What Is Jazz To You? Please Help

[rmj]

I'm doing a class assignment about how people define jazz and jazz improvisation, and I was wondering if any of you might be able to provide your own definition. Thanks!

[bluenoter]

Somebody is going to quote this to you, so it might as well be me. Supposedly, when asked what jazz is, Louis Armstrong said, "If you have to ask, you'll never know."

Hope you get some other answers.

[Richardo Caerleoni]

Wish you all the luck with this!

I argued for years that Ray Charles was "Jazz"...others said "no, he's soul, blues, country,pop, MoR etc. etc.

It is a terrible response...for your use, but as someone once said..."you'll know it when you hear it"...

Or as Duke Ellington once said to a fan who pestered him to know who played second trumpet in some obscure 1936 recording...

"Look, what you see is sixteen men trying to earn a living"

Anything, above that, in that context is "Jazz".

Beware definitions..they define!

Best ...RC. Ok..."Still..The Sound of Surprise?" (A good quote - use it!)

[Squaredancecalling Steve]

There is a 100-year old jazz tradition now, and to some extent your answer should point to that and draw from that.

[bluenoter]

Further predictions: Somebody is going to define jazz as having improvised elements, and a mild argument will ensue. Then somebody is going to define jazz as being blues based, and a big fight will ensue.

[Ron Thorne]

A very simplistic definition of jazz might include the combination of melody + harmony + rhythm + syncopation + improvisation.

In my humble opinion, there should be no argument whatsoever that improvisation is a key element of jazz expression.

A simplistic definition of improvisation is playing what comes to mind immediately, without forethought or written music to guide you. It's often reactive, but sometimes simply an instantaneous extension of thoughts and/or emotions.

[sashabur]

My Collins dictionary says that jazz is a kind of music of American Negro origin, characterized by syncopated rhythms, solo and group improvisation, and a variety of harmonic idioms and instrumental techniques. It exists in a number of styles. Compare: blues. See also: bebop, bop, Dixieland, free (sense 7), hard bop, harmolodics, mainstream (sense 2), modern jazz, New Orleans jazz, swing (sense 28), trad.

Bwa-ha-ha!
(I liked the harmolodics part, by the way. You might say, it's an advanced dictionary. )

No, seriously, people usualy try to avoid answering this question! Especially musicians. I might also offer you a definition of jazz from the "Jazz in Russia" website, given in the form of a conversation of three people. It's in Russian, but I'll translate it for you:

A: Let's talk about jazz. Tell me something about jazz finally.
B: Well, A, jazz... is... you know... how do I put it best...
C: Hmmm... well... errr... jazz is such a... hmm... so.
A: Ahh, I see, I see!

[Rob C]

My personal definition of jazz is "the music that gives primacy to the musicians". In other words, the performance is what counts, as opposed to the composition.

I have a pretty broad definition, I guess.

[RainyDay]

There is also no argument that the blues gave birth to jazz.

[frankiepop]

improvisation








not all improvisation is jazz...but jazz is improvisation...

[J Lee]

Jazz is also composition -- plenty of the greatest jazz performances have involved zero degree of improv and 100% prepared parts.

So, jazz is improv, but also not. Jazz is either syncopated or not. Jazz uses extensions, altered or unaltered, beyond a ninth, or it does not. Jazz players manipulate the sound and feel of the blues or they're unwilling to. I don't conclude from this that these are the wrong categories to use in attempting a formal definition -- just that you must account for these and similar disjunctions as you attempt your definition.

I'm thinking of a famous thought experiment an important American philosopher named Quine thought up, which I'm not going to type up right now, on how the inability to ascribe with any rigor a definition to a single word does not preclude its being used with functional limpidity by any particular group. I wouldn't go that route. I would instead claim that gross objects such as the sun or bebop music or stride piano or an animal are universally understood, independently of culture, independently of any particular linguistic definition, and especially because they don't belong to language. As you determine at what granularity or level of detail you wish to discover the essence of jazz music, you'll be able to come up with a formal, if incomplete, portrait of its dependent and independent parts. And it won't be pretty, either -- since you'll not be able to refer to rhythm, harmony, melody, improvisation, song structure, in any simple fashion. It will be a huge, messy, formalization filled with "nots" and "unless" and so forth. It will also be incomplete.

In other words, the assignment sounds retarded, as do the likely responses to it by your peers. I would blow it off if I were you, or just make something up about physical exertion or history or some such.

[frankiepop]

read...what is jazz to YOU? it is not meant to be definitive or empirical...just personal...


rmj, if i were given the assignment, then i would tackle it like a adult. dont be a little baby girl and cry and whine your way out of it...go ahead and tackle it.

