Why do modern Jazz musicians all sound the same? | My response to comments
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- Опубліковано 18 кві 2023
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Andy is a drummer, producer and educator. He has toured the world with rock legend Robert Plant and played on classic prog albums by Frost and IQ.
As a drum clinician he has played with Terry Bozzio, Kenny Aronoff, Thomas Lang, Marco Minneman and Mike Portnoy.
He also teaches drums privately and at Kidderminster College
In his book , Miles Davis said that it takes some time for a musician to sound like himself. Thinking about that makes perfect sense .
Didn't he also hate the "butter notes"¿ Never made sense to me
@@johtfloridaman6227 sometimes full beautiful woman look better slightly concealed than fully naked 😊
@@naderzekrya5238 that chic still needs to get naked at some point if we gonna get down tho 😂
The less time you spend trying to copy other people, no matter how great they are, the sooner you will find your own voice :)
Another thing that should be considered is, older Musicians came through apprenticeship. Look how many great musicians came through Miles Davis band, Pat Metheny came through Gary Burton, Steve Vai through Frank Zappa...on and on. That's whats missing today i think
I believe that it's more that each of today's musicians aren't focusing on developing their own unique style and sound, as they are focusing more on technical aspects instead.
@Guitarzen Boy, do you not understand the discussion. Taking private lessons, graduating music college, self taught is just what gives you some background on learning how to play. But usually, you get taken in by someone that's been around the block to mentor you, if you will. At least that's how things worked in the JAZZ world.
Look at the grand masters, like Miles Davis, look at the catalog of musicians coming in/out of his world that started successful bands, created solo careers? Just on the album Bitches Brew, you have a HUGE list of what became the big names in the Fusion era.
Steve Vai still had to cut his teeth with Zappa because Steve Vai was a nobody. He also took lessons from Joe Satriani. But again, we are talking about JAZZ musicians from the early days on through to today.
Steve Vai isn't a jazz player. Allen Holdsworth isn't a jazz player either. I put him more in the Prog Rock, fusion realm. To call yourself a jazz musician, you typically have to be able to put out some major JAZZ albums that are impactful.
I'm going with people just don't play with feel. for instance, I'll hit a note and then slide my finger up or down until I hear a note that strikes my interest and then keep going from there. no thinking just hearing. I talked to a jazz musician and he was too focused on theory. theory being good of course except if a person forgets to go by what they hear and feel. Pure reaction to musical notes will create individuality.
@@BrokenFingersGuitar A musician that's focused on theory is STILL in the learning or teaching stage.
@@Oneness100Tony Williams and many others insist that “trying” to develop your own style puts the cart before the horse. Just get technically strong and your sound will come.
Wunderbar Video Andy.
I am an old modern jazz musician.
And I sound like no one else.
Unfortunately !!!
No matter how hard I try.
But I don’t care…. I love it.
Playing gives me peace.
I will never be an important musician.
But making my own, has always rewarded me.
Bowie comes to mind as a rock-based musician who never wanted to repeat himself.
One of the greatest innovators of all time on drums, Tony Williams, spent his formative years imitating the greats in great detail, going as far as changing the tuning of his drums to sound just like Max Roach, Art Blakey etc. Through that exercise of learning how it's done by people who also copied the greats at first, he found his own voice. The innovators will always show up, standing of the shoulders of those who have gone before. The rest of us mere mortals are richer for their contributions.
Clark Terry...imitate...incorporate...innovate.
Tony also had three different teachers that taught him different aspects of drumming. One was highly TECHNICAL, one was more FEEL, and the other was for CREATIVITY as those three things contributed to Tony's playing.
Most of today's players are more into technical aspects as their primary focus.
