Double Bass Why isn't Jazz that popular? (DB forum thread)

[fishdreams]

While in these expansive musics there is a lot of overlap, generally speaking jazz is a form of music (which is no reason to be snobistic about it), pop and rock is a form of musical theatre, IMO.

As to the OP's original question: I also believe (but I am sure many will disagree) that the Wynton camp has done a lot of damage to the popularity of jazz. Ever since he made his reputation by badmouthing lots of musicians (some of who he really cant stand in the shadow of, IMO) and being a total bully about what is "not real jazz", this infighting has become the main theme of jazz through the last 3 decades.

This turns off a lot of people, and rightly so. It is like 13 year olds on youtube who defend their mini-turf as "the only real metal" and it just poisonous and harmful when adults engage in it.

It has been slowly getting a bit better,recently, and I hear lots of interesting music brewing in the jazz underground here in NY. So I am optimistic jazz will regain some relevancy in the marketplace, no matter how minimal.

 

[Jhengsman]

Let's see in 50 or so years who has the staying power.... (course, I won't be around to know, unless I live to be 101)

Lets see the pop star who also is building a movie career or the musician who plays small clubs and sells a relatively few records. I dare say 50 would win the battle of who our great grandchildren will know.

 

[Marial]

Someone brought up dancing earlier in the thread. From it's earliest days to the big-band era Jazz was dance music. It didn't become associated with cerebral exercise until the forties and fifties when it was elevated to the status of 'art'. The was a brief period between the fall of the big band era and the rise of rock and roll where this more cerebral music was popular, but people want to dance, they want to have their bodies moved, not just their minds.

Wynton Marsalis has, in my opinion, been both absolutely wonderful for jazz and horrible for it. Competitions like Essentially Ellington have been fantastic for outreach to kids and spreading the music to new generations (my nephew, now at USC, was a member of the Garfield jazz band here in Seattle which one the competition twice while he was a member, I'm a proud uncle). But Marsalis has also been part of the institutionalization of jazz, the hardening of its arteries, if you will.

People Lady Gaga, Keisha, country artists, etc., are popular both because of their visual style or message, but also because you can DANCE to their music. How much jazz can you dance to these days? Hell, even metal makes people dance, though it ain't one-two-three-box-step dancing.

I think the reason jazz isn't more popular is because it's an often times insular, cerebral, non-danceable form of music. I love jazz, but I'm not going to be dancing with my baby to A Love Supreme, or Branford Marsalis' The Black Keys, know what I mean?

And, of course, it goes without saying that there are many, many, forms of jazz and you can certainly dance to latin jazz, for instance, but we're again discussing mainstream music fans. Dudeberry in rural Indiana is probably going to be more likely to listen to Tobey Keith or Eminem or Nickelback (hey, someone's buying millions of their records) than Charles Mingus.

 

[RBrownBass]

To: auriaprottu

Don't

Dude, spare me. I'll type what I please.

Now you tell me why jazz is not more popular.

Maybe because people like you can walk into a full club with awesome players, walk out, log onto the Internet and make an observation that no one in that full club was wiggling around in their seat?

 

[transition]

the institutionalization of jazz, the hardening of its arteries, if you will.

Ignoring the popularity aspect, this is definitely a contentious point, and one that people often want to have both ways.

"Jazz deserves respect! Jazz is art, and should be given the same value as classical music!"

Jazz subsequently gets respect, treated like an artform, and in the process, institutionalized—just like classical music.*

"Jazz can't breathe in those stuffy confines! Jazz can't be put into a box! Jazz shouldn't be taught like that!"


*whatever that term means, which is a whole different discussion.

 

[lsabina]

Also, the majority of jazz is non-vocal...hence the inability to actually listen and discern a melody.

"poetry must be the obedient daughter of music"--W.A. Mozart

 

[dvh]

Lets see the pop star who also is building a movie career or the musician who plays small clubs and sells a relatively few records. I dare say 50 would win the battle of who our great grandchildren will know.

I understand what you are saying but it kind of underscores this whole discussion. Scofield's place is firmly established and his name will absolutely remain in the jazz canon. So, fewer of the hoi polloi will know of him... for me, at least, his presence in the musical scene means a lot more than 50 cent.... (or however that's spelled).

 

[Marial]

Ignoring the popularity aspect, this is definitely a contentious point, and one that people often want to have both ways.

"Jazz deserves respect! Jazz is art, and should be given the same value as classical music!"

Jazz subsequently gets respect, treated like an artform, and in the process, institutionalized—just like classical music.*

"Jazz can't breathe in those stuffy confines! Jazz can't be put into a box! Jazz shouldn't be taught like that!"


*whatever that term means, which is a whole different discussion.