[Dennis Gonzalez]

Twenty years ago, Anthony Braxton came to my home to teach a workshop about jazz as an alternative creativity. He stated that he saw jazz as a phenomenon related to social reality and,

1) What it poses for economical and political implications of this time zone;
2) What it poses for alternative spiritualism (that being a reinvestigation as to the nature of the alignment we have while we're on this planet with the greater forces which are involved in this experience);
3) Alternative functionalism for what it poses for the establishment of new positions; new cultures;
4) Creativity as a means for reinvestigating mysticism;
5) Creativity as a factor related to healing;
6) Future technology;
7) Creativity as a consideration dealing with investigation and restoration of positive ethics;
8) Creativity as a vehicle for positive stimulation;
9) Releasing the shackles on the creative woman, the black composer, or the white improviser; and,
10) Creativity as a means for establishing the meta-significance of form and ritual.

OK...dig it and dig in!

[Ron Thorne]

Originally Posted by J Lee

Jazz is also composition -- plenty of the greatest jazz performances have involved zero degree of improv and 100% prepared parts.

So, jazz is improv, but also not. Jazz is either syncopated or not. Jazz uses extensions, altered or unaltered, beyond a ninth, or it does not. Jazz players manipulate the sound and feel of the blues or they're unwilling to. I don't conclude from this that these are the wrong categories to use in attempting a formal definition -- just that you must account for these and similar disjunctions as you attempt your definition.

A couple of things come to mind with respect to this 2nd paragraph, J Lee.

• I've never heard a piece of music in my life to which I would ascribe the genre of jazz which didn't involve syncopation.

• As frankiepop points out, the thread originator was not seeking a "formal" definition (assuming that there is one) of jazz, but rather what defines jazz for us ... individually and personally.

Jazz players manipulate the sound and feel of the blues or they're unwilling to.

• That doesn't mean that there's not an inherent jazz/blues connection, beyond these factors, however. I don't get the "unwilling" part, frankly.

In other words, the assignment sounds retarded, as do the likely responses to it by your peers. I would blow it off if I were you, or just make something up about physical exertion or history or some such.

"Retarded"?

With all due respect, you're painting with an awfully broad brush here, not to mention bordering on clairvoyance.

"Make something up"?

[sashabur]

Personally, I could only give a metaphoric definition. What to me distinguishes jazz from other genres of music is its focus on development, as opposed to form or atmosphere. Jazz is like traffic: some people drive carefully, some people drive recklessly, some follow the rules, some don't. They're kind of on their own, but they're parts of the same process. Sometimes accidents happen. And when you're driving, your attention is mostly occupied with the current road situation, although you know you are going to arrive somewhere.

[Lois Gilbert]

There's a very good book by musician Jonny King called What Jazz Is - not sure it's still in print, but you can email Jonny (he's a jazzcorner client) and he perhaps can help you score a copy.

Good luck
Lois

[Dr Dave]

Originally Posted by sashabur

Personally, I could only give a metaphoric definition. What to me distinguishes jazz from other genres of music is its focus on development, as opposed to form or atmosphere. Jazz is like traffic: some people drive carefully, some people drive recklessly, some follow the rules, some don't. They're kind of on their own, but they're parts of the same process. Sometimes accidents happen. And when you're driving, your attention is mostly occupied with the current road situation, although you know you are going to arrive somewhere.

Excellent!

[Dr Dave]

DANGER! The following is a very conventional definition from a moldy fig mind!

What is jazz to me? To me, it's what happens when the blues encounters more than three chords. To me, if it isn't at least informed by the blues, then it may be improvised music, but it isn't jazz.

I am also in complete agreement with the idea that while the word cannot be pinned down to a single meaning, its meaning is well known and it is a perfectly useful word.

Years ago, on the old JCS board, I offered a foolproof definition of jazz: It is the music played on Lou Donaldson's "Blues Walk." There is no getting around the fact that "Blues Walk" is jazz. And anything that sounds like "Blues Walk" is probably also jazz. Anything that doesn't at least incorporate some elements of the music on "Blues Walk" may or may not be jazz--we can argue. But we can't argue about "Blues Walk." Well, nobody's had the temerity to suggest that it isn't jazz, anyway.

[J Lee]

Well a personal definition is a lot easier to come up with -- for me, it's easy: jazz is strenuous physical labor, something I associate with slicking down an instrument with sweat and perhaps other fluids, like blood, or the thin strand of saliva that sometimes hangs feet-long from one or both corners of the mouth when one concentrates at something. But I wouldn't call that my definition of jazz -- because rock and roll is sort of like that exertion in a higher degree. It is what I associate with jazz music, though, sometimes more intensely than others.

I like Dr. Dave's solution best, I think -- you get to know what's at the core of things by looking at instances of that thing very carefully. And why not any single one of Donaldson's great records? He's the man!

sashabur's metaphor is spot-on, to me, as well. It *is* excellent.

But, and keep in mind I agree -- Bill Evans's music sounds to me much like Donaldson's, but I don't really get the blues in Evans music at all...I'm not sure if he ever recorded a blues tune or played a "blues lick" once his own career got going...Or perennial bandstand favorites like the tunes on "Hotel Hello"? I don't think of these as counterexamples that prove anything, but just as cautions that if you say one thing about the blues, it's only fair to keep in mind to what extent the opposite may be true as well. So, I'd keep Donaldson but lose the blues element, and call it good.

