Of course, there's the old joke that "if you play a wrong chord it's a mistake, if you play it twice, it's jazz."
Actually, I really like listening to a jazz band, seems to me everything is improviational, I can't imagine those songs are actually written down in notation...I hear "This is Thelonius Monk's version of so and so" but I wonder if it's actually notated. However, I have been known to be wrong once or maybe twice.
Depends on what and when, there's many styles of jazz.
Monk solo on piano may well have been doing an interpretation by ear while still following the changes to the tune in whatever key he happened to be in the mood for, and tossing in his improvs, but in general, the larger the band the greater the need for charts of greater or looser tightness or the result
would have been sheer cacophony.
Classic example:
"Take Five"
Absolutely Brubeck charted out the basic chords and melody, but Paul Horn was allowed to improvise freely in his assigned set of bars.
The magic is in how well a guy can play around with the scale/melody formula and still evoke the theme and telegraph that he's winding up for the return to it.
Another: Benny Goodman's "Sing Sing Sing"
You can bet Goodman gave each player a chart just to be able to learn the tune with.
That's where it gets complex and necessary, writing out charts so that each of 3 horns actually plays a different part but when they're playing together correctly they're actually
playing chords.
And then you've got to decide which parts are right for which horns: trombones; alto/tenor and even soprano saxes; trumpets; let's not forget Goodman's own woodwind clarinet...
"Take the A Train" 's another great example of that.
Also the Mingus Big Band "Haitian Fight Song" (itself, er, "borrowed" in almost complete form by Hendrix at Woodstock as "Jam Back at the House" IIRC)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WPfSD0vJi8Y
That one's probably a little closer to what you were thinking of in more modern settings, so take a look at this:
https://www.musicnotes.com/sheetmus...MIwoSX1qm45AIVD9tkCh2WWwxvEAQYASABEgLvN_D_BwE
and the bass chart:
https://cdn3.virtualsheetmusic.com/images/first_pages/HL/HL-257779First_BIG.png
At the other extreme was Miles Davis'
Kind of Blue, revolutionary at the time for his concept of basing a whole take around a theme and maybe 2-3 chords while the soloing was modal instead of based on a fixed melody in the traditional major or minor or whatever scales.
That's where Coltrane came from when he recorded
A Love Supreme.
So even the "free jazz" had (has) structure based on a given set of modes or scales and yeah a lot of that
is 100% uncharted improvisation , but even there I suspect there were at least some notes given out to the players for orientation, help 'em figure out what the common thread is.
Dixieland is also notorious for sounding like twenty guys all playing something different, but if you take a classic like "Saints Go Marching In", you can hear there's usually 2 or 3 (or more) playing the refrain while a couple of other guys play embellishments, and the various guys trade off carrying the parts so everybody gets a chance to "cut".
It's the counterpointing and syncopation that make it sound like everybody's off on their own, but when they're inside the band looking out, they know if a guy's off his mark or flubbing his scales.
Final example:
Zappa.
NOTORIOUS for charting everything out.
And guaranteed "Big Swifty" on
Waka Jawaka is.
One of my top 3 favorite Zappa cuts pure instrumental big band jazz.
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