Music in the 20th century
Bogdan Tudose
What do you think is the most important phenomenon in music
in the 20th century?
I would have to say jazz; I would also have to say that it's time to
ease the separation of 'classical' music from its more popular relatives
and recognize
there is bad music and there is good music, and the latter is not to be
found
in classical music only.
So now I ask the music lovers in this group: what non-classical
music do you appreciate most? Do you think it holds value comparable to
classical masterpieces?
Come on, it's time to come out of the closet...
I'll go first: I listen to a lot of jazz, among my favorites being the
Louis
Armstrong Hot Fives and Hot Sevens sessions, the Count Basie from the
thirties on Decca, all of Coltrane, Ornette Coleman, Chick Corea (at
least his
avantgarde period).
The French chanson, starting with Piaf ( I heard you , Samir...), Brel
and Brassens,
plus a couple great new bands: Tetes Raides and La Tordue. Then Dylan,
Yes, Genesis and King Crimson... I have 'The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway'
on right now.
I think classical music is on its way to extinction unless it renews its
historically
fertile contact with the popular genres and foregoes the obsession with
its
own history.
Bogdan
samir ghiocel golescu
On Fri, 25 Feb 2000, Bogdan Tudose wrote:
>
> What do you think is the most important phenomenon in music
> in the 20th century?
The same phenomenon that was the most important in the European culture of
the last centuries.
> I would have to say jazz;
Before Shostakovich, Enescu, Ravel, Pfitzner, Messiaen, Hindemith etc.
etc.? (some other music lovers would pick other names,
probably, some of them more recent than mine)
> I would also have to say that it's time to
> ease the separation of 'classical' music from its more popular relatives
> and recognize
> there is bad music and there is good music, and the latter is not to be
> found
> in classical music only.
I would have to say that this "easyfying" went already far, much to far.
I would say that not only good music is to be found, in classical
music!(-:
> So now I ask the music lovers in this group: what non-classical
> music do you appreciate most? Do you think it holds value comparable to
> classical masterpieces?
>
> Come on, it's time to come out of the closet...
>
> I'll go first: I listen to a lot of jazz, among my favorites being the
> Louis
> Armstrong Hot Fives and Hot Sevens sessions, the Count Basie from the
> thirties on Decca, all of Coltrane, Ornette Coleman, Chick Corea (at
> least his
> avantgarde period).
Jazz, at its best (including the names quoted by you) is admittedly
different from classical music, but it is at least as different from "pop"
music as it is from "classical" and that's a compliment.
> The French chanson, starting with Piaf ( I heard you , Samir...), Brel
> and Brassens,
> plus a couple great new bands: Tetes Raides and La Tordue. Then Dylan,
> Yes, Genesis and King Crimson... I have 'The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway'
> on right now.
You are moving toward the end too much higher, to express myself politely,
than the zones I can access... (-:
> I think classical music is on its way to extinction unless it renews its
> historically
> fertile contact with the popular genres and foregoes the obsession with
> its
> own history.
Popular genres cannot help. The dilemma of the classical composer today
seems to be: uncomprehensibility (the composer delights himself in a
language invented by himself and understood only by himself) OR vulgarity
(comprehensibility does not equate [cheap] accessibility).
Let me rephrase yours: classical music is on its way to extinction unless
it renews its fertile contact with what is alive in its own history,
finding the light of the future in the sublime ashes of the past.
regards,
SG
Steve Emerson
>
[deletions]
> I'll go first: I listen to a lot of jazz, among my favorites being the
> Louis
> Armstrong Hot Fives and Hot Sevens sessions, the Count Basie from the
> thirties on Decca, all of Coltrane, Ornette Coleman, Chick Corea (at
> least his
> avantgarde period). [deletions]
A refreshing post, and pleasant to see you mention Ornette. To the name
of Corea (and preceding it, really) I would like to add Cecil Taylor,
Paul Bley, Andrew Hill, Abdullah Ibrahim, Muhal Richard Abrams, Ran
Blake, Dave Burrell, Walter Norris, Jaki Byard, and before them, Herbie
Nichols, Thelonious Monk, Bud Powell, Richard Twardzik, Lennie Tristano,
not to mention Tommy Flanagan, Evans, Horace Silver, Elmo Hope, John
Lewis, Hampton Hawes, Joe Albany, Erroll Garner, to go just back to the
bop era, among the pianists, leaving out legions of worthies. But you're
right, the Corea of the "Now He Sings..." period was good.
Quoth Ran Blake (of the New England Conservatory): "How can anyone
seriously think they can conduct an orchestra if they've never listened
to Tadd Dameron."
Otherwise, for me the comparative-value gambit becomes reductive, and
actually has nothing to do with how art works. I find great value in
music of innumerable kinds.
SE.
Simon Roberts
: So now I ask the music lovers in this group: what non-classical
: music do you appreciate most?
None
Do you think it holds value comparable to
: classical masterpieces?
No, they're all different, and are presumably best evaluated by their own
standards, whatever they are; none of them has any value to me at all,
though my reactions range from indifference to strong dislike (which is
also how I react to much classical music...).
Simon
Raymond Hall
>
> What do you think is the most important phenomenon in music
> in the 20th century?
>
> ease the separation of 'classical' music from its more popular relatives
> and recognize
> there is bad music and there is good music, and the latter is not to be
> found
> in classical music only.
>
> classical masterpieces?
>
>
> Louis
> Armstrong Hot Fives and Hot Sevens sessions, the Count Basie from the
> thirties on Decca, all of Coltrane, Ornette Coleman, Chick Corea (at
> least his
> avantgarde period).
>
Johnny Dodds, Bechet, up through Coleman Hawkins, then through Charlie
Parkie, Gillespie, Gerry Mulligan (that baritone sax, wow), early
Coltrane, McCoy Tyner, Mingus, Phil Woods, with a special mention for
Billie Holiday (a study in human heartbreak),
and for Samir, then who can really forget the great Edith Piaf?
As for Miles Davis .... yucky poo!!
And .... and ..... wait for it ... Doris Day. She makes me happy.
Listening proportioned 85% classical, 15% the above.
Regards,
Ray Hall, Sydney
Mike Humberston
>What do you think is the most important phenomenon in music
>in the 20th century?
The Second World War.
>I would have to say jazz; I would also have to say that it's time to
>ease the separation of 'classical' music from its more popular relatives
>and recognize
>there is bad music and there is good music, and the latter is not to be
>found
>in classical music only.
>
>So now I ask the music lovers in this group: what non-classical
>music do you appreciate most? Do you think it holds value comparable to
> classical masterpieces?
I also listen to some Jazz for pleasure. I'm not sure that I would
consider any to have as great as value as the classical masterpieces.
>I think classical music is on its way to extinction unless it renews its
>historically
>fertile contact with the popular genres and foregoes the obsession with
>its
>own history.
I don't understand what you are trying to say. I don't see an
obsession with history.
Mike Humberston
unbar email address to reply
I Fagiolini's Web Page: http://www.philomel.demon.co.uk/fagiolini
David Hurwitz
> > in the 20th century?
> >
Agreed, 100%
>I would also have to say that it's time to
> > ease the separation of 'classical' music from its more popular relatives
> > and recognize
> > there is bad music and there is good music, and the latter is not to be
> > found
> > in classical music only.
Also agreed, and very important to the survival of "classical" music.
> > So now I ask the music lovers in this group: what non-classical
> > music do you appreciate most?
Ella Fitzgerald (greatest singer of the 20th century); Esquivel; Duke
Ellington; Simon and Garfunkel; The Beatles; Gentle Giant; 70s rock in
general; Coltrane; Miles Davis; Oscar Peterson; Bill Evans; Art Tatum; lots
of Broadway: Sondheim, Rodgers, Kern, Porter; Sarah Vaughan; Dagmar Kraus;
Brian Eno; Modern Jazz Quartet; Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass; Burt
Bacharach; Lionel Hampton; Thelonius Monk
>>Do you think it holds value comparable to
> > classical masterpieces?
Certainly it does. Good music is good music. However, I don't believe that
"styles" (such as Jazz or Pop) have any value as such (nor does
"Romanticism" or "Expressionism" in classical music). You cannot compare
styles except in a totally subjective way with respect to personal
preference; only works of the same formal type can be compared by at least
some reasonably objective musical criteria defined by the form itself. Thus,
classical songs are fully comparable to pop songs, because the definition of
"song" hasn't changed. This issue in such a case is simple: do the music and
words go together, and how sophisticated or ambitious is the composer is his
selection and approach to the setting of song texts. On the other hand, you
cannot compare a song to a symphony, even if they are by the same composer,
in terms of musical ambition, formal complexity, etc. Jazz, when it does not
consist of songs, generally employs variation forms or multi-movement suite
forms, and these are certainly comparable to their "classical" equivalents.
Duke Ellington's extended suites are at least as fine as any number of
Baroque dance suites (better than most, in my opinion), for example, or
suites from ballets or incidental music. An extended piano improvisation
based on a song tune is certainly comparable to a similar keyboard piece by
Byrd based on a popular theme (like "Sellinger's Round"). The separation of
music by style, while convenient in terms of what listeners may or may not
prefer, says absolutely nothing about the sophistication or musical quality
of individual works created within that style. This can only be assessed on
a case by case basis. The comparison between Jazz and the Baroque is no
accident, incidentally. Both styles offer forms of great strictness, an
emphasis on counterpoint, and many opportunities for improvisation and
ornamentation, and this is why there have been so many effective Jazz
arrangements based on Baroque music.
>>I think classical music is on its way to extinction unless it renews its
>>historically fertile contact with the popular genres and foregoes the
obsession with
>>its own history.
Classical composers have never forgotten this, even if many listeners have.
The cross fertilization of musical genres and styles is ongoing, and you can
be sure that much of the music mindlessly revered here in rmcr was
considered hopelessly vulgar and trashy by its contemporaries for exactly
this reason. Classical music is not a "thing," but a "process," by which the
greatest music of all styles and genres is selected and perpetuated in
performance by succeeding generations. It therefore cannot die, though it
can certainly change, and in fact does. "Classical music" is not obsessed
with its own history; some of its less than mentally healthy enthusiasts
certainly are, though.
--
David Hurwitz
Executive Editor
http://www.classicstoday.com
dhur...@classicstoday.com
"Raymond Hall" <hallr...@bigpond.com> wrote in message
news:38B75888...@bigpond.com...
Evelyn Vogt Gamble (Divamanque)
ability to RECORD it, of course! (What's the name of this
news group, again?)
Bogdan Tudose wrote:
>
> What do you think is the most important phenomenon in music
> in the 20th century?
>
> I would have to say jazz; I would also have to say that it's time to
> ease the separation of 'classical' music from its more popular relatives
> and recognize
> there is bad music and there is good music, and the latter is not to be
> found
> in classical music only.
>
> So now I ask the music lovers in this group: what non-classical
> music do you appreciate most? Do you think it holds value comparable to
> classical masterpieces?
>
> Come on, it's time to come out of the closet...
>
> I'll go first: I listen to a lot of jazz, among my favorites being the
> Louis
> Armstrong Hot Fives and Hot Sevens sessions, the Count Basie from the
> thirties on Decca, all of Coltrane, Ornette Coleman, Chick Corea (at
> least his
> avantgarde period).
>
> The French chanson, starting with Piaf ( I heard you , Samir...), Brel
> and Brassens,
> plus a couple great new bands: Tetes Raides and La Tordue. Then Dylan,
> Yes, Genesis and King Crimson... I have 'The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway'
> on right now.
>
> I think classical music is on its way to extinction unless it renews its
> historically
> fertile contact with the popular genres and foregoes the obsession with
> its
> own history.
>
> Bogdan
>
> http://altern.org/btudose/
Bob Taffelsen
golden age from about 1955 to about 1975, then went downhill. Jazz had
at least two golden ages, with lots of good stuff in between, but it did
not spread to the entire world.
Anyway, it was a great century for classical music. The names speak for
themselves: Bartok, Stravinsky, Szymanowski, Webern, Martinu, Britten,
Prokofiev, Villa Lobos and so many other giants of music. Original
music, great music, not gimmicks. The gimmicks wear out their welcome
and disappear.
Boundaries have never been rigid. I am not talking about Krossover Krap
here. Composers hear lots of music outside their chosen genre. They
absorb it. So do performers.
Cheers,
BobT
Jeremy Dimmick
> ease the separation of 'classical' music from its more popular relatives
> and recognize
> there is bad music and there is good music, and the latter is not to be
> found
> in classical music only.
>
> So now I ask the music lovers in this group: what non-classical
> music do you appreciate most? Do you think it holds value comparable to
> classical masterpieces?
I listen to a lot of jazz, primarily the 'bop'-oriented innovators like Fats
Navarro and Bud Powell, and then postwar musicians like Coltrane, Mingus and
Eric Dolphy. The later Coltrane is an interesting case for me because I
appreciate things albums like 'The John Coltrane Quartet Plays' more for
their compositions and arrangements than for the actual improvisations,
whose logic I can't quite follow any more. This puts me in mind of the
basic issue that makes it difficult or unhelpful to compare jazz (or many
flavours of it at least) with any other musical tradition: music that's good
to improvise to needs on the whole to be quite simply and stereotypically
composed. Some of jazz's ambitions towards occupying the place of classical
music seem to me to be dead ends because they exacerbate the tension between
the composer-as-writer and the player-as-improvising-composer.