I'm uncertain how to better get at the syncopation issue: my initial take is that whenever you've got a group of musicians playing together, there's some syncopation going on at some level, or between the right and left hands of a piano, like, say, in Chopin? I think there are ways of playing the drum which needn't imply strong and weak beats, though, if that's what Ron is getting at, and I'm pretty sure I heard some of that when I was listening to some of the early-mid-sixties free stuff, which I don't anymore.

And, finally, why the hell not make something up? That's certainly what I'm doing here, and in my last post, and probably in every other post, and I relish it.

P.S.
This was the OP: "I'm doing a class assignment about how people define jazz and jazz improvisation, and I was wondering if any of you might be able to provide your own definition. Thanks!" Certain of you were wrong to chide me for attempting to provide my own definition. And certain of you might do well to look up "empirical" in the dictionary, as well, if only to make certain that no observation of yours be tainted by this garish and base perversion of the True Path called "empiricism."

[Ron Thorne]

Note to rmj-

Just print out the responses on this thread, put a date and your name at the top. You're done!

ps: Post#13 should get you some extra credit, while putting a pained/confused expression on your teacher's face.

[J Lee]

I thought the Braxton stuff was fascinating; even though I don't really get it, it seems like there is some direction there, some path to follow. Maybe Braxton should get out of the performance biz and leap straight-ahead to the vanguard of jazz criticism.

Perhaps you meant Post #11? Or Post #12?

[jazzfiend]

For me, jazz is the staff of life. Without it, I don't function properly.

[claude]

I was watching my cats this morning prowling around the windows stalking the birds that were flying around outside. It struck me that they have something inate within them that compels them to love hunting and to get a lot of pleasure from it, even if they never "really" do it.

For me music is similar in that it is something that I am compelled to seek out. My hack theory is that we are genetically programmed to create beauty in order to give our brief existence here some purpose, or maybe for some greater reason (note: I am an atheist, so I'm still strugging to figure out how this all ties together). For me jazz is the best of being human, when it is done well, it is a person or group opening themselves up to their audience and expressing all that is within them. In my mind it is unlike any other art because it can be so spontaneous and performed from the true soul of the artist without time to massage the product for mass consumption (again when done well it can be like this). So for me jazz has never struck me as an intellectual listening experience, the music that I love most has always had an emotional impact beyond the notes, chords and technique.

Anyway, those are the rantings of this madman on this cold January morning. Hope it makes some sense and doesn't cause me too much embarrassment should I re-read this with a clearer head.

[Richardo Caerleoni]

Originally Posted by claude

I was watching my cats this morning prowling around the windows stalking the birds that were flying around outside. It struck me that they have something inate within them that compels them to love hunting and to get a lot of pleasure from it, even if they never "really" do it.

For me music is similar in that it is something that I am compelled to seek out. My hack theory is that we are genetically programmed to create beauty in order to give our brief existence here some purpose, or maybe for some greater reason (note: I am an atheist, so I'm still strugging to figure out how this all ties together). For me jazz is the best of being human, when it is done well, it is a person or group opening themselves up to their audience and expressing all that is within them. In my mind it is unlike any other art because it can be so spontaneous and performed from the true soul of the artist without time to massage the product for mass consumption (again when done well it can be like this). So for me jazz has never struck me as an intellectual listening experience, the music that I love most has always had an emotional impact beyond the notes, chords and technique.

Anyway, those are the rantings of this madman on this cold January morning. Hope it makes some sense and doesn't cause me too much embarrassment should I re-read this with a clearer head.

PERFECT SENSE..AND JUST PERFECT!

"I am an atheist, so I'm still strugging to figure out how this all ties together). For me jazz is the best of being human, when it is done well, it is a person or group opening themselves up to their audience and expressing all that is within them. In my mind it is unlike any other art because it can be so spontaneous and performed from the true soul of the artist without time to massage the product for mass consumption (again when done well it can be like this). "

"WAY DOWN IN MY SOUL..!"...RC.

[sonic1]

Jazz is being tied to the wall, repeatedly slapped by a husky fellow, and yelling out "mommy, mommy oh mommy".

[Derek Taylor]

Jazz is a hamhock in your cornflakes… no wait, that’s Soul. I guess I’m partial to Balliett’s bon mot: “Jazz is the sound of surprise.”

[Richardo Caerleoni]

[QUOTE=Derek Taylor]Jazz is a hamhock in your cornflakes… no wait, that’s Soul. I guess I’m partial to Balliett’s bon mot: “Jazz is the sound of surprise.”[/QUOTE]

See earlier post #3 ? ...

RC.

[Derek Taylor]

Looks like we're on the same page, RC & both owe Balliett a debt of gratitude.

[Gary Sisco]

Whatever Stanley Grouch says it is. If not, he'll smack you in the face.

[Richardo Caerleoni]

Originally Posted by Gary Sisco

Whatever Stanley Grouch says it is. If not, he'll smack you in the face.

After SC ...................Before SC !

RC.