Jazz for aficionados

Hey fourwinds - Glad you took my little rant as humor. Getting an original pressing of that Spyrogyra LP is a NICE present. I can see where you are coming from talking about Aja and Gaucho in the context. Add Royal Scam to the list (some tracks from it, anyway). I think I prefer the Steely Dan stuff because it seems a bit more complex - but that’s based on very limited familiarity with Spyrogyra and I might be selling them short. I don’t question their talent as musicians, more a case of questioning how they employ it. At the same time, these guys gotta pay the rent and buy groceries. Back in the day, seems like they found a commercially successful "formula". If it was so easy to do, lots more woulda done it. Might not be my preferred cuppa but I also think I can’t act all superior about their choices not having walked in their shoes.

As usual, thoughtful and insightful comments from Frogman. I agree with the parallel he draws between Spyro and Chuck Mangione. Pop Jazz is an apt sub-genre heading too.  Trying to think of some others that are in this category...maybe some of Tom Scott's L.A. Express work??

I’m not sure why some here have a problem with analytical discussion ("critiquing"! even) of the music. I like getting below the surface, past the "Like it" or "Don’t like it" initial reaction and on to what makes it tick. Why is composition or performance ABC "better" (or not) than XYZ?  Why are Flanagan and Evans "elegant" players while Monk, not so much. Does McCoy Tyner's intricacy qualify as elegant?  How about Keith Jarrett?? Such discussion doesn’t detract from the music at all but can add to the enjoyment.

FWIW - Elegant is more restricted in meaning than simply being of high quality or "good".  A definition of "elegance" (that which elegant embodies) from Merriam Webster on-line:

1a : refined grace or dignified propriety : urbanity
b : tasteful richness of design or ornamentation <the sumptuous elegance of the furnishings>
c : dignified gracefulness or restrained beauty of style : polish <the essay is marked by lucidity, wit, and elegance>
d : scientific precision, neatness, and simplicity <the elegance of a mathematical proof>

Restrained beauty of style strikes me as entirely applicable to what I've heard of Tommy Flanagan.

Hope you continue to participate in this thread. Hats off to Orpheus for starting it. Been a Jazz 101 course for me.

"Soul", what is it? Some of the most brilliant minds have tried to define it without success. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel spent his entire life writing about the philosophy of soul; The Phenomenology of Spirit was the name of his most famous book. When the uneducated refer to "soul", they are speaking of the same thing that Hegel spent his life studying, and writing about. I find that point of contrast quite fascinating.

"Ray Charles got soul"; nobody in his right mind will argue with that statement. "Ray Charles can play jazz". "Huh"! might be the response from many people. Those who are not "Jazz aficionados" might find the two words, soul and jazz to be incongruous; that's because they think of "soul music", which is light years away from jazz; but moving right along to "Brother Ray" and jazz, his jazz got plenty plenty soul.

The top example of this is "Blue Funk"; that's on a LP titled "Soul Brothers", featuring Brother Ray, and Milt Jackson plus all the other "Soul Brothers" that make this music; the word can not be overused when discussing this album.

"Blue Funk"

              https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CQnOY5LWrWI


Enjoy the music.

Orpheus - enjoyed your comments about Soul and Jazz.  You can have soul music without jazz but the best jazz music got to have soul.  

You realize of course that you and Frogman are Yang/Yin, Head/Heart, Objective/Subjective...polar opposites - but the whole is not possible without both.  At the same time, let me be quick to add, while I see Frogman's postings being interpreted as exclusively favoring an objectivist  perspective on jazz, I don't think that accurately reflects where he's coming from.  He doesn't need me to defend him.  That's not my intent.  Rather, as something of an outsider, I see merit in both your perspectives and no need for it to be one at the expense of the other.     

Excellent comments, Ghosthouse; you are exactly right. Re the objective/subjective issue:

As I see it, the main sticking point in the debate is what often seems to be the assumption by some that when objective criteria are used to judge some or all aspects of a particular music, that this automatically means that the evaluation is devoid of subjectivity or simple emotional reaction; or, that the person who sometimes analyses ALWAYS analyses when listening. Nothing could be further from the truth. As you point out, not only is there "no need for one to be at the expense of the other", objective analysis can actually help the listener appreciate MORE of what might otherwise fall under the heading of subjectivity. All this, of course, then plays into issues of the personality of a listener. I can understand why some need to keep analysis out of the equation and don’t want to be "hampered" by it and want to keep the listening experience as "simple" as possible and not be "challenged" as a listener; its a personal call. However, like you, I don’t understand the aversion to knowledge. Moreover, one of the key unanswered questions in this never-ending debate is why the "subjectivists" have no problem having strong opinions and even putting down certain music liked by others. In other words, if "subjectivity" alone is to be considered the best approach, should not the subjectivity of all listeners be respected while rendering ANY criticism moot? Why should the criteria used by subjectivists, whatever those may be, be more credible than that of those who bring SOME analysis to the equation? The pure subjectivists’ criteria are, by definition, personal; objective criteria are not.

One of the most curious aspects of all this as concerns subjectivity/objectivity and as it relates to the old jazz/new jazz debate is the simple fact that it is the staunch old jazz devotee(s?) who seem to like ONLY old jazz while I don’t think there has been a single fan of new jazz to post here that has not posted or expressed liking old jazz as well. So, to my simple minded way of thinking, just what is the problem? As you yourself have pointed out, there ARE universally accepted (well, almost 😉) basic criteria for judging SOME aspects of art. That is a hard pill for some to swallow for some reason.

Related in a very roundabout way, if arguably related at all, but came across this quote and thought it was worth sharing ☺️:

"Some days you get up and put the horn to your chops and it sounds pretty good and you win. Some days you try and nothing works and the horn wins. This goes on and on and then you die and the horn wins" - Dizzy Gillespie

My position in music is quite simple, "Everybody is right" because music is so "subjective". With a stance like that, what is there to argue about?