[Kees]

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Originally Posted by clarke68 /img/forum/go_quote.gif ...Nah...that can't be it. Compare any Mozart symphony; which is beautiful, makes you feel good, and is about as "high brow" art as it gets; to a movie like "Saw III"; which is incredibly unsettling and is about as "low brow" entertainment as it gets. You even refute your own notion here:There are lots of ways to be moved besides being unsettled, or put "NOT at ease".

You turn the argument around, which makes it invalid. If art unsettles you that does not mean that noting else can.
Every cow has four legs. That doesn't mean every animal with four legs is a cow....

I personally find Mozart more entertainment than art.....

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Originally Posted by clarke68 /img/forum/go_quote.gif ...Art isn't any one thing. It certainly can be unsettling and make you uneasy, but it can also be inspiring, make you want to climb a mountain, call up an old friend, or remind you of your first crush.

I'd call that unsettling (wanting to climb a mountain at least) in gradations.

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Originally Posted by clarke68 /img/forum/go_quote.gif ...Maybe art & entertainment aren't seperate at all, but art is like a "category" within entertainment...the stuff we do to pass the time that isn't work. Other "categories" could be, like, sports (both watching and playing) or playing games. Earlier in this thread (although a year or two ago) I explained that art was unique in that it required something from it's audience...time, attention, perhaps a certain humility to let the artist be the artist. I don't know. But it kinda fits in this example: Getting back to jazz, I think Louis Armstrong's attitude towards his audience was something akin to, "you paid your hard-earned money to come here tonight, I'm going to make sure you have a good time." He'd crack jokes, play hit songs, and also play some absolutely freaking killer trumpet for the people who were there to hear that. Everyone had a good time. Contrast that with the attitude of Miles or Mingus, which was more like, "I'm here to play. You paid your money to listen, so shut up." Which is, actually, fine with me. I saw Miles a couple of times, he didn't say much and played with his back to the audience most of the time, but it still blew me away. I'm fine if a player wants to tell jokes or say, "how 'ya doin' out there?" between tunes, but I don't require that to be entertained.

I agree with you that there definitely is a large grey area between art and entertainment.

I also think the definition is very personal. Which implies that you cannot say "this is art and that is not", because it could be true for one person and not for the other.

 

[Faust2D]

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Originally Posted by bigshot /img/forum/go_quote.gif Check out this post on my blog. It's aimed at young animators, but it's sure to make you mad too... ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive: Tangent: Live The Fabulous Lifestyle Of A Hollywood Cartoonist Or hear Basie reminisce about the 20s... late night coffee shops: Out Of Time: Count Basie See ya Steve

Does not make me mad, just makes me realize that some of the things that you think are great I think are not.

Have fun Steve.

By the way I love Ralph Bakshi

so thanks for producing his work.

 

[feverfive]

So....has it been decided? Is jazz dead?




Just kidding......Sorry, I'm in a goofy mood today..

 

[Kees]

Jazz lives. \m/

 

[dcstep]

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Originally Posted by feverfive /img/forum/go_quote.gif So....has it been decided? Is jazz dead?...

No, not yet.

I'm "only" 60, but this lame thread comes up about every ten-years, yet jazz is still here.

Dave

 

[bigshot]

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Originally Posted by Faust2D /img/forum/go_quote.gif By the way I love Ralph Bakshi so thanks for producing his work.

Ralph is going to be in New York this week promoting his new book. If you're in that area, go see him and tell him I say hi.

See ya
Steve

 

[Spyro]

Jazz will never be dead. It is just far less popular than it was 30-40 years ago. The jazz leaders of today are every bit as good as those of yesterday.

 

[Faust2D]

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Originally Posted by bigshot /img/forum/go_quote.gif Ralph is going to be in New York this week promoting his new book. If you're in that area, go see him and tell him I say hi. See ya Steve

Cool. I will look into this. I would love to talk to the guy. I always loved this take on the music history as well. American Pop was a good music in history adventure from burlesque to pop-rock

 

[clarke68]

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Originally Posted by bigshot /img/forum/go_quote.gif The big difference between the 30s and now, which I guess people your age just aren't aware of, is that the best art being made back then *was* mainstream.

I don't know, but I think schlock existed in the '30s as it still does today...Al Jolson, for example, was awfully popular back then. The signal/noise ratio may have been better back then because there were fewer distribution channels, and the cost of putting something out was so much higher. There was no opportunity for anything to be a "cult favorite", everything was either a major commercial success or it was a failure.

