[Dixielandjazz] Listening to different kinds of music

[david richoux]

Let me re-quote parts of my message of yesterday:
> I am not saying that everything about Rap and Hip-Hop is just fine and 
> dandy - there are a lot of negative folks out there and it can get 
> ugly!
>
(BTW, the thread  was actually discussing the turn-table "Scratchers" 
who usually don't ever say a word during a Rap performance...)

> But I often read what people in "Polite Society" thought about early 
> Jass and Blues records - the profanity, sexual innuendo, drug 
> references and the "low class" artists and musicians - the NERVE!

I have read (in a history of British Brass Bands) of announcements from 
the pulpit and in the newspapers in the 1840s about how listening to 
Brass Band music on a Sunday afternoon would lead to dancing, and then 
directly to Sin and Moral Degradation!

The sensibilities of the middle class and upper class  population in 
the USA in the early 1900s were shocked by even the "coded" language in 
Jazz and Blues - no need to use the harsher words!

(however, have any of you all seen the new HBO program "Deadwood?" The 
use of expletives in that 1870s Wild West setting has been researched 
by the writer/producer David Milch , there was a lengthy discussion on 
NPR Fresh Air yesterday:
<http://freshair.npr.org/day_fa.jhtml?display=day&todayDate=03/25/2004> 
)

anyway, I think that the lyrical content of early Jazz is as important 
as the musical content. I know some "Jazz Societies" have a preference 
for groups that do not do a lot of vocals but "And That's Jazz" has 
three good singers and we use them!

Dave Richoux

On Mar 25, 2004, at 6:09 PM, Craig Johnson wrote:

> Well, Dave, you may be more tolerant than I or simply more PC.
>
> While I'll admit that my note was half in jest (to make my washboard
> comment.) still, I feel fairly poorly about rap music. I consider the 
> jazz
> and
> swing age sexual innuendo at least had a bit of subtlety to it , 
> GENERALLY
> mare a double entendre rather than an explicit step by step "how-to" 
> guide.
>
> Warning -- this diatribe continues......
>
> Admittedly, each generation has felt we are going to hell in a 
> handbasket.
> But I think the handbasket is getting smellier.
> snip