[Dixielandjazz] The "oldest" jazz is the best

[Charles Suhor]

>
>> From: <brian at radiojazz.co.uk>
>> The problem surely is that the public - who might be attracted to our
> music if they heard it >played well - may out of curiosity go to see 
> Woody
> and think it's awful. That could be their >lifelong impression of New
> Orleans jazz. The same could be said of some American Music label
>> "documentary" recordings which are frankly awful but which do have 
>> research
> value. Happy >Christmas everyone - I'm now off-list until the 26th. 
> Brian
> Harvey

An interesting offshoot of the belabored Woody Allen comments from 
Brian Harvey, above.

It's refreshing to hear that particular bit of heresy stated outright. 
Many jazz fans bring no semblance of a critical ear to the American 
Music sides and other recordings of earliest jazzmen. There seems to be 
a compulsion to lionize everything that's old, just because it's old. 
The jazz genre itself was a work-in-progress with these pioneering 
artists and many of them still used pre-jazz phrasing, vibratos, 
artifculation, etc., along with a great strain towards invention. It's 
interesting, as Brian says, for the research and historical value, but 
far from great jazz. The players themselves acknowledged qualitative 
distinctions and welcomed the movement away from many of the quirks of 
early near-jazz (squawking clarinets, flat-on-the-beat articulation, 
excessive growling, "freak music," etc.).

It's sad that corny and clumsy elements are still adopted today--as a 
conscious choice-- by some musicians in New Orleans and elsewhere. Many 
fans flock to it, thinking that the older, brassier, and cruder the 
sound, the better the jazz. Meanwhile, players who have a deep sense of 
jazz feeling often go under-recorded, under-employed, or unemployed. I 
don't think there's a cure for this, but it's useful to acknowledge and 
it support the players who aren't committed to ancestor worship.

Charlie Suhor