I've also never or VERY rarely do I see any of the younger drummers even talk about LISTENING to the melody on the song and playing musically. I find even some of the biggest names in the 2nd gen of fusion players to be homogenized IMO. I prefer the Billy Cobham's, Lenny White, Tony Williams, Narada, Alphonse Mouzon, Trilok Gurtu (he's more of an anomaly) , rather than the later gen of the Vinnie Colaiuta, Dave Weckl, Dennis Chambers even though the later do have great chops, etc. I just find them less listenable from a drumming perspective and they are much more predictable. Nowadays, it's not so much what they do with the song, it's more of how they solo or play over everyone else, rather than playing WITH the other members or WITH the song.
Just my opinion, but I think the composing has taken a backseat than what the first gen fusion groups were doing and composing is VERY important aspect.
@@Oneness100 Everything you say about Colaiuta, Weckl and Chambers and other younger drummers who only focus on technique (in your view) contains all the criticism Billy Cobham, Tony Williams Lenny White and Alphonse Mouzon also had to endure when they started.
@@PeffDada Yeah, but the 1st gen players have far more recordings that would be viewed as MUST HAVE and the 2nd gen don't. For every "must have album" with the 2nd gen players, I can easily cite 3 to 4x more albums with the 1st gen that are CLASSIC fusion.
I don't hear the 1st gen players trying to copy the 2nd gen players, but I hear the 2nd gen players trying to emulate the 1st gen all of the time.
I left out Gadd, Tony Smith, Gerry Brown out of the 1st gen crowd.
Simon Phillips, I'd stick him more in the 2nd Gen lane as he's about 40% of his playing is directly out of Cobham's catalog of identifying licks.
That's right. If you take from every one of them, you can't sound like any one of them.
Glad I found this channel, completely by accident seemingly. I was such a snob, I was depriving myself of so much great music. Thank you Andy
This isn’t a problem with just Jazz music surprisingly
You got that right. Every music form that gets integrated into mainstream becomes formulaic. Most people are copycats
@@davruck1 I’m kinda guilty of it as well. I’ve been making hip hop for over 10 years now and never really fell into my own but at a certain point, and presently, finding my own sound was my main mission, and while looking for artists that have cracked the code, I found there was a wider variety of sound in the 90s (golden era of course) and that variety continuously diminished every decade until what we have now. Limits seemed to breed creativity (using what you had available, less equipment, less resources). You had to use your ears back then to figure out what your favorite artist was doing! You’d inevitably interpret it in your own way! Now you can just watch a tutorial that gives thousands of artists the same answers. Thus spawning the clones
@@aldali724 I feel you. That’s why I started looking for artists that have their own lane. Lots of psychedelic influences on trap music lately that I like. Lots of experimental stuff with focus on production. You can see the influence that the wider availability of mushrooms and other edibles is having on music. The old boom bap rap was boring to me a long time ago.
@@davruck1 I said in the other video that Jazz becoming a predictable medium, that has the aesthetic values of music meant to be place in high end car commercials was the byproduct of the kids, who'd show up for the drug scene and dance in the 50's/60's had moved to other styles over time. I don't really love that it's true, but I think where ever the psychedelic crowd is quite often where what will be perceived as innovation is usually at.
Copying is something you do but you copy what you learn. Internalise it and mold it with your mass of other influences. Subconciously or consciously. But being credited for copying a solo note note… If Zappa was alive I would love to hear his commentary on this 😂
I feel that this is also very true with rock musicians. I see guitarists on Instagram with 100k subscribers who’s whole career is based on playing basic covers of classic rock songs/riffs. Also bands like Greta Van Fleet becoming very popular and shows like Stranger Things reintroducing classic rock to a younger generation keeps this trend happening. None of it is inherently bad.
It seems that the jazz and rock cultures view themselves retrospective genres. All that can be done now is keep playing/promoting what has already been tried and true. It’s easier to make money that way, especially with rock music still being very popular with the older generations as well. When it comes to the newer stuff it tends to be very musician oriented (modern jazz, prog metal, etc.) There is a larger musician audience than before with social media, so that also influences this trend.
It could be that music is becoming polarized into two camps, the musician side and the non-musician/business side. These two worlds I feel were a lot more intermingled in the past.
