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 Why Americans don't like Jazz... 
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Post Why Americans don't like Jazz...
Lifting this bit from Matt Tate's page.

Why Americans don't like Jazz...

A great read if you are looking to stir up some debate on the state of the lazy American ear. This crowd is a bit more sophisticated (a bit!), so I'd be curious to see how Stickists feel about this.

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Mon May 12, 2014 10:17 am
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Post Re: Why Americans don't like Jazz...
Thought provoking and interesting read… I might add, the American society as a whole is culturally bankrupt…. This is do to the federal government, local government and what is valued in our system…. The federal government cuts music programs and education, budgets a tiny amount to support the arts and a two party system where one party (both are guilty here) has no sense of art, culture and are run by a religious creed that views just about everything as sinful. Local governments are forced to cut programs, and it is the arts and music programs that are the first to go, while leaving in place unproductive sports programs that breed unhealthy competition and bullys, later …. some go on to being mega million whiners and crybabies! The American Sheeple have also gotten dumbed down and lazy as of late…. Question is… when is a great social movement going to happen again that wakes everyone up? Sorry for the Rant// :mrgreen:


Mon May 12, 2014 10:41 am
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Post Re: Why Americans don't like Jazz...
Jazz and rock came from the roots, part of a distinctly American culture and history. A class of bureaucrats deciding which musical projects should win or lose? I guess that's only slightly worse than the media calling the shots. (Rant continues.)


Mon May 12, 2014 11:35 am
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Post Re: Why Americans don't like Jazz...
Good read actually. I've always felt that for most people, music has more to do with rationalizing their lifestyle than anything else. People like to wrap themselves around other people they can relate to or consider cool who they think are saying cool things.

For the most part, the masses like simple music that's essentially tailored for the masses. Tough guys like tough guy music. People who consider themselves to be off the beaten path gravitate toward music that is also off the beaten path. The pathology is exactly the same though. These are the folks who suddenly decide that they hate what used to be their favorite band because they aren't the only ones who like them anymore.

Personally I think this dates back to the advent of recorded music. It just took several decades to reach its full potential. I remember reading an article about 10 or 12 years back talking about how many American households had pianos in 1900 vs 2000. The difference was staggering and it wasn't a per capita comparison. It was raw numbers.

When my family gets together for holidays, we still take turns playing the piano.

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Mon May 12, 2014 11:44 am
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Post Re: Why Americans don't like Jazz...
All art (music, visual, etc.) is completely subjective and personal, with every human being equal. Anything that says "so and so" is lazy or somehow wrong or ignorant because they don't appreciate the same art that I appreciate is complete elitist bulls##t.

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Mon May 12, 2014 11:53 am
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Post Re: Why Americans don't like Jazz...
I’d say that’s right on the money. Why don’t Americans like jazz? Because now they’re too fucking stupid to understand it. That’s the long and short of it. But why? This piece articulates it and expounds on it in the kind of detail I’m pretty much too weary to bother with anymore. I remember a class called music appreciation in the 4th grade where the teacher would bring in a record player and explain why Ravel’s Bolero was important and then play the record and have a discussion about it with the class. The drummer in my first band - an instrumental surf guitar band - could play guitar as well as me and also had 3 years of accordion and we were both 15. Almost everyone I knew played piano, clarinet, guitar or was in the choir.

“Question is… when is a great social movement going to happen again that wakes everyone up?”

I thought it was gonna be the 60s. That’s when I came of age and started playing music. I was all into the whole “This is the dawning of the age of Aquarius…..” when everyone dropped acid and found out the universe was this great feast for the senses, art and music defined everything and love for your fellow man was the order of the day. There were no music videos. People listened to music. If you wanted visuals, you went out to clubs, concerts and festivals and watched people play musical instruments. It was all set to be great from then on. What ruined that era culturally was that’s the generation who found out that the civil war wasn't really over and if the president didn't “do right” he got a bullet in the head – just like all the other corrupt countries we’d heard about. The cat was out of the bag. American society went downhill from there taking art, culture and music and especially disturbing - science with it.

Now 40 some years later it’s just worse – all the way worse. The cat’s back in the bag and the bag’s in the river folks.


Mon May 12, 2014 12:59 pm
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Post Re: Why Americans don't like Jazz...
I think it's unfair to peg Americans as the only ones that don't listen to jazz. Can you really name another culture where jazz music is really that popular? We live in a world culture of pop music, and human ears are naturally going to be tuned towards the human voice. Not everyone can identify with a trombone player, but everyone can identify with a vocalist. It's even more prevalent with the popularity of nationally broadcast singing competitions. Not just in the US, but in Asia and Europe as well. And to say that non-English speaking cultures (specifically Japanese in the article) are more attuned to jazz music is questionable. Is there a source to cite? From my personal (subjective) experience, J-pop and K-pop music is more popular and perhaps even more fanatical than American pop music.

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Mon May 12, 2014 1:12 pm
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Post Re: Why Americans don't like Jazz...
Interesting read, indeed!

I tend to agree with Karma and Nomad. We like to glorify the past when people paid attention to music, literature and painting. This thinking aligns with that most enjoyable pastime - bashing the American popular mind and its culture and lamenting our inevitable decline and fall (an activity dear to the hearts of many Americans!) Yet, history belongs to those who write it and the writers of history are frequently those who have the pre-existing environmental proclivity, time and resources to enjoy high culture.

Every society seems to have a need for culture - singing, storytelling, drawing - and your society's worship of Britney Spears and 2Pac is no better or worse than my society's deification of Miles Davis and Ravi Shankar.

I won't deny that Miles takes more effort on the part of the listener than Britney. Thank you, TV. When I was a young classical concert goer, almost everyone around me was much, much older (i.e., they grew up with less or no TV and developed listening skills.) Now... well... who goes to classical concerts anymore really? :(

Listen. Read. Look. And get out there, contribute, go to live events. Stop buying stuff off iTunes - buy a CD from the musician(s) at his/her next gig. :)

Thanks!

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Mon May 12, 2014 1:19 pm
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Post Re: Why Americans don't like Jazz...
I haven't read the article yet, so please take my commentary with a grain of salt.
Please understand that I do love the art form; I came into an appreciation and affection for jazz relatively late (in my early 20's in music college), and have enjoyed it ever since. However, jazz isn't immune to the same kinds of foibles that other forms of music are. Whenever I put on my jazz "station" on Pandora, or listen on a jazz channel on DirecTV, or listen to a (rare) jazz radio station, I hear very little that's new, fresh, or breaking new ground. Like all the classic rock stations I hear, everyone seems to be stuck in the same post-bop head space. (Thanks a lot, Wynton...)
As Jack DeJohnette remarked: "(A lot of cats are stuck playing music) like Miles - or, rather, that specific period of Miles...Miles left that long ago."
Then again, I freely admit that it cold be that I'm not hearing anything fresh because there's no medium exposing me to it. This, I'm sure, discourages any young artist from trying anything remotely adventurous...sounds just like rock & pop, doesn't it?

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Mon May 12, 2014 1:37 pm
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Post Re: Why Americans don't like Jazz...
Luc, you raise a great point. I think that's a symptom as well as a cause of the "problem." Where is the "modern Jazz ecosystem"? Where is the innovative Jazz happening? I am not being facetious - I really want to know.

For all the crap on rock radio, there is plenty of innovation in that genre. Much of it is quite challenging and edifying to listen to.

And I don't think many Americans listen to that either. :ugeek:

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Mon May 12, 2014 2:47 pm
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