Technology has made making a movie, cutting a record, etc. possible for anyone who really wants to do it. Getting the stuff in front of a large audience is still difficult and expensive, and those channels are held by people who must turn a profit. A lot of this stuff still finds an audience, albeit not a huge one, but in the '30s it wouldn't have existed at all.


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Originally Posted by bigshot /img/forum/go_quote.gif I guess the confusion here comes down to the fact that people in their 20s today have never really experienced great art in the mainstream. That's led them to assume that popularity means "lowest common denominator" and favor marginalized niches. Sad. The history of the first half of the 20th century is astounding, and when you compare just about anything then (aside from technology) to today, modern life pales in comparison. The primary difference was that back then, mass media served to elevate culture, not to stoop to its level and in so doing hold it back.

Very interesting point, however I think you glamorize the past a bit too much. Think of Birth of a Nation.

I find it refreshing/fascinating that mass media can elevate culture. But if it's not, I'd rather get my "elevation" from underground/alternative/"marginalized" scenes, rather than not get it at all.


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Originally Posted by Bigshot As someone who works in the entertainment business, I can say without doubt that it's *never* the audience's fault. When the curtain goes up, the folks in the seats are there to be entertained and enlightened. That's their expectation. If that doesn't happen, it isn't because they don't want to be entertained and enlightened, it's because a performer isn't doing his job of entertaining and enlightening.

As someone in the entertainment business, it's probably good that you think that, so you take responsibility for your work.

I, however, am free to disagree with you here. I talked to people who saw Miles in the same era I did and were all bent out of shape because he played with his back to the audience. I say they missed the point, and that's not Miles' fault.

Coltrane was enlightening...but Sam the Sham sold more copies of "Wooly Bully" in the 1965 than he did of A Love Supreme. Maybe that's because Coltrane wasn't entertaining enough, but whatever he would have had to do to A Love Supreme to outsell Sonny & Cher that year would have ruined it.

 

[bigshot]

You're mistaken about the opportunities today as opposed to the past. If they were performing today, the Carter Family would never be heard. They never set foot out of the hills of Kentucky before Wildwood Flower became a hit. Recording companies actively sought out regional performers all over the country and released their music to the world. Thousands of different performers were recorded and distributed. It wasn't just a select few like today.

In the rock n' roll era, (just before the genius song Wooly Bully was released) it was possible to produce a single for $100 and get it played on the radio. Patsy Cline would never have been heard today, but she went to number one based on a self financed barnstorming tour of radio stations across the country. Ritchie Valens was a kid in Pacoima who recorded a song in his basement and hit it big with a tiny local label called Del-Fi. Try to do that today!

As for your examples of "bad stuff" from the past, you just don't know.

Al Jolson was a drop dead genius! Listen to his version of California Here I Come on Brunswick from the late 1920s. Yow! He jumps right out of the record! Louis Armstrong cited Joson as being one of the greatest performers he ever met, and he wasn't alone. You just haven't heard prime Jolson. The trick with older stuff is that the things that are common on reissues aren't necessarily the best. Jolson for instance, is always heard in the late 40s remakes of his hits, not the original releases.

Birth of a Nation is also a drop dead genius film. Completely innovative- try to find anything else at that time that came close. You can't do it.

I think you just know a lot about the history of modern jazz, and not so much about the other periods and kinds of music. That's OK. That's why we live to be 90. Plenty of time. I probably have few decades of digging and listening up on ya. Keep your ears open and you'll get there. You'll also come to realize that what I say is true. Culturally, American popular entertainment has slipped drastically from its peak in the mid 20th century.

See ya
Steve

 

[clarke68]

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Originally Posted by bigshot You're mistaken about the opportunities today as opposed to the past.

You bring up some excellent examples here, although you're performing a bit of revisionist history on the life of the Carter family (they were from Virginia, and travelled to Tennessee to make their first recordings). but to say "only a select few" performers get recorded and distributed today is nonsense...there are almost 2000 new releases available on Amazon.com this week alone.


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Originally Posted by bigshot In the rock n' roll era, (just before the genius song Wooly Bully was released) it was possible to produce a single for $100 and get it played on the radio.

Another good point. However, how much is that $100 now, adjusted for inflation? In contrast, today you can post a video to YouTube, promote it on MySpace, and even sell music on CDBaby all for free.


