taking Jazz too seriously

[Gary75]

exactly, music is too personal for me to share it with just anybody. Would you share your wife with somebody you don't know?

 

Could I have any keyboards I wanted on this deal?

[Dave Horne]

exactly, music is too personal for me to share it with just anybody. Would you share your wife with somebody you don't know?

 

Is it possible he's doing to the music what we hope he's doing to his wife.

[Gary75]

Is it possible he's doing to the music what we hope he's doing to his wife.

 

Oh dear!

[delirium]

exactly, music is too personal for me to share it with just anybody. Would you share your wife with somebody you don't know?

 

Is it possible he's doing to the music what we hope he's doing to his wife.

 

yeah, as I could expect no taste at all, you're who you are after all - fleeing to Netherlands didn't help you much. Any discussion with you is a waste of time.

 

[Eric VB]

Ok, a lot of ground has been covered and I haven't had a chance at it yet, so please forgive me for going back to some earlier points. (Sorry, I'm too lazy today to go back and cut and paste quotes.)

 

A Brief History of Jazz

At the turn of the last century rag and ragtime laid the foundations of jazz, not unlike how in modern times rap was the fore runner of hip hop. (Stay with me! )

 

Some of the earliest jazz (1910s to '30s), primarily from New Orleans, is now called traditional jazz. A standout of this era is Louis Armstrong, who is perhaps as famous for his trumpet playing as he is for his singing and scatting. Yes, that's right jazzers, jazz roots include lyrics and singing; heaven forbid!

 

What came next was swing, which had its heyday in the '40s. I think this could be called the golden age of jazz, when it was the dominant form of music. Why was swing so popular? It was the music to which everyone danced.

 

So when jazz was the dominant form of music it had lyrics people could sing along to (e.g. "What a Wonderful World") and it was the foundation for all of the popular dance steps (swing, lindy hop, charleston, etc.).

 

Maybe, just maybe, jazz is not as popular today because it no longer makes any attempt to be sing-a-long or dance music; it is too "serious" now for such trivial things. And, to me, that is the crux of the matter in relationship to the OP.

 

As an aside, the jazzers of the '40s didn't just see a war abroad (WWII), they were also fighting for their musical lives at home. The battle was over replacing radio musicians with pre-recorded music. For those who don't know, it used to be that every time a radio station would announce its call letters the accompanying jingle was played by a live band in the studio. (Ignore the oxymoron! ) The musicians, which were unionized, went on strike but ultimately lost.

 

As an aside, because singers weren't part of the union they filled in for the striking instrumentalists. I hope this is not the reason for lingering bitterness by instrumentalists towards singers: get over it. This is even more ironic when you consider that jazz instrumentalists -- especially the wind players -- once strived to mimic the human voice.

 

In the '50s I think we all know what that upstart and his gyrating pelvis did. If Elvis hadn't appeared, would the greasers and their poodle-skirted girls have embraced swing, the music of their parents? Or would these rebellious youthes have done something even more shocking for the time: white kids idolizing African American musicians? Was change forced on kids of the '50s, or were they looking for change?

 

While rock took over the popular scene jazz turned to bebop. Free at last from catering to commoners who enjoy singing and dancing, jazz could finally start to get "serious".

 

Note, too, that something similar happened to "classical" music. (Here used in the broadest sense of the word to denote music that is not of a "popular" nature.) Didn't people used to sing to classical? (In some churches they still do.) And what did people (nobility) dance to? Well, admittedly I'm basing my answer on movies portraying the era, but there seems to have been a number of dances based on classical music. Today it would be quite astonishing to see a dance hall with an orchestral group providing the music, especially among 20somethings.

 

So, it appears, the rarefied air of "seriousness" is only breathed by music that does not minister to the unwashed masses.

[delirium]

Maybe, just maybe, jazz is not as popular today because it no longer makes any attempt to be sing-a-long or dance music; it is too "serious" now for such trivial things.

 

very good analysis, I agree - that's the problem, when people cannot hum a jazz tune or dance to it what other usage for it as being a background in the restaurant to make steak digestion smoother?

We cannot go back to standards all the time, we need create new ones which relate to current times and problems. People don't care really what was 50 years ago.

 

[Dave Horne]

Delirium, it would be refreshing to learn what your set list is. You won't share your playing with us, but how 'bout sharing your set list.

 

This could help to put things in perspective ... or is this still too personal a question to ask?

 

As to what was 50 years ago - don't mention this to Diana Krall or Michael Buble ... and the many other singers who perform those restaurant tunes.

 

You know, if you're going to have strong opinions about anything, it really helps to back it up with something a tad more substantial ... otherwise it's just more words from an anonymous poster.

