[Dixielandjazz] Chet Baker and Lack of Melody

[Charles Suhor]

Great analysis, Dan! A couple of comments, and a question...

When speaking about the evolution of arts in general, I agree that it's  
safe to say that they tend to move to more complexity, as in painting  
and jazz, as you note--with the reservation that reactions might come  
to the complexity, as in the minimalist  movement. I'm betting $8.00  
you'll agree that when it comes to individual performances in the more  
complex forms, many pursue complexity for its own sake (as in guys who  
play too many notes but lose feeling and musical meaning--as with many  
Coltrane imitators).

Critics of the newer form take cluttered or experimental performances  
as a flaw in the style itself, often failing to respond to fine  
performances (like [most of] Bird, Coltrane, Konitz, Rollins). The  
detractors who aren't honest enough to say that their distaste for  
modern jazz is just that--a matter of taste--are jazz fundamentalists.  
Of course, there are snobs on both sides. Some fans and players in the  
modern movement, esp. during its origins, put down early jazz as corny  
and simplistic, missing the fact that the new music incorporates most  
of the expressive values of the old--"transcends and includes" it, as  
Ken Wilber says.

Another wrinkle--the smaller audience for the new art form often grows  
to dominate as the form gets to be heard or seen more widely. Modern  
jazz that started as underground music beloved by a few has become  
virtually the only jazz we hear on the radio, as background music at  
chic restaurants, Starbucks, etc., while early jazz doesn't typically  
sell beyond a small set of fans. Same with new ideas, in the sciences,  
religion, or literary criticism, etc. The new stuff has to become part  
of what Rupert Sheldrake calls the morphic resonance of the culture.

The question: how can we talk appreciatively of the early jazz that we  
love and about the growth of more complex forms without sounding like  
elitists who are claiming inherently greater value of styles that  
present a more nuanced palette for the performer? I've been nailed with  
that charge even after swearing that I dig music well played in every  
style.

Charlie


On Dec 2, 2006, at 9:57 PM, Dan Augustine wrote:

> I think that it's possible that the limits of human perception limit  
> art.
>
> In literature, stories can become character studies, or intricate
> macaronic plays on words.
>
> In art, line and color can each become so hard to follow that
> representation of worldly objects disappears.
>
> In music, melody can drift ever farther from harmony, and rhythm
> starts to shed pulse.
>
> For the great mass of humanity, art in words, in pictures, and in
> sound is never very far from speech and everyday life.  For those of
> us who create art in these media, or for those of us who like to
> experience ever more complicated patterns in these arts, it's like
> eating spicy food.  The more you eat and can stand, the spicier you
> can stand and prefer.  Also, over time, every style of art tends to
> become more and more intricate within its own style.  To the appeal
> of the senses is more and more added complexity for the mind.
> Eventually a reaction to this over-complication will generate a 'new'
> simpler style based on but antithetical to the old one.  Art, as all
> things human, goes in cycles, which are really spirals, in three not
> two dimensions.  Old elements are dropped, new techniques are tried
> out, and the new beginning occurs again.
>
> But for every 'advance' in art, you lose part of your audience.
> Eventually the artists will be functioning at (for their style) a
> very high level, but the audience for that style will have
> correspondingly shrunk.
>
> Stay tuned.  It'll come around again.  Until then, like what you
> like, without apology.
> --  
> **-------------------------------------------------------------------- 
> **
> **  Dan Augustine  --  Austin, Texas  --  ds.augustine at mail.utexas.edu
> **    "When one day an arctic traveler played a recorded song by one
> **     of the most famous European composers to an Eskimo singer,
> **     the man smiled somewhat haughtily and stated: 'Many many
> **     notes, but no better music.'"
> **               -- Curt Sachs _The Wellsprings of Music_
> **-------------------------------------------------------------------- 
> **
>
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