Tag Archives: Charlie Parker

Spot the Jazz Nerds — and show them some respect

by Peter Hum
Ottawa Citizen
May 20, 2010

Earlier this month, I featured this provocation from drummer Jason Marsalis.

… which prompted responses from several jazz musician/bloggers I know. Some agreed with Marsalis. Others repudiated his “false dichotomy.” I took a break then from wading yet again into the jazz-wars debate, but figure now I might as well step back into those murky waters again, even if I generally feel there are much more important matters for jazz-oriented people of all stripes to invest their energy in.

I’ll summarize Marsalis’ argument. He sketches, quite humourously, a division between the constituents of “Jazz Nerds International” and other jazz musicians who belong to an unnamed faction.  Maybe Marsalis would simply call them the “good guys” in this battle. JNI consists, he says, of young musicians in their teens and in college who eschew playing jazz standards and don’t love swinging. Instead, they play compositions with a straight feel, often in odd meters, with “boring, chromatic solos and a million notes an hour.” They play for fellow JNI musicians rather than for non-musician listeners, who can come to doubt their tastes. Marsalis recommends that listeners “run away” from JNI music and keep the faith with music that has “melodies you can sing along to.”

Before offering my two cents, I’ll suggest that you read:

Montreal organist Vanessa Rodrigues’ response, in which she agrees “99-per-cent” with Marsalis.

Montreal-based clarinetist James Danderfer’s response, in which he agrees that “institutionalized jazz music hasn’t placed nearly enough emphasis on the core element of expressing emotion to audiences”  But Danderfer continues: “On the other hand, it’s music dude! People should be allowed to do whatever the hell they want to! If some guy wants to play jazz music for himself (possibly in 5/4 too) then let him. There’s nothing wrong with that.”

Meanwhile, on the blog of Montreal pianist Joshua Rager, saxophonist Becky Noble commented:

What bothers me about the so called “jazz wars” (popping up online all over the places these days!) is the idea that there are two camps; the purists and modernists. I think the reality is that most people actually fall somewhere in between on the spectrum. To be quite honest, I just don’t buy the idea that a significant percentage (at least significant enough to be ranting about) of young musicians are shunning the history, abandoning melody, refusing the learn the standards, playing 30-minute solos void of meaning. Please, tell me where these people are???!!! Because in my experience studying and playing, I don’t think I’ve met one.

In my opinion some of the more successful “jazz” musicians today have been able to meld the art form’s history with modern influences, to create their own unique voice. I mean, that’s what Bird did. Miles. Coltrane. Bill Evans. All of them. Let me cite five contemporary examples, off the top of my head: Brad Mehldau, Kurt Rosenwinkel, Dave Douglas, Brian Blade, Seamus Blake. All are “hip”. You can clearly hear the entire history of their respective instruments when they play. They can swing like crazy, they aren’t afraid to play a blues or in 4/4, and they also play chromatically and often in odd meters. They play standards and they also compose beautiful music. The don’t sound like anyone else, and they just happen to be some of my favourite musicians.

I agree with SOME of the “essence” of what Marsalis is saying, but I think what I don’t like, and what bothers me, is the way he says it. It just seems so negative and extremist; painting a highly complex picture much too black and white. It reeks of intolerance to my ears.

I agree wholeheartedly with Noble. (And yes, I agree with her in agreeing with Marsalis, insofar as I hope that standards and swinging will never be forsaken by contemporary and future jazz players, even as I assert that jazz is flexible and pliable enough to grow with the inclusion of other musical aspects and influences.)

To reiterate a question that Noble rightly asks: Who are the jazz nerds that Marsalis so vehemently opposes? I don’t think it’s good enough for Marsalis to say — if he’s serious — that it’s simply the students in jazz schools who are woefully misguided. Surely these students are influenced by any number of established musicians who work (prominently, but not exclusively) in the odd-time, straight-eighths, chromatic nerd zone. It’s reasonable to assume that Marsalis is not denigrating the students, but also their influences too. Would today’s Jazz Nerd elders include:

Saxophonists Dave Binney and Mark Turner?