[iLaw]

Much of jazz, as with much of many other musical genres (and haiku and competitive chess and single-malt Scotch) is an "acquired taste." What we mean by that is simply that it takes a certain amount of training and experience to appreciate the subtle differences between mediocre, good, and great.

 

Nothing wrong with that. In fact, for most of us I think, our acquired tastes are what give us the most joy in our lives.

 

But don't expect any acquired taste to become "popular." It is the antithesis of "popular."

 

That's just what I think.

 

Larry.

 

[jsaras]

The only conclusion I can draw from all of this is that Delirium named himself very aptly.

[Eric VB]

As an addendum people should be aware that around 1900 the precursors to jazz had plenty of company in the world of music. The ones I'm aware of -- and please correct my ommissions/errors -- are:

 

Marches (e.g. Sousa)

 

the mandolin orchestra craze (classical music played by common people on fretted mandolins, mandolas, mandocellos and mando basses, counterparts to the corresponding orchestral instruments).

 

Vaudeville (not a particular style of music per se and I am at a loss for an example. Wiki says Guido Deiro [piano accordianist] was one of their highest paid musicians, but he started in 1910 and his hit song was Kismet from 1911)

 

traditional (folk)

 

Tin Pan Alley (an interesting quote from Wiki that follows some of the earlier discussion follows)

Initially Tin Pan Alley specialized in melodramatic ballads and comic novelty songs, but it embraced the newly popular styles of the cakewalk and ragtime music. Later on jazz and blues were incorporated, although less completely, as Tin Pan Alley was oriented towards producing songs that amateur singers or small town bands could perform from printed music. Since improvisation, blue notes, and other characteristics of jazz and blues could not be captured in conventional printed notation, Tin Pan Alley manufactured jazzy and bluesy pop-songs and dance numbers. Much of the public in the late 1910s and the 1920s did not know the difference between these commercial products and authentic jazz and blues.

 

close harmony (e.g. The Haydn Quartet, "Bring Back My Bonnie to Me", 1901)

 

According to Wiki GAS didn't start until 1920, but see also how it summarizes the topic:

Great American Songbook (sometimes abbreviated as "GAS") is a term referring to the interrelated music of Broadway musical theater, the Hollywood musical, and Tin Pan Alley, in a period that begins roughly in the 1920s and tapers off around 1960 with the coming of rock and roll. Aside from the enduring popularity of this music in its original context, it also became (and remains) the central repertoire of jazz musicians. (In jazz, such tunes are simply referred to as "standards".) For its devotees, the Great American Songbook represents a level of musical and lyrical sophistication that has yet to be equaled.

 

Sorry for resorting to Wiki; I'm indeed feeling lazy today!

 

[edit: forgot Western (cowboy) music]

[Griffinator]

For its devotees, the Great American Songbook represents a level of musical and lyrical sophistication that has yet to be equaled.

 

Yeah, this is unparalleled "lyrical sophistication" alright...

 

Jeepers, creepers....whered ya get them peepers

Jeepers, creepers...whered ya get those eyes

Gosh oh, git up....howd they get so lit up

Gosh oh, gee oh....howd they get that size

 

[Griffinator]

What happened - did I just kill the thread? Does Dave (or any of the other "Jazz is such a serious thing, how dare you mock it" guys) not have a retort?

 

Trust me, I had to put up with learning a large number of jazz standards in concert choir in high school. The songs are banal to the point of stupidity, from a lyrical perspective. Mercer, the Gershwins, and Berlin particularly annoy me with their oh-so-period slang garbage...

 

Dressed up like a million dollar trouper

Trying hard to look like Gary Cooper (super duper)

 

It's very difficult to take a collection of songs "oh so seriously" when the lyric is this bad. Sure, the chord changes are cool and funky, but "Hit Me With A Hot Note And Watch Me Bounce" just begs to be ridiculed.

[Jazz+]

Jazz is alive and well, it's being performed and listened to all the time. New tunes are constantly being written. It is an art, not some genre of pop music.

[Griffinator]

It is an art, not some genre of pop music.

 

That's exactly the frickin' point - it is some genre of pop music - a forgotten genre.

 

To say that, because modern jazz is all bebop and abstract and fusion blah-de-blah, that it isn't a pop genre, is to say that, because progressive rock is all abstract and fusion and blah-de-blah, that rock isn't a pop genre.

 

Do we now understand how utterly stupid that statement is?

[delirium]

It is an art, not some genre of pop music.

 

That's exactly the frickin' point - it is some genre of pop music - a forgotten genre.

 

exactly, which is more or less my point from the beginning of the thread, and attempt to figure it out why did that happen.

 

p.s.

of course we have some exceptions to that statement.

 

[Eric VB]

Personally I don't have many reservations when it comes to music.