Speaking only for myself, I don't want it both ways. I do not care about jazz being seen as America's Greatest Cultural Export or its status as America's True Classical Music.

 

[transition]

Speaking only for myself, I don't want it both ways.

Yeah, sorry Marial - I wasn't trying to imply that you were thinking like that.

You just touched on the topic, so I ran with it as if this were an in-person conversation.

 

[Marial]

No worries at all.

 

[transition]

And to be clear, I don't think there actually is an inherent conflict; I do think jazz can be given the respect it deserves, even in an institutional setting.

I don't necessarily agree with some of the approaches to jazz education within some of the institutions, but that, again, is a whole other conversation.

 

[MR PC]

I'm just wondering why Jazz really isn't as popular as other music as far as mainstream is concerned..

that's a really good question.

maybe for some of the same reasons that Charles Ives never became a household name in his lifetime?

 

[Bruce Lindfield]

I was listening to a radio programme about Lee Morgan the other day and they were saying how when the Sidewinder was released, it went into the charts as a popular hit single - but that was the last time that Jazz really troubled the chart!

I think that people growing up today don't realise that Jazz was the popular music of the 30s,40s, 50s and then was overtaken by pop and rock in the 60s. If you watch any B&W hollywood films/movies from that period - they are full of Jazz to the point where nobody batted an eyelid at the star role in the incredibly popular "Some Like it Hot" being a Jazz Double Bass player, struggling to find a living!

 

[fingerbun]

While in these expansive musics there is a lot of overlap, generally speaking jazz is a form of music (which is no reason to be snobistic about it), pop and rock is a form of musical theatre, IMO.

There are times when I know I should just walk away but I can't help myself.

There are many quotes in this thread I could have picked as a starting point, but, read the above quote which seems to say to me "jazz is music, pop and rock are not". If I were to say to you "The stuff you like to listen to isn't really music" how would you feel?

Do not make the mistake of confusing elegant simplicity with mediocrity, or complexity with virtue.

I play a lot of different styles, including jazz, though I am at best a mediocre jazz player. And in all styles I find great creativity, and mediocre commercialism. I find music that is accessible and music that is not. I find musicians who are about finding a sound people connect with, and musicians who are about satisfying what they personally want. I find musicians who are disciplined and musicians who are self indulgent.

Jazz, when someone like Norah Jones, Dianna Krall or Kenny G applies commercial principles to it, can sell. "What A Wonderful World" was a number one hit alongside "Good Morning Vietnam". "Sir Duke" was a killer single that still gets a lot of love whenever a bar band performs it.

Two of my all-time favourite records are jazz records - "The Golden Wedding" and "Now You Has Jazz" from the movie "High Society". But both of those tunes seem to me to conform to the rules of pop records as well as being in a jazz style.

I wonder if many reading here might dismiss the examples I have cited as mediocre.

At the same time, I think you need to acknowledge the skill of musicians in other genres. Eddie Van Halen's guitar mastery, the barrage of new sounds and techniques created over ten years by the Beatles (who still managed to achieve a certain level of commercial success...how they did that is worth pondering for jazz guys), the exploration of ideas by Mozart, Beethoven, etc.

Edit : to be fair, I do concede that a lot of pop and rock is about theatre rather than musical exploration, but I don't think jazz is any different in that regard. Nor any other style.

 

[pedroims]

Jazz is VERY popular, millions of people listen Jazz, BUT, Jazz is not a mass oriented music style, just like classic music, how many people have a Mozart's cd collection at home. This ''problem'' is not related only to music, you can find it everywhere, think about movies, million of people likes movie like Matrix, Pirates of the Caribbean, but they will never ever will watch a movie from Krzysztof Kieślowski, some other will prefer to drink 10 cans of miller lite rather than one pint of Trappist Westvleteren 12, some people think that Mc Donald's it is great! I can even tell that there are jazz players that watch Ocean Eleven while drinking a miller lite and eating a big mac

 

[fishdreams]

There are times when I know I should just walk away but I can't help myself.

There are many quotes in this thread I could have picked as a starting point, but, read the above quote which seems to say to me "jazz is music, pop and rock are not". If I were to say to you "The stuff you like to listen to isn't really music" how would you feel?

Do not make the mistake of confusing elegant simplicity with mediocrity, or complexity with virtue.

I play a lot of different styles, including jazz, though I am at best a mediocre jazz player. And in all styles I find great creativity, and mediocre commercialism. I find music that is accessible and music that is not. I find musicians who are about finding a sound people connect with, and musicians who are about satisfying what they personally want. I find musicians who are disciplined and musicians who are self indulgent.