Excellent analysis. Also the lack of venues (night clubs) and jazz jams have dried up. There jazz musicians would play every night and had people sit in. Few and far between now. Music colleges have become the place where this happens but it is not enough.
Yep
Where are the jazz jams on the street !?
It's so true. My area only has bars that only want rock and country cover bands. I've got a buddy in a jazz band who can get gigs at hipster-y cafés every now and then, but this is rare, and it's mostly because they're all under teenagers and older folks want to give them a chance because they're young.
In the 90’s there was a resurgence in the interest of Jazz. I lived in Toronto at that time and was a part of the Jazz community. There was like 7 full time Jazz clubs and lots of venues that had Jazz nights. Plenty enough Jam nights and enough elders to pass on their knowledge and experience to the next generation. Then of course there was the Jazz festivals that were all Jazz. You could also hope the train and head to Montreal to experience their Jazz scene. Almost all that is gone now and up and coming Jazz musicians don’t have the scene to enrich them like it was back then.
I totally agree with you. Something that I see in the rock pop world but I'm not sure happens with jazz, but relates to all of this is how I see the algorithms of online music services like Spotify influence musicians. At one time folks bought and listed to albums so they would get a sense of the scope of what artists do. Listen to several albums by several different artists and you then would hear lots of different sounds that you could pull inspiration from. These days even though so much music is available at the touch of a button, the way folks consume it often means that they aren't getting the full bandwidth of what any given artist does. They'll hear an old hit song, let's say by Led Zeppelin and then rather than being inclined to seek out the full album that song is off of, they'll allow the algorithm to pick similar tracks by different artists. All of that ends up giving one a narrower view of music and if that's what inspires you to create music it's going to mean that your music is likely to be less original in character. I feel like I can hear this I'm contemporary music and that this phenomenon is how a group like Greta Van Vleet happens...
right on brother---- Andy, I forgot where I read this but this has been one of my beliefs as a player " I rather be a bad innovator than a good copyist"
Amen. He knocked it out the park.
You are revolutionarily right my friend! Instantly subscribed and liked this video. What you say about us being oversaturated in extreme virtuosity thanks to insta guitarists and all the “how to” jazz is exactly what is killing the genre and turning it into a “baah baah” situation no one wants to be Shepards thanks to the dopamine hits of insta and trying to be accepted by the chin scratching snobs of jazz. You are just so on point about how virtuosity back in the day was shown through the composition. Please keep speaking your mind and posting!
Please make more videos on this subject
This is a very important video. Yes, some feathers will be ruffled, but that is always the case in healthy talks. 👍👍👍👍
i was in the studio with this 21 year old kid who others talk about being a “virtuoso”. He was struggling with an traditional track and i said just do the cowboy 1 to 5 thing. It worked but he had no idea what i was talking about. I think the youth are skipping fundamentals and basics and are just going for impressive stuff. Im trying to say you must first learn the rules before you can break them!
I think you're right. All the emphasis on UA-cam players is on "shredding" and speed. Ask these people to play a 12 bar blues and they are probably in trouble.
This is a phenomena that drummers run into almost as fast as they can do any real playing. Is it all odd meter, long fills, high tempos? Is all of that stuff in place at the expense of 4 on the floor, nice spacing and feel?
@@colinburroughs9871 It all depends on what serves the composition/song.
Isn’t that like how Jimi Hendrix struggled to sound like a normal blues guitarist? He wrote and played some impressive stuff but his 12 bar blues stuff sounded off
It's a complete inversion of what being a great drummer is about. If there's any ONE worthwhile source to copy from the past drummers, it would be Jeff Porcaro and his ability to establish the groove and feel of not just a song, but even of the individual groove and feel of an individual section of a song. Flawlessly, without crazy chops or polyrhythms.
It's ultimately the secret to the greatest drumming: do you know how to push and pull the sense of time, while always staying in time?