 

Or food for that matter. I can't see limiting myself to a koala's diet!

 

I've played the music of both nobles ("classical") and commoners ("popular").

 

If I were a blue-blooded koala I suppose I would stick to piano concertos and sonatas by a select few master composers, playing only the finest orchestra halls with only the top symphony orchestras. Anything else would contempibly be beneath my lofty standards. (Since Marika Bournaki, Yuja Wang, Jonathan Biss, Yundi Li, Lang Lang, etc. don't seem to hang out here I figured I could get away with that. )

 

And yes, at one time I did consider a career as a professional symphonic instrumentalist.

 

Even within "popular" music I've strayed: jazz, rock, blues, gospel ... I even sat in with an r&b/funk group once. According to Wiki I've even played from the GAS. (I always considered Ellington/Strayhorn -- "Sophisticated Lady", "Satin Doll", etc. -- to simply be jazz.)

 

Heck I've even "dirtied" my hands by playing percussion: drums for a Chinese lion dance troupe and hand bells at church! (Are there no depths to which I will not sink? )

 

To me, "it's all good".

 

But hip hop is a tough line to cross as an instrumentalist. (Obviously.) And as a singer. (Just listen to popular singers from the '80s as they awkwardly tried to incorporate rap for the first time.) And as a dancer. (Despite what all of you may think of my lack of morals, I do find it rather uncomfortable to grind my groin against a stranger in public.) It hasn't toppled rock (or I guess country is the new king of the hill, if you go by music sales) yet, but it is certainly shaping up as a fine metric to delineate the generations, much like rock did in the '50s, daddy-o.

 

Or is it? Some teens and 20s that aren't satisfied with today's music are turning to older music instead.

 

I've performed a variety of music to a variety of people over the years, listened to a bunch more (I'll never cover Laurie Anderson, for example), and I'm fine with that. And I'm fine with other musicians that are more selective than me. But please don't think any less of me as a musician for currently being in a rock cover band.

 

And don't make a face at the dinner table when I eat something not to your liking.

[Griffinator]

Personally I don't have many reservations when it comes to music.

 

But please don't think any less of me as a musician for currently being in a rock cover band.

 

All that needed to be said.

 

 

[Jazz+]

Jazz has not been a genre of pop music for many decades. And I take being called stupid as an insult, Griff.

[Griffinator]

Jazz has not been a genre of pop music for many decades. And I take being called stupid as an insult, Griff.

 

I didn't call you stupid, Jazz, I called the statement stupid. Because it is.

 

 

[Eric VB]

Jazz is alive and well, it's being performed and listened to all the time. New tunes are constantly being written. It is an art, not some genre of pop music.

Today's jazz may be considered "art" in the sense that it tends to be abstract and is only appreciated by true connoisseurs. Like cubism (e.g. Picasso) in the visual arts.

 

And while performers of today's jazz would not play a traditional Armstrong piece in the way it was performed in the '30s, or a Ellington swing piece in the way it was performed in the '40s, that does not make those original performances any less "jazz". (I still love hearing a New Orleans street band playing traditional and a big band playing swing. But I also find it interesting to hear how the same music is reinterpreted by today's musicians.)

 

Jazz is a very broad term. It does encompass music that was, in its day, very much a pop genre. Not a particularly good example, but the movie Cotton Club is illustrative.

 

And like it or not jazz is still considered "popular" music, even though it fails to have a large following as such a label would suggest. But this label is used to distinguish jazz -- and all other "popular" music -- from "classical".

 

Perhaps it is time for a new label? Until then jazz -- as "artistic" as it has evolved to become -- remains a form of popular music.

[iLaw]

Rather than contrasting "popular" with "classical," I think of "popularizing" as something that can be and is done to many musical genres, including rock, jazz, classical, folk, and many others. When I hear the soundtrack album from a "Pirates of the Caribbean" movie, for example, it strikes me as "pop classical."

 

I don't know hip hop well enough to express an opinion, but I bet there are others here who can readily give examples of "pop hip hop" versus "art hip hop."

 

Larry.

 

[Jazz+]

It is a fact that Jazz does not appear on the pop charts. Therefore, by definition, jazz is not pop music.

 

 

From Wiki's definition of "pop music"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pop_music

 

"Pop music is music charted by the number or sales, plays, etc., that the work receives.[1] It is not a particular genre or style of music, but simply that which is the most popular for the tracked period of time. Most commercial music of any genre is composed with deliberate intent to appeal to the majority of its contemporaries,[2][3][4] but, unless extremely popular in its own genre, it must appeal to a wider audience to appear on the pop charts.

