimagine all of them in a way that was genuine, authentic and stunningly original, that spoke to life and love and existence in a way that resonated powerfully with a wide array fans across several generations. To do that, he dealt with larger topics philosophically and poetically, leaving questions asked rather than answered, which is, I think, the eternal quest of our lives. Given all of that, it is hard to imagine the force of will and commitment that it took for him to embark on "??," which became his eulogy and his final goodbye. I can think of no greater testament to his artistry and devotion than this affirmation of life and love, his final gift to the world.

Endnotes

¹ Wikipedia Accessed on August 24, 2024.??
² rogerscruton.com Accessed on August 24, 2024.??
³ Rolling Stone Accessed on August 24, 2024.??
⁴ USA Today Accessed on August 24, 2024.??
⁵ tagesschau.de Accessed on August, 24, 2024. ??
⁶ Los Angeles Times Accessed on August, 24, 2024.??
⁷ Bowie surrounded himself with many jazz and classically trained musicians from early on in his career. Keyboard virtuoso Rick Wakeman was with him early on, after which Mike Garson, another virtuoso pianist trained in jazz and classical music, became a regular member of his band. Others include jazz saxophonist David Sanborn, jazz drummers Joey Baron and Omar Hakim, bassist Tony Levin, guitarist Robert Fripp and blues guitarist Stevie Ray Vaughn. His last album, "??," as mentioned above, features mostly jazz musicians, including jazz saxophonist Donny McCaslin, bassist Tim Lefebvre, pianist Jason Lindner, drummer Mark Guiliana, guitarist Ben Monder, and jazz composer, Maria Schneider. ??

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