> I think classical music is on its way to extinction unless it renews its
> historically fertile contact with the popular genres and foregoes the
obsession with
> its own history.
>
There I disagree. Jazz itself has had a profoundly creative relationship
with its own past as well as with other musical traditions, and I simply
don't see these two as an antithesis. Music needs to be continually
reinventing itself and its history; you can't innovate unless you have a
sense of time.
jd
Bogdan Tudose
Mike Humberston wrote:
> >I think classical music is on its way to extinction unless it renews its
> >historically
> >fertile contact with the popular genres and foregoes the obsession with
> >its
> >own history.
>
> I don't understand what you are trying to say. I don't see an
> obsession with history.
>
> Mike Humberston
>
I mean too many musicians are exclusively involved in performing music
at least a hundred years old and too few are composing.
Bogdan
Bogdan Tudose
Jeremy Dimmick wrote:
> > I think classical music is on its way to extinction unless it renews its
> > historically fertile contact with the popular genres and foregoes the
> obsession with
> > its own history.
> >
> There I disagree. Jazz itself has had a profoundly creative relationship
> with its own past as well as with other musical traditions, and I simply
> don't see these two as an antithesis. Music needs to be continually
> reinventing itself and its history; you can't innovate unless you have a
> sense of time.
>
> jd
I meant: exclusive obsession with history is bad. Absorbing it is oviously
crucial. As for jazz, it is still too young for that; its bleeding edge is
still vital.
Bogdan
Bogdan Tudose
"Evelyn Vogt Gamble (Divamanque)" wrote:
> Most important thing in music in the 20th century? Why the
> ability to RECORD it, of course! (What's the name of this
> news group, again?)
>
You're right of course. The best and at the same time the worst
thing that could have happened to classical music.
Bogdan
Bogdan Tudose
Raymond Hall wrote:
>
> Agree with you on jazz. Much of the early jazz, Beiderbecke, Morton,
> Johnny Dodds, Bechet, up through Coleman Hawkins, then through Charlie
> Parkie, Gillespie, Gerry Mulligan (that baritone sax, wow), early
> Coltrane, McCoy Tyner, Mingus, Phil Woods, with a special mention for
> Billie Holiday (a study in human heartbreak),
> and for Samir, then who can really forget the great Edith Piaf?
> As for Miles Davis .... yucky poo!!
>
> And .... and ..... wait for it ... Doris Day. She makes me happy.
>
> Listening proportioned 85% classical, 15% the above.
>
> Regards,
>
> Ray Hall, Sydney
Yes, I forgot Billie Holiday, my favorite jazz singer...
Bogdan
Bogdan Tudose
samir ghiocel golescu wrote:
> On Fri, 25 Feb 2000, Bogdan Tudose wrote:
>
> >
> > What do you think is the most important phenomenon in music
> > in the 20th century?
>
> The same phenomenon that was the most important in the European culture of
> the last centuries.
Which one is that?
>
>
> > I would have to say jazz;
>
> Before Shostakovich, Enescu, Ravel, Pfitzner, Messiaen, Hindemith etc.
> etc.? (some other music lovers would pick other names,
> probably, some of them more recent than mine)
I meant important as in influential, carrying the potential to germinate
new styles and currents, and not as a measure of the intrinsic value of the
output of one particular artist. The composers you mention and many others
have written immortal masterpieces, but that does not necessarily mean they
were the beacons of musical evolution.
>
>
>
> > I would also have to say that it's time to
> > ease the separation of 'classical' music from its more popular relatives
> > and recognize
> > there is bad music and there is good music, and the latter is not to be
> > found
> > in classical music only.
>
> I would have to say that this "easyfying" went already far, much to far.
>
> I would say that not only good music is to be found, in classical
> music!(-:
Well, I don't mean "The Symphonic Pink Floyd"; that kind of stuff is
worthless,
but try to listen to King Crimson's "Lark's Tongues in Aspic" and I doubt you
will find it "easy"; a little vulgar? Maybe.
>
>
>
> > I think classical music is on its way to extinction unless it renews its
> > historically
> > fertile contact with the popular genres and foregoes the obsession with
> > its
> > own history.
>
> Popular genres cannot help. The dilemma of the classical composer today
> seems to be: uncomprehensibility (the composer delights himself in a
> language invented by himself and understood only by himself) OR vulgarity
> (comprehensibility does not equate [cheap] accessibility).
>
> Let me rephrase yours: classical music is on its way to extinction unless
> it renews its fertile contact with what is alive in its own history,
> finding the light of the future in the sublime ashes of the past.
>
> regards,
> SG
Of course, the vast majority of popular music is trash, but there are some
good
things out there that anyone seriously interested in music should not ignore.
The history is important but it should not be the only source.
Bogdan
samir ghiocel golescu
On Sat, 26 Feb 2000, Bogdan Tudose wrote:
>
> samir ghiocel golescu wrote:
>
> > On Fri, 25 Feb 2000, Bogdan Tudose wrote:
> >
> > >
> > > What do you think is the most important phenomenon in music
> > > in the 20th century?
> >
> > The same phenomenon that was the most important in the European culture of
> > the last centuries.
>
> Which one is that?
Classical music--as an organic, evolving phenomenon--that we name it
"classical" or otherwise.
> > > I would have to say jazz;
> >
> > Before Shostakovich, Enescu, Ravel, Pfitzner, Messiaen, Hindemith etc.
> > etc.? (some other music lovers would pick other names,
> > probably, some of them more recent than mine)
>
> I meant important as in influential, carrying the potential to germinate
> new styles and currents, and not as a measure of the intrinsic value of the
> output of one particular artist. The composers you mention and many others
> have written immortal masterpieces, but that does not necessarily mean they
> were the beacons of musical evolution.
The distinction brings much better sense.
Two questions raised:
1) why is the evolutionary principle more important than the intrinsic
value of an accomplished masterpiece, written in a more or less
"revolutionary idiom"?
2) even in your newly specified acception of "most important", I doubt
jazz is the most influential. I don't claim I know which *is*, I believe
we don't have yet the perspective to judge that. But what you say may be
convincingly argued, I'm sure.
> > > I think classical music is on its way to extinction unless it renews its
> > > historically
> > > fertile contact with the popular genres and foregoes the obsession with
> > > its
> > > own history.
> >
> > Popular genres cannot help. The dilemma of the classical composer today
> > seems to be: uncomprehensibility (the composer delights himself in a
> > language invented by himself and understood only by himself) OR vulgarity
> > (comprehensibility does not equate [cheap] accessibility).
> >
> > Let me rephrase yours: classical music is on its way to extinction unless
> > it renews its fertile contact with what is alive in its own history,
> > finding the light of the future in the sublime ashes of the past.
>
> Of course, the vast majority of popular music is trash, but there are some
> good things out there that anyone seriously interested in music should
> not ignore.
Yes, there are some good things, even this "fundamentalist" (-: enjoys
some, just that I do not extract a compatible meaning from them and
from "classical" music--which is not, of course, suggesting you do.
> The history is important but it should not be the only source.
Absolutely true--and thanks for what was, beyond slight disagreements, an
interesting posting.
regards,
Samir
David Grayshan
> (Snip)
>
> And .... and ..... wait for it ... Doris Day. She makes me happy.
>
(Snip)
Amazing. She's one of my faves too. Those Hollywood musicals she sang in were
close to 100% crap, she was the sole redeeming feature in them. Even when she
was singing crappy songs she was watchable. But if you want to know what she
*might* have become if Hollywood had not got its dirty hands on her, you have
to watch those 8 minute black & white 1-reelers (I forget the name for them)
that were produced for showing in those machine things (help! what were they
called?).
She sang some simple torch-songs and she sang them like an angel. She was
quite breathtaking and a true popular singing artist was revealed, lord knows
what she might have done if she had not "gone to Hollywood".
David.
jan winter
wrote:
>"Evelyn Vogt Gamble (Divamanque)" wrote:
>
>> Most important thing in music in the 20th century? Why the
>> ability to RECORD it, of course! (What's the name of this
>> news group, again?)
>>
>
>You're right of course. The best and at the same time the worst
>thing that could have happened to classical music.
But also: you wouldn't know about jazz if it wasn't recorded.
Moreover; a lot of other ethnic music, now, like jazz, extinct or
heavily coca-cola-ized, would not have been heard of.
I think Evelyn hit the nail on the head.
--
regards,
jan winter, amsterdam
(j.wi...@xs4all.nl)
music is the healing force of the universe
(Albert Ayler)
jan winter
wrote:
>Jeremy Dimmick wrote:
>
>> > I think classical music is on its way to extinction unless it renews its
>> > historically fertile contact with the popular genres and foregoes the
>> obsession with
>> > its own history.
>> >
>> There I disagree. Jazz itself has had a profoundly creative relationship
>> with its own past as well as with other musical traditions, and I simply
>> don't see these two as an antithesis. Music needs to be continually
>> reinventing itself and its history; you can't innovate unless you have a
>> sense of time.
>>
>> jd
>
>I meant: exclusive obsession with history is bad. Absorbing it is oviously
>crucial. As for jazz, it is still too young for that; its bleeding edge is
>still vital.
Listening to jazz *is* an exclusive obsession with history. Jazz is
dead. From the about 50 jazz musicians mentioned in this thread so far
at least 80% is dead and most of the rest, to say the least, far past
their expiration date.
jan winter
wrote:
(snip)
>Quoth Ran Blake (of the New England Conservatory): "How can anyone
>seriously think they can conduct an orchestra if they've never listened
>to Tadd Dameron."
That's a nice one. But, however much I admire Dameron's gifts as
composer, arranger *and* pianist, I hope Blake wasn't too serious.
>Otherwise, for me the comparative-value gambit becomes reductive, and
>actually has nothing to do with how art works. I find great value in
>music of innumerable kinds.
Agreed. As long as every one of us can use his own definition of
'innumerable'.
Bogdan Tudose
David Hurwitz wrote:
> Classical composers have never forgotten this, even if many listeners have.
> The cross fertilization of musical genres and styles is ongoing, and you can
> be sure that much of the music mindlessly revered here in rmcr was
> considered hopelessly vulgar and trashy by its contemporaries for exactly
> this reason.
What music would that be? Mindlessly revered?... What does that mean?
> Classical music is not a "thing," but a "process," by which the
> greatest music of all styles and genres is selected and perpetuated in
> performance by succeeding generations. It therefore cannot die, though it
> can certainly change, and in fact does.
I agree, it is a process, but that does not mean it cannot die, or at least
hibernate...
> "Classical music" is not obsessed
> with its own history; some of its less than mentally healthy enthusiasts
> certainly are, though.
So you're the resident shrink here. Things start
to make a little more sense now...
Bogdan
Bogdan Tudose
samir ghiocel golescu wrote:
> > > > I would have to say jazz;
> > >
> > > Before Shostakovich, Enescu, Ravel, Pfitzner, Messiaen, Hindemith etc.
> > > etc.? (some other music lovers would pick other names,
> > > probably, some of them more recent than mine)
> >
> > I meant important as in influential, carrying the potential to germinate
> > new styles and currents, and not as a measure of the intrinsic value of the
> > output of one particular artist. The composers you mention and many others
> > have written immortal masterpieces, but that does not necessarily mean they
> > were the beacons of musical evolution.
>
> The distinction brings much better sense.
>
> Two questions raised:
>
> 1) why is the evolutionary principle more important than the intrinsic
> value of an accomplished masterpiece, written in a more or less
> "revolutionary idiom"?
The intrinsic value is more important to the individual listener, while the
potential for evolution is crucial for the vitality of music as a living
organism.
>
>
> 2) even in your newly specified acception of "most important", I doubt
> jazz is the most influential. I don't claim I know which *is*, I believe
> we don't have yet the perspective to judge that. But what you say may be
> convincingly argued, I'm sure.
One argument would be that the evolution of jazz happened with tremendous
momentum, branching out in different styles, fashions that usually hate
each other with passion; it influenced all music-making including classical from
Gershwin to the avant-garde. You're right that we're too close to know for sure,
but being close also has its advantages.
>
>
>
> > Of course, the vast majority of popular music is trash, but there are some
> > good things out there that anyone seriously interested in music should
> > not ignore.
>
> Yes, there are some good things, even this "fundamentalist" (-: enjoys
> some, just that I do not extract a compatible meaning from them and
> from "classical" music--which is not, of course, suggesting you do.
I agree; on the other hand, such diversity of idiom and meaning exists
in classical music itself: a Bach fugue speaks a different language than
a Mahler symphony.
>
>
> > The history is important but it should not be the only source.
>
> Absolutely true--and thanks for what was, beyond slight disagreements, an
> interesting posting.
>
> regards,
> Samir
Disagreements are my favorite pastime...
Bogdan
David Hurwitz
can
> > be sure that much of the music mindlessly revered here in rmcr was
> > considered hopelessly vulgar and trashy by its contemporaries for
exactly
> > this reason.
> What music would that be? Mindlessly revered?... What does that mean?
Read Slonimsky's "Lexicon of Musical Invective" and find out. "Mindlessly
revered" means just what it says. Unthinkingly treated with a reverence it
does not need or does not deserve.
> I agree, it is a process, but that does not mean it cannot die, or at
least
> hibernate...
Only with the extinction of the human race; the process cannot be stopped.
> So you're the resident shrink here. Things start
> to make a little more sense now...
Not by choice, but you don't need a degree in psychology to recognize Bedlam
when you see it.
Ibkco
in the 20th century?
