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Jazz Is Freedom

thebaffler.com

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Re: Jazz Is Freedom

#41

Post by slater- »

pixelfarmer wrote: post #38
slater- wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

there's this concept of jazz "as a verb" vs "as a noun." musicians back in the day were limited by the technology of the day, so they played things like horns and upright basses. the thing that made their music "jazz" was the improvisation. the jazz was something they did, not an objective genre standard. if monk or miles or coltrane were alive today, their music would be way different. they'd probably take advantage…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sR_rPd_ufK4

omg i love this

Re: Jazz Is Freedom

#42

Post by eyelidlessness »

dang wrote: post #10
eyelidlessness wrote: post #5

[flagged]

Please don't do this—it just ends up adding noise to the thread once the original comment ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34285208 in this case) gets vouched for. Instead, just vouch for it and trust your fellow community members to do the rest of the work; or, if it's particularly good and worth the effort, let us know at hn@ycombinator.com so we can make sure it's unkilled. (In this case the comment was kill…

Sorry, I’ll send an email next time!

Re: Jazz Is Freedom

#43

Post by browningstreet »

hanlec wrote: post #27
50 wrote: post #17

If anyone wants a hear of modern jazz, I'm liking Jazzwise's "The 20 Best Jazz Albums of 2022": https://www.jazzwise.com/features/article/the-20-best-jazz-a...

Every month, I comb through previous month Downbeat, JazzTimes, and Jazzwise magazines putting together a list of albums. The trick? I do this with past years magazine though. I recently discovered the MusicBox app; sort of a listen later. My current playlist has 62 albums, as in December, these magazines are publishing their best of lists. As someone close said a couple of days: "I didn't realize how much time goes…

Thank you for your post. I’ve been hoping to find a JustWatch.com for music. Looks like musicbox is that.

Re: Jazz Is Freedom

#44

Post by browningstreet »

jefurii wrote: post #9

In one sense jazz is all about freedom - you can play "whatever you want!"- but in many other senses it's as incredibly traditional and formulaic.as classical. There is a canon of songs that is worshipped, and song structures and instrument combos are mostly frozen in amber, and there are lines you just cannot cross. Every genre gets like that after awhile I guess.

I think Adam Neely (youtube) does a great job of talking about this.

Re: Jazz Is Freedom

#45

Post by ltbarcly3 »

megmogandog wrote: post #2

It's a shame that any time anyone talks about Underground, they only talk about the cover art and not the music. I think it's one of his best albums, the last by his longest-running quartet, and with a few excellent late tunes — Ugly Beauty, Boo Boo's Birthday, and Green Chimneys — that you won't hear anywhere else. The only thing misguided about it is the last track, a version of In Walked Bud with vocals, that if I…

I suspect it's because everyone wants to talk about Jazz but almost nobody sits and listens to it long enough to have an ear be able to enjoy listening to it. Like 95% of the people who talk about Jazz never listen to it, but anyone can blather on about some visual piece. They have probably spent 100x more time looking at the album they have prominently displayed than they have spent with it out of it's sleeve.

Re: Jazz Is Freedom

#46

Post by gvurrdon »

Simon_O_Rourke wrote: post #15

Jazz club (parody) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TebUMhJAKSM

This stuff is great. The host of "Jazz Club" is actually a musician, and wrote this article:

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2016/nov/11/john-thomson-l...

I'm an amateur jazz musician myself (in rural England), and the people I know locally who've seen these sketches also like them. But, when I've mentioned them to Americans they do not seem to be at all amused, and are sometimes rather offended; I'm not sure why.