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Originally Posted by bigshot You just haven't heard prime Jolson.

Entirely possible. Every time I hear Jolson's whiny, nasal intonations I think, "tastes sure have changed. Thank goodness."


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Originally Posted by bigshot Birth of a Nation is also a drop dead genius film. Completely innovative-

Birth of a Nation was brilliant filmmaking, a landmark in composition and visual storytelling in the (new, at the time) medium of film. But it's still the movie where the KKK are heroes, lynching an evil negro (who wasn't even black, but a white guy in makeup, because black people weren't allowed to appear on film at the time) and thus saving a poor white woman from being raped. In the end, victorious Klansmen dance in the streets as they successfully disenfranchise black voters. If that's the cultural peak of American popular entertainment, I'll take a pass.

Leni Riefenstahl was a brilliant filmmaker too, but I wouldn't say her Nazi propaganda films exactly served to elevate culture.

 

[bigshot]

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Originally Posted by clarke68 /img/forum/go_quote.gif You bring up some excellent examples here, but to say "only a select few" performers get recorded and distributed today is nonsense.

Technology has made it possible for a lot of people to self publish today, but it's almost impossible to get signed to a label until you have already sold over a hundred thousand CDs. In order to get radio play, you need a record label behind you. Catch-22. Ask any professional musician how easy it is to get distribution and marketing for their music. They'll tell you how easy it is.

A professional musician in the 20s had a wide range of opportunities, from the pit orchestra at his local theater, to radio broadcasts, to community dances, to hotel ballrooms, symphonic and pops orchestras, vaudeville and burlesque, nightclubs, performing in restaurants or rent parties... Recording was just the icing on the cake. It was a struggle even then to be sure, but the whole culture was open to music and performers could find work as performers one way or another. Today, either you make hundreds of thousands of dollars as a name act on a major label, or you get paid next to nothing to perform in bars or at community festivals and fairs with the hopes of pocketing some money from selling a few CDs. It really isn't easy to be a professional musician nowadays.

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Originally Posted by clarke68 /img/forum/go_quote.gif Another good point. However, how much is that $100 now, adjusted for inflation? In contrast, today you can post a video to YouTube, promote it on MySpace, and even sell music on CDBaby all for free.

Calculating for inflation, $100 is about $700 today.

Do you know any professional musicians selling CDs on CDBaby or through the MySpace digital downloads? You'd be surprised at how dismal the average sales figures are for individual artists. Someday the internet will be a great way for musicians to get their music heard and marketed, but that time hasn't come yet.

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Originally Posted by clarke68 /img/forum/go_quote.gif Every time I hear Jolson's whiny, nasal intonations I think, "tastes sure have changed. Thank goodness."

You just don't know what you're talking about when it comes to Jolson.

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Originally Posted by clarke68 /img/forum/go_quote.gif Birth of a Nation was brilliant filmmaking, a landmark in composition and visual storytelling in the (new, at the time) medium of film.

Precisely. Richard Wagner was an anti-Semite who took shameful advantage of his most faithful friends, but that doesn't make Der Ring des Nibelungen any less of an artistic achievement.

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Originally Posted by clarke68 /img/forum/go_quote.gif Leni Riefenstahl was a brilliant filmmaker too, but I wouldn't say her Nazi propaganda films exactly served to elevate culture.

You're mistaking politics for artistic quality. But it doesn't matter, because these are irrelevant red herring arguments. We're adults who can take history in its proper context. We don't have to constantly make moral judgements based on our totally different times. And the examples you're choosing are selected just for shock value. They're far from representative.

See ya
Steve

 

[clarke68]

Quote:

Originally Posted by bigshot /img/forum/go_quote.gif Technology has made it possible for a lot of people to self publish today, but it's almost impossible to get signed to a label until you have already sold over a hundred thousand CDs.

I think you're making a lot of this stuff up, but if you're not, I find it incredibly encouraging that someone could sell over a hundred thousand CDs without even signing with a record label. That's hardly an indication of the demise of our culture since the '30s, as you suggest.


