Billy B

I would like to see this get back on topic. The young jazz academics learn from guys like Pat Harbison and David Baker where as Pat Harbison and David Baker learned from people like Woody Shaw and George Russel. It doesn't matter where you live. That experience simply doesn't exist. Add in the degrees available from university and you have a scene similar to what happened to classical music. This turned off a lot of listeners as a certain amount of academic snobbery took place.

The question still stands and I think it is an important one that Jazz educators must ask themselves regularly.
Has academia provided the vehicle for the preservation of Jazz or has it become an elitist club that limits the common man's accessibility to this music called Jazz?

bas

I have a problem with the term "preservation of jazz". That term has leanings toward the point of jazz as a museum piece. I prefer to think that a university program should set a strong foundation in all of the music that has come before us and instill a curiosity as to what the music can evolve into. I believe that there are many institutions that teach with this in mind.

All roads lead from Bebop, but don't stop in the mid 60s.....

As for the thought that academia has turned the music into an elitist club that limits the common man's accessibility....I am not sure if this could be blamed on academia itself. Jazz is an art music and most art is unaccessible intellectually to most of the American public. Mayba more of a social statement that a statement about academia's role.

JunkyT

If we as Jazz musicians think of our music as "art music", we are doomed.

Jazz is soul music. And I don't mean like Otis Redding. I mean music that comes from, and should stir, the soul. Why should that be "unaccessible (sic) intellectually to most of the American public"?

Read some of the writings of Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Horace Silver, Art Blakey, hell, even Wynton Marsalis. They all talk about playing music FOR the audience, not for themselves or other musicians.

Until we get over our inferiority complexes and view our music just as much "for the people" as pop, hip-hop or country music, we are relegating ourselves to the museums.

Academia is only one part of the equation, and I think a small one at that (as far as bringing the music to the masses). Academic institutions can help, but it's up to us as players of Jazz to find, cultivate and grow our own audiences.

IMHO. ;)

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bas

[quote=JunkyT;307108]If we as Jazz musicians think of our music as "art music", we are doomed. .....Jazz is soul music.

Well said and point well taken. Good food for thought.


Why should that be "unaccessible (sic) intellectually to most of the American public"?

I often wonder the same thing....but to the vast majority of people it is. So even though a jazz musician plays, in their opinion, music for the masses, it rarely is.

JunkyT...you are right on the money on your comments. I did not mean to put an attitude out there when I used the term "art music", but improvised music is an art. It is music to be listened to and diigested and that is where the disconnect begins with the masses. IMHO

uatrmpt

This is precisely where Jazz left the pavement. It had run its course as popular music (swing & the big bands) and the jazz-as-art mentality doesn't do anything to help its popularity. Accessibility is the key; and, since bebop, jazz hasn't been accessible to the majority of people.

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trpt2345

But unfortunately there isn't an audience anymore as there was when Louis, Duke, Horace and Blakey were around. Even into the sixties and seventies there was a network of clubs around the country where a band like Horace Silver's or Art Blakey's or Coltrane's or Miles' could get steady year 'round work. That enviornment has collapsed. Part of the challenge of jazz education is to create an audience for real jazz again. Without an audience it's a museum music. I think the biggest challenge that jazz as an art form faces is that the enviornment that forstered its development, indeed made it possible, has completely disappeared. Jazz musicians are now a fauna without a natural habitat.
That being said, jazz is indeed an art music, African American art music to be specific. It has standards and requirements as stringent as any in the history of the world. Whether it can survive as a live and vital form or just as an academic and museum form remains to be seen. One thing that I find encouraging is that it has become an underground and alternative art form again, like in the bebop days. I doubt Charlie Parker ever sold more than 5000 copies of any recording.

Michael McLaughlin

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Billy B

<Part of the challenge of jazz education is to create an audience for real jazz again. Without an audience it's a museum music.>

This is the same challenge being met by orchestras. Not too many years ago orchestras were on the ropes, partly because of their elitist attitude. I think this was at least partly due to the universitites. I know a DMA brass student who was asked on his exam how many piano sonatas Beethoven wrote. So is the painting upside down? Should it matter?

gridjam

Hey all,

I have been following this thread and I have some thoughts.

First one: Des Moines ROCKS!!
J

The initial jist was along the lines that there is a young generation that has no sense of how the music works, feels, sounds, smells, etc…

I agree but I don’t see it as a negative unless the elements of swing + groove, blues, communication and story-line have been completely ruled out. Along with that, a sense of history, a passion for the spirit of improvised music and an appreciation of the African rhythms mixed with European harmonies. (I believe Duke Ellington described jazz along those lines-last 6 words)

If any of these are missing, then there is a problem.

If the students are not getting acquainted with the above elements and their teachers can’t inspire them to fall in love with these particular fundamentals then they will be lost and probably WON’T be able to appreciate Miles or Wayne even or Louis for that matter.

Bottom line, Jazz school is an odd concept. I went to Berklee and played, A LOT. I met people who I still play with to this day. I don’t remember anyone forcing a style or a practice concept down my throat but I did get a lot of tools for my trade that I put to use once I was released from the ‘organized’ world of school. There are many young players around the world that will be players and already are players (before school), there are others that study but don’t get it, there are others who do get it and don’t play much, there are others who don’t get it but eventually do and come out screaming( years later) with an original and important voice.

To generalize and criticize is not the answer, to do what Art Farmer did (and so many of my friends did for me) and sit me down and expose me to the music I needed to hear is.



As far as places to live?:

Yes, New York on a random Tuesday can yield some pretty amazing stuff BUT, so can a lot of pocket scenes around the world! Ha, last week I sat in with a cookin and grooving like mad student brass band in, of all places, Missoula Montana!!!

gridjam

some more thoughts...
…but improvised music is an art. It is music to be listened to and digested and that is where the disconnect begins, with the masses…

Definitely! People in more cultured and educated areas of the world have not only the tolerance, but the desire to hear things they have never heard before and to go on ear adventures without all the show-biz and hoop-la that some think necessary to sell ‘the jazz’. This opens an entirely new set of questions so all I will add to this is that, as Duke, said “If it’s good music, it’s good music.” I thank my mother daily for filling my ears with ‘good music’ and for teaching me the difference without lecturing me. (too much…)





as for the thought that academia has turned the music into an elitist club that limits the common man's accessibility....I am not sure if this could be blamed on academia itself. Jazz is an art music and most art is un-accessible intellectually to most of the American public. Maybe more of a social statement that a statement about academia's role.



Hmm? Not sure if I agree with all of this. I have been to small towns in the states and Europe, and received incredibly excited responses from people who know little or nothing about the art-form. Audiences that put the slick cultured city-folk to shame. As a player who plays from the muse space: me/band/music/room sound/soul energy from crowd/divine spirits hanging out, etc..(order varies) I can testify that when a band is a band and are in love with the music they are playing and with supporting one another, there are no limitations on where your audience will go!


Peace,

ecarroll

Wonderful thread.

Pax,
EC