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Double Bass Why isn't Jazz that popular? (DB forum thread)
- Thread starter gai113
- Start date
+1 I also hear comments (and I'm included in this group) from people who don't really care for horns of any kind. There also seems to be very little continuity in groups. If you find an album you like, chances are those musicians have moved on to play with other people. It can be like rooting for a baseball team made up of free agents.
Save for a few singers like Norah Jones (who does get a lot of airplay), today's jazz is not aimed at the masses but rather experimental. I understand why common people aren't interested into it.
Accessible forms of jazz used to be popular but it was 50 years ago.
Accessible forms of jazz used to be popular but it was 50 years ago.
"Mediu- ... what? Cooked? No need for all that junk. Just show me your pasture and I'll go bite random chunks out of the cattle 'til I'm full... "
Nothng you've said here raises the level of appreciation for the use of musical training or vocabulary. Have whatever day you can manage.
Accessible to whom? I know quite a few people who don't play anything but the stereo but listen to tons of jazz. Most of it is older, yes, but not all of it.
Accessible as in popular music, that gives easy listening pleasure in a radio format.
As much as I enjoy listening to Takashi or Truffaz, they don't give instant emotion like, say, a 3 minute song by Ella or Astrud Gilberto. Well sure there is Kenny G but it isn't the same is it?
As much as I enjoy listening to Takashi or Truffaz, they don't give instant emotion like, say, a 3 minute song by Ella or Astrud Gilberto. Well sure there is Kenny G but it isn't the same is it?
Yeah, pop and rock pretty much took over radio. Not a real problem for me --I love those genres, too-- but in this day and age, surely it can't be that difficult to find. If people aren't willing to look for it, well... they get the music they deserve regardless of what it is.
But who decides what's easy and what isn't? I don't find jazz of any type difficut to listen to, follow or enjoy (depending, of course, on the execution). It's not med school boards, but there's a group of our population that seems to believe it is.
No. No, it isn't.
That said, I never could understand how some forms of music get bashed as being (translated) too cerebral or too difficult to follow or too something or another. I know a lot of people who turn on the radio just to have something to listen to, and I know a lot of people whose favorite music is something that makes them wiggle or bounce. They're friends of mine, and I'm seen with 'em. I just don't expect to find them on a site dedicated to musical instruments and the technique involved in using them to make music.
It's funny, the perjoratives people toss at thinking and the results of thought...
I think this is a big part of it. Coming out of the swing era jazz artist started ignoring dancers and gave the field up to blues musicians. "Bored" is a term I hear a lot. We went to a Paul Jackson Jr concert a few months ago. Since my wife came from a "pop" musical background she did not recognize his many covers of R&B songs and she was "bored" because she did not recognize the head of only a few of his songs
Along these line there is the immortal comment from Eddie and The Cruisers "words and music" without a vocal my wife and many other non-jazz listeners I know immediately declare they are bored. A band can be grooving as hard as any rock band but there is no emotional commitment to sound as there is to words, the hook specifically. Occasionally a smooth jazz, or fusion song will breakthrough but that happens about as often as a foreign language song breaks through.
I like to listen to music which matches up with the moods I feel. I have major depressive disorder and as a consequence I like to listen to a lot of classical, blues and certain kinds of rock, folk and country.
When I was younger going through my teenage angst I liked metal and heavier classical.
When I was a kid, I kinda liked bubblegum pop and funny stuff like Weird Al and whatnot.
So I figure If I ever develop a case of multiple personality disorders with severe OCD and chronic tourretts syndrome then I'll probably start thinkng jazz was the greatest thing ever invented. I'll even start wearing neon striped zuit suits and dancing the funky chicken with a bit of swing in my swagger.
When I was younger going through my teenage angst I liked metal and heavier classical.
When I was a kid, I kinda liked bubblegum pop and funny stuff like Weird Al and whatnot.
So I figure If I ever develop a case of multiple personality disorders with severe OCD and chronic tourretts syndrome then I'll probably start thinkng jazz was the greatest thing ever invented. I'll even start wearing neon striped zuit suits and dancing the funky chicken with a bit of swing in my swagger.
Musicians aside, most people just like catchy memorable tunes that they can sing along with or dance to and that is the exception and not the rule in jazz.
If I put on a jazz disc my wife just rolls her eyes, she can't stand it but same for me if she put's on her Dixie Chicks disc!
If I put on a jazz disc my wife just rolls her eyes, she can't stand it but same for me if she put's on her Dixie Chicks disc!
As far as I know, jazz was the popular music from 1910-ish to 1950-ish.
Classical music became more and more complex as time went by and Jazz took the flag and did the same thing. After that music get dumbed down to a point it isn't funny.
I heard a lot of people saying that jazz just sound like a bunch of notes that make no sense at all. I also heard that classical music and jazz are for elitism only ... like you need to be highly educated to appreciate music that require a lot of effort to make.
From more pop/rock/punk musician I heard phrases like it is too complex to bother with it they just want to have fun. Also, you need to have a theory background to understand and/or play it.
I think people listen to music like it is a merchandise ... like a t-shirt or a dress. They listen to it when it is popular but with the next mode comes, they put that song or band in the trash can and never bother again.
Classical music became more and more complex as time went by and Jazz took the flag and did the same thing. After that music get dumbed down to a point it isn't funny.
I heard a lot of people saying that jazz just sound like a bunch of notes that make no sense at all. I also heard that classical music and jazz are for elitism only ... like you need to be highly educated to appreciate music that require a lot of effort to make.
From more pop/rock/punk musician I heard phrases like it is too complex to bother with it they just want to have fun. Also, you need to have a theory background to understand and/or play it.
I think people listen to music like it is a merchandise ... like a t-shirt or a dress. They listen to it when it is popular but with the next mode comes, they put that song or band in the trash can and never bother again.
As someone who enjoys Jazz... As I was reading this thread I was getting kinda annoyed. Seems to be a lot of what Im taking in as -my musical taste is better than your musical taste- Maybe there is part of the problem right there
I don't buy into the theory that jazz is too complicated to the average listener or is uninviting. This is because, in my experience, the average listener isn't looking to disect a piece of music or approach it in the same way a musician does. The average listener wants a catchy tune and memorable lyrics. Most contemporary jazz only has the former, and so will never catch on in the mass market. Jazz that has vocals, however, will and has caught on in recent years (e.g. Norah Jones, Michael Buble and Esperanza Spalding).
Not to stir the pot or anything, but I think this is exactly why Jazz isn't as popular as Rock or any other pop genre. Because listening to Jazz is a status symbol as being sophisticated. Considering this isn't the fifties anymore and being sophisticated isn't "cool" these days, Jazz therefore becomes pretentious.
The messages and themes hidden in Jazz music, because it's not obvious or easily discovered, is therefore pretentious by societal standards. Even if it's not; esoteric messages hidden in music put other people off because of the aforementioned image of jazz that most people have in their mind: Usually somebody in their late fifties or forties wearing a turtle-neck who drinks brandy and closes his eyes really tightly when he listens to jazz and puts himself in the "Thinker" pose.
It's not that the average person isn't "capable" or anything like that; it's that they're predisposed to disregarding the entire genre because of stereotypes. It's not that they're shutting themselves out from Jazz--quite the contrary, from their perspective, it's Jazz that's shutting everyone out from it.
And WeatherChannel jazz...
I'm serious, I hated Jazz for the longest time because I had to listen to that dry type of jazz in car-rides for hours with my father. I despise it to this day.
