*Flash-foward: I have mixed emotions now about this article. Comments made by the BA trumpet player Ben Syversen (www.myspace.com/bensyversen) have made me rethink some ideas. So you may be seeing a sequal to this one.
In my 7th grade music appreciation class I was talking to the students about why they should not give up on jazz. I said jazz was the hip hop of its time-- rebelious, immoral, passionate, raw, and deep.
But I was wrong.
(And I had to tell these 7th graders what half those words meant).
Jazz was not the hip hop of it's time. That is like saying Lebron James or Dwayne Wade is the next MJ (whether it be Michael Jordan or Magic Johnson-- I've heard both). It is simply wrong to say such things. In fact while we are mentioning it, if I hear one more person say that Dwayne Wayde is the new Jordan I am gonna shoot myself or someone around me (more than likely someone around me-- I wanna have kids some day). First of all Jordan was overcompetitive to a fault, and somehow became one of the single greatest athletes of all time because of it. Dwayne Wade is benefiting from what MJ did. He is nicer. He flops more. He can create better. He can't score as big. He gets fouled more (at least in the Mavs finals).
Alright enough of that. So as you can see I am not into the whole "this is the new that thing" (like pink is the new orange--people including me really say that). Thus hip hop is not the jazz nor was jazz the hip hop of its time.
So what was jazz? Should I ask what is jazz? I am going to say is. Here's why.
Most people don't know this, but jazz officially died to the mainstream in or around the 1950's. The big band era before that was a fairly big deal. But R&B; (thanks to the help of artists such as Louis Jordan) was starting to take the simple rawness and sophistication of the jazz of old and spin it into a new and sellable entity. R&B started it's brutal take over as early as the 30's, but it teamed up with rock&roll; to completely take over jazz in the 50's.
So was jazz ever truly popular? To some it was. But even most of those defected eventually. Then jazz kept going-- turning into what many people today would call an eletist and academic genre. Everyone's problem with jazz is that they think that they aren't good enough to play it, or smart enough to listen to and understand it. Jazz fans became minorities. They flocked into clubs and started practicing their own art. They adapted it, added new ideas, new concepts, and jazz became an underground genre that, to this day, still thrives in little known urban clubs and academic institutions.
The entire time the rest of the musical world was simplifying the message and sound of jazz and using it in their own music, but the complete sound of jazz has never truly returned to the mainstream. Most people can't handle everything jazz has to say.
Any of this sound familiar?In my 7th grade music appreciation class I was talking to the students about why they should not give up on jazz. I said jazz was the hip hop of its time-- rebelious, immoral, passionate, raw, and deep.
But I was wrong.
(And I had to tell these 7th graders what half those words meant).
Jazz was not the hip hop of it's time. That is like saying Lebron James or Dwayne Wade is the next MJ (whether it be Michael Jordan or Magic Johnson-- I've heard both). It is simply wrong to say such things. In fact while we are mentioning it, if I hear one more person say that Dwayne Wayde is the new Jordan I am gonna shoot myself or someone around me (more than likely someone around me-- I wanna have kids some day). First of all Jordan was overcompetitive to a fault, and somehow became one of the single greatest athletes of all time because of it. Dwayne Wade is benefiting from what MJ did. He is nicer. He flops more. He can create better. He can't score as big. He gets fouled more (at least in the Mavs finals).
Alright enough of that. So as you can see I am not into the whole "this is the new that thing" (like pink is the new orange--people including me really say that). Thus hip hop is not the jazz nor was jazz the hip hop of its time.
So what was jazz? Should I ask what is jazz? I am going to say is. Here's why.
Most people don't know this, but jazz officially died to the mainstream in or around the 1950's. The big band era before that was a fairly big deal. But R&B; (thanks to the help of artists such as Louis Jordan) was starting to take the simple rawness and sophistication of the jazz of old and spin it into a new and sellable entity. R&B started it's brutal take over as early as the 30's, but it teamed up with rock&roll; to completely take over jazz in the 50's.
So was jazz ever truly popular? To some it was. But even most of those defected eventually. Then jazz kept going-- turning into what many people today would call an eletist and academic genre. Everyone's problem with jazz is that they think that they aren't good enough to play it, or smart enough to listen to and understand it. Jazz fans became minorities. They flocked into clubs and started practicing their own art. They adapted it, added new ideas, new concepts, and jazz became an underground genre that, to this day, still thrives in little known urban clubs and academic institutions.
The entire time the rest of the musical world was simplifying the message and sound of jazz and using it in their own music, but the complete sound of jazz has never truly returned to the mainstream. Most people can't handle everything jazz has to say.
Any of this sound familiar?
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