The advent of "electrical recording" in 1925 via the development of the vacuum
tube amplifier and the condenser microphone.
The ability to record music was actually a 19th century development of Edison
and Berliner albeit acoustical.
Ira Kraemer
samir ghiocel golescu
On Sun, 27 Feb 2000, Raymond Hall wrote:
> > Listening to jazz *is* an exclusive obsession with history. Jazz is
> > dead.
> I wouldn't necessarily say it is an obsession. Why couldn't it simply be
> an intense admiration for supremely gifted musicianship, given to a
> chosen few, for whom musical expression often had a deep and profound
> effect, on themselves, as well as their devotees.
> If it is dead, which I sincerely doubt, and maybe jazz is in some sort
> of hiatus (and waiting to continue evolving), then the flame that burnt
> so brightly and became extinguished (as you claim), is mercifully
> preserved for us in recordings.
Oh, that's interesting--may I use your text, changing "jazz" with
"Mengelberg"? (-:
regards,
SG
Russell W. Miller
news:38B84B49...@tschan-partner.com...
> Raymond Hall wrote:
>
> > (Snip)
> >
> > And .... and ..... wait for it ... Doris Day. She makes me happy.
> >
>
> (Snip)
>
> Amazing. She's one of my faves too. Those Hollywood musicals she sang in
were
> close to 100% crap, she was the sole redeeming feature in them. Even when
she
> was singing crappy songs she was watchable. But if you want to know what
she
> *might* have become if Hollywood had not got its dirty hands on her, you
have
> to watch those 8 minute black & white 1-reelers (I forget the name for
them)
> that were produced for showing in those machine things (help! what were
they
> called?).
You mean soundies?
Bogdan Tudose
Mike Humberston wrote:
> Bogdan Tudose <btu...@altern.org> wrote:
>
> >> Most important thing in music in the 20th century? Why the
> >> ability to RECORD it, of course! (What's the name of this
> >> news group, again?)
>
> >You're right of course. The best and at the same time the worst
> >thing that could have happened to classical music.
>
> Why do you consider it to be the worst thing?
>
> I consider the effect recording technology to be almost entirely
> positive. It has made classical music available to a much wider
> audience than would have been the case without. I myself came to
> classical music through the technology of the 78 and the LP. It has
> also served to extend our concept of music, playing an important part
> in the avant-garde. It has allowed us to preserve a record of music
> performed over the last 3 or 4 generations. The only negatives that I
> can thnk of at the moment are those associated with the current
> limitations of the technology - its inability to give us a truely
> lifelike sound and balance (even when truely enormous sums of money
> are spent on equipment), particularly for orchestral music.
>
> Mike Humberston
>
You listed the advantages, so I'll stick to the negatives.
The bad part is that it transforms music into a product that is bought
with an
expectation of gratification without stimulating musicianship, it
makes music a passive experience. Imagine that instead
of buying the latest release on cd you would buy the score
and play it with friends, or go to the concert. At the same time it
squeezes
out the life from the live music scene, as more and more people choose to
skip
a concert and listen instead to the cd at home at least partly because
it's cheaper.
I don't say this is happening in every case but on average.
Bogdan
Steve Emerson
> jan winter wrote:
> > >> Listening to jazz *is* an exclusive obsession with history. Jazz is
> > >> at least 80% is dead and most of the rest, to say the least, far past
> > >> their expiration date.
> > >>
> >
> > rephrase: Listening to jazz is listening to history.
> >
> > >Why couldn't it simply be
> > >an intense admiration for supremely gifted musicianship, given to a
> > >chosen few, for whom musical expression often had a deep and profound
> > >effect, on themselves, as well as their devotees.
> >
> >
> > >If it is dead, which I sincerely doubt, and maybe jazz is in some sort
> > >of hiatus (and waiting to continue evolving), then the flame that burnt
> > >so brightly and became extinguished (as you claim), is mercifully
> > >preserved for us in recordings.
> >
> > Ayler there is not very much left to evolve. Most contemporary jazz I
> > hear is a rehash of the old thing and most of the masters, who just
> > *played* the old thing and didn't need to rehash it, are dead.
> >
> Sadly, for jazz lovers, I think you may well be correct with the above
> paragraph. Jazz did commence within a certain social/racial structure,
> that existed within a certain window of time, and which has largely, if
> not altogether, disappeared (so I am led to believe).
>
> Regards,
>
> Ray Hall, Sydney
I think you guys are overstating it a bit. Ayler was a kind of
ne-plus-ultra, but in their own way David Murray and Anthony Braxton are
a gain, and there was enormous vitality to the AACM players throughout
the '70s and '80s, some of which continues. Also the continuing work of
preceding avant gardists like Cecil Taylor, Ornette, Sam Rivers, Paul
Bley, Andrew Hill, and perhaps today more than any of them, Steve Lacy
and Roswell Rudd -- can't be dismissed so easily. Then there are a few
who simply "played" the old thing, as you say, and continue to with
wisdom and increasing intelligence -- like Johnny Griffin, Tommy
Flanagan, and Hank Jones.
I understand exactly what you're reacting to, and I think it's in part
the academicizing of the Marsalises, N. Payton etc etc -- the studied
neo-hard-boppers -- and even a sort of academicized avant garde. Coupled
with a titan like Sonny Rollins reaching finally a form of complacency.
But I'm not willing to let that mask over some actual vitality that
remains, and say that the flame is extinguished.
Best,
SE.
Raymond Hall
>
> Raymond Hall wrote:
>
> > (Snip)
> >
> > And .... and ..... wait for it ... Doris Day. She makes me happy.
> >
>
> (Snip)
>
> Amazing. She's one of my faves too. Those Hollywood musicals she sang in were
> close to 100% crap, she was the sole redeeming feature in them. Even when she
> was singing crappy songs she was watchable. But if you want to know what she
> *might* have become if Hollywood had not got its dirty hands on her, you have
> to watch those 8 minute black & white 1-reelers (I forget the name for them)
> that were produced for showing in those machine things (help! what were they
> called?).
>
> quite breathtaking and a true popular singing artist was revealed, lord knows
> what she might have done if she had not "gone to Hollywood".
>
> David.
Yes, I agree the film songs are quite trite, but there was a bright
vibrancy about her, and her voice also, and I agree many of the films
were of the "chewing gum for the brain" type. I particularly loved her
in Calamity Jane.
Agree fully with your last paragraph though, although she was a *vision*
on the screen, and lit up every scene she was in.
Regards,
Ray Hall, Sydney
Raymond Hall
>
> On Sat, 26 Feb 2000 12:32:34 -0400, Bogdan Tudose <btu...@altern.org>
> wrote:
>
> >Jeremy Dimmick wrote:
> >
> >> > I think classical music is on its way to extinction unless it renews its
> >> > historically fertile contact with the popular genres and foregoes the
> >> obsession with
> >> > its own history.
> >> >
> >> There I disagree. Jazz itself has had a profoundly creative relationship
> >> with its own past as well as with other musical traditions, and I simply
> >> don't see these two as an antithesis. Music needs to be continually
> >> reinventing itself and its history; you can't innovate unless you have a
> >> sense of time.
> >>
> >> jd
> >
> >I meant: exclusive obsession with history is bad. Absorbing it is oviously
> >crucial. As for jazz, it is still too young for that; its bleeding edge is
> >still vital.
>
> dead. From the about 50 jazz musicians mentioned in this thread so far
> at least 80% is dead and most of the rest, to say the least, far past
> their expiration date.
>
an intense admiration for supremely gifted musicianship, given to a
chosen few, for whom musical expression often had a deep and profound
effect, on themselves, as well as their devotees.
of hiatus (and waiting to continue evolving), then the flame that burnt
so brightly and became extinguished (as you claim), is mercifully
preserved for us in recordings.
Regards,
Ray Hall, Sydney
jan winter
<hallr...@bigpond.com> wrote:
>jan winter wrote:
>>
>> On Sat, 26 Feb 2000 12:32:34 -0400, Bogdan Tudose <btu...@altern.org>
>> wrote:
(snip)
>> >I meant: exclusive obsession with history is bad. Absorbing it is oviously
>> >crucial. As for jazz, it is still too young for that; its bleeding edge is
>> >still vital.
>>
>> Listening to jazz *is* an exclusive obsession with history. Jazz is
>> dead. From the about 50 jazz musicians mentioned in this thread so far
>> at least 80% is dead and most of the rest, to say the least, far past
>> their expiration date.
>>
>I wouldn't necessarily say it is an obsession.
You're right. I misinterpreted the way Mr Tudose used the term. I'll
rephrase: Listening to jazz is listening to history.
>Why couldn't it simply be
>an intense admiration for supremely gifted musicianship, given to a
>chosen few, for whom musical expression often had a deep and profound
>effect, on themselves, as well as their devotees.
On this I think we are in total agreement.
>If it is dead, which I sincerely doubt, and maybe jazz is in some sort
>of hiatus (and waiting to continue evolving), then the flame that burnt
>so brightly and became extinguished (as you claim), is mercifully
>preserved for us in recordings.
That's why we are listening to history. As I see it, after Albert
Ayler there is not very much left to evolve. Most contemporary jazz I
hear is a rehash of the old thing and most of the masters, who just
*played* the old thing and didn't need to rehash it, are dead.
Mike Humberston
>> Most important thing in music in the 20th century? Why the
>> ability to RECORD it, of course! (What's the name of this
>> news group, again?)
>You're right of course. The best and at the same time the worst
>thing that could have happened to classical music.
Why do you consider it to be the worst thing?
I consider the effect recording technology to be almost entirely
positive. It has made classical music available to a much wider
audience than would have been the case without. I myself came to
classical music through the technology of the 78 and the LP. It has
also served to extend our concept of music, playing an important part
in the avant-garde. It has allowed us to preserve a record of music
performed over the last 3 or 4 generations. The only negatives that I
can thnk of at the moment are those associated with the current
limitations of the technology - its inability to give us a truely
lifelike sound and balance (even when truely enormous sums of money
are spent on equipment), particularly for orchestral music.
Mike Humberston
unbar email address to reply
I Fagiolini's Web Page: http://www.philomel.demon.co.uk/fagiolini
Mike Humberston
>> >I think classical music is on its way to extinction unless it renews its
>> >historically
>> >fertile contact with the popular genres and foregoes the obsession with
>> >its
>> >own history.
>>
>> I don't understand what you are trying to say. I don't see an
>> obsession with history.
>I mean too many musicians are exclusively involved in performing music
>at least a hundred years old and too few are composing.
Presumably you would prefer to see more composer/performers.
Possibly, but I don't see any dearth of people who are composing.
Also, the realities of life will always limit the numbers of people
who might wish to make a career out of composition. It is already
pretty difficult for composers to get performances of their works,
particularly second and subsequent performances, unless they are
already quite well known. With more people composing that would get
even more difficult - for many musicians the psychological rewards of
performing are probably far greater than they would ever be for
composing. Neither is it possible to make a living out of classical
composing unless you are particularly talented. The standards
required for both fields mean that they are, for most people, mutually
incompatible activities because they both require too much investment
of time. I also suspect that most musicians don't have any talent for
composing.
Raymond Hall
>
> On Sun, 27 Feb 2000, Raymond Hall wrote:
>
> > > dead.
>
> > an intense admiration for supremely gifted musicianship, given to a
> > chosen few, for whom musical expression often had a deep and profound
> > effect, on themselves, as well as their devotees.
> > of hiatus (and waiting to continue evolving), then the flame that burnt
> > so brightly and became extinguished (as you claim), is mercifully
> > preserved for us in recordings.
>
> "Mengelberg"? (-:
>
as well ;-)
Regards,
Ray Hall, Sydney
Raymond Hall
>
> On Sun, 27 Feb 2000 10:31:06 +1100, Raymond Hall
> <hallr...@bigpond.com> wrote:
>
> >jan winter wrote:
> >>
> >> On Sat, 26 Feb 2000 12:32:34 -0400, Bogdan Tudose <btu...@altern.org>
> >> wrote:
> (snip)
> >> >I meant: exclusive obsession with history is bad. Absorbing it is oviously
> >> >crucial. As for jazz, it is still too young for that; its bleeding edge is
> >> >still vital.
> >>
> >> at least 80% is dead and most of the rest, to say the least, far past
> >> their expiration date.
> >>
>
> rephrase: Listening to jazz is listening to history.
>
> >an intense admiration for supremely gifted musicianship, given to a
> >chosen few, for whom musical expression often had a deep and profound
> >effect, on themselves, as well as their devotees.
>
>
> >of hiatus (and waiting to continue evolving), then the flame that burnt
> >so brightly and became extinguished (as you claim), is mercifully
> >preserved for us in recordings.
>
> Ayler there is not very much left to evolve. Most contemporary jazz I
> hear is a rehash of the old thing and most of the masters, who just
> *played* the old thing and didn't need to rehash it, are dead.
>
Raymond Hall
>
> Raymond Hall wrote:
> > jan winter wrote:
> ne-plus-ultra, but in their own way David Murray and Anthony Braxton are
> a gain, and there was enormous vitality to the AACM players throughout
> the '70s and '80s, some of which continues. Also the continuing work of
> preceding avant gardists like Cecil Taylor, Ornette, Sam Rivers, Paul
> Bley, Andrew Hill, and perhaps today more than any of them, Steve Lacy
> and Roswell Rudd -- can't be dismissed so easily. Then there are a few
> who simply "played" the old thing, as you say, and continue to with
> wisdom and increasing intelligence -- like Johnny Griffin, Tommy
> Flanagan, and Hank Jones.
