[Dixielandjazz] Re: Why Most Music Critics Don't Like OKOM

[TCASHWIGG at aol.com]

In a message dated 9/7/04 7:22:29 AM Pacific Daylight Time, 
barbonestreet at earthlink.net writes:

> I believe the original USA definition of funky music was applied to "bluesy
> jazz. Mean, low down, depressed blues. originated probably by 1920 but I
> don't know for sure about the date. When explaining "funky", US Dictionaries
> refer to one meaning as "funky jazz" and go on to state: "Jazz having an
> earthly quality or style derived from early blues or gospel music."  but do
> not explain it further.
> 
> 

I learned a long time ago that if you don't FEEL it you probably can't Play 
it, you can't write that on a chart, if you want to learn how to play it and 
feel it you have to go where it came from and listen and watch it, it is very 
visual.  Go to some old style Black Holiness churches and pay attention.  Most 
white folks have to go back many times to "GET IT."

The swing in Early Jazz I believe came from the Black American musicians who 
came first from the Black Gospel Churches, and then mixed with the Black Blues 
players who then gave ideas to guys like Armstrong and Bolden and Bechet to 
mix the feel with the syncopation, that was already in existence in Rag time 
and vaudeville, then smoothed it out a bit and invented the first versions of 
SMOOTH JAZZ so to speak.  It kept progressing to faster and hotter styles as 
they kept experimenting and improvising it.  These guys were playing what they 
FELT not charts for the most part for certain.

I have always found that Black Musicians play Blues and Jazz in a more laid 
back easy going style which is the characteristic of Early New Orleans music, 
many Black musicians did then and still do today however often play the same 
music in two distinctively different styles.  One for Black audiences and 
another for White.  

White players have, as far back as I can recall, always been technically 
orientated and consistently put more notes into the music and play it faster and 
louder to try and overcompensate for not being able to FEEL IT like most Black 
players do instinctively.

I also believe that artists like Count Basie, and Fats Domino became POP 
icons of their day by playing this style of Black Music for White audiences who 
they found willing to embrace it and buy it because it did not sound so BLACK 
like all those Race records.  This was further emphasized by the audiences they 
drew to hear them, Predominately White everywhere they went unless they played 
in the Black community, to a smaller audience usually because the Black 
communities thought they had sold out to the White man with their music and did not 
support them like they did other Black artists who remained in poor 
communities almost exclusively.

It was a smoothed out version of the Black sound and therefore considered to 
be much more civilized, the same musical ideas remained in tact for many years 
to come and still do so today to a certain degree.  We had groups like the 
Fifth Dimension, The Platters, The Coasters, The Mills Brothers, Smokey Robinson 
& The Miracles, The Supremes, and the whole Motown movement, created by Berry 
Gordy, to market Black music to White audiences where the Money was.


This is exactly the same thing that Elvis Presley saw when he started to 
develop his STYLE of Rock & Roll, he went down to New Orleans and listened and 
learned licks form the Black players and took them back to Memphis and 
interspersed them with the Blues up there and mixed in White Country music to form his 
own unique style that was quickly embraced by White audiences.  In his early 
stages however we must remember that he met with considerable resistance from 
the "Media" ALA ED SULLIVAN, who was the voice of pop America.

The same was admitted by Hank Williams in American Country Music, who went to 
New Orleans as well to listen to the Black Blues and Creole and Cajun bands 
which greatly influenced his writing and performance styles, changing Country 
Music's entire direction.

This brings me back to a former post of John Petters saying that it ain't 
Traditional Jazz.
These elements of evolution of Traditional Jazz prove otherwise, it evolved 
into different styles over time and form improvisational creative musicians 
daring to jump off the stage and walk away from the chart and Play whatever they 
"FELT" musically.

Cheers,

Tom Wiggins