 

In opposition to music that may require education or formation to fully appreciate, a defining characteristic of pop music is that anyone is able to enjoy it. Artistic concepts such as musical form and aesthetics are not a concern in the writing of pop songs, the primary objectives being audience enjoyment and commercial success.[5]

 

Although pop music is produced with a desire to sell records and do well in the charts, it does not necessitate wide acclaim or commercial success: there are bad or failed pop songs.[6]

 

Initially the term was an abbreviation of, and synonymous with, popular music, but evolved around the 1950s to describe a specific musical category.[7]"

 

Top selling Pop Artists

Artist Records Sold Genre Albums Years Active

1. Michael Jackson 350 Million + Pop 20 1967-present

2. Mariah Carey 290 million + Pop R&B 15 1990-present

3. Elton John 250 Million + Pop 56 1964 - present

4. Madonna 215 Million + Pop 21 1982-present

5. Julio Iglesias 200 Million + Pop Latin 77 1968-present

6. Celine Dion 190 million + Pop 45 1981-present

7. Cher 180 Million + Pop 31 1964- present

8. Whitney Houston 170 Million + Pop 14 1985-present

9. ABBA 160 Million + Pop 33 1972-1982

10. Janet Jackson 130 Million + R&B Pop 11 1982 - present

11. Bee Gees 110 Million + Pop 29 1965-present

12. Barbra Streisand 100 Million + Pop 60 1957- present

13. Backstreet Boys 100 Million + Pop 7 1993-present

14. The Jacksons 100 Million + Pop 19 1966- 1990

15. Britney Spears 88 Million + Pop 7 1998 - present (10 Years)

16. Robbie Williams 70 Million + Pop 13 1990 - present

17. New Kids On The Block 70 Million + Pop 8 19841994, 2008-present

18. Kylie Minogue 68 Million + Pop 21 1987-present

19. Spice Girls 55 Million + Pop 4 1996-2001, 2007-2008

20. The Human League 25 Million + Pop 10 1977-present

 

 

 

[Jazz+]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jazz

 

From Wikipedia "jazz":

 

"Jazz is an American musical art form which originated around the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States from a confluence of African and European music traditions. The style's West African pedigree is evident in its use of blue notes, call-and-response, improvisation, polyrhythms, syncopation, and the swung note of ragtime.[1]

 

From its early development until the present, jazz has also incorporated music from 19th and 20th century American popular music, which is based on European music traditions.[2] The word jazz began as a West Coast slang term of uncertain derivation and was first used to refer to music in Chicago in about 1915; for the origin and history, see Jazz (word).

 

Jazz has, from its early 20th century inception, spawned a variety of subgenres, from New Orleans Dixieland dating from the early 1910s, big band-style swing from the 1930s and 1940s, bebop from the mid-1940s, a variety of Latin-jazz fusions such as Afro-Cuban and Brazilian jazz from the 1950s and 1960s, jazz-rock fusion from the 1970s and later developments such as acid jazz."

 

[Griffinator]

Jazz is an American musical art form

 

Sounds like a jazz snob wrote that piece. Ironically, not a single other entry in Wikipedia discussing a genre of music refers to it as an "art form" - not even Classical.

 

If Classical doesn't get to be an art form, then neither does jazz.

[Griffinator]

Initially the term was an abbreviation of, and synonymous with, popular music

 

Just made my point for me. Thanks!

[Jazz+]

Yes, initially the term was an abbreviation of, and synonymous with, popular music. That is no longer the case.

[Jazz+]

My previous statement stands:

 

Jazz has not been a genre of pop music for many decades. And I take being called stupid as an insult, Griff.

[ProfD]

As mentioned several times already, a contest of musicianship, tune and genre selection is pointless.

 

We are fortunate in this day and age to have access to such a wide variety of recorded music.

 

Labels make it easier to identify music. Otherwise, musicians of any style/genre has a catalog of source material to cover, reinterpret, sample, mash-up, etc.

 

Well composed tunes will always work. Just a matter of interpretation. If the lyrics don't fit the times, it is easier just to remove them.

 

Seriously, the secret is to make music that resonates within yourself and to the best of your abilities.

 

Music is something we play. The magic lies in doing so well enough that other folks dig it too.

[Griffinator]

My previous statement stands:

 

Jazz has not been a genre of pop music for many decades. And I take being called stupid as an insult, Griff.

 

And for the second time, Jazz, I never called you stupid. Please re-read the post that offends you, you'll discover that what I referred to as stupid was indeed a statement, not a person. As a general rule, I don't call someone stupid unless they consistently demonstrate stupidity as a trait.

[iLaw]

... As a general rule, I don't call someone stupid unless they consistently demonstrate stupidity as a trait.

 

I think we should leave politics out of forum discussions.

 

Larry.