Quote:

Originally Posted by bigshot /img/forum/go_quote.gif A professional musician in the 20s had a wide range of opportunities, from the pit orchestra at his local theater, to radio broadcasts, to community dances, to hotel ballrooms, symphonic and pops orchestras, vaudeville and burlesque, nightclubs, performing in restaurants or rent parties... Recording was just the icing on the cake. It was a struggle even then to be sure, but the whole culture was open to music and performers could find work as performers one way or another. Today, either you make hundreds of thousands of dollars as a name act on a major label, or you get paid next to nothing to perform in bars or at community festivals and fairs with the hopes of pocketing some money from selling a few CDs. It really isn't easy to be a professional musician nowadays.

Agree with you that being a musician is an incredibly tough job these days. I don't know that it was all that easy in the '20s either, but I'll buy it if you say so. That being true doesn't mean there was more music available in the '20s than now, which was your point.


Quote:

Originally Posted by bigshot /img/forum/go_quote.gif Calculating for inflation, $100 is about $700 today. Do you know any professional musicians selling CDs on CDBaby or through the MySpace digital downloads? You'd be surprised at how dismal the average sales figures are for individual artists. Someday the internet will be a great way for musicians to get their music heard and marketed, but that time hasn't come yet.

Sure, I know guys who do that, the dismal figures wouldn't surprise me at all. But the hypothetical person you proposed who paid $100 in the "pre-Wooly Bully rock era" to get their song on the radio didn't necessarily sell any records either, and they were entirely dependent on a label to promote & distribute them. These days, more options exist for artists to get their work there out besides the classic equity deal.


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Originally Posted by bigshot /img/forum/go_quote.gif You just don't know what you're talking about when it comes to Jolson.

Maybe, maybe not. What's certain is that I simply don't like Jolson's music, and I don't think "knowing what I'm talking about" with him would change that, any more than reading Graham Lock's book would convince you to like Anthony Braxton.


Quote:

Originally Posted by bigshot /img/forum/go_quote.gif You're mistaking politics for artistic quality...We don't have to constantly make moral judgements based on our totally different times.

Considering artistic quality without considering the message of that same art is a dangerous business, and not one I care to take any part in.


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Originally Posted by bigshot /img/forum/go_quote.gif these are irrelevant red herring arguments...the examples you're choosing are selected just for shock value.

So what? You used Wagner to defend D.W. Griffith! You point to the popular culture of the early 20th century as this glorious, lofty thing that served to "elevate culture". I'm just pointing out that wasn't always the case.

Look, I know there were great films made in the '20s. We saw "Sunrise" in a film history class in college, and I thought it was great. Not just "great for a silent film", or "great for 1927" but great, pure and simple. However, "Crash" was great, too. So was "Little Miss Sunshine". So was "Ratatouille". I'm just not buying your argument that popular culture took this diving leap off a cliff after 1940.

I think part of what made pop culture great back then was that everything was new. When Al Jolson sang in "The Jazz Singer", everyone in the theaters stood up and cheered...it was a landmark moment because no one had ever seen a picture talk before. If you brought "Ratatouille" back in time to those same people, they'd have a freaking cow over it.

Louis Armstrong was incredible, he practically defined what jazz is. Someone today playing those same licks would probably have fans, but he certainly wouldn't be considered innovative. To innovate you have to move on, play different stuff, and that ruffles people's feathers. Most Americans have demonstrated a limited enthusiasm for having their feathers ruffled.

Also, I can't help but wonder if the creative output of the '20s - '40s hasn't been naturally edited by time. The mediocre and schlocky stuff gets forgotten, and all that remains are the gems. I thought the '80s were pretty dismal creatively at the time, but I go back and look at it now, at least the stuff that's still in easy grasp, and there were some good pop songwriters, and in jazz you had David Murray, Pat Metheny's best work, Bill Frisell, John Zorn and the start of the NYC downtown scene...some great music. That fact that it wasn't in the mainstream doesn't mean it wasn't vital, or that it had no impact.

 

[bigshot]

I work in the entertainment business. I'm not making this up.

See ya
Steve

 

[tru blu]

Two tiny things to inject:

1. While it's true that digitization has "democratized" the creative process, I think it's worth saying that this has opened up potential consumers to tons of folks whose only real talent is for self-promotion. Things weren't perfect in the old days, but the tier of DJs and indie labels (like Blue Note, Atlantic, Stax) filtered out quite a bit of dreck.

2. The saxist James Carter is about to drop a fine new album, Present Tense, that seems tailored to satisfy both trad folk and avant-gardists. Heard some of the ballads…quite gorgeous. His playing's always innovative. Kinda has the feel of his first great ballads disc, The Real Quietstorm.