Copy more of that, whippersnappers
Important topic that feeds back into the larger musical world. I remember when I was young there were a lot of musicians around with all kinds of backgrounds and styles. I think originality was forged from learning and adapting to other players and audiences. The limits, constraints and practicalities of playing in bands and all the personalities involved really is a sink or swim situation. I don’t know just my two cents. Great talk Andy.
Sam Gendel is another name that comes to mind. He is an individual on his instrument but he’s done it through the environments or songs that he makes and seeks out. His compositions are a vehicle for his voice
Plus 1 on Sam Gendel. Totally unique!
Out here in the cover band doldrums of Florida there is absolute subservience to the recorded versions of pop and rock songs. Drummers will have electronic drum pads mixed in with their acoustic kit for the sole purpose of duplicating the snare sound on Prince's Kiss or the opening drum fill on INXS' What You Need. Greil Marcus called playing it live like the record "satisfying an audience without actually moving it". Similarly, pop and rock has been largely reduced to maybe 20 songs. I call it getting Spotified. Freefallin' and Sweet Child o' Mine are inescapable. Two years ago, my wife and I heard The Stones' Miss You whilst driving to a restaurant. We heard it again on the drive home. Then I heard it again the next day whilst setting up for a hotel gig in which we would be playing - you guessed it - Miss You.
It’s awful. Even “deep cut” Sirius stations play the same cliched tracks. Makes me want to disc jockey for my own damn self!
I’m in Florida, its like hell. I used to play in cover bands,made good money, had to stop because I started hating playing gigs.
The thing here now is Guitaraoke , Karaoke with guitars, it’s abysmal. Last night I saw a Drumaoke guy beating his drums to death to top forty, absolutely junior high level player in his fifties, the most bizarre gig I’ve ever seen. Sweet Caroline is the bane of my existence.
Totally agree with you about the importance of compositions.....repertoire is so important. Not just for the artists but also the "play something we know" audience. There is a limit to the number of times 'Stella' or 'All The Things' can sound fresh....Great for education and getting your chops up to speed, bug not necessarily for the bandstand....,
Great thought provoking video chap!!!
The thing about knowing tunes like Stella and All the Things You Are is that standard tunes are a common language used by jazz musicians around the world. A trained jazz musician can go into a jam session anywhere in the world, sit in, and share a satisfying musical experience with other musicians who have bothered to learn the tradition. There are cats out there like Marc Copeland who can start with a tin pan ally tune and take it to the stratosphere There's a value to the musical traditions, as well as innovation.
Love what you're saying here! Fascinating to me, because I was just saying some extremely similar things (on Instagram as it turns out). Being a jazz trumpeter and American I see some of it from a slightly different angle, but our conclusions are essentially identical. I know classical musicians who make similar arguments in their world. I'm determined to be increasingly committed to an individual statement and sound - just can't go along with this "jazz on steroids" - incredible playing that says... nothing, but sees music as an obstacle course that somehow must be negotiated - as a to-do list. We have done better and we need to do better. Thanks for taking on the topic head on.
That finale was wonderful! I stopped gigging and going to gigs because all people here want are cover bands and tribute bands, aside from some fringe metal, which isn't my thing. I also came from that age when originality was valued. Today quirky individual players are just thought of as incompetent (at playing covers), so they cannot gain a foothold unless they have monster technique.
I think we're reaching a point where music generally has peaked, all forms of it. It's more and more difficult to come up with something original in any genre.
Boring people get bored, maybe that’s the issue
It’s like saying, all the good dishes have been cooked already, cuisine is over.
Even the simplest meal prepared and cooked with excellence can wake up your senses.
Simple ingredients in music the same thing, I think a lot has to do with the framing or presentation too.
Everyone is feeling the need to impress in the first seconds, a song, a set, a night of music built architecturally, moments framed within a greater context, thats where the originality and meaning and wonder is.
