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Double Bass Jazz vs. "smooth jazz"? How to articulate the difference?

#123
I can't really add much. I have been thinking about the term Smooth Jazz, though. Seems like someone was at one point trying to say "its jazz, but better" and instead ended up saying "we are trying to be a form of jazz but we just can't compete with the original." Of course I am biased and old and not particularly flexible in my thinking...

I think this topic gets such a reaction from musicians because "Smooth Jazz" is more like R&B and Pop. Funk and slap bass lines and rhythms, not much swing at all in the clips people are posting. So calling it jazz litters the jazz genre. Case in point below:

The wedding band I play in often gets requests to play jazz during the cocktail hour. After a discussion with the customer, it becomes apparent all too frequently that what they really want is smooth jazz.
 
#124
I've always considered smooth jazz like Muzak. It's a non offensive and non obtrusive silence filler. When I'm at an amusement park that doesn't have it's own theme music (Sea World, Universal Studios, Magic Mountain), I get to hear smooth jazz. Rippingtons, Spyro, Sade, Kenny G, etc. I can eat my corn on the cob with my fried chicken and carry a conversation with the while table without the distractions of real jazz throwing off my attention. Bored people in line unconsciously tap their hands to it while they are talking or thinking about what to ride on next. It blends really well with the announcer's voice (I swear it's the same voice that you hear before a movie at the theatre). Amazingly you never feel like anything was disrupted or amiss when they duck the music in and out for announcements even during solos, because all of the solos sound the same anyhow.
 
#125
uprightbass.com said:
I've always considered smooth jazz like Muzak.

Amazingly you never feel like anything was disrupted or amiss when they duck the music in and out for announcements even during solos, because all of the solos sound the same anyhow.
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I suppose depending on the music selected it could be categorized in this way. I will have to respectfully disagree as I believe there is a lot of really good "smooth jazz" music. Honestly, I'm kind of tired of playing the same tunes out of the Real Book night after night. Our quartet is going out of it's way to NOT play "standards" any more. And people listening love it. That gets us gigs. That makes me money. Yes, it always has to do with money. ;)
 
#126
Jack Clark said:
Wow. Lots of feeling in those comments. But it sure is hard to articulate, isn't it? I'm not sure we're much closer after all that, but the discussion was good, I think.

My wife's one word was "predictability." Smooth jazz has it, and she likes that about it.

My word was "improvisation," and it seemed to me that "predictability" may be just another way of saying that Jazz emphasizes improvisation and "smooth jazz" doesn't. So, Jim and Ed were right there where my wife and I were, I think.

But then what do you do with Ellington's big band arrangements? Were they not jazz because they were written down? Were only the improvised solo parts of them jazz, but not the written arrangements?

And if a smooth jazzer tootles out an original improvisation solo that is in keeping with the style of the rest of the smooth jazz tune he's playing, does that make his solo jazz?

That can't be it, either. Because we all can recognize whether we're going to be listening to Jazz or smooth jazz during the first four bars of a piece. Maybe my wife's word is best, then, because we know right away whether what we're going to hear is "predictable"--including whether the improvised solos are going to be predictable. Does that work? I think that's what Ed was saying, too.
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The improvisation label is interesting. I hold that not all Jazz players improvise their solos. In the book "Thinking in Jazz" by Paul F. Berliner, the author quotes a couple of top jazz (bop and post-bop) performers (who want to remain nameless) whereby they state they do not improvise but they write out and memorize their solos. You can study the great soloists and accompanists and see that they all have standard lines they default to during solos and accompaniement. This will (or can) evolve with time and artistic maturation but their are certain moves that are associated with players.

In the improvise vien, one can argure that Jerry Garcia is a jazz player. Wait, you say but he is playing over simple not complex chord changes most of the time. So then does that mean Miles Davis, John Coltrane are not jazz players when they play a modal blues where the entire song is composed of only one or two chords?

I will also hold that some jazz is very predictable. Look how many songs are based on the chord changes of "Rthymn Changes", etc. Look at the standard Basie ending. Good improvisers do surprise the listener but I bet i(I know) f you saw him/her play night after night patterns would emerge.
 
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#128
SteveC said:
I suppose depending on the music selected it could be categorized in this way. I will have to respectfully disagree as I believe there is a lot of really good "smooth jazz" music. Honestly, I'm kind of tired of playing the same tunes out of the Real Book night after night. Our quartet is going out of it's way to NOT play "standards" any more. And people listening love it. That gets us gigs. That makes me money. Yes, it always has to do with money. ;)
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There is money to be made in smooth jazz. Just look at Kenny G, the most financially successful of them all. If you need a certain level of money, smooth jazz will bring in money far easier than real jazz, no doubt. Of course there is "good" smooth jazz, that's why so many people tune to it in the dentist office, elevators, weather channel, on the phone and no one gets bothered by it. I think that people hate it because of what it represents and that it trivializes jazz, because in reality it's so non-offensive and non-obtrusive that the music itself isn't capable of polarizing people. As far as the music itself, I'm indifferent to it like I am fluorescent lighting, puddles in the gutter, dogs pissing on a fire hydrant, and dead grunions on the beach.

