Jazz vs. Smooth Jazz

[fearceol]

Yes - this is what is confusing some of this discussion - so, people are talking about artists who were playing 15 or more years ago, as if they were around today!

Whereas, I tend to talk about what is happening today in 2010.

The other things is that this leads to "changing history" - so in the 1970s, there was no such thing as Smooth Jazz, the term had never been used - but artists like the Crusaders were playing and Bob James was playing some great stuff on TV soundtracks and with Tom Scott, if I remember correctly..?

But this is all long ago in the past and surely we should be looking at what the music means today and cannot label it retrospectively - that just cheating!!

It's like saying that Mozart is a chill-out artist, because some of his music appeared on a compilation CD to help you relax!!

I agree. Another reason why it should all be given the one label that does not go out of date.... MUSIC.

 

[Elrend]

So you guys regard fusion as jazz? I usually regard it as instrumental R&B/rock with improvisational bits.

That doesn't mean I discredit is as a genre, but I prefer to keep fusion and jazz as two separate genres.

 

[JimK]

Bob James in on that list. I always thought that he was regarded as one of the "kings" of smooth jazz. Stuff like his "Angela" (theme from "Taxi"), I have seen on numerious occasions being defined as "smooth". It just goes to prove my point on how futile this pidgeon-holing concept really is. It is a matter of interpretation.

Bob James had a history pre-"Angela". Acoustic piano, acoustic Jazz...as a leader & sideman. I have all those Bob James albums up to #11 or #12? gary King was one of my favourite EB-ers & he was James' bassist-of-choice during that time frame. I considered all those records as "electric Jazz".
BTW, in the '70s, it was "hip" to hire a Jazz composer/arranger (Tom Scott was another) for TV & movies.

Maybe you should use A-Z by artist name when filing your music.

Nah, too many albums & I wouldn't want the Osmonds near my Oscar Peterson albums.

Re Crusaders : I also, have not bought any of their albums for a long time, as their later stuff did not appeal to me. By the way, you call this "Pop/Jazz". What's the difference in your opinion between it and "smooth" ?

Smooth, IMO, has that over-produced processed vibe about it...there may be live drums or bass...but usually not. Pop/Jazz, to me, is some Jarreau, some Manhatten Transfer, some Benson, etc.

 

[KJung]

You know what Miles would say if he read this thread....


......F*** yourselves you mother f***ers.





Seriously, though, interesting discussion, but trying to put music styles in a 'box' always ends up with pure personal taste and preference.... 'which is better, J Bass or P Bass'?!

 

[Bruce Lindfield]

So you guys regard fusion as jazz? I usually regard it as instrumental R&B/rock with improvisational bits.

That doesn't mean I discredit is as a genre, but I prefer to keep fusion and jazz as two separate genres.

Well - the Jazz Fusion that happened in the 70s was clearly Jazz musicians playing amplified/electric instruments.

So - John McLaughlin,Billy Cobham, Joe Zawinul all played with Miles and are Jazz players who went on to experiment with electronics, amplification etc.

I would see the definition as a fusion of Rock instruments and amplification with Jazz.

There are lots of other types of fusion - so in Britain - we had Indo-Jazz fusion - traditional Indian music fused with Jazz!

 

[burk48237]

I will play the game and have deleted either those I don't know (so can't comment) or which I don't think are Jazz!

So those left are where I consider they have played Jazz at some point in their career.

Anybody who doubts Diana Krall's credentials only need to read the interview in BP magazine with Christian McBride - who should know!!

Your reply list is a great example of the problems making these distinctions. While I would agree that Grover WashingtonJR., did some Pop music that might be considered smooth Jazz he has also played some great and VERY mainstream Jazz. One of my favorite CD's is the Grover Washington JR, Kenny Burrell Duet CD where Grover blows over standards and a few originals with the very smooth Jazz rhythm section of Ron Carter and Jack Dejohnet.

