Paul Chambers: Man Of The Hour
In March, we looked at Paul Chambers’s interpretation of the blues on Miles Davis’s “Freddie Freeloader.” This time around, we’ll examine a composition that bears his name, “Mr. P.C.,” which comes from the pen of sax player and all-around jazz giant John Coltrane. Because of its memorable melody and simple chord changes, the tune remains a jam-session favorite today.
Paul Chambers’s strong points were his sound, pulse, and note choices. His playing achieved a bounce that lifted the ensemble and created the definitive feel-good hard-bop beat. On “Mr. P.C.,” dig his hookup with drummer Jimmy Cobb to hear why they were the hottest rhythm section in jazz at the time. On the original 1960 recording, Coltrane’s Giant Steps [Atlantic], the tempo is brisk, and Chambers demonstrates an exemplary economy of information in his bass line.
The most important factor in any walking bass line is the groove. In an uptempo burner such as this, the groove becomes critical. In chorus after chorus of this 12-bar minor blues, Chambers repeats himself many times. This is not a cop-out on Chambers’s part, but a wise approach to precisely outlining the harmony while keeping the tempo skimming along. After all, it clips away at 250 bpm for almost seven minutes! It’s the mark of a musically mature bassist: Conserve energy while playing just enough, no more. Alongside a fiery drummer, Chambers stokes the groove with muscular coolness.
In bars 1–2, 13–14, and 25–26, Chambers plays the exact same line to outline the Cm7 chord. In the phrase’s second bar, he implies a Dm7(b5) to G7, which adds a feeling of harmonic movement in the otherwise static four bars of Cm. In bars 3 and 4, P.C. plays a C Dorian scale, moving to melodically dexterous lines on the Fm7 in bars 5 and 6. In bars 9 through 12, Chambers plays triads over the Ab7 to G7, then walks down from the Cm7 to the G7. He repeats this four-bar line in bars 21 through 24, and again at the parallel spot in the third chorus, bars 33 through 36.
This bass line demonstrates perfectly the role of the bassist in an uptempo walking situation: Keep the time, outline the harmony, maintain composure, and swing!