Jazz, when someone like Norah Jones, Dianna Krall or Kenny G applies commercial principles to it, can sell. "What A Wonderful World" was a number one hit alongside "Good Morning Vietnam". "Sir Duke" was a killer single that still gets a lot of love whenever a bar band performs it.

Two of my all-time favourite records are jazz records - "The Golden Wedding" and "Now You Has Jazz" from the movie "High Society". But both of those tunes seem to me to conform to the rules of pop records as well as being in a jazz style.

I wonder if many reading here might dismiss the examples I have cited as mediocre.

At the same time, I think you need to acknowledge the skill of musicians in other genres. Eddie Van Halen's guitar mastery, the barrage of new sounds and techniques created over ten years by the Beatles (who still managed to achieve a certain level of commercial success...how they did that is worth pondering for jazz guys), the exploration of ideas by Mozart, Beethoven, etc.

Edit : to be fair, I do concede that a lot of pop and rock is about theatre rather than musical exploration, but I don't think jazz is any different in that regard. Nor any other style.

I really dont understand what you are getting from my statement.

I never implied or said there is a lack of musicianship in pop or rock. I do not rank musical theatre inferior to music. I also did not say that complexity equals virtue. What I am saying is that theatrical elements are a part of, say, Pete Townsend's or Bootsy Collins's toolbox, and not of, say, Joe Pass's or Ray Brown's toolbox. And they are all highly effective musicians in my book (and i dont rank one above the other)

What I did mean with this, is that that I have noticed (when I taught music in schools, for example) whole generations of kids who are unable to separate the choreography from the music, because that is what they have grown up with. So therefore, an art form like jazz therefore does not immedeately speak to them, and I think it is 1 reason why jazz is not so popular.

 

[AlmightyPancake]

Jazz isn't popular because... well, because music is always changing. You might as well be asking why Victorian-era folk music isn't jiving with modern times, or why Kabuki Theatre isn't as popular as Batman.

Tastes change, for a variety of reasons. It's got nothing to do with big mean corporations (although they may influence what the tastes change TO), or teenagers today being somehow dumber than teenagers of yesteryear (they're not). It's just the way art works. What's modern tends to be what's relevant, and what's relevant tends to be modern.

 

[fingerbun]

I really dont understand what you are getting from my statement.

I never implied or said there is a lack of musicianship in pop or rock. I do not rank musical theatre inferior to music. I also did not say that complexity equals virtue. What I am saying is that theatrical elements are a part of, say, Pete Townsend's or Bootsy Collins's toolbox, and not of, say, Joe Pass's or Ray Brown's toolbox. And they are all highly effective musicians in my book (and i dont rank one above the other)

What I did mean with this, is that that I have noticed (when I taught music in schools, for example) whole generations of kids who are unable to separate the choreography from the music, because that is what they have grown up with. So therefore, an art form like jazz therefore does not immedeately speak to them, and I think it is 1 reason why jazz is not so popular.

Well, first thing is, if I misunderstood what you said, I apologise. And I admit that my post was a lot broader than just a response to your post....I didn't mean to imply that I was just picking up on you.

I would compare Joe Pass more to someone like David Gilmour in terms of performance, and would put Bootsy Collins up against someone like Louis Armstrong perhaps.

I would accept the premise that popular musical performance often has an element of theatre about it, and I would say that some people obtain more kudos than their music deserves as a result of showmanship. But I think that happens in jazz as much as any other form. My teacher, who is VERY old school orchestral, dismisses the best jazz in the world as flashy hillbilly junk. "By all means play jazz for fun, but when you want to talk about REAL music..."

 

[beggar98]

Man, the "Why isn't jazz more popular?" is everywhere these days. Check out some Anthony Dean-Harris' essays on nextbop.com for some insights.

There are a ton of reasons why jazz lost so much popularity (and why it continues to experience shrinking audiences). A lot of jazz music is geared towards hardcore fans and other musicians. Ask someone for a good "introduction to jazz" record and they'll probably recommend a record that is 50+ years old. Those artists aren't on MTV or the covers of popular magazines, they aren't playing Saturday Night Live or Leno. That is a huge barrier to entry for uninitiated music listeners.

Couple with that the fact that many efforts to modernize jazz or incorporate elements of current-day popular music are often met by scowling disapproval from the jazz establishment and arguments about what is and isn't "real jazz". Note the comments about the US3 tune above. Sure, that song isn't "real jazz", but I'm willing to bet when that song was a hit it inspired a lot of people to dig into Herbie Hancock who wouldn't have otherwise. And from Herbie they can get into Miles and from Miles they can pretty much discover the entire history of the music. Why should this be a bad thing?

 

[JtheJazzMan]

It might elicit all sorts of unorthodox thoughts. Next we'll be seeing electric double basses in the main double bass section!