Drummer John Hollenbeck and his Claudia Quintet?

Saxophonist Rudresh Mahanthappa, in a group playing a pieces that “built on two measures of 5 followed by a measure of 9, and this is then gradually speeded up through metric modulation, using the 8th note triplet as a subdivision”? (The only reason I know this bit of nerdy esoterica is that bassist Ronan Guilfoyle provided it in this post that will fascinate rhythm nerds.)

Saxophonist Steve Coleman? (He seems like the nerdiest of the batch, but in a likeable way,

Frankly, I think if Marsalis would do better to name the alleged ringleaders of Jazz Nerds International rather than simply besmirch its rank and file — not because I would be keen on any resulting controversy, but because if he wants to be taken seriously, then he ought to move beyond a straw-man opponent. Or he should argue that his beef with mediocre students rather than the proficient pros.

I also think that the impulse that Marsalis is railing against — the move beyond standard repertoire and swinging  — is some years older than he is, and that this historical context ought to be kept in mind. Think of bebop nerdily extending the language of swing, Miles Davis and Bill Evans investigating the use of modes in jazz more than 50 years ago, John Coltrane investigating tone rows with Miles Mode in 1962, and for that matter, performing the kind of epic, set-long songs that Marsalis slams. These are just a few classic examples of music history’s jazz nerds in action. In other words, there were jazz nerds long before Marsalis was drumming, and there will be jazz nerds ever after, in spite of what he said.

I have to wonder if Marsalis in the clip isn’t just exaggerating for the sheer, blustering fun of it. He’s criticizing the worth and validity of a great swath of music, and I’d prefer to think he’s being deliberately outrageous rather than monumentally arrogant. (Note: to be fair, there are many anti-Marsalis, anti-tradition folks who have struck me as equally blunt and heavy-handed in their statements.)

Stepping back, I side with Marsalis in affirming the value of playing music that revels in swinging, and in playing jazz standards with a whole-hearted embrace of their tradition. I also agree with Marsalis that jazz, however it sounds, ought to be played to connect with and move listeners (optimally, through a feeling of personal commitment, not through pandering manoeuvres). But these affirmations can be made without a simultaneous takedown against music that may not sound like the music that Marsalis makes, but may even appeal to jazz fans who don’t feel the artificial need to choose sides.

Ellis and Jason Marsalis Talk Back

Alex Rawls talks to Ellis and Jason Marsalis about An Open Letter to Thelonious, teaching and traditional jazz. “When you deal with language to describe music, you’ve got a problem,” Ellis says. “I remember talking to a guy who was a player, and he said, ‘I’m really into traditional jazz,’ and he started rhyming off Charlie Parker, Monk, and all these guys.”

by Alex Rawls
offBeat Magazine
April 2008

While we’re talking, Ellis Marsalis takes two calls and ignores another. Spring in New Orleans is a musician’s busiest time, and not only is Marsalis playing the French Quarter Fest and Jazz Fest, but he’s promoting his new album, An Open Letter to Thelonious (ELM). He and Irvin Mayfield also released Love Songs, Ballads and Standards (Basin Street), and today he’s at NOCCA to teach a master class to his son Jason’s students.

An Open Letter to Thelonious is a family affair. Jason plays in Ellis’ quartet, and both contributed liner notes. Ellis recalls the one missed opportunity he had to meet Monk, while Jason analyzes Monk’s sense of rhythm, dubbing him “the first unofficial funk musician.”

We’re in NOCCA’s performance hall, and Jason was talking about his efforts to teach his students to play traditional jazz just before the recorder started. Ellis is talking about his efforts to document traditional jazz that emerged from playing it with a good band.

Ellis: I started to write down all the things we played, each song. I did it over three nights, so I had a pretty good list. I thought about writing out more than a lead sheet, actually the piano accompaniment; now I’m trying to make myself get started on this project. [laughs]

Part of what Jason is talking about is the inability of those who find themselves in a teaching position to get prepared music to present to students from that idiom. The traditional jazz idiom has a lot of music, and it’s structured in such a way that all of the elements of western music are in it—the key signatures, the modulations, the tempo. Now that I’m confessing that [gesturing at the recorder], I’ve got to do it. I don’t think something like that could be done anywhere but New Orleans.

This goes to something I’ve been thinking about for a while—what does it mean to be traditional? How do you best honor a tradition? Does a player have to play in the idiom, or is it in the composition? How is tradition manifested?

Ellis MarsalisEllis: First of all, when you deal with language to describe music, you’ve got a problem. I remember talking to a guy who was a player, and he said, “I’m really into traditional jazz,” and he started rhyming off Charlie Parker, Monk, and all these guys. It’s not his fault if he’s from Detroit or Chicago or L.A. The documentation isn’t set in such a way so that it will allow him to get a complete perspective.

When you think of European art music, the documentation by the various composers over 300, 400 years helps to understand some of that, at least from the 15th Century on. One thing that may be missing is a certain relationship that those composers had to the gypsies. You found references to dances—Hungarian Dance, number this or that or the other. Talk about Rodney Dangerfield, they don’t get no respect! America is a little too young to have that kind of thing happen. If enough of us can start trying to make certain kinds of documentation…

One of the things that was lost in certain kinds of European music—I don’t know how much time after Beethoven—was the ability to improvise. There are stories about when Czerny, who was a student of his, would be turning pages for him and there would be no notes on the page. He hadn’t even written it down. That improvisational process, eventually, they lost.

If it’s still in Europe, maybe it’s over there, but people who learn to play that music here, they go to the conservatory and improvisation isn’t even part of that. I think that as a part of American history, this is a necessary cog in the wheel. I’ve been telling Jason for years, “Whatever you do, write it down. Make some notes.”

I’ve seen some situations where some of the jazz stars have begun to be used in institutions to come in and do workshops. I look at some of them and say, “I don’t want them anywhere near my students.” They play well, but you have to do a certain amount of reflective thinking or what you end up doing is teaching in the abstract, which is why students can’t read, or why they can’t do math.

There are some things we have to do to assist in that process.

Thankfully, there are enough recordings of the earlier music by some of the top players so that can be a great reference point.

I would have to think that over the years, you’ve heard people play traditional jazz and get it wrong.

Ellis: I was one of them. I stood in the driveway with Albert “Papa” French, who played with “Papa” Celestin, and had his own band with his sons, Bob and John. Papa French, said, “Some of you young guys need to play this music because we’re about to lose it.” I said, “Yeah, man. You’re right.”

In my mind, I was thinking, “I don’t want to play that old stuff.” That degree of ignorance was profound with me. Eventually, I’m playing with the Storyville Jazz Band, which is Bob French’s group, at Crazy Shirley’s on St. Peter and Bourbon in the early 1970s—so I wasn’t a spring chicken. I started playing a stride solo and everybody in the band started to laugh. I didn’t know why they were laughing because I was serious. I wasn’t trying to caricature the music. I tried it again and got the same response.

I started to do some research. I went and really listened to Jelly Roll and Willie “the Lion” Smith. I realized these guys have ideas peculiar to this style of music. If you’re going to play this, you’ve got to be involved with those ideas—the rhythm of the ideas, the melody, and all of that. I started working on that. The next time I played a stride solo, I didn’t get the same response, and I realized I was on the right track.

Right around the corner from Crazy Shirley’s was Preservation Hall, and Willie Humphrey and Percy and them would come by on the way to work. Some of those old guys came in one night while I was playing one of those solos, and the guy looks and goes, “Mmmm hmmm, okay,” and I knew just from that gesture that I was on the right track.

Let’s jump forward to the Monk record. I’m always fascinated when a musician approaches another musician’s work. How do you decide which pieces to do?

Ellis: Well in this particular case, Jason was sort of the brains behind most of that. The idea was to approach Monk’s music with a certain kind of groove without tarnishing what Monk had put there. I went through a similar thing with Marcus Roberts, which was a dual-piano thing. We did one or two pieces of Thelonious Monk, and Marcus would say that we have to be very careful that we don’t superimpose our stuff on top of Monk.

We have been talking about doing a Monk record for a long time. Monk’s music is not easy to play and the degree of difficulty is less in technical facility and more in conceptualization of where he was coming from. A lot of what you have to listen to determines the results of what you play.

Jason MarsalisJason: The best description that I read of that was from Orrin Keepnews—and this really put a lot of perspective for me on Monk’s music—he said, “You know, it’s kind of like when you are at a jam session and musicians start playing ‘Blue Monk.’ They solo for about 20 minutes, then they look around and say, ‘What’s the big deal about Monk?'”

There is an essence of Monk’s music in terms of melodic, rhythmic and harmonic formation that should not be taken for granted. It’s easy to take a Monk tune and play over it, but it’s different when you try to play the music and still have the essence of what he was about still there. That’s the challenge when trying to play his music.

The rhythm element is what drew me to Monk first. How he phrased lines. Even inside the phrases, exactly where the notes fell always felt so personal and idiosyncratic.

Jason: He was definitely a master at using rhythm and space. I noticed with his own tunes just how strong the rhythm would be in those melodies.

Who was responsible for the selection of the pieces?

Jason: It was a combination of both. My father brought up the idea of doing a Monk record a while back. I believe what got the ball rolling was when we played this one quartet performance with “Epistrophy.” We played it in a way that was arranged slightly, very subtly. I liked the way it went, and I started thinking maybe we should pursue this album. There were some things that I picked and some things that my father picked.

Was there anything you decided was too him to do, or requires us to move too far, or just did not want to do?

Ellis: Nothing that I can think of. I think what we did on that CD is a pretty fair representation of Monk, in a wider sense. We did “Crepuscule with Nellie”—I wouldn’t even know how to solo off of that. I did decide to do “‘Round Midnight,” but I decided to do that as a piano solo. I messed with that tune and I even thought of forming a string quartet of that tune a long time ago, and I did not get too far.

I think Jason mentioned it in the liner notes about the grooves. There is a story going around about Monk—a guy, a drummer I think, and he was kind of new to Monk’s music. He asked Monk, “What do you want me to do?” Monk said, “Swing.” The guy said, “I understand that, but after that, what then?” “Swing some more.”

So you had the idea of applying specific grooves to Monk?

Jason: The only tune on there, honestly, that I really wanted to do was a tune called “Teo.” A few years ago I heard a recording of this tune on Live at the It Club, and I was first interested in it because I never heard it. No one ever plays it. Monk has written hundreds of tunes and there are a lot of tunes that have slipped through the cracks and are not played very much. I checked it out and I think, okay this isn’t bad, but after eight bars I started hearing a funk groove. So when we decided to do the record, I said this is one tune we have to do.

I recently rehearsed that with some students from here, and I think that my description may have confused the drummer a little bit. I said, “Think Monk and the Roots’ drummer Questlove and the stuff he does with DeAngelo.” I think that threw him off, but really, rhythmically you can do that with a lot of Monk’s tunes.

You talked about playing Monk with Marcus Roberts; he said we have to be careful not to put ourselves all over this. Isn’t part of the business of playing it to find how you interact with that person’s work?

Ellis: Yeah, but I think what Marcus is saying when in reference to the term “superimposed” is that, like I’ve heard this one pianist who did a Bud Powell tune called “Hallucinations.” When the solo came, there was no harmonic reference to “Hallucinations” at all. It was all about whoever this pianist was and his stuff. You can make an argument for that saying that’s what jazz does, and it’s true, but if you approach what you’re doing philosophically, you try and do the best that you can with the melody, the harmony, and the rhythm. Those three components.

I remember once Tommy Flanagan told me something. I was in Europe at one of those festivals, and it always leaves you wanting to play. You go over there, you do 45 minutes then you’re done. There was a space under the hotel in which there was a piano against the wall, and I went over to the piano because I felt like playing more than the 45 minutes. I started playing “A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square,” just fooling around with it. When I finished, I saw Tommy was sitting over there against the wall, and I got up to go and speak to him. As I got close to him, he said, “You forgot the verse.” I don’t think I even knew there was a verse, so I went home and got the music and there was the verse. I recorded it again with the verse.

I think there is a certain amount of specificity that is necessary from where I am coming from philosophically. Coltrane was guilty of this all the time; he didn’t care much about the melody. He played it however it came out. You owe the composer of the tune, whether it’s Richard Rogers or Jobim. If you are going to play the melody, play the melody. Then when you get ready to solo, that’s on you.

A Fireside Chat With Jason Marsalis

by Fred Jung
Jazz Weekly

Having the last name Marsalis amounts to having the distinction of being a Kennedy in American politics. There is a good deal of pressure that comes with being a Marsalis and a certain amount of preconceived biases and expectations. It comes with the territory being the son of Ellis and the younger brother of Branford, Wynton, and Delf. But Jason, the drummer in the family, seems to be handling it all in stride. I spoke with the young Marsalis from his home in New Orleans about being a Marsalis and his new album on Basin Street. It is a portrait of a Marsalis, unedited and in his own words.

FRED JUNG: Let’s start from the beginning.

JASON MARSALIS: I got started playing jazz as a kid when I was six years old. That is when I started playing drums. Jazz music was always something I loved. I loved listening to it and knew that it was something I wanted to play as well. Plus, I had great family support. That was how I really started out playing in New Orleans.

FJ: Was it by process of illumination, with your father Ellis playing piano, Wynton playing trumpet, Branford, saxophone, and Delf, trombone?

JASON MARSALIS: Well, that had nothing to do with it, as far as what my other family members were playing (laughing). The first instrument I played with the violin. That was really my first instrument. My father got some sort of deal through the elementary school that I was attending at the time. When I was three, my mother and father used to play this game with me. They actually had a toy drum set. They had a toy drum set and they would always introduce me like I was on some performance stage or something. They would say, “Ladies and gentlemen, we now present to you, the great, wonderful Jason.” I would start banging away. I guess that maybe stuck in my mind somehow, but I eventually choose that instrument a year after playing the violin.

FJ: In a past life, I played the violin, so I am empathetic to your switch.

JASON MARSALIS: Well, when I first started playing the violin, it was hard to play, but I kind of liked playing it. I wasn’t the most serious musician, but I liked playing it. Years later, when I was about twelve years old, a lot of things happened. The instrument got more difficult and I was losing interest and I was also more interested in classical percussion. That had to do with us moving to Richmond, Virginia for three years, which had no jazz scene. I had always played in these student orchestras and I believe it was my last year in Richmond. I was in this youth orchestra and I believe it was the first orchestra that I was in that actually had a percussion section. I was upset that I wasn’t in the percussion section because that is where I wanted to be. To make matters worse, one of the guys playing timpani didn’t know what he was doing. He was playing all kinds of wrong notes and the conductor couldn’t hear it. The violin was getting more difficult as far as playing second position and I was getting less and less interested in playing the violin. I wanted to pursue percussion and so when we moved back to New Orleans, which was the summer of ’89, that is when I decided that I was not going to play violin anymore. However, Fred, I did want to study percussion in classical music.

FJ: Did you feel any pressure at all from the expectations of being a Marsalis?

JASON MARSALIS: Nope. None what so ever. The only time when there is pressure is if I was doing music and I didn’t want to and I only felt like I did it just to either please the family or I felt like I had to live up to something, but that wasn’t happening at all. I loved playing music. Music was something I loved doing. The only pressure that could be possible is maybe living up to a certain legacy and even then, that didn’t affect me at all.

FJ: You worked with your father’s trio for a lengthy period of time, what knowledge did he impart upon you?

JASON MARSALIS: The first thing I learned playing in his trio was how to play on a ballad and how difficult playing on a ballad was. That was one of the first things. The second thing was how to play in a jazz trio, which took me a minute to conceptualize. I also gained a certain respect for standards.

FJ: Is that an aspect many younger musicians are ignoring?

JASON MARSALIS: Oh of course, absolutely. That is a lot of the problem with a lot of younger musicians today is that there is a lack of knowledge as far as jazz history is concerned across the board. I have to do more work on it myself, just learning drum solos and learning more drum vocabulary. You find musicians now who don’t know a lot of standard songs.

FJ: Why do you feel that is?

JASON MARSALIS: The reason that is, is because those standard songs were the popular songs of my father’s day, which is why it is that he and my mother, who does not play music, knows those songs better than I do. Those were the popular songs of their day, coming from those musicals. I learn part of this from playing with my father. A lot of the younger musicians don’t know a lot of those songs.

FJ: Is that detrimental to their progress overall as musicians?

JASON MARSALIS: It can be. You have to have some sort of historical background in order to really play the music. If not that, than definitely learn the vocabulary of the music and the history of the music. Even when learning the vocabulary of the music, eventually, you will have to learn standards. Those are the songs and tunes that those musicians play. Be it Louis Armstrong or Bud Powell or Charlie Parker, the songs that they were playing were all standards anyway.

FJ: Let’s touch on Los Hombres Calientes.

JASON MARSALIS: First off, I want to make that straight off the bat because there are a lot of misunderstanding that it is my band, which it really isn’t. It was a band that was put together by Irvin Mayfield. He was the one who put the band together. I remember he called me one day. It was like January of ’98 and he told me about this gig that he was going to do. When he told me about it, “I said that is great.” Bill Summers would have these percussion meetings every Saturday at his house and other percussionists would get together and play Cuban rhythms and I learned a lot from those meetings. When Irvin called me about that gig, I asked him if he had been to Bill’s house and he said, “No.” I said, “Well, that is something you need to go check out before you even do the gig.” He went over there and he was really the one that put the band together.

FJ: Let’s touch on the two volumes you recorded for Basin Street.

JASON MARSALIS: Well, I hated Volume One and I still do to be honest with you, Fred. The reason for that was because that record was done straight out of the band’s first gig. We did one gig and bam, we were recording. At the time, I thought it was a little rushed and I was like, “Hold on. We just got started. We can’t just start recording.” The way recorded it, a lot of the musicians we not comfortable. We did a lot of overdubbing more so than live playing. Also too, the sound wasn’t that great either, which I think had to do with the equipment that was being used. Also, the spirit of the band was not captured on Volume One. That is something that a lot of people did hear when they heard the band live and then heard the record. They would always comment on how the band was better live and how we needed to do a live record and I would say, “No, we just need to get better. That is all it is.” So when we did the second record, which is much better, the band had been playing for a long time and we were more prepared to do the second album. Also, another thing is that we explored more genres. The first record is mostly Cuban based. So I told him that for the next record, we need to expand on that. We need to have a reggae tune, some samba stuff, funk tunes, and expand beyond the Cuban sound.

FJ: And your own debut, Year of the Drummer.

JASON MARSALIS: There was still some experience that I still needed to gain in working in the studio, which comes through time. Other than that, I was comfortable in some aspects because I had done some studio work and so I was pretty prepared. As far as how the album came out, I thought it came out pretty good. There were still some things that needed to be worked on, such as sound production and so forth. That is something you learn over time.

FJ: Let’s talk about your latest, Music in Motion.

JASON MARSALIS: My new album is coming out tomorrow. That record is also better than Year of the Drummer as far as sound production and as far as the band is concerned. The band on the last record wasn’t quite as prepared as the one on the new one. The difference is we had a lot of chances to play it and we did a lot of gigs.

FJ: It is comprised entirely of your own compositions.

JASON MARSALIS: One of the advantages that I had is fortunately I have had brothers who have made a lot of records and they can do whatever they want. On Basin Street, I was able to do whatever I wanted. Mark, the owner of the label, trusted me and so I did do that. But I did want to go in and record original music.

FJ: You also produced the recording. What were some of the non-musical tick tacks you had to concern yourself with?

JASON MARSALIS: Well, I had to oversee the sound. What order the tunes went in. The artwork and so forth. The actual putting together of the CD.

FJ: Do you enjoy producing?

JASON MARSALIS: Yes, I do. I learned a bit about if, obviously from Delfeayo. I do think that as far as producing goes, there is still some things about the sound and technical things that I am still not as quite knowledgeable with. The engineer would run the board and I would guide him as to how I wanted it to sound.

FJ: What is the role of a good drummer?

JASON MARSALIS: The role of a drummer is to keep the groove. The drummer supports the band. This is the same thing whether it is jazz, rap, R&B, whatever. The drums is what supports the group. The drums is what drives everything. In jazz music, the drums can go beyond that role. In order to go beyond that, you have to understand it. You have to understand the original role. There are things that the drummer can do within that role that can change. Sometimes, there have been instances that drums can be really flexible with the time and as far as one, two, three, four and as far as the pulse is concerned. There are some people, particularly horn players who don’t like that. There are horn players out there who want you to keep everything the same. They just want something that is comfortable for them to solo over.

FJ: How would you describe New Orleans?

JASON MARSALIS: The music. I will give you one example, Fred. I was watching Boomerang in North Carolina, visiting some friends and there was a scene where Eddie Murphy is at a club and the Rebirth Brass Band was playing. I was like, “Rebirth, oh man, OK.” The people that were watching were like, “Who?” Rebirth is big in New Orleans, but they don’t know what I am talking about. The funny thing is, the next day, I was at a CD Superstore and one of the guys that worked there and said, “You have seen the movie Boomerang. What was that band?” I said, “Rebirth Brass Band. Their records are on Rounder Records.” That has happened again, with that same band. In New Orleans, they are just really big and that is how it is in New Orleans, period.

FJ: What is the coolest thing about being a Marsalis?

JASON MARSALIS: I never thought of that as meaning anything. To be honest, Fred, family is just family. That is all that is. And plus, there are people that identify things with “Marsalis,” that frankly, doesn’t make much sense and is a waste of time. Especially like philosophical views in music. This whole nonsense about being a purist musician and what not. Some people associate that with Marsalis and that is really stupid, but there are fools out there doing it. I remember when I was in college, I was listening to some fusion records, the real fusion not that Eighties trash, like Return to Forever and Weather Report. Some other college student, who was a jerk to be honest with you, he says, “Yeah, man, it is good to see that you are into fusion.” I asked him why that was and why that was an issue. He said, “You are from a purist family.” I was like, “What with people like Branford? He is a purist?” There are these views that people associate with Marsalis and family. That is really just a waste of time. The family is full of individuals.

Jazz Wars – guest posting on Josh Rager’s blog “x…y…jazz”

by Vannessa Rodrigues
May 10, 2010

Montreal jazz pianist/educator and all around nice guy Josh Rager sent out a call to local musicians to check out a passionate rant by Jason Marsalis about the current state of jazz. Aside from being an awesome jazz musician (more on this later) Josh writes a blog that actively engages the jazz community and often features opinions of local musicians. The following is my long-winded response … hey, he asked for it! He has even added it to his blog as a guest posting 🙂

(it’ll probably make more sense if you watch the video of Jason’s rant first … then again, maybe not …)

re: Jason Marsalis rant at the Rex …

I am always very interested to hear a Marsalis’ take on things; there was a time when I thought Wynton was a stodgy, crusty old purist, stuck in a rut and bitter about it. However, the more I learn about jazz and jazz history, the more I can appreciate his point of view and the more, I have to say, I agree with him.

Think about where the Marsalis family is from … New Orleans, the cradle of American musical culture and birthplace of what is almost certainly America’s greatest contribution to art on the world stage. We look back through the history of jazz with rose coloured glasses, especially now that it’s no longer “the devil’s music”, and has now been institutionalized, systematized, accepted as an academic field of study, and dare I say it, somehow sanitized in the process as well. Early jazz was thought of by the white upper class as low-life brothel and gambling hall music that the undesirables (read “blacks”) partook in, and it ultimately took Europeans to recognize and nurture this incredible emerging art form.  (Germans Alfred Lion & Francis Wolff launched Blue Note Records). Wynton was around to see his fellow African Americans press on through unimaginable hardship and win their civil rights, only to have the image of his culture be reduced to the vapid glorification of black on black violence, to the benefit of Big Entertainment Corp.

Some of the most romanticized, revered figures in jazz history that we admire today were often victims of police brutality and racial profiling, debilitating drug addictions and a host of other problems affecting mostly the poor and down-trodden. (Billie Holiday, Charlie Parker and Bud Powell come to mind). If we look farther back in history to the blues, the original roots of jazz and all African American music (and by extension rock & roll and pop music), we see that it is the mournful cry of an oppressed people who also had hope and a sense of humour to see them through; there is such a rich pallette of emotions in the blues, the songs tell incredible stories of suffering and despair, love & laughter … to call yourself a jazz musician and shrug off the blues as being old and tired is like calling yourself an Italian chef and deciding that tomatoes and olive oil are boring and passé and are going to cook with something newer and more exciting. You have removed a key element of the essence of what it IS, one of the main things that makes people fall in love with it, and it ceases to be what you say it is if you do that.

I’m not saying that in order to be considered jazz it can only be Cotton Tail played like Ben Webster plays it, but what I am saying is that for it to be meaningful, the history, and therefore the melodies, rhythms and phrasing, have to be respected and built-upon. It’s a language. All languages evolve by building on what came before. Nobody speaks Latin anymore, but anybody who speaks French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese or Romanian can read, understand and appreciate Latin, and through that gain some insight and respect for the history and lives of the people who spoke it while experiencing the constant evolution of their own languages in modern times.

Jason talks about melody and communicating/connecting with the audience, and I’m absolutely with him on this. Like a spoken word performance (stand-up comedy comes to mind), it’s not what you say, but how you say it; it’s about HOW you deliver your story using the common language, and there is NO limit to the creative possibilities involved. Take the ending of Bye Bye Blackbird from “God Bless Jug and Sonny” – Sonny Stitt and Gene Ammons … they quote pretty much every tune under the sun during the endless turnaround and the exchange between them gets more and more exciting, more and more energetic, comical, engaging, and dare I say it, orgasmic! They are using this rich vocabulary of timeless melodies and songs and interweaving it in such a brilliant way … I can’t imagine anyone who claims to love or play jazz not being affected deeply by this.

Now, after all is said and done, I can’t say I agree completely with Jason’s rant, (though I think it’s hilarious and he’s totally within his right to say all of those things) in that I believe because the very spirit of jazz is one of growth, progress and exploration, that there is a place for complex meters and chromatic, cerebral improvisation. (Small digression – odd meters can groove like crazy if they’re approached in a natural, organic way – ex. Soulive’s “One in 7”).  That being said, while I can appreciate the particular area of jazz Jason is referring to, it certainly doesn’t move and shake me personally the way a hard-swinging take on an old standard tune steeped in emotion and history does.

So I suppose I’m with Jason 99% 🙂