>
> I understand exactly what you're reacting to, and I think it's in part
> the academicizing of the Marsalises, N. Payton etc etc -- the studied
> neo-hard-boppers -- and even a sort of academicized avant garde. Coupled
> with a titan like Sonny Rollins reaching finally a form of complacency.
> But I'm not willing to let that mask over some actual vitality that
> remains, and say that the flame is extinguished.
>
from a highly informed jazz admirer. In this genre, which is really
off-topic here, (but what the heck, the philosophers have taken over, so
why not us?), I find there is as great a gulf (musically) between say
Beiderbecke and for example Lee Konitz, (compressed over a period of 45
years), as there is between Haydn and Lutoslawski. In both genres I
prefer Beiderbecke and Haydn though, which isn't to say I don't enjoy
Lee Konitz or Lutoslawski. I found some of Pat Methany's stuff far too
"academic", for want of using a better word ;-)
Regards,
Ray Hall, Sydney
Bogdan Tudose
>
> Hope remains eternal. Thanks for your comments. Seems like they come
> from a highly informed jazz admirer. In this genre, which is really
> off-topic here, (but what the heck, the philosophers have taken over, so
> why not us?), I find there is as great a gulf (musically) between say
> Beiderbecke and for example Lee Konitz, (compressed over a period of 45
> years), as there is between Haydn and Lutoslawski. In both genres I
> prefer Beiderbecke and Haydn though, which isn't to say I don't enjoy
> Lee Konitz or Lutoslawski. I found some of Pat Methany's stuff far too
> "academic", for want of using a better word ;-)
>
> Regards,
>
> Ray Hall, Sydney
Mentioning Haydn and Lutoslawski brings the discussion back on-side...
It's interesting how jazz and classical meet in the avant-garde movements. I
wonder how
much reciprocal awareness exists between the two.
Bogdan
jan winter
wrote:
>I think you guys are overstating it a bit. Ayler was a kind of
>ne-plus-ultra, but in their own way David Murray and Anthony Braxton are
>a gain, and there was enormous vitality to the AACM players throughout
>the '70s and '80s, some of which continues. Also the continuing work of
>preceding avant gardists like Cecil Taylor, Ornette, Sam Rivers, Paul
>Bley, Andrew Hill, and perhaps today more than any of them, Steve Lacy
>and Roswell Rudd -- can't be dismissed so easily. Then there are a few
>who simply "played" the old thing, as you say, and continue to with
>wisdom and increasing intelligence -- like Johnny Griffin, Tommy
>Flanagan, and Hank Jones.
>
>I understand exactly what you're reacting to, and I think it's in part
>the academicizing of the Marsalises, N. Payton etc etc -- the studied
>neo-hard-boppers -- and even a sort of academicized avant garde. Coupled
>with a titan like Sonny Rollins reaching finally a form of complacency.
>But I'm not willing to let that mask over some actual vitality that
>remains, and say that the flame is extinguished.
I'm more pessimistic than you are and your reply only strenghtens my
pessimism. All the guys you mention are at least 25 years on the scene
- they belong, in as far as they are masters, to my category of Old
Masters - and I have witnessed performances of all of them in the late
60's and the 70's. Ok, so maybe the flame is smouldering a little bit
more. But my point is: where are the *new* masters? Not in jazz I'm
afraid. I think the American blacks have moved their creative and
innovative musical capacities to other fields of music which in itself
may not be bad if only it didn't create a new dunghill where I have to
look for the pearls.
jan winter
<jarls...@geocities.com> wrote:
>Bogdan Tudose wrote
>>
>>What do you think is the most important phenomenon in music
>>in the 20th century?
>>
>>I would have to say jazz
>
>I would disagree and say Rock, which in the second half of
>the 20th Century had an incredible impact on popular culture.
There was no rock if there hadn't been jazz.
jan winter
<alep...@camtech.net.au> wrote:
>Perhaps a little X-posting will help. And go easy on them, they obviously
>lead sheltered lives. ;-)
This is not the first time a post of mine appears in
rec.music.bluenote, so you don't have to go easy on me :^)
But please read also what followed (in rec.music.classical.recordings)
>Raymond Hall wrote: [ in rec.music.classical.recordings ]
>> jan winter wrote:
>> > Raymond Hall wrote:
>> > >jan winter wrote:
>
>> > >> Listening to jazz *is* an exclusive obsession with history. Jazz
>> > >> is dead. From the about 50 jazz musicians mentioned in this
>> > >> thread so far at least 80% is dead and most of the rest, to say
>> > >> the least, far past their expiration date.
>> > >>
>> > > If it is dead, which I sincerely doubt, and maybe jazz is in some
>> > > sort of hiatus (and waiting to continue evolving), then the flame
>> > > that burnt so brightly and became extinguished (as you claim), is
>> > > mercifully preserved for us in recordings.
>> >
>> > That's why we are listening to history. As I see it, after Albert
>> > Ayler there is not very much left to evolve. Most contemporary jazz I
>> > hear is a rehash of the old thing and most of the masters, who just
>> > *played* the old thing and didn't need to rehash it, are dead.
>> >
>> Sadly, for jazz lovers, I think you may well be correct with the above
>> paragraph. Jazz did commence within a certain social/racial
>> structure, that existed within a certain window of time, and which has
>> largely, if not altogether, disappeared (so I am led to believe).
>>
>> Regards,
>>
>> Ray Hall, Sydney
jan winter
<szur...@mail.uni-mainz.de> wrote:
>Jazz is dead? What about Courtney Pine, Toshinori Kondo, Maria Schneider,
>Bill Laswell, John Zorn, Cassandra Wilson, Uri Caine, ...
>They are alive and their music is as well: new music which has never been
>played before but is referring to the past. Jazz at its best. There is a lot
>of new jazz music around, but nobody - especially the best-known labels -
>want record it, so only few people are able to hear what this musicians
>create.
"Jazz at its best"??? Do I have to name Morton, Dodds, Dodds, Satchmo,
Fats, Duke, Bird, Monk, Fats, Bean, Lester, etc etc etc?
"Referring to the past" indeed. I just downloaded the ca. 950 headers
in this ng (rec.music.bluenote) since 11/99, and the bulk of them
deals with musicians that are dead.
Jazz is on its way to becoming the classical music of the 21st
century.
Matti Alasalmi
John Powell wrote:
> In article <Jb9u4.34932$3b6.1...@ozemail.com.au> , "Andrew McKinnon"
> <alep...@camtech.net.au> wrote:
>
> >Perhaps a little X-posting will help. And go easy on them, they obviously
> >lead sheltered lives. ;-)
> >
> >
> Is "classical" music (broadly defined, not just the classical era)
> "dead" because all its major composers before, say, 1965, are deceased? Are
> others simply rehashing polytonality, modernism and minimalism? Is the only
> thing preserving it the recordings and familiar concert repertoires?
>
> You get the idea...
I got the idea. Of course music of Coltrane, Parker, Mingus, Monk etz lives
forever.It is preserved in the recordings on vinyl and CD and especially in
minds of the lucky people who were fotunate enough to hear them live. Live is
live and preservation is
like cannded food. You can get a some proof of that by listening live recordings
of Miles
and Coltrane and Mingus. The ultimate proof is of course beeing in a concert.
Even the
best music needs an audience and preferably present when playing takes place.
On the other hand question was that not so much interesting new things has
happened
in jazz since fifties and sixties. I wery much agree on that statement which was
written
on this thread before.
Matti
Jon Parker
"jan winter" brought this to our attention from r.m.c.r.-
> >> > That's why we are listening to history. As I see it, after Albert
> >> > Ayler there is not very much left to evolve. Most contemporary jazz I
> >> > hear is a rehash of the old thing and most of the masters, who just
> >> > *played* the old thing and didn't need to rehash it, are dead.
> >> >
> >> Sadly, for jazz lovers, I think you may well be correct with the above
> >> paragraph. Jazz did commence within a certain social/racial
> >> structure, that existed within a certain window of time, and which has
> >> largely, if not altogether, disappeared (so I am led to believe).
Now I'd like to also ask, What is your definition of jazz? Just because
many of the original masters are now dead doesn't mean that the music has
died. Fortunatey for us, jazz is a constantly growing musical stlye, and
the music you describe to have heard nowadays called jazz may certainly just
be an homage to the masters (especially with all those musicians sounding
like Trane these days.) IMO, there are guys like Herbie Hancock and Chick
Corea (and several others) that are doing a part to expand the sonorities in
jazz, so they all don't sound like post-bop musicians. In the 1930's there
was a rebelion against be-bop, and most of us here would consider bop jazz.
Back then, to the jazz purists, be-bop was not jazz, and it created a
movement towards the original New Orleans style of jazz. Most of those guys
are not remembered as well as the guys that were on the forefront of modern
jazz at the time (Bird and Diz, then came Davis, Trane, Monk, etc..) If I
remember correctly, there was a Cardinal in the Catholic church in the
1600's that said that all the melodies and chord proggresions had been used.
He really sealed up music for good. On jazz, it is changing, certain
developments might be through working themselves out, but it is certainly
not dead.
The original racial/social curtails in the original jazz does not exist
today as far as I've seen. As far as I'm concerned, this has actually
brought better oportunities to the table because black/white musicians can
play in the same band, they can play in the same club, and they all walk
through the front door if they want to. We are at a time when jazz is more
exciting than yesterday because there are no limitations on what we can/can
not do socially. Now it's all about the music.
--
Jon Parker
Jazz Pianist
Denver, CO USA
To reply by e-mail, remove the spamblocker
--
Hal Vickery
> On Sun, 27 Feb 2000 15:49:37 +0100, "Jan Szurmant"
> <szur...@mail.uni-mainz.de> wrote:
>
> >Jazz is dead? What about Courtney Pine, Toshinori Kondo, Maria Schneider,
> >Bill Laswell, John Zorn, Cassandra Wilson, Uri Caine, ...
> >They are alive and their music is as well: new music which has never been
> >played before but is referring to the past. Jazz at its best. There is a lot
> >of new jazz music around, but nobody - especially the best-known labels -
> >want record it, so only few people are able to hear what this musicians
> >create.
>
> "Jazz at its best"??? Do I have to name Morton, Dodds, Dodds, Satchmo,
> Fats, Duke, Bird, Monk, Fats, Bean, Lester, etc etc etc?
> "Referring to the past" indeed. I just downloaded the ca. 950 headers
> in this ng (rec.music.bluenote) since 11/99, and the bulk of them
> deals with musicians that are dead.
> Jazz is on its way to becoming the classical music of the 21st
> century.
Especially if that noted dead guy Wynton Marsalis has his way. (Sorry, I
just had to.)
nsmf
samir ghiocel golescu
On 27 Feb 2000, Clovis Lark wrote:
> > samir ghiocel golescu wrote:
>
> >> On Fri, 25 Feb 2000, Bogdan Tudose wrote:
> >> > I would have to say jazz;
> >>
> >> Before Shostakovich, Enescu, Ravel, Pfitzner, Messiaen, Hindemith etc.
> >> etc.? (some other music lovers would pick other names,
> >> probably, some of them more recent than mine)
>
> If you are referring to jazz as an influence: Berg, Krenek, Schulhof. You
> bet eveyone has a different set of names.
Of course I wasn't--Pfitzner and jazz?! That was a *not* deeply
thought-out list, of *some* of the composers whose music I particularly
like. Not that I'd be that dumb to exclude Bartok, I.S. and others.
> >> Popular genres cannot help. The dilemma of the classical composer today
> >> seems to be: uncomprehensibility (the composer delights himself in a
> >> language invented by himself and understood only by himself) OR vulgarity
> >> (comprehensibility does not equate [cheap] accessibility).
>
> These are easy generalizations without substance.
Of course they are easy and crude--what do you expect in r.c.m.r.? A
treatise? Do you really think I attempted to exhaust the history
of music in 20th century (which I otherwise don't claim I master) in two
phrases? Could you? I said, as a simple listener, what the composer's
dilemma *seems to be* to me, nothing more.
> >> Let me rephrase yours: classical music is on its way to extinction unless
> >> it renews its fertile contact with what is alive in its own history,
> >> finding the light of the future in the sublime ashes of the past.
> It is ironic to note that those
> composers who have the greatest knowledge of past music would be the ones
> you would accuse of composing incomprehensible music.
How do you know who I would accuse? How do you know who I consider
composes (composed) incomprehensible (to myself) music?
> But they are in good company, Beethoven and many others suffered the
> same accusation.
Yes, Beethoven and two dozens of others, if not as great as Beethoven,
comparable.
MANY OTHERS, to quote you, consolate(d) themselves with the idea that
they are ignored today, but they will become the Beethovens of
tomorrow, and they still wait for posterity to recognize their
mistake and, by any probability, will have to wait for a good while--does
Final Judgment sound realistic enough to you? (-:
regards,
SG
samir ghiocel golescu
> they still wait for posterity to recognize their mistake
that's *its* mistake but who's counting? not me
Chuck Nessa
Raymond Hall
Yes I did, although I didn't mean to. Apologies for the cross
fertilization ;-)
Actually there are many who love classical music, that also love jazz,
and vice versa I guess.
Regards,
Ray Hall, Sydney
Clovis Lark
> On 27 Feb 2000, Clovis Lark wrote:
>> > samir ghiocel golescu wrote:
>>
>> >> On Fri, 25 Feb 2000, Bogdan Tudose wrote:
>> >> > I would have to say jazz;
>> >>
>> >> Before Shostakovich, Enescu, Ravel, Pfitzner, Messiaen, Hindemith etc.