Standards are great, but just like anything else in life, do it enough times frequently and it gets boring. If all you know of jazz is in the fake books, then you've only scratched the surface.
 
#129
SteveC said:
I suppose depending on the music selected it could be categorized in this way. I will have to respectfully disagree as I believe there is a lot of really good "smooth jazz" music. Honestly, I'm kind of tired of playing the same tunes out of the Real Book night after night. Our quartet is going out of it's way to NOT play "standards" any more. And people listening love it. That gets us gigs. That makes me money. Yes, it always has to do with money. ;)
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Don't blame the violin and don't rely on material to generate interest. I haven't heard you play, my experience has been if you are really making music with the rest of the band it doesn't matter WHAT tune you are playing. For a lot of folks, as soon as you start something from the standard repertoire, they start playing to some model in their head and NOT with each other...
 
#132
Bruce Lindfield said:
I think Dave Holland's stuff is as far away from what people are talking about here as possible!

So - you have great original compositions, often in odd time signatures and there is a huge amount of group interaction, with the lack of piano opening up huge latitude for the soloists...:) :eek:
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Yeah, but slick saxophone in 7 isn't much better to my ears than slick sax in 4! Especially when coming from listening to no time!
There are only a few DH tracks I just couldn't get through, and the band has always killed it live when I saw them.

The point is just one listener's most adventuous is another's easy listening.
 
#133
uprightbass.com said:
I think that people hate it [smooth jazz] because . . . it trivializes jazz, . . . .
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Yes, I think there's a lot to that. On thinking about it, for me, it really has to do with what seems to me to be the high-jacking of the word "Jazz." If they called that genre of music "New New Age" or "21st Century" or "Purple Blob" or just "Smooth," it wouldn't bother me at all.

Not that I can define "Jazz," though. I just know when I'm not hearing it. Tonight I'm going to hear some: Paul Carman (ts, ss), Barnaby Finch (keys), Marshall Hawkins (b).
 
#135
abstractart06 said:
Not all Smooth Jazz is crap. Fourplay is smooth in my opinion in a good way, while Kenny G is not. Of the four videos on you tube, that Marcus Johnson with Bobby Lyle and David Dyson, defies description. It's just that damn good!
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I must need the bumpy jazz because Fourplay was so smooth that it literally put me to sleep when I was sitting at a mall bench, which I have never done before. This probably a known fact that i missed since they play smooth jazz on a lot of radio stations around here late night.

I can understand that slab players tend to like smooth jazz since that genre of music allows the BG to play a more prominent role than other genres of music. I wonder if they would like smooth jazz style of music much if BG was relegated to the same roles as rock and country. In other words, is it the bassist that you like and you listen to smooth jazz because you get to hear them in action, or it is the actual music that you enjoy?
 
#136
How would you describe what the Headhunters do? Lots of improvising within a groove.
Is it Jazz? Who cares... It's good.

Whilst the term 'Smooth Jazz' conjures up alot of negative responses, there is a lot of groove based improvised music that isn't fluffy elevator crap.

Alot of 'straight ahead' (for lack of a better word) jazz players seem to be threatened by the general listening public lumping the word 'jazz' into this Smooth label... Music that should probably be called instrumental R&B/Pop/Funk....

I've honestly been quite surprised to see a lot of forum members, whom opinion I respect, dismissing a whole genre of music... I mean the smooth elevator type stuff has as much to do with jazz as Micahel Buble does... So why be theatened by it or even compare to the art form that you all love? Is it just because it has the word 'jazz' in the title?

Another point, I don't think improvisation can be THE word. Improvisation exists in almost every style. A mainstream band like the Dave Matthews band improvise, albeit over harmony, feel and form more stylisitcally appropriate for the mainstream band that they are. etc etc
 
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#138
uprightbass.com said:
I must need the bumpy jazz because Fourplay was so smooth that it literally put me to sleep when I was sitting at a mall bench, which I have never done before. This probably a known fact that i missed since they play smooth jazz on a lot of radio stations around here late night.

I can understand that slab players tend to like smooth jazz since that genre of music allows the BG to play a more prominent role than other genres of music. I wonder if they would like smooth jazz style of music much if BG was relegated to the same roles as rock and country. In other words, is it the bassist that you like and you listen to smooth jazz because you get to hear them in action, or it is the actual music that you enjoy?
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I don't have a problem with music that is soothing and mellow. I also love fusion, and that really makes you pay attention to what's happening. To me Good music is just good music. There is something to be learned in every genre.
 
#140
uprightbass.com said:
I must need the bumpy jazz because Fourplay was so smooth that it literally put me to sleep when I was sitting at a mall bench, which I have never done before. This probably a known fact that i missed since they play smooth jazz on a lot of radio stations around here late night.

I can understand that slab players tend to like smooth jazz since that genre of music allows the BG to play a more prominent role than other genres of music. I wonder if they would like smooth jazz style of music much if BG was relegated to the same roles as rock and country. In other words, is it the bassist that you like and you listen to smooth jazz because you get to hear them in action, or it is the actual music that you enjoy?
Click to expand...
I am also a big fan of flamenco music. The where bass has a truly supportive harmonic role. Great bassists like Willie Weeks and Lee Sklar have done some great work in Country and Folk where the bass is not prominent.
 

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