[Dixielandjazz] Porte ñ a Jazz Band/"cartoon music"

[Charles Suhor]

On Jan 16, 2007, at 6:40 PM, Scott Anthony wrote:
> I'm really sorry, but I don't understand this whole "cartoon" label 
> being placed on this band. It makes it sound like you guys are saying 
> that any band that use charts cannot be considered a jazz band...
> ...Turk had tight ensemble arrangements but I doubt many people would 
> have considered him playing cartoon music.
>
> Scott Anthony

It's not the fact that bands play or don't play charts that make their 
music jazz, near-jazz, or non-jazz. I think it's two things that make 
the difference--the conception of the players of the charts, and the 
lines of the music itself.

The ensemble work of the Basie band (and countless others, including 
earlier jazz bands) is played with a jazz conception, whereas the same 
charts played by a beginner's high school band will typically miss the 
mark and it will sound like football field music. (Many players have 
mastered the art of playing hip charts with a jazz conception but can't 
improvise. I don't think they call themselves jazz musicians even 
though they can swing their butts off in the section.)

If the lines of the chart itself are, for instance, ragtimey and they 
call for choppy articulation, that's another performance that's less 
jazz-like, even (or especially) when played precisely.

Good jazz improvisers who are good readers don't stop being jazzers 
when playing in a big band section, or even when playing in 
Mickey/cartoon/corn/call-it-what-you will music. But they know that 
different demands are made on them in all of these contexts. Mixtures 
of musics aren't uncommon, of course, as when there are solo choruses 
in mouse bands that give some space for improvisation.  This happened a 
lot with bands in the 20s and 30s. But the mixing doesn't totally blur 
the genres, and the players I know and use different terms to describe 
musics that are dramatically different, like the music of the Porte n a 
Band and a Preservation Hall unit, or a smooth jazz performance and 
Sonny Rollins, etc.

It's can all be good music that's fit for different contexts, so 
there's no harm, no foul if we try to sort it out in the available 
language. Trouble is. we've inherited some loaded language for certain 
musics, and we either have to invent new terms or use the old ones 
without prejudice.

Charlie Suhor