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Ernest J. Hopkins said:
"JAZZ" (WE CHANGE the spelling each time so as not to offend either faction) can be defined, but it cannot be synonymized. If there were another word that exactly expressed the meaning of "jaz," "jazz" would never have been born. A new word, like a new muscle, only comes into being when it has long been needed. This remarkable and satisfactory-sounding word, however, means something like life, vigor, energy, effervescence of spirit, joy, pep, magnetism, verve, virility ebulliency, courage, happiness – oh, what's the use? – JAZZ.
(Source: In Praise of 'Jazz,' a Futurist Word Which Has Just Joined the Language by Ernest J. Hopkins in Bulletin, April 05, 1914)
(Source: In Praise of 'Jazz,' a Futurist Word Which Has Just Joined the Language by Ernest J. Hopkins in Bulletin, April 05, 1914)
Jazz is hard to define, so hard that I've been witness to several more-or-less heated arguments by self-proclaimed experts or jazz fans whether or not a specific piece of music or a specific band or artist could or should be labelled as "Jazz". Most of the times, they're just arrogantly trying to fence off their precious superior genre from the peasantry of "pop". This thread is not about that, this thread is about the music itself.
What I would like is to share and talk about jazz-related music, in the broadest way imaginable. If you think a song is influenced in any way by Jazz, that's enough for this thread, so share it. As I think that most people have relatively little experience with jazz music, please don't hesitate to share a bit of background on the artist, composer or track you're introducing to the thread. Likewise, if you hear anything you like, but would like to know similar songs or artists, don't hesitate to ask.
I'll start. (I'm by no means an "expert")
Miles Davis - Kind of Blue (album)
So, let's start in the most predictable way imaginable and talk about Miles Davis. Like the cliché or not, his music was the mean reason I developed an interest in jazz as a teenager and his 1959 album "Kind of Blue" started it all. As it's arguably the best-selling jazz record of all time, I would expect that most of you have at least heard some of the tracks on the album, even if were just a fragment used during a film. However, while now often seen as the stereotype of jazz, the album was actually quite revolutionary at the time. In the decade or so prior to the release of the album, the common way to improvise was to follow and play around with the chord progression. However, as chord progressions grew ever more complex during the "Hard Bop"-era, Miles Davis felt that the growing complexity limited creativity. Dictated by the complex and fast progressions, the musician was restricted rather than free in their improvisations.
After experimenting with it on his 1958 album "Milestones", Davis therefore decided to ditch the complexity in chords progression and adopt a thing called modality ("modal jazz"). Instead of having to focus on the complex chord progression, as the progression was kept relatively simple, the improvising musician was free to improvise using the mode, or tonality/scale of the song. This lead to an album full of tracks with relatively simple chord progressions, in fact most of the progressions are (derivations of) a simple blues progression, and a lot of freedom for the improvising musicians.
For me, this is still one of the go-to albums when I'm in need of a relaxing evening with a good glass of whisky after a stressful week.
So, here's the opening track of that album, "So What". I think it's a great example of the simplicity in chord progression as there hardly is any progression at all. In fact, the basic structure consists of only two chords, Dm7 and Ebm7, and both are played for bars at a time.
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Continuing in a second post due to the media limit.
This post has been edited by Gredfallan Ale: 21 September 2015 - 11:51 AM
I find it hard to determine where something stops being jazz and starts being 'alternative' or 'prog'.