>> >> etc.? (some other music lovers would pick other names,
>> >> probably, some of them more recent than mine)
>>
>> If you are referring to jazz as an influence: Berg, Krenek, Schulhof. You
>> bet eveyone has a different set of names.
> Of course I wasn't--Pfitzner and jazz?! That was a *not* deeply
> thought-out list, of *some* of the composers whose music I particularly
> like. Not that I'd be that dumb to exclude Bartok, I.S. and others.
I was just giving a prewar group for reference.
>
>> >> Popular genres cannot help. The dilemma of the classical composer today
>> >> seems to be: uncomprehensibility (the composer delights himself in a
>> >> language invented by himself and understood only by himself) OR vulgarity
>> >> (comprehensibility does not equate [cheap] accessibility).
>>
>> These are easy generalizations without substance.
> Of course they are easy and crude--what do you expect in r.c.m.r.? A
> treatise? Do you really think I attempted to exhaust the history
> of music in 20th century (which I otherwise don't claim I master) in two
> phrases? Could you? I said, as a simple listener, what the composer's
> dilemma *seems to be* to me, nothing more.
And it remains a generalization based upon a certain unwillingness to
comprehend the medium. It is like viewing a Miro and exclaiming that your
3 year old could paint that. They couldn't.
>
>> >> Let me rephrase yours: classical music is on its way to extinction unless
>> >> it renews its fertile contact with what is alive in its own history,
>> >> finding the light of the future in the sublime ashes of the past.
>> It is ironic to note that those
>> composers who have the greatest knowledge of past music would be the ones
>> you would accuse of composing incomprehensible music.
> How do you know who I would accuse? How do you know who I consider
> composes (composed) incomprehensible (to myself) music?
Why don't you give a little list and then we'll have the concrete answer?
>> But they are in good company, Beethoven and many others suffered the
>> same accusation.
> Yes, Beethoven and two dozens of others, if not as great as Beethoven,
> comparable.
> MANY OTHERS, to quote you, consolate(d) themselves with the idea that
> they are ignored today, but they will become the Beethovens of
> tomorrow, and they still wait for posterity to recognize their
> mistake and, by any probability, will have to wait for a good while--does
> Final Judgment sound realistic enough to you? (-:
You miss it completely. They, like Mozart and a list too long to print
here, compose as they feel they must to express an idea that has no other
way of manefesting itself. WHether the public cherishes the result in
this moment, the next, or never, is simply not an issue. Those who do
compose with pleasing the public as their ultimate aim end up composing
the same work repeatedly (Part, Adams, etc.).
> regards,
> SG
Bruce LeClaire
jan winter wrote:
>
>
> "Jazz at its best"??? Do I have to name Morton, Dodds, Dodds, Satchmo,
> Fats, Duke, Bird, Monk, Fats, Bean, Lester, etc etc etc?
> "Referring to the past" indeed. I just downloaded the ca. 950 headers
> in this ng (rec.music.bluenote) since 11/99, and the bulk of them
> deals with musicians that are dead.
> Jazz is on its way to becoming the classical music of the 21st
> century.
Oh, and what's wrong with being dead? Look, some of my best friends are
dead. Hell knows ... urrhhh I mean ... heaven knows, I might even be
dead myself someday.
--Regards a tous, Bruce
jan winter
wrote:
>If you'd read the damn header, you'd know that Ray posted to rmb too.
>
>jan winter wrote:
>>
>> But please read also what followed (in rec.music.classical.recordings)
>>
>> >Raymond Hall wrote: [ in rec.music.classical.recordings ]
I think you mean something else than I did. I wrote "followed" and not
"followes". The (sub)thread started in rmcr.
jan winter
<jonatho...@DONTSPAMMEhotmail.com> wrote:
>First I'd like to say thanks.
>
>"jan winter" brought this to our attention from r.m.c.r.-
>> >> > That's why we are listening to history. As I see it, after Albert
>> >> > Ayler there is not very much left to evolve. Most contemporary jazz I
>> >> > hear is a rehash of the old thing and most of the masters, who just
>> >> > *played* the old thing and didn't need to rehash it, are dead.
>> >> >
>> >> Sadly, for jazz lovers, I think you may well be correct with the above
>> >> paragraph. Jazz did commence within a certain social/racial
>> >> structure, that existed within a certain window of time, and which has
>> >> largely, if not altogether, disappeared (so I am led to believe).
>
>Now I'd like to also ask, What is your definition of jazz? Just because
>many of the original masters are now dead doesn't mean that the music has
>died. Fortunatey for us, jazz is a constantly growing musical stlye, and
>the music you describe to have heard nowadays called jazz may certainly just
>be an homage to the masters (especially with all those musicians sounding
>like Trane these days.) IMO, there are guys like Herbie Hancock and Chick
>Corea (and several others) that are doing a part to expand the sonorities in
>jazz, so they all don't sound like post-bop musicians.
Sure, but didn't they learn their tricks from Miles?
>In the 1930's there
>was a rebelion against be-bop, and most of us here would consider bop jazz.
>Back then, to the jazz purists, be-bop was not jazz, and it created a
>movement towards the original New Orleans style of jazz. Most of those guys
>are not remembered as well as the guys that were on the forefront of modern
>jazz at the time (Bird and Diz, then came Davis, Trane, Monk, etc..)
Of course (although bop was in the 40's at its earliest). The same
happened in the 60's when the New Thing emerged. And that's exactly my
point: where is the new thing of today?
(snip, because I don't bother with cardinals)
>The original racial/social curtails in the original jazz does not exist
>today as far as I've seen. As far as I'm concerned, this has actually
>brought better oportunities to the table because black/white musicians can
>play in the same band, they can play in the same club, and they all walk
>through the front door if they want to. We are at a time when jazz is more
>exciting than yesterday because there are no limitations on what we can/can
>not do socially. Now it's all about the music.
I don't think there is anything in jazz today that equals the
excitement from 1920's New Orleans and Chicago; 1930's Kansas City and
Harlem; 1940's 52nd Street; 1950's everywhere and 1960's and '70's
Greenwich Village.
jan winter
"Woke up this mornin' and found myself dead" (Jimi Hendrix before he
became famous)
Howard Peirce
> point: where is the new thing of today?
Pretty much in the same place as the "new thing" in New Music (aka Contemporary
Classical), or in experimental pop music, or any other music for that matter.
For about the last 10 years, the "new thing" across the board has involved
ironic pastiche, freely borrowing and mixing & matching elements of popular,
improvised, and composed music. The heady mixture of highbrow, lowbrow, and
middlebrow into a freewheeling, almost "value-free," egalitarian musical stew is
the defining characteristic of what I'd consider cutting edge today.
It's a rejection of the striction Modernist requirement of continual
reinvention. Far from being a copout, I'd say that rejecting the High Modernist,
art-for-arts-sake, cult-of-the-individual-creative-artist mindset is a radical
departure from anything we've seen in the 175 years of musical history.
Right now, IMO, culture is in the kind of broad, cross-category esthetic change
that is comparable not to the change from, say, Serialism to Neo-Classicism, or
Swing to Bop, but to the kind of changes we saw, for example, during the
Rennaissance and early Baroque era, where music shifted from a utilitarian
exercise to an "art form." That change took a couple hundred years to be
complete, and I don't think anyone saw it for what it was at the time. I'm not
surprised that people are having trouble finding the "new thing" today--there's
a shift in our culture that's rapidly making "newness" a tired old 20th century
cliche that's become redundant.
> I don't think there is anything in jazz today that equals the
> excitement from 1920's New Orleans and Chicago; 1930's Kansas City and
> Harlem; 1940's 52nd Street; 1950's everywhere and 1960's and '70's
> Greenwich Village.
That's strictly opinion. It's not evidence in any kind of discussion of what's
going on today. None of us here knows what you're listening to. It could simply
be that you're drawing conclusions from too small a sample.
HP
Jon Parker
I wrote some stuff about modern jazz musicians-
To which Jan replied:
> Sure, but didn't they learn their tricks from Miles?
Their foundation was partly Miles, but probably goes all the way back to
Armstrong, Beiderbecke and their contemporaries, indirectly. Jazz has been
changing, constantly searching for a new voice. They have taken a little
from the past, and added some. It has taken a long time to get to where
jazz is now, and Miles was a stepping stone that was on the forefront of
modern jazz in his time. Also, what do you mean by 'tricks'?
> Of course (although bop was in the 40's at its earliest). The same
> happened in the 60's when the New Thing emerged. And that's exactly my
> point: where is the new thing of today?
Howard Pierce said it best, so I won't bother.
> I don't think there is anything in jazz today that equals the
> excitement from 1920's New Orleans and Chicago; 1930's Kansas City and
> Harlem; 1940's 52nd Street; 1950's everywhere and 1960's and '70's
> Greenwich Village.
So you would be classified as a bop jazz purist amd earlier. I know guys
that think jazz died when bebop came along, and that is partly why we have
groups that play only trad jazz. I put a wide range of categories in jazz,
so I would not be considered a purist. For example, the latin jazz of the
50's and 60's is really nothing like that of today. I happen to like both,
but enjoy playing today's style of latin jazz.
sendt...@yahoo.com
j.wi...@xs4all.nl wrote:
> On Sun, 27 Feb 2000 15:49:37 +0100, "Jan Szurmant"
> <szur...@mail.uni-mainz.de> wrote:
> in this ng (rec.music.bluenote) since 11/99, and the bulk of them
> deals with musicians that are dead.
IMHO, once anything (music or otherwise) has been around for awhile,
the number of 'greats' in it who are dead will outnumber the number
of 'greats' at their artistic peak at any given time, and the
relative number of dead greats to living greats will always be
increasing. The only cure is to follow the major media and look
for something 'new' every week.
The good news: someday, Kenny G. will die too.
Gratuitous G-bashing, but I wanted to fit in. :-)
Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Before you buy.
sendt...@yahoo.com
j.wi...@xs4all.nl wrote:
> On Sun, 27 Feb 2000 17:32:18 -0700, "Jon Parker"
> <jonatho...@DONTSPAMMEhotmail.com> wrote:
> >IMO, there are guys like Herbie Hancock and Chick
> >Corea (and several others) that are doing a part to expand the
sonorities in
> >jazz, so they all don't sound like post-bop musicians.
>
Hancock played with Miles, Miles played with Charlie Parker, ...
Does anyone get to be featured in their very own quartet right
off the bat? Doesen't everyone learn from someone?
sab...@mindspring.com
>Perhaps a little X-posting will help. And go easy on them, they obviously
>lead sheltered lives. ;-)
>
>
>Raymond Hall wrote: [ in rec.music.classical.recordings ]
>> jan winter wrote:
>> > Raymond Hall wrote:
>> > >jan winter wrote:
>
>> > >> Listening to jazz *is* an exclusive obsession with history. Jazz
>> > >> is dead. From the about 50 jazz musicians mentioned in this
>> > >> thread so far at least 80% is dead and most of the rest, to say
>> > >> the least, far past their expiration date.
>> > >>
>> > > If it is dead, which I sincerely doubt, and maybe jazz is in some
>> > > sort of hiatus (and waiting to continue evolving), then the flame
>> > > that burnt so brightly and became extinguished (as you claim), is
>> > > mercifully preserved for us in recordings.
>> >
>> > That's why we are listening to history. As I see it, after Albert
>> > Ayler there is not very much left to evolve. Most contemporary jazz I
>> > hear is a rehash of the old thing and most of the masters, who just
>> > *played* the old thing and didn't need to rehash it, are dead.
>> >
>> Sadly, for jazz lovers, I think you may well be correct with the above
>> paragraph. Jazz did commence within a certain social/racial
>> structure, that existed within a certain window of time, and which has
>> largely, if not altogether, disappeared (so I am led to believe).
>>
>> Regards,
>>
>> Ray Hall, Sydney
>
===================
I think we have a little time problem here.
"Jazz" evolved VERY rapidly, and I belive its evolution is simply
slowing down a little.
Consider the history of what can be loosely termed Western European
classical music.
J. S. Bach was born in1685, Mozart in 1756, Brahms in 1833,
Stravinsky and Bartok in 1882 and 1881 respectively.
That's 71 years to get from Bach to Mozart, 73 from Mozart to
Brahms, another 49 from Brahms to Stravinsky. That's somewhere around
200 years, give or take a few, to travel that idiomatic distance.
In well under 100 years "jazz" went from Pops and the Hot Five
through Duke, the swing era, the bebop revolution, Miles, Coltrane,
Ornette and beyond, into this nebulous time where anything and
everything seems to be competing for what is in reality a fairly small
audience.
I think today's players have been given too much information...not
too much, really, just more than they can digest quickly. Add to that
the reluctance of big recording in a currently big economy to risk big
money on people who are a gamble as far as their return...better to
spend money on the sure things, the imitators and popularizers, less
risk...and you've got what appears to be a static (or "dead") idiom.
But wait a minute...good news coming in hot off the wire..jazz is
NOT dead.
There are players out there who, although they may not be blazing
new stylistic trails, can stand toe to toe with the best players that
jazz has ever produced. Thet're ALL OVER New York, and they live in
DC, and Indianapolis, and LA, Boston...LOTS of places.
I play regularly with a lot of them, and they are playing (and
writing) on the same level as the people so often held up as the
greats.