When was the last time that a jazz musician came close to being a household name? Currently. The quote from Dizzy Gillespie is worth repeating. "I would rather be the world's worst innovator than the world's best imitator.." Also something worth noting, Very sadly, Alan Holdsworth was close to penniless when he died. Many times there is a price to being a distinct and individual artist.
When you’re looking to garner a percentage of the 1.1% of the music market that jazz currently occupies…..not terribly likely that you’ll be raking it in.
Kamasi Washington? He's a pretty household name among hipsters at least, though he isn't an innovator.
Mozart was buried in an unmarked pauper’s grave.
Being great at something, particularly in the arts, doesn’t guarantee anything.
@@adde65 your words are solid as stone. I will remember them the rest of my life.
By the way, you can make a meme with them and be famous Good vibes!
Also Mozart … nothing new, just the vagaries of serendipity
One important point you only just glossed over is the replacement of composition with sound shaping. It became quite noticeable in rock and pop in the 90s and has been the trend since.
I would say the 80s, but totally agree with your observation: the emphasis on sound shaping has tended to compromise composition and performance, or at least to make the composition and performance more generic when the final production comes out.
Also! In the book “the rest is noice” by Alex Ross. He talks about when recording technology took over classical music. Before recording technology industrial complex a violinist from France had a completely different sound as a violinist from Spain. But because of the recording industry all violinists ended up sounding the same. The violinists had to play in a way that was easy to be recorded. Longer deeper baser notes over thin short ones that microphones couldn’t pick up
I think one reason that some people have trouble finding innovative or distinctive music is because they only look within certain genres. Some of the best instrumental and improvised music these days is not billed as jazz, it can be found within genre labels such as post-rock, electronic, noise et al.
The "free improvisation" scene and the "electroacoustic post-rock" scene definitely have innovative stuff
Post Rock is mostly boring...always the same guitarsounds( like metal has!) from pedals a thousand of artists use. Nothing innovative at all! 5 minutes the same bassline with a little grungy guitar and voices you can't decipher with lots of reverb and delay... King Crimson did that many years ago, but better.
A lot of today's Rock, Jazz and Metal musicians don't want to practice enough. I've talked with musicians in the state of Washington and many of them have told me that 3 days a week of band practice is too intense.
It’s not just practice, it’s about being experimental. Jam sessions are supposed to be experimental
@@davruck1 And you can’t get them to “jam” 3 days a week.
@@k.p.bolden7329 they must not really be serious artists. I know people who quit their jobs to focus on music even if they never get famous. They do it for fun and to keep them sane. It’s not just a hobby for some of us.
I guess in some way all songs have been written, all music has been made ? There will be no more "music revolutions", there will never be a another Rave, Punk, Shoegaze, Hip Hop / Rap, Synth Pop, etc, etc, etc. There will be variations of what came before, like Grime (not that I know much at all about Grime, but it is a form of Rap & Jungle / Drum 'n' Bass kinda thing). Pretty-much every lyric has been written, every sound has been heard.
That's not to take away from some of the amazing artists out there creating some amazing music ! The likes of Yvette Young, Sarah Lipstate (Noveller), to name just a couple...
I know I'm kinda off topic here, as I haven't really mentioned anything relating to Jazz. But, it's all related. The same issue with Jazz is pretty-much the same issue with all music, it's pretty-much all been done. Musicians are in the predicament where to create something different will probably drastically reduce their audience / appeal ?
Though there are also some current Jazz Movements which deserve to be highlighted. Certainly the current London Jazz Scene with bands like Ezra Collective, The Comet Is Coming, Kokoroko, Yussef Kamaal, etc, and musicians like Nubya Garcia, Shabaka Hutchings, Sheila Maurice-Grey, Tom Skinner etc, etc.. These bands / musicians do also incorporate elements of modern music, whether it be Hip Hop / Rap, Pop, Electronic, Psych, etc, but that's what Jazz has always done and that's the reason why Jazz has existed for so long, because with each decade Jazz uses elements of whatever that era produces.
