[Dixielandjazz] Jazz--Art--John Cage

[Fred Spencer]

Apropos of your thoughts about the jazz jargon of  "free form" and modal
jazz, how about this from an essay entitled "The Word Jazz" by Krin Gabbard
in "The Cambridge Companion to Jazz" (2002)?

"...early jazz, proto-jazz or 'Ur'-jazz was performed by people from an
extremely wide variety of backgrounds."

The only Ur I know of was a Babylonian city by that name in about 3,000
B.C., so perhaps we shall have to reconsider the American claim to the
foundation of jazz!!!!!
Fred

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Harold Smith" <s3856lpa at webtv.net>
To: <paul.edgerton at eds.com>; <Dixielandjazz at ml.islandnet.com>
Sent: Thursday, December 04, 2003 5:09 AM
Subject: [Dixielandjazz] Jazz--Art--John Cage


> Very interesting comments regarding the injection of musical "Dada-ism"
> such as 4'33"  into the world of art.
>
> I'm a bit Neanderhal, and I shed my youthful adventurism something over
> 50 years ago.  To my mind, these attempts by avant-garde "composers" to
> fashion chaos into a musical language are fostered by their inabllity to
> confront creativity in an established form.  Thus, we have such things
> as "free form" and modal jazz, and, God forbid, other things as the
> youthful Ozzy Osborne biting the head off of a bat as part of a
> so-called musical performance.
>
> I could go on expounding and raving, but then I'd be joining in the very
> thing I'm criticizing.
>
> Regards,  Harold Smith
>
>
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