Not just beneath them...as good, sometimes better.
Heresy ???
Get your asses out of the CD stores and into the clubs.
A few examples ???
Sure !
If Jimmie Green (a tenor player in NYC), Greg Gisbert (trumpet
player, ditto), Tom Williams (trumpet player/drummer[ !!!???] out of
D.C.), and Frank Glover (tenor player from Indiana) aren't playing on
a level that would match...ohhh, say Clifford Brown, Dexter Gordon,
Freddie Hubbard, Stan Getz...I must be deaf. And they're doing it
THEIR way, from the heart.
They're not imitators, they're PLAYERS...playing in idioms that are
no longer new, to be sure, but not playing borrowed notes.
To get up to that next level...where one becomes an iconic figure,
a trailblazer,a changer of idioms and traditions...these (and many
other players) need real recognition.
They're not getting it.
Hell, peple like Bob Brookmeyer, bands like the Vanguard Orchestra
aren't getting it, either. (Check out what Jim McNeely's been writing
for The Vanguard Orchestra the last few years, you want to talk about
"new" and still in the tradition...or Brookmeyer's latest writing...a
living genius.)
The music's not dead, not by a long shot, but another generation or
two w/out some solid financial support from either the record
companies or the government, and it sure as hell WILL be.
Players whose talent even 30 years ago would have made them if not
stars at least regularly recording and working players are doing B'way
shows, traveling w/washed up singers and repairing computers, while
second rate imitators who play from a LACK of conviction instead of
from the heart sell CDs.
If you want to be angry at something...look at the art/academic/big
business/industrial complex.
They're the ones missing the boat...the music and musicians are out
there.
Later...
S.
jan winter
<howard...@sdrc.com> wrote:
>jan winter wrote:
>
>> point: where is the new thing of today?
>
>Pretty much in the same place as the "new thing" in New Music (aka Contemporary
>Classical), or in experimental pop music, or any other music for that matter.
>
>For about the last 10 years, the "new thing" across the board has involved
>ironic pastiche, freely borrowing and mixing & matching elements of popular,
>improvised, and composed music. The heady mixture of highbrow, lowbrow, and
>middlebrow into a freewheeling, almost "value-free," egalitarian musical stew is
>the defining characteristic of what I'd consider cutting edge today.
Well, that's what I called a rehash. And if I understood you correctly
it seems to be a post-modern rehash at that.
>It's a rejection of the striction Modernist requirement of continual
>reinvention. Far from being a copout, I'd say that rejecting the High Modernist,
>art-for-arts-sake, cult-of-the-individual-creative-artist mindset is a radical
>departure from anything we've seen in the 175 years of musical history.
A lot of that existed already in the 19th century.
>Right now, IMO, culture is in the kind of broad, cross-category esthetic change
>that is comparable not to the change from, say, Serialism to Neo-Classicism, or
>Swing to Bop, but to the kind of changes we saw, for example, during the
>Rennaissance and early Baroque era, where music shifted from a utilitarian
>exercise to an "art form."
I'm not completely sure, but I don't think the Middle Age craftman saw
his business as an "utilitarian exercise". Also I'm not quite sure
where you see culture moving to at this moment.
>That change took a couple hundred years to be
>complete, and I don't think anyone saw it for what it was at the time. I'm not
>surprised that people are having trouble finding the "new thing" today--there's
>a shift in our culture that's rapidly making "newness" a tired old 20th century
>cliche that's become redundant.
But that doesn't prove that culture, or jazz, is as exciting as it
was. Maybe I'm only a tired old 20th century music lover, but even
then I have still some months to go.
>> I don't think there is anything in jazz today that equals the
>> excitement from 1920's New Orleans and Chicago; 1930's Kansas City and
>> Harlem; 1940's 52nd Street; 1950's everywhere and 1960's and '70's
>> Greenwich Village.
>
>That's strictly opinion. It's not evidence in any kind of discussion of what's
>going on today. None of us here knows what you're listening to. It could simply
>be that you're drawing conclusions from too small a sample.
I formulated it as an opinion, as opposed to the opinion that "we are
at a time when jazz is more exciting than yesterday", which I simply
don't see. My sample is of course the victim of a vicious circle. The
more you hear that don't excite you, the less you sample. (But I have
had certainly a lot of samples from pre-post-modern jazz : ] )
Here in Amsterdam we are blessed with the BIM-huis, a high quality
international oriented podium. What was the highlight of the last few
month's? Lacy/Rudd/Waldron/Workman/Cyrille playing Monk's music. Very
fine, but certainly a rehash. And in excitement miles away from
Coltrane/Monk/Ware/Wilson (or Malik/Haynes as on record live). IMO!
--
Groet,Jan Winter, Amsterdam (j.wi...@xs4all.nl)
There is no such thing as a wrong note
(Don Byas)
jan winter
<jonatho...@DONTSPAMMEhotmail.com> wrote:
(I wrote:)
>> I don't think there is anything in jazz today that equals the
>> excitement from 1920's New Orleans and Chicago; 1930's Kansas City and
>> Harlem; 1940's 52nd Street; 1950's everywhere and 1960's and '70's
>> Greenwich Village.
>
>So you would be classified as a bop jazz purist amd earlier. I know guys
>that think jazz died when bebop came along, and that is partly why we have
>groups that play only trad jazz. I put a wide range of categories in jazz,
>so I would not be considered a purist. For example, the latin jazz of the
>50's and 60's is really nothing like that of today. I happen to like both,
>but enjoy playing today's style of latin jazz.
I don't want to be mean but your knowledge of jazz history stands some
improvement. As you can gather from what I wrote for me the excitement
stops after Ayler (more or less). I'm only a purist in so far as I
prefer exciting music making to flat music making (whatever the
genre).
jan winter
> I think we have a little time problem here.
>
> "Jazz" evolved VERY rapidly, and I belive its evolution is simply
>slowing down a little.
>
> Consider the history of what can be loosely termed Western European
>classical music.
>
> J. S. Bach was born in1685, Mozart in 1756, Brahms in 1833,
>Stravinsky and Bartok in 1882 and 1881 respectively.
>
> That's 71 years to get from Bach to Mozart, 73 from Mozart to
>Brahms, another 49 from Brahms to Stravinsky. That's somewhere around
>200 years, give or take a few, to travel that idiomatic distance.
There is ten years between Bach's death and Haydn's first appointment
as Kapellmeister. The development of music is not linear. There were
quite a few big hiccups. Only thing is: where are the hiccups of
today?
sab...@mindspring.com
==================
Generally speaking, hiccups are considered a pathology.
S.
Raymond Hall
>
> I think we have a little time problem here.
>
> "Jazz" evolved VERY rapidly, and I belive its evolution is simply
> slowing down a little.
>
from Beiderbecke to Charlie Parker, a musical gulf if ever there was
one.
>
> But wait a minute...good news coming in hot off the wire..jazz is
> NOT dead.
> There are players out there who, although they may not be blazing
> new stylistic trails, can stand toe to toe with the best players that
> jazz has ever produced. Thet're ALL OVER New York, and they live in
> DC, and Indianapolis, and LA, Boston...LOTS of places.
> I play regularly with a lot of them, and they are playing (and
> writing) on the same level as the people so often held up as the
> greats.
> Not just beneath them...as good, sometimes better.
> Heresy ???
> Get your asses out of the CD stores and into the clubs.
> A few examples ???
> Sure !
>
> If Jimmie Green (a tenor player in NYC), Greg Gisbert (trumpet
> player, ditto), Tom Williams (trumpet player/drummer[ !!!???] out of
> D.C.), and Frank Glover (tenor player from Indiana) aren't playing on
> a level that would match...ohhh, say Clifford Brown, Dexter Gordon,
> Freddie Hubbard, Stan Getz...I must be deaf. And they're doing it
> THEIR way, from the heart.
>
> They're not imitators, they're PLAYERS...playing in idioms that are
> no longer new, to be sure, but not playing borrowed notes.
>
> To get up to that next level...where one becomes an iconic figure,
> a trailblazer,a changer of idioms and traditions...these (and many
> other players) need real recognition.
>
And also, occasional (not solely) jazz lovers like myself, sort of
stopped at Mingus, especially when going on to hear Miles Davis spitting
out maybe one or two prolonged notes to Gil Evans arrangements (and I am
supposed to go into ectasies because he bothers to even blow his
instrument), and late Coltrane sounding almost medieval and gloomy, and
the MJQ sounding about as polished and rehearsed as a string quartet. I
do have some Phil Woods, Bennie Wallace and Eddie Gomez on tape, and
THAT sounds good. But where is jazz *really* going, and when it gets
there - will it be jazz, or simply contemporary classical music? Maybe
the two genres are essentially merging.
> If you want to be angry at something...look at the art/academic/big
> business/industrial complex.
> They're the ones missing the boat...the music and musicians are out
> there.
>
Of that, I have always been convinced. Isn't it a bit like classical
music though, in the respect that many of these fine musicians, are
simply playing (in their way of course) the 'standards' of the greats
that burnt so brightly between 1915 - 1965?
Just curious, and very interested in your thoughts.
Regards,
Ray Hall, Sydney
Nicolai P. Zwar
consequences the recording technology has brought to music lovers world
wide far far outweigh any negatives there could possibly be.
Bogdan Tudose wrote:
> You listed the advantages, so I'll stick to the negatives.
> The bad part is that it transforms music into a product that is bought
> with an
> expectation of gratification without stimulating musicianship, it
> makes music a passive experience.
Basically no different than a concert ticket is a "product", or a
concert is a "passive" experience. However, it has become a product
virtually anybody with interest is able to afford. Even a hundred years
ago, most music was limited to a fairly small number of people who could
appreciate it. (Namely people living in larger cities with concert
halls).
> Imagine that instead
> of buying the latest release on cd you would buy the score
> and play it with friends,
Far too many friends would be needed far too long to perform, say,
"Götterdämmerung", or Mahler's 8th, or even such a regular standard as
Beethoven's 9th... your neighbors might not find this all that great
either. And it would basically restrict again those who would be able to
enjoy the music, because they would have to be able to read scores and
perform a musical instrument. Perhaps you might be able to enjoy much of
Chopin's or Schubert's output like that, solo and chamber music, but no
full blown symphony or opera score. However, *if* you're able to play a
mucial instrument or own a grand piano, it's unlikely that a recording
of Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata will prevent you to try your own hand at
it.
And I don't think there are less people today who *can* read and perform
music because of recording thechnology either... quite the opposite
seems true to me.
> or go to the concert. At the same time it
> squeezes
> out the life from the live music scene, as more and more people choose to
> skip
> a concert and listen instead to the cd at home at least partly because
> it's cheaper.
Perhaps that's true in some cases. On the other hand, I've been to
concerts I would have never considered going to were it not for the fact
that I've heard some of the music beforehand.
> I don't say this is happening in every case but on average.
Do you think more people would go to classical concerts if recording
technologies would not exist? I seriously doubt it. On the contrary, I
believe even less people would go, because "classical" music would
become more and more a totally obscure thing just a bunch of insiders
have even any access to. I mean, how many people would be willing to pay
$50.- to $60.- on a "classical" concert if they have never been
expsosed to the music? I would guess that those $50.- to $60.- would be
spend on the latest Nine Inch Nails concert, or the nearest Michael
Jackson concert (after all, those folks would not be available on CDs
either, but they would be better promoted). How many people have become
afficionados of "classical" music because of live concerts alone? And
how many because of recorded music you've heard at home, on the radio,
in the car, in movies or TV?
No, sorry, I don't think there is anything *really* negative about the
fact that numerous people worldwide can enjoy "their" music on CD. Some
CDs are printed in numbers of no more than 2500 or 3000, because that's
the number of people *worldwide* interested in this music. There is no
way certain scores would *ever* be performed if they would have to fill
a concert hall.
--
Nicolai P. Zwar
send spam to: NPZ...@aol.com
send e-mail to: nicola...@pironet.de
Howard Peirce
> On Mon, 28 Feb 2000 18:03:32 -0500, Howard Peirce
> <howard...@sdrc.com> wrote:
>
> >For about the last 10 years, the "new thing" across the board has involved
> >ironic pastiche, freely borrowing and mixing & matching elements of popular,
> >improvised, and composed music. The heady mixture of highbrow, lowbrow, and
> >middlebrow into a freewheeling, almost "value-free," egalitarian musical stew is
> >the defining characteristic of what I'd consider cutting edge today.
>
> Well, that's what I called a rehash. And if I understood you correctly
> it seems to be a post-modern rehash at that.
Well, sure. What I'm trying to say is that the idea of "newness," that things must
be new, made of whole cloth, is a historically grounded value, linked to Modernism.
"Newness" is not a universal, timeless value. On the other hand, care, skill, and
attention to detail would seem to be valued across history and culture. There is
plenty of music being made today with care , skill, and attention to detail. I find
a thing done well tremendously exciting.
> >It's a rejection of the striction Modernist requirement of continual
> >reinvention. Far from being a copout, I'd say that rejecting the High Modernist,
> >art-for-arts-sake, cult-of-the-individual-creative-artist mindset is a radical
> >departure from anything we've seen in the 175 years of musical history.
>
> A lot of that existed already in the 19th century.
Really? I'm familiar with Duchamps, Satie, et al in the early 20th century, but am
not aware of any attempts to bridge, say, High and Low culture in the 19th century.
Of course, that's not my area, so I could be certainly be mistaken or misinformed.