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Oh... and just to add - for my, purchasing the likes of the current London Jazz Scene Bands & Musicians on Vinyl kinda entices and encourages me to listen to these band and musicians even more-so !
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there are very good compositions of modern jazz musicians like Hiromi Uehara, JD Beck, Peter Evans, Vijay Iyer…
Ignoring jazz for the moment, I think shows like "American Idol" have been poisonous to music. If you're going to compete on that show, you *have* to choose a well-known song, and you have to sing it in a way which sounds good to people who already know that specific song. These shows do not reward people who write great new songs or start new genres, they reward people who sound just like the successful artists of the past.
American Idol doesn't focus on original songs because they wouldn't be able to get enough singers to compete and it would be more about finding the "best" singer/songwriter, rather than an 'Idol" singer. Many singers aren't famous for writing their own songs. They either get a catalog of published songs and they and their producer pick the songs they want to sing, or they get a group of songwriters to write songs for them.. Look at Whitney Houston. Most of her songs she didn't write or co-write. She did start to get partial songwriting credit, but it was still with a group of other more notable songwriters. American Idol is looking more for the singer rather than a singer/songwriter.
Same with the Voice. While a few do write their own songs, that aspect is not focused on because they wouldn't be able to have as many contestants to choose from and then they'd have to rate them on singing AND songwriting separately and it would make the contest more difficult. Remember, they are catering to a narrow population of mostly young adults, teenagers and children as their target audience.
Talent shows are not poisonous to music. That's daft AF.
@@Oneness100 - Yeah, but my point is that such shows by their very nature encourage "sameness", not "innovation".
@@garanceadrosehn9691 I don't agree with that. the problem is that the judges they have suck. They are too easy on the contestants sometimes. They let people in that shouldn't be there, but the producer sometimes dictates who gets on the show.
They also let a bunch of contestants on that have NO experience. I mean, NONE, no vocal lessons either. And I can tell within a couple of seconds if they should even be there in the first place.
I would rather they just pick the best 12 and allow each one to perform longer rather than picking from a bigger list of contestants that pass the first audition.
I would rather hear someone sing a song that's a "classic" and do an excellent job with an original arrangement of it, than some song I've never heard that's a crappy song to begin with. There's a lot of contestants that choose crappy songs, which is a problem.
They should tell the contestants to come up with an original arrangement if they decide to do a "classic" song. That will make them be more innovative rather than copycat karaoke style singing.
@@Oneness100 - A different set of judges might improve the situation, but I really think there's an unavoidable problem with the way these shows work. And that problem is *US,* the audience. For the show like American Idol to survive, it must produce results that we-the-audience like enough that we keep coming back to watch the show.
The contestants have one shot to convince us that they're good. And it's much easier for us to do that if the contestants are singing songs which we already know. There are *so* many excellent songs which I did not particularly like the very *first* time I heard that song. But if a group is doing a cover of some already-popular song, then I'm already familiar with the song itself so I can focus on whether *THIS* group is doing a good job at singing a song I already know.
Andy, really enjoyed your followup to the previous video.
Gatekeepers.
They are everywhere.
They are in industries and organizations.
They are in your peer groups, they may even be found among your family and/or friends.
But the one gatekeeper with the greatest magnitude and potency is…YOU.
Your mention of composition is intertwined with this reality of gatekeepers.
Composition is the process of Listening, which is to be aware of what is inside you and to express it. You get to choose how you listen to yourself and if, and how, you will express what you discover evoking itself inside you.
Sincere composition most commonly carries the peril of being excluded, being maligned, being ignored, because it often shows what we do not see outside ourselves…and inside we are full of Surprises.
The gatekeepers may wield the above outcomes of denial, but if you love what you hear inside, and you love how it feels being expressed, then the gatekeepers “keep” very little compared to the feelings of genuinely expressing what is inside you.
Composition cannot be taught. It can only be embodied. And that in itself is the nourishