Author: Michael Darling
Last Tuesday was just like any ordinary day as I headed down to the Marketplace for some lunch. Now, as you know, it’s common for music to be playing in the quad around this time. It’s usually rap, indie rock, electronica, ’90s nostalgia or something pertaining to whatever themed week a campus group says it is. However, on this day, I walked out to the quad and heard smooth jazz.
Those who know me well know that I am a lover of most things musical. I’m open-minded when it comes to this aural art and will listen to anything that is put in front of me. However, there is one genre that I cannot stand, and that is smooth jazz. This is not to say I have a problem with jazz. No, I find jazz to be fantastic and the one true democratic musical genre. Everybody gets to have a solo at some point in the set, even the bassist. Jazz is also subtle and nuanced; it’s kind of the wine of music. You can keep taking sips of the same song and find new little flavors and instrumental quirks. It’s a versatile art form that straddles that annoying little line between classical and popular music. Jazz, and its country cousin the blues, have been the backbone of pop music for the last half-century. The guitar solo in “Rock Around the Clock” is a jazz solo and A Tribe Called Quest used jazzy samples to match their flow. The Tribe even released a song about how “they’ve got the jazz.”So yes, jazz is a brilliant art form, and, as such, its tangential connection to smooth jazz diminishes its reputation. Now a brief note: When I say smooth jazz, I don’t mean mid-tempo big band pieces, I’m talking about Kenny G and his ilk. It’s a common error to lump real jazz and smooth jazz under the same umbrella-slightly like trying to pass off a Big Mac patty as London Broil. Sure, the same instruments and ingredients are used, but one’s a lukewarm chunk of questionable meat and the other’s Miles Davis. Although the genre of smooth jazz itself does nothing offensive, it’s blandness and sterility makes it offensive.
Smooth jazz is what jazz, and almost all music, would be like if we took out the soul and the danger. Such stripping of the sacred and profane elements of the music turns it into a bland mush of vibes and soprano saxophones with the occasional repetitive drum fill thrown in for something like variety. Classic jazz may have slow songs, but even those tracks demand attention through brilliant playing, as opposed to a well-programmed drum machine. Even the freedom of a jazz jam is taken away so that the music can be at proper radio length. Smooth jazz is like Pat Boone’s rock and roll records-it takes potentially “dangerous” music largely created by African Americans and makes it safe for white consumption. Now, I’m not calling smooth jazz a racist genre, I’m just saying that it’s what The Man would want us to listen to-if he existed.
In a way, The Man has won, despite his non-existence. Most major cities have an FM smooth jazz station, but the only spot on the dial where true jazz can be found is on AM or NPR. And, as a stigma grows around smooth jazz, it begins to taint the classic jazz of the first half of the 20th century. To put it bluntly, if we aren’t careful, a curly-haired idiot playing muzak on a soprano sax will become the face of jazz, and Mingus and Allison will be forgotten.
Michael Darling is a sophomore History major. He can be reached at mdarling@oxy.edu.
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