> I'm not completely sure, but I don't think the Middle Age craftman saw
> his business as an "utilitarian exercise".
Poor choice of words, perhaps. I don't think medieval craftsman (including musical
craftsman like Dufay or Machaut) saw their business as producing radical new
expressions as a means of self-expression.
> Also I'm not quite sure
> where you see culture moving to at this moment.
Well, I don't think culture moves "to" anywhere. It changes and evolves. Values
change (i.e., what is important in culture). Evolution is *not* progress toward a
goal; it's simply changing from thing to another thing. There is no destination, and
tomorrow's culture does not improve on today's, and vice versa. It's not a contest.
> there's
> >a shift in our culture that's rapidly making "newness" a tired old 20th century
> >cliche that's become redundant.
>
> But that doesn't prove that culture, or jazz, is as exciting as it
> was.
It doesn't prove that it's less exciting, either. Excitement is irrelevant to the
discussion. This thread began with the subject "The Death of Jazz." My point is that
it's not jazz that is dead, it's Modernism that has died. Jazz has been strongly
associated with Modernism, and with American Modernism in particular, since the
mid-1920s. The death of Modernism poses significant challenges to jazz; I don't deny
that. But they're not the same thing.
> Maybe I'm only a tired old 20th century music lover, but even
> then I have still some months to go.
Nerd alert! :-) But seriously, cultural trends show far less respect for calendrical
systems than people do. IMO, the "20th Century" as a cultural concept has been
losing relevance at least since the early '90s, particularly with the political
changes in Europe.
I just don't think it's fair to judge the validity of today's jazz based on what you
or I or anyone considers exciting. (Right now, most of my listening is to jazz
recorded before 1936 or so.) At some point, if we're going to be historians/cultural
theorists/prognosticators/what-have-you, we need to step out of the role of judge,
and just try to make sense of what demonstrably *is*.
HP
Howard Peirce
> > That's 71 years to get from Bach to Mozart, 73 from Mozart to
> >Brahms, another 49 from Brahms to Stravinsky. That's somewhere around
> >200 years, give or take a few, to travel that idiomatic distance.
>
> There is ten years between Bach's death and Haydn's first appointment
> as Kapellmeister. The development of music is not linear. There were
> quite a few big hiccups. Only thing is: where are the hiccups of
> today?
The "big hiccup" of today started around 1915, and it started slowing down
about 20 years ago. In the grand scheme of things, 1915-1980 is just one
big hiccup. We only see it as a series of discrete revolutions because of
our historical proximity. Musically, the "birth" of jazz occurred over the
last 70 years or so. A single event in the history of music, about the
same distance as Bach to Mozart.
HP
Bogdan Tudose
> Well, I'm afraid I agree entirely with Mike here, the positive
> consequences the recording technology has brought to music lovers world
> wide far far outweigh any negatives there could possibly be.
>
> Bogdan Tudose wrote:
>
> > You listed the advantages, so I'll stick to the negatives.
> > The bad part is that it transforms music into a product that is bought
> > with an
> > expectation of gratification without stimulating musicianship, it
> > makes music a passive experience.
>
> Basically no different than a concert ticket is a "product", or a
> concert is a "passive" experience. However, it has become a product
> virtually anybody with interest is able to afford. Even a hundred years
> ago, most music was limited to a fairly small number of people who could
> appreciate it. (Namely people living in larger cities with concert
> halls).
This was one of the advantages already discussed, I think. On the other hand,
I do not think that going to a concert is as passive an experience as
listening to
a cd at home; of course it depends on the listener also.
>
>
> > Imagine that instead
> > of buying the latest release on cd you would buy the score
> > and play it with friends,
>
> Far too many friends would be needed far too long to perform, say,
> "Götterdämmerung", or Mahler's 8th, or even such a regular standard as
> Beethoven's 9th... your neighbors might not find this all that great
> either. And it would basically restrict again those who would be able to
> enjoy the music, because they would have to be able to read scores and
> perform a musical instrument. Perhaps you might be able to enjoy much of
> Chopin's or Schubert's output like that, solo and chamber music, but no
> full blown symphony or opera score. However, *if* you're able to play a
> mucial instrument or own a grand piano, it's unlikely that a recording
> of Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata will prevent you to try your own hand at
> it.
No, but *because* of recordings, many more households have a stereo
than a piano.
>
>
>
> Do you think more people would go to classical concerts if recording
> technologies would not exist? I seriously doubt it. On the contrary, I
> believe even less people would go, because "classical" music would
> become more and more a totally obscure thing just a bunch of insiders
> have even any access to. I mean, how many people would be willing to pay
> $50.- to $60.- on a "classical" concert if they have never been
> expsosed to the music? I would guess that those $50.- to $60.- would be
> spend on the latest Nine Inch Nails concert, or the nearest Michael
> Jackson concert (after all, those folks would not be available on CDs
> either, but they would be better promoted).
These "artists" would not exist outside of the recording industry.
> How many people have become
> afficionados of "classical" music because of live concerts alone? And
> how many because of recorded music you've heard at home, on the radio,
> in the car, in movies or TV?
But that's exactly the heart of the matter; canned music has displaced live
music making and that is terrible for the classical genre, which cannot
compete
with the products designed specifically for mass consumption.
>
> No, sorry, I don't think there is anything *really* negative about the
> fact that numerous people worldwide can enjoy "their" music on CD. Some
> CDs are printed in numbers of no more than 2500 or 3000, because that's
> the number of people *worldwide* interested in this music. There is no
> way certain scores would *ever* be performed if they would have to fill
> a concert hall.
>
> --
> Nicolai P. Zwar
>
What is good for the individual listener is not necessarily good
for music.
Bogdan
jan winter
>j.wi...@xs4all.nl (jan winter) wrote:
>
>>On Tue, 29 Feb 2000 06:41:07 GMT, sab...@mindspring.com wrote:
>>
>>> I think we have a little time problem here.
>>>
>>> "Jazz" evolved VERY rapidly, and I belive its evolution is simply
>>>slowing down a little.
>>>
>>> Consider the history of what can be loosely termed Western European
>>>classical music.
>>>
>>> J. S. Bach was born in1685, Mozart in 1756, Brahms in 1833,
>>>Stravinsky and Bartok in 1882 and 1881 respectively.
>>>
>>> That's 71 years to get from Bach to Mozart, 73 from Mozart to
>>>Brahms, another 49 from Brahms to Stravinsky. That's somewhere around
>>>200 years, give or take a few, to travel that idiomatic distance.
>>
>>There is ten years between Bach's death and Haydn's first appointment
>>as Kapellmeister. The development of music is not linear. There were
>>quite a few big hiccups. Only thing is: where are the hiccups of
>>today?
>>--
>>regards,
>>
>>jan winter, amsterdam
>
>==================
>
>
> Generally speaking, hiccups are considered a pathology.
>
> S.
That's what makes them interesting.
--
regards,
jan winter, amsterdam
Jon Parker
"jan winter" <j.wi...@xs4all.nl> wrote in message
news:38bbb6c4...@news.xs4all.nl...
> I don't want to be mean but your knowledge of jazz history stands some
> improvement. As you can gather from what I wrote for me the excitement
> stops after Ayler (more or less). I'm only a purist in so far as I
> prefer exciting music making to flat music making (whatever the
> genre).
I won't comment on my knowledge of jazz history. You prefer different
styles than what I personally do; I happen to like the free movement, even
though I am not playing any free jazz. I also prefer the late 80's and
early 90's fusion to the trad, or bop, but that is just me, and I will leave
it at that. (I do know what I am talking about, and what I am listenening
to I merely have different preferences.)
Marc Sabatella
> >IMO, there are guys like Herbie Hancock and Chick
> >Corea (and several others) that are doing a part to expand the
sonorities in
> >jazz, so they all don't sound like post-bop musicians.
>
> Sure, but didn't they learn their tricks from Miles?
Some "tricks", sure, but I'd say for the most part, when the harmonic
language of Miles' group changed in the early-to-mid 60's, it was
because of the influence of Hancock and Shorter. In any case, seeing as
that was almost 30 years ago, I wouldn't hold that up as the example of
the most modern of playing, even if it still strikes the majority of
listeners as incredibly modern-sounding, in comparison with so much of
what else is popular in jazz or other formsof music.
> Of course (although bop was in the 40's at its earliest). The same
> happened in the 60's when the New Thing emerged. And that's exactly my
> point: where is the new thing of today?
What, you want examples? People like Myra Melford, John Zorn, Steve
Coleman, Matthew Shipp, and so forth? Or was this supposed to be a
rhetorical question, indicating you don't believe there is any new jazz
being played? Usually people who say such things either don't listen to
much modern music, or else they have closed off their definition of jazz
in the 1960's, denying that anything new that has taken place since
should be considered "jazz" (and then acting surprised that no new jazz
is being played...)
> I don't think there is anything in jazz today that equals the
> excitement from 1920's New Orleans and Chicago; 1930's Kansas City and
> Harlem; 1940's 52nd Street; 1950's everywhere and 1960's and '70's
> Greenwich Village.
Sorry you aren't excited by what is going on today, but there is plenty
going on that excites others.
--------------
Marc Sabatella
ma...@outsideshore.com
Check out my latest CD, "Second Course"
Available on Cadence Jazz Records
Also "A Jazz Improvisation Primer", Sound clips, Scores, & More:
http://www.outsideshore.com/
Marc Neville
Just so we know where you are coming from, and to exactly whom you have been
referring, could you please let us know those current improvising musicians,
and, where applicable, their respective movements, which you find unoriginal
and unexciting?
Then, perhaps, if you are truly interested, we can familiarize you with the
work of those contemporary artists which I am led to believe might
eventually cause you to reconsider your position.
There's no guarantee that they will move you the same way they do us, but
you never know what you might be missing!
Marc Neville
Studio City, CA
marcn...@worldnet.att.net
"jan winter" <j.wi...@xs4all.nl> wrote in message
news:38bbb6c4...@news.xs4all.nl...
> On Mon, 28 Feb 2000 17:28:23 -0700, "Jon Parker"
> <jonatho...@DONTSPAMMEhotmail.com> wrote:
>
> (I wrote:)
> >> I don't think there is anything in jazz today that equals the
> >> excitement from 1920's New Orleans and Chicago; 1930's Kansas City and
> >> Harlem; 1940's 52nd Street; 1950's everywhere and 1960's and '70's
> >> Greenwich Village.
> >
> >So you would be classified as a bop jazz purist amd earlier. I know guys
> >that think jazz died when bebop came along, and that is partly why we
have
> >groups that play only trad jazz. I put a wide range of categories in
jazz,
> >so I would not be considered a purist. For example, the latin jazz of
the
> >50's and 60's is really nothing like that of today. I happen to like
both,
> >but enjoy playing today's style of latin jazz.
>
> I don't want to be mean but your knowledge of jazz history stands some
> improvement. As you can gather from what I wrote for me the excitement
> stops after Ayler (more or less). I'm only a purist in so far as I
> prefer exciting music making to flat music making (whatever the
> genre).
Walter Davis
> Maybe there are some enthusiastic amateurs, who are doing the
> job (actually recording stuff) that these big corporations SHOULD be
> doing.
Actually there are dozens/hundreds of _professionals_ running high
quality indie labels that, I'd gather from your response, guys like you
are too often ignoring while waiting for "the majors" to catch on. The
musicians mentioned by the earlier poster have dozens of in-print
albums, some even for major labels.
Labels: Koch, Red, Challenge/Buzz, A, Accurate, Ubiquity, Wobbly Rail,
Black Saint/Soul Note, Hep, Hat, Cadence Jazz, CIMP, Asian Improv,
Okkadisk, Arabesque, New World, Eremite, AUM Fidelity, BOXmedia,
Sublingual, DIW, Avant, Between the Lines, Leo, Chaiarascuro, Winter &
Winter, Victo, FMP, Delmark, Nessa, Mapleshade, Music & Arts, Songlines,
Justin Time, Evidence, Silkheart, and on and on. Every once in a while,
a review of one of these labels' releases will sneak into a downbeat or
jazz times, but really something like Cadence will provide much better
critical coverage of what the jazz world is really like.
Throughout jazz history, indie labels have pretty much always led the
way. Folks forget now, but Atlantic, Blue Note, Prestige, etc. were all
small labels headed up by jazz enthusiasts interested in quality music.
For the most part, those labels got bought up by majors after they'd
made all their great recordings and, generally speaking, the quality of
their output declined.
And anyone who thinks this is some dark ages for jazz really needs to
start listening. Yes, the pantheon is now closed, but I'll wager there
are far more outstanding musicians making varied, interesting, complex
jazz than at any previous time. It's a crime that more "jazz fans"
can't take the time to investigate them.
--
walt davis
not officially speaking for the Alliance for Improvised Music
(http://baobabcomputing.com/aim). When I am, hopefully I'll
remember to use my AIM sig.
Marc Sabatella
> There is ten years between Bach's death and Haydn's first appointment
> as Kapellmeister. The development of music is not linear. There were
> quite a few big hiccups. Only thing is: where are the hiccups of
> today?
Your questions make little sense to me. What do you mean by "today"?
Do you mean, within the last 20 years? Prove to me that every other 20
years period over the centuries has had such a "hiccup", and then maybe
I'd be bothered if you claimed that the past 20 years haven't, but as it
is, I see no reason to think this is a problem, even if I understood
what you mean by "hiccup", which I don't. Does "hiccup" to you mean,
when you suddenly hear some music you like, after a few years of you not
having bothered to go out and hear enough music to find something you
like?
void
>
>There is ten years between Bach's death and Haydn's first appointment
>as Kapellmeister. The development of music is not linear. There were
>quite a few big hiccups. Only thing is: where are the hiccups of
>today?
