[Dixielandjazz] Why We Play Jazz Music

[Steve barbone]

"Elazar Brandt" <jazzmin at actcom.net.il> wrote a moving note and a couple of
points might be discussed further. (polite snip)

> Many of the greatest have only been recognized long after their deaths. Some
> lived and died in poverty, the world not being ready
> for or failing to notice the gift they laid at its feet. It is arguably the
> very pain and suffering and struggling to make it happen
> that forged the creations that we have come to know and love.

You could argue that, but the opposite is also quite provable.
 
> I mean, did Louis go to school and take classes to learn how to play like
> Louis, so he could get a job (one of many no doubt on the
> market at the time) playing like Louis? Heck no. He played when and where he
> could because he loved to play, or was driven to by
> whatever fire was burning in his soul, and when he got good enough, someone
> took notice and started to hire him. As far as I know,
> that's how it works.

Reading about Louis' life one also realizes that it was also the sex, drugs,
booze and escape from abject poverty that helped drive him to music
 
> I don't think I've ever seen an angry musician who can play OKOM. Doesn't
> work.

I've played with a few in my time who were wonderful OKOM musicians. But
there are two very well known jazz musos, one live, one dead that I
know/knew who made the most beautiful music you will ever hear. You would
agree immediately if I named them. On the personal side, they are the
angriest scum of the earth you would ever meet.
 
> One last point. From what I've seen in my short life, making art into a
> commercial enterprise kills it.

Perhaps too sweeping a statement? Salvador Dali was blatantly commercial.
Yet he was, in every sense of the word, an artist. On the OKOM side, the
master commercialist was, gasp, choke, Louis Armstrong. One of the inventing
artists of Jazz. I mean, he venerated the audience and did whatever it took
to make sure he was doing what they wanted.

I think you will find that any jazz musician who works steadily is
commercial and that includes therefore, just about all of our old heroes.
Condon, Wild Bill, Yerba Buena, Turk Murphy, ODJB, Phil Napoleon, Teagarden,
Fletcher Henderson, Gene Goldkette, etc. You name a working band and talk to
the working musicians in it and they will tell you that music is a business.

Most musicians who make their living playing music have a very different
outlook about "art" and "music" from that of non-playing fans, or part time
players with day gigs. The working OKOM jazzers will also concede that they
are less concerned about producing "art" than just producing good music that
an audience appreciates.
 
Questions like "Is it jazz?", or "Is it Art." or "Is Jazz Art?" or "Is it
OKOM?" have no real meaning for the working musician. Most that I have
known, including guys like Hawkins, Bechet, Erwin, Condon, Russell,
Eldridge, Simeon, et al, could have cared less. Like Eddie Condon, they
called it music. Their goal was simply to play good music every night. And
when you are working six nights a week, plus recording, boozing and chasing
woman, that becomes a chore very quickly.

Cheers,
Steve Barbone