[Dixielandjazz] Term 'Moldy Fig' in jazz

[Barb Jordan]

Thanks Dan!

 

The guys I sing with play tunes from the 20's to the 50's.... but I am happy knowing the term's original meaning.

 

Barbara
 
> From: ds.augustine at mail.utexas.edu
> Date: Tue, 23 Jun 2009 09:57:55 -0500
> Subject: Re: [Dixielandjazz] Term 'Moldy Fig' in jazz
> CC: dixielandjazz at ml.islandnet.com
> To: jordan_barb at hotmail.com
> 
> Barb & DJML--
> I've written about this before (in 2003), but here's the short 
> answer:
> 
> "Moldy figs From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
> 
> Moldy figs are purist advocates of early jazz, originally those such 
> as Rudi Blesh, Alan Lomax, and James Jones who argued that jazz took a 
> wrong turn in the early 1920s with developments such as the 
> introduction of printed scores. Blesh, for example, dismissed the work 
> of Duke Ellington as "tea dansant music" with no jazz content whatever.
> 
> According to John Lowney, the term moldy figs was first used in this 
> sense by Bernard Gendron in a 1942 editorial in Metronome magazine, 
> "'Moldy Figs' and Modernists: Jazz at War".
> 
> The term was later used by the beboppers with reference to those who 
> preferred older jazz to bebop. During the post-World War II era there 
> was something of a revival of "traditional" jazz, and bebop displaced 
> swing as the "modern" music to which it was contrasted. [4] More 
> recently, Gene Santoro has referred to Wynton Marsalis and others, who 
> embrace bebop but not other forms of jazz that followed it, as "latter- 
> day moldy figs", with bebop now lying on the side of "jazz tradition".
> 
> Although the term was originally a pejorative, it has at times been 
> embraced by trad jazz fans and players."
> (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moldy_figs)
> 
> For the record, i checked out all editorials in 1942 Metronome 
> magazines, but never saw this reference.
> 
> Dan
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> From: Barb Jordan <jordan_barb at hotmail.com>
> Date: June 23, 2009 9:15:51 AM CDT
> Cc: Dixieland Jazz Mailing List <dixielandjazz at ml.islandnet.com>
> Subject: Re: [Dixielandjazz] Been gone for 10 months and yet...
> 
> I sing periodically with a Dixieland band called the Fig Leaf Jazz Band.
> Can someone explain the connection between figs (mouldy or otherwise) 
> and jazz/swing/dixieland?
> Thanks,
> 
> Barbara Jordan
> Burlington, Ontario, Canada
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> > From: rebecca.e.thompson at verizon.net
> > Date: Mon, 22 Jun 2009 22:19:54 -0500
> > Subject: [Dixielandjazz] Been gone for 10 months and yet...
> > CC: dixielandjazz at ml.islandnet.com
> > To: jordan_barb at hotmail.com
> >
> > Some things remain the same. I have been away from DJML since last 
> > August
> > and return to hearing the same arguments as before. Why debate 
> > Mouldy Fig
> > vs Modernist when THIS IS THE Dixieland Jazz Mailing List and not the
> > Modernist Mailing List?
> >
> > Everyone has their own style to which they prefer to listen. Just 
> > leave it
> > at that. The music I prefer does not reflect my respect - or lack 
> > there of
> > -- for previous musicians.
> >
> > Respectfully,
> >
> > Rebecca Thompson
> > Flower Mound, TX
> > -----Original Message-----
> > The Mouldy Fig v Modernist arguments still appears to rage. I can't 
> > get my
> > head round this at all. To my way of thinking, everything that 
> > happened in
> > jazz up to about 1970 developed out of what went before. It was all 
> > the one
> > music at different stages of development: Horace Silver and 
> > Thelonius Monk
> > (to name just two) couldn't have done what they did without Jelly, 
> > James P
> > and others having done their thing first.
> 
> **--------------------------------------------------------------------**
> ** Dan Augustine -- Austin, Texas -- ds.augustine at mail.utexas.edu
> ** "Thank you, but I have other plans."
> ** -- Response to "Have a nice day" suggested by Paul Fussell
> **--------------------------------------------------------------------**
> 
> 
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