Ramsey Lewis is another interesting case. The "In Crowd" was one of the most popular Jazz Albums ever and certainly pre-dates "smooth Jazz" (1966). At the time he was considered revolutionary like Miles for going electric. Another interesting tidbit, Ramsey hosted a radio show called the Smooth Jazz hour where he featured music from Dizzy Gilispe? Miles Davis? Duke Ellington? Chic Corea? And Pat Metheny? I'm sure all of them would be surprised to be called smooth jazz.

I suspect that Jim K hit on a real point with the use of one word in this line:

Smooth, IMO, has that over-produced processed vibe about it...there may be live drums or bass...but usually not. Pop/Jazz, to me, is some Jarreau, some Manhatten Transfer, some Benson, etc.

To me the word is processed. I have a tough time calling anything before 1980 "Smooth" jazz. But around 1980 the record companies and producers started to really discover studio tricks, with reverbs, delays, multi tracking of solo's, midi, sequencing, triggers, drum machines, and synth basses. In fact one of the things that makes 80's pop so annoying to many is the dated sound of that over-production.

To me one of the real keys with jazz is, is it real muscians playing it ALL THE TIME. There were Jazz CD's that came out in the 80's with sequenced rhythm sections, or the same exact rhythm section for the entire tune (just repeated tracks from one verse or chorus). This was real common on some Jazz vocalists CD's in that era. If real musicians aren't doing it in real time with each other it isn't Jazz. Its one of the reasons so many of those early CD's sound so authentic, they couldn't multi track. They had to do it in one take.

One great example of this actually came on a non Jazz CD. Steve Winwood came out with a Traffic reunion CD a few years ago. The only problem was it wasn't a Traffic reunion it was Steve Winwood playing Traffic like tunes with sequenced music. Man even Steve Winwood didn't "get" it . Traffic was Traffic because real musicians did what they did together in real time with each other.

I included Basia on that list because she had no "real jazz" cred, and yet she was one of the top voices on the jazz vocal charts in the early 80's. I suspect she was in a sense a victim of the new technology. If any Jazz CDs could be used as evidence of processed production it would be hers.

 

[fearceol]

Bob James had a history pre-"Angela". Acoustic piano, acoustic Jazz...as a leader & sideman. I have all those Bob James albums up to #11 or #12? gary King was one of my favourite EB-ers & he was James' bassist-of-choice during that time frame. I considered all those records as "electric Jazz".
BTW, in the '70s, it was "hip" to hire a Jazz composer/arranger (Tom Scott was another) for TV & movies.

Yes, I have Bob James' "Explosions" album on the ESP disc label. King was also a big favourite of mine. My point was that this early material accounts for about 2% of his output, the rest is regarded as smooth by the "label gurus."




Nah, too many albums & I wouldn't want the Osmonds near my Oscar Peterson albums.

Something happened with my reply. It is in the quote.

 

[JimK]

You know what Miles would say if he read this thread....


......F*** yourselves you mother f***ers.

OK...so you've read Miles' autobiography.

Seriously, though, interesting discussion, but trying to put music styles in a 'box' always ends up with pure personal taste and preference...

Point taken...when I first came online (late '90s), I was involved in this sorta discussion about every other day. Still, this is one of the better threads of late at TB, IMO.

'which is better, J Bass or P Bass'?!

P-J bass.

 

[JimK]

To me the word is processed. I have a tough time calling anything before 1980 "Smooth" jazz. But around 1980 the record companies and producers started to really discover studio tricks, with reverbs, delays, multi tracking of solo's, midi, sequencing, triggers, drum machines, and synth basses.

Eureka! You're right...the term back then wasn't Smooth...it was Fuzak (Fusion + Muzak).
Still, Fuzak had more balls than (most of) today's Smooth.
'70s/'80s Spyro Gyra would have been stuck with this label.

 

[Bruce Lindfield]

Although I take the point about subjectivity - there are some objective truths that can't be ignored - so these distinctions weren't around in the past and so you canot label things retrospectively - you can't change history.

If an artist chooses to promote themselves as something and go out live under that "banner" - then fair enough you can say they are an "xxxxxx" artist.

But you cannot impose these labels on artists who were just playing the music they wanted to and never jumped on any bandwagon!