Re: Jazz Is Freedom

#47

Post by seanhunter »

wahnfrieden wrote: post #32
navane wrote: post #29

At every moment in history there were artists moving the boundaries of what was considered music. Every so often, a near past style was frozen and called a genre, you could call it a major version. Once the jazz as most people know it was part of a movement pushing those boundaries, but so was debussy, chopin, or almost any other composer. Now, this jazz has little freedom and has more in common with classical music,…

I've seen acceptance of all kinds of avant-garde music here but the one genre that repeatedly gets called out as perhaps not fitting the requirements for qualifying as music is rap. Couldn't help think of that with your description. It's too bad because even with endless repetition and copying it's a genre that continues to innovate every year, eg Playboi Carti who is among the most popular yet works in the realm of…

Speaking as an ex-professional Jazz Musician and someone who loves 20th and 21st C music in the Western "Classical" tradition, I can categorically say that there is hiphop that qualifies as great music.[1] Like all popular genres of music there is plenty of junk though.

As Louis Armstrong said "There's only two kinds of music, good music and bad music... and we play good music".

[1] A few simple examples from artists that HN folks may not be super familiar with to prove my point:

Little Simz

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hxfGQ2AJHGk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kh8Q2iytzns

Dave (this was live at the UK's version of the Emmys and noone knew he was going to do the verse about then Prime Minister Boris Johnson at the end so it caused a real stir).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mXLS2IzZSdg

Re: Jazz Is Freedom

#48

Post by klik99 »

tmountain wrote: post #33
navane wrote: post #29

At every moment in history there were artists moving the boundaries of what was considered music. Every so often, a near past style was frozen and called a genre, you could call it a major version. Once the jazz as most people know it was part of a movement pushing those boundaries, but so was debussy, chopin, or almost any other composer. Now, this jazz has little freedom and has more in common with classical music,…

Classical musicians (Chopin, etc) were noted for their improvisational capabilities, and there were many famous jam sessions throughout their respective time periods. Unfortunately, the technology didn’t exist to capture those moments, so we can only imagine what may have transpired.

Baroque was a particularly strong time for improvisation - Bach was more well known as an improvisor in his life time than a composer (or for his educational pieces which is what he was known for right after his death).

At music school I knew a few baroque improvisors, a good one on the harpsichord is one of my favorite music, really miss that.

Re: Jazz Is Freedom

#49

Post by jefurii »

galaxyLogic wrote: post #16
slater- wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

there's this concept of jazz "as a verb" vs "as a noun." musicians back in the day were limited by the technology of the day, so they played things like horns and upright basses. the thing that made their music "jazz" was the improvisation. the jazz was something they did, not an objective genre standard. if monk or miles or coltrane were alive today, their music would be way different. they'd probably take advantage…

Miles did some nice synthesizer stuff as well. And he said he would never go back to be-bob it was all done already.

I remember watching a documentary about Miles right before he released Tutu. The interviewer asked if he ever got nostalgic for the old bebop or cool jazz stuff he used to play. Miles paused for a long time, then he said I love those old tunes but they're in the past and I can't go back there. I got to keep moving.

I really respected him for that, but when I got to college the music program was so focused on the past. It looked like the only prof who was doing contemporary stuff was the percussion guy and I played trumpet. I got booed out of the room once for suggesting it'd be cool to mix jazz and hip-hop (this was 1989).

If I'd stuck with it I probably would have discovered all kinds of new stuff going on, but I followed what Miles said and got into electronic music.

Re: Jazz Is Freedom

#50

Post by navane »

wahnfrieden wrote: post #32
navane wrote: post #29

At every moment in history there were artists moving the boundaries of what was considered music. Every so often, a near past style was frozen and called a genre, you could call it a major version. Once the jazz as most people know it was part of a movement pushing those boundaries, but so was debussy, chopin, or almost any other composer. Now, this jazz has little freedom and has more in common with classical music,…

I've seen acceptance of all kinds of avant-garde music here but the one genre that repeatedly gets called out as perhaps not fitting the requirements for qualifying as music is rap. Couldn't help think of that with your description. It's too bad because even with endless repetition and copying it's a genre that continues to innovate every year, eg Playboi Carti who is among the most popular yet works in the realm of…

Where current popular music (I would call it EDM) is pushing the sound more than the song, rap is obviously about the words. Maybe hence the schism in the value of rap in music.
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