It seems to me (though I am not completely convinced) that this question
could be answered better in 20 or 30 years than today.
--
Ben
220 go.ahead.make.my.day ESMTP Postfix
Raymond Hall
also invest in some jazz publications. So another question, if you don't
mind, what publications are available, and which are the better ones?
TIA.
Regards,
Ray Hall, Sydney
Nicolai P. Zwar
> No, but *because* of recordings, many more households have a stereo
> than a piano.
Certainly true that a lot more households have a stereo than a piano,
*but* would really many more households have a piano if they would not
own a stereo? Probably there would be a few more, but I doubt it would
be *that* many more.
> I would guess that those $50.- to $60.- would be
> > spend on the latest Nine Inch Nails concert, or the nearest Michael
> > Jackson concert (after all, those folks would not be available on CDs
> > either, but they would be better promoted).
>
> These "artists" would not exist outside of the recording industry.
For a lot of these folks that's probably true (though Michael Jackson at
least has really big laser light shows with explosions, stage special
effects etc... I wonder how a simple Brahms symphony could compete with
that). But now we are already extrapolating a whole lot of things.
Certainly our world would be a completely different one if we were not
able to record sound. But once again I think that the effect of the
recording industry has been a positive one for the "classical" field.
>
> > How many people have become
> > afficionados of "classical" music because of live concerts alone? And
> > how many because of recorded music you've heard at home, on the radio,
> > in the car, in movies or TV?
>
> But that's exactly the heart of the matter; canned music has displaced live
> music making and that is terrible for the classical genre, which cannot
> compete
> with the products designed specifically for mass consumption.
I imagine that there are many more performances of classical music world
wide today than there were a hundred years ago. I would guess that there
are many more technically top notch orchestras world wide than there
were a hundred years ago. I would imagine that there are more people
going to classical concerts today than a hundred years ago. At least to
some degree that's probably a result of the vast improvements and
availability of the home stereo technology.
There are so many top concerts here in Cologne, I have to be quite picky
because I cannot afford to go and see everything. This month alone there
are top orchestras (London Symphony, Chamber Orchestra of Europe,
Staatskapelle Dresden, Ensemble Intercontemporain, etc.), top conductors
(Pierre Boulez, Giuseppe Sinopoli, Jukka-Pekka Saraste, etc.), top
soloists (Maurizio Pollini, Andreas Schiff, Alfred Brendel, etc.), there
is no way I can go and hear it all, whether or not I would own any
recordings. And when I go, the performances are usually very well
visited. I got tickets for a concert Saturday, March 4th, Pierre Boulez
conducting the LSO, The Wooden Prince by Bartok, Ligeti's violin
concerto, and a premiere performance of... well, I don't know,
something by Peter Eötvös (I let myself be surprised). Last month I
heard Andre Previn conduct Mahler's 4th, among other things. Whenever I
go to Cologne's Philharmonic Hall I have the impression that those
concerts are well visited, and there is no lack of them either. I just
don't believe that the recording technology has significantly impaired
live concert performances, and even if it has in some areas withdrawn
audiences because they rather spend the money on a CD, it has also wet
novice's appetites and brought new people to the concert hall. Somehow,
I do not think that the number of people going to live music concerts
world wide has significantly decreased since the advent of recorded
music.
And listening to a piece of music in your own home or listening to a
live performance are two different things that cannot easily replace
each other. I would not want to miss either.
jan winter
<howard...@sdrc.com> wrote:
>jan winter wrote:
>
>> On Mon, 28 Feb 2000 18:03:32 -0500, Howard Peirce
>> <howard...@sdrc.com> wrote:
>>
>> >For about the last 10 years, the "new thing" across the board has involved
>> >ironic pastiche, freely borrowing and mixing & matching elements of popular,
>> >improvised, and composed music. The heady mixture of highbrow, lowbrow, and
>> >middlebrow into a freewheeling, almost "value-free," egalitarian musical stew is
>> >the defining characteristic of what I'd consider cutting edge today.
>>
>> Well, that's what I called a rehash. And if I understood you correctly
>> it seems to be a post-modern rehash at that.
>
>Well, sure. What I'm trying to say is that the idea of "newness," that things must
>be new, made of whole cloth, is a historically grounded value, linked to Modernism.
>"Newness" is not a universal, timeless value. On the other hand, care, skill, and
>attention to detail would seem to be valued across history and culture. There is
>plenty of music being made today with care , skill, and attention to detail. I find
>a thing done well tremendously exciting.
Right. But some things more so than others.
>> >It's a rejection of the striction Modernist requirement of continual
>> >reinvention. Far from being a copout, I'd say that rejecting the High Modernist,
>> >art-for-arts-sake, cult-of-the-individual-creative-artist mindset is a radical
>> >departure from anything we've seen in the 175 years of musical history.
>>
>> A lot of that existed already in the 19th century.
>
>Really? I'm familiar with Duchamps, Satie, et al in the early 20th century, but am
>not aware of any attempts to bridge, say, High and Low culture in the 19th century.
>Of course, that's not my area, so I could be certainly be mistaken or misinformed.
I think you are mixing two things up here. The "arts-for-arts-sake,
cult-of-the-individual-creative-artist mindset" is something else as
"attempts to bridge High and Low culture". But even then, both are so
to say cornerstones of Romanticism, which may be defined, with cutting
some corners, as the dark side of the Enlightment.
>> I'm not completely sure, but I don't think the Middle Age craftman saw
>> his business as an "utilitarian exercise".
>
>Poor choice of words, perhaps. I don't think medieval craftsman (including musical
>craftsman like Dufay or Machaut) saw their business as producing radical new
>expressions as a means of self-expression.
Right. But that also goes for Bach. Again, the idea of the artist as
expressing his innermost feelings belongs to Romanticism.
>> Also I'm not quite sure
>> where you see culture moving to at this moment.
>
>Well, I don't think culture moves "to" anywhere. It changes and evolves. Values
>change (i.e., what is important in culture). Evolution is *not* progress toward a
>goal; it's simply changing from thing to another thing. There is no destination, and
>tomorrow's culture does not improve on today's, and vice versa. It's not a contest.
>
>> there's
>> >a shift in our culture that's rapidly making "newness" a tired old 20th century
>> >cliche that's become redundant.
>>
>> But that doesn't prove that culture, or jazz, is as exciting as it
>> was.
>
>It doesn't prove that it's less exciting, either. Excitement is irrelevant to the
>discussion. This thread began with the subject "The Death of Jazz." My point is that
>it's not jazz that is dead, it's Modernism that has died. Jazz has been strongly
>associated with Modernism, and with American Modernism in particular, since the
>mid-1920s. The death of Modernism poses significant challenges to jazz; I don't deny
>that. But they're not the same thing.
*If* jazz is the expression of American Modernism (sounds plausible to
me, although I have some doubts about the origins of both not being
the same), and *if* Modernism has died, than it follows that jazz has
(to) become another kind of music - both musically and sociologically
- in order to 'survive'. That I find less excitement in the 'new' jazz
than in the 'old' one (1915 - 1970's) may be irrelevant to the
discussion, but not to my evaluation of what's happening.
>> Maybe I'm only a tired old 20th century music lover, but even
>> then I have still some months to go.
>
>Nerd alert! :-) But seriously, cultural trends show far less respect for calendrical
>systems than people do. IMO, the "20th Century" as a cultural concept has been
>losing relevance at least since the early '90s, particularly with the political
>changes in Europe.
>
>I just don't think it's fair to judge the validity of today's jazz based on what you
>or I or anyone considers exciting. (Right now, most of my listening is to jazz
>recorded before 1936 or so.) At some point, if we're going to be historians/cultural
>theorists/prognosticators/what-have-you, we need to step out of the role of judge,
>and just try to make sense of what demonstrably *is*.
I thought we were just doing that. And I think that my 'sense' may not
be so different from yours. Only thing is: I draw different
conclusions regarding my listening behaviour.
jan winter
<marcn...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
>Hello Jan.
(snip)
>There's no guarantee that they will move you the same way they do us, but
>you never know what you might be missing!
Also on 01 Mar 2000 08:12:46 GMT, beelz...@aol.com (BeelzBubba)
wrote:
>Here's my prescription - go out and get a handful of disks and play them until
>you feel your feet tapping and your body swaying to the beat. It's out there.
>If Ayler is a god for you, try Charles Gayle, he's a worthy acolyte. Or
>Matthew Shipp. C'mon, it's supposed to be fun and it is!!!!
Of course I've taken carefully note of all the names that came up in
this thread. Some of them I've heard, some of them not, but I'll sure
check out.
As far as now *my* prescription for feet-tapping-body-swaying music
remains an old and approved one: Bird/Navarro/Powell/Russell/Blakey
Live at Birdland 1950. *This* music certainly isn't dead. It's so
alive that I should like to see anyone's foot that can tap in this
tempo.
jan winter
<ma...@outsideshore.com> wrote:
>jan winter <j.wi...@xs4all.nl> wrote:
>
>> I don't think there is anything in jazz today that equals the
>> excitement from 1920's New Orleans and Chicago; 1930's Kansas City and
>> Harlem; 1940's 52nd Street; 1950's everywhere and 1960's and '70's
>> Greenwich Village.
>
>Sorry you aren't excited by what is going on today, but there is plenty
>going on that excites others.
I gathered. But you are quoting me out of context. What I wrote was a
reply to someone who stated that there is *more* excitement in jazz
today than yesterday.
jan winter
<howard...@sdrc.com> wrote:
>jan winter wrote:
>
>> > That's 71 years to get from Bach to Mozart, 73 from Mozart to
>> >Brahms, another 49 from Brahms to Stravinsky. That's somewhere around
>> >200 years, give or take a few, to travel that idiomatic distance.
>>
>> There is ten years between Bach's death and Haydn's first appointment
>> as Kapellmeister. The development of music is not linear. There were
>> quite a few big hiccups. Only thing is: where are the hiccups of
>> today?
>
>The "big hiccup" of today started around 1915, and it started slowing down
>about 20 years ago. In the grand scheme of things, 1915-1980 is just one
>big hiccup. We only see it as a series of discrete revolutions because of
>our historical proximity. Musically, the "birth" of jazz occurred over the
>last 70 years or so. A single event in the history of music, about the
>same distance as Bach to Mozart.
The point of my Bach-Haydn hiccup was that the distance between Bach
and Mozart is, in time, much smaller than 70 years.
Glenn Wilson
smaller independent layers. I'd just like to add the label I record for -
Sunnyside - to your list.
Thanks
Glenn
Walter Davis <walter...@unc.edu> wrote in message
news:38BD6BBD...@unc.edu...
Marc Sabatella
> reply to someone who stated that there is *more* excitement in jazz
> today than yesterday.
And since the state of being excited is completely subjective, such a
claim can never be either "right "or "wrong". At most, you can say
*you* aren't more excited by modern jazz. Big deal. For some of us,
though the original statement holds.
Walter Davis
>
> Walter - I totally agree that most of the creative music is being made on
> smaller independent layers. I'd just like to add the label I record for -
> Sunnyside - to your list.
y'know I was gonna put Sunnyside on the list, but it's been so long
since I'd seen anything new on Sunnyside that I worried they were out of
business. (Note, I don't really buy that many records anymore so it's
not that big a deal if I haven't seen something.)
Walter Davis
> > Maybe I'm only a tired old 20th century music lover, but even
> > then I have still some months to go.
>
> Nerd alert! :-) But seriously, cultural trends show far less respect for calendrical
> systems than people do. IMO, the "20th Century" as a cultural concept has been
> losing relevance at least since the early '90s, particularly with the political
> changes in Europe.
this is way off-topic and maybe not worth mentioning, but we (Western?)
humans do get all caught up in our notions of time as if they're
meaningful. In sports, as the decade closed, everyone (especially ESPN)
had to chime in with their "baseball player of the decade", "baseball
team of the decade", etc. As if some guy who was great from 85-95
achieved less since he was neither an 80's nor a 90's player, as if
players on the Braves and Yankees really cared if the 99 world series
"would determine the team of the decade."
Dennis J. Kosterman
wrote:
>The point of my Bach-Haydn hiccup was that the distance between Bach
>and Mozart is, in time, much smaller than 70 years.
We're starting to get away from the main thread of the argument here,
but the "distance between Bach and Mozart" depends on how you define
it. Distance between birthdates = 1756 - 1685 = 71 years. Distance
between approximate dates of first major compositions = 1771 - 1710 =
61 years, less than 70 but not by that much. Distance between Bach's
final composition ("The Art of Fugue", left unfinished at his death in
1750) and Mozart's first juvenile compositions (in the early 1760s) is
only a little more than 10 years, but this isn't really a fair
measurement.
The "distance between Bach and Mozart" was being compared to the
entire history of jazz, and that could be made to look shorter than 70
years (I would say more like 80 years, but the point still holds --
they're in the same ballpark), too. After all, Louis Armstrong and
Duke Ellington, who were around pretty close to the beginning, were
still playing when most of today's "Young Lions" were born, and there
are still people alive today who *played* with Pops and Duke.
Dennis J. Kosterman
den...@tds.net
Tripletz
Culture. More people value "Louy, Louy,"
than the entire Beethoven Symphony Canon.