Sul sito The News Record è apparso un interessante articolo che cerca di spiegare il rapporto tra improvvisazione e jazz. Ecco un estratto dell'articolo.
Despite my indifference for Wynton Marsalis’ music, I have to say I subscribe to a mindset attributed to the famed trumpeter: jazz is free-form music. I can hear jazz in everything, but everything is not jazz.
Marsalis, and myself consequently, can be considered as barriers to the growth and exploratory nature of jazz.
But still.
Just because there are electric guitars in a song doesn’t make it rock and roll. Violins don’t make something classical (Dave Matthews Band is not classical, classy or good.).
Similarly, just because there is improvisation in something, it isn’t jazz. I cringe every time I hear the saxophone in “Careless Whisper,” which makes me want to crash my car into a black hole while lighting myself on fire. Hopefully the afterlife has nothing to do with synthesizers, either. Then, if there is such a thing as an afterlife, I hope I can meet Adolphe Sax and tell him all the havoc his invention has caused.
Then have a cocktail with Dex.
Music changes; that’s just the nature, I suppose. I have to even be happy that jazz exists and how the blues birthed it. However, I really can’t deal with some of the stuff being labeled as jazz nowadays.
Jazz changes, I can deal with that. I can cope with avant-garde styles and seemingly random phrases and dissonance. I’ve had a moment of clarity while listening to Albert Ayler tunes.
For instance, listen to a song like “Giant Steps” by John Coltrane. Then, listen to “Spiritual.” Then listen to “Ascension.” It’s the same guy, but you can hear an evolution in the way he plays. “Ascension” can sound like noise, I admit, but that’s just how it turned out. That was Trane’s expression, which is beautiful.
Pharaoh Sanders is virtuosic, too, in the song. It’ll take me a while to fully understand what’s being said — if it’s anything at all — but I’m confident I’ll be able to someday.
On the other hand, even if something sounds good, it isn’t necessarily jazz. The Jazz Messengers played jazz. You can hear some bluesy parts of songs, but there’s nothing holier than Art Blakey, Wayne Shorter, Lee Morgan, Bobby Timmons and the bass lines of Jymie Merritt.
It doesn’t get better than that. Really.
Forget all the fog machines and playing to sold-out crowds in auditoriums and huge venues. Jazz is meant to be played in an intimate place for an intimate experience, even if it reminds of you going on a bender and sinning in bulk.
Think about it. I’ll leave with a quote, not even mine, but one of the great Duke Ellington.
“By and large, jazz has always been like the kind of a man you wouldn’t want your daughter to associate with.”
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Despite my indifference for Wynton Marsalis’ music, I have to say I subscribe to a mindset attributed to the famed trumpeter: jazz is free-form music. I can hear jazz in everything, but everything is not jazz.
Marsalis, and myself consequently, can be considered as barriers to the growth and exploratory nature of jazz.
But still.
Just because there are electric guitars in a song doesn’t make it rock and roll. Violins don’t make something classical (Dave Matthews Band is not classical, classy or good.).
Similarly, just because there is improvisation in something, it isn’t jazz. I cringe every time I hear the saxophone in “Careless Whisper,” which makes me want to crash my car into a black hole while lighting myself on fire. Hopefully the afterlife has nothing to do with synthesizers, either. Then, if there is such a thing as an afterlife, I hope I can meet Adolphe Sax and tell him all the havoc his invention has caused.
Then have a cocktail with Dex.
Music changes; that’s just the nature, I suppose. I have to even be happy that jazz exists and how the blues birthed it. However, I really can’t deal with some of the stuff being labeled as jazz nowadays.
Jazz changes, I can deal with that. I can cope with avant-garde styles and seemingly random phrases and dissonance. I’ve had a moment of clarity while listening to Albert Ayler tunes.
For instance, listen to a song like “Giant Steps” by John Coltrane. Then, listen to “Spiritual.” Then listen to “Ascension.” It’s the same guy, but you can hear an evolution in the way he plays. “Ascension” can sound like noise, I admit, but that’s just how it turned out. That was Trane’s expression, which is beautiful.
Pharaoh Sanders is virtuosic, too, in the song. It’ll take me a while to fully understand what’s being said — if it’s anything at all — but I’m confident I’ll be able to someday.
On the other hand, even if something sounds good, it isn’t necessarily jazz. The Jazz Messengers played jazz. You can hear some bluesy parts of songs, but there’s nothing holier than Art Blakey, Wayne Shorter, Lee Morgan, Bobby Timmons and the bass lines of Jymie Merritt.
It doesn’t get better than that. Really.
Forget all the fog machines and playing to sold-out crowds in auditoriums and huge venues. Jazz is meant to be played in an intimate place for an intimate experience, even if it reminds of you going on a bender and sinning in bulk.
Think about it. I’ll leave with a quote, not even mine, but one of the great Duke Ellington.
“By and large, jazz has always been like the kind of a man you wouldn’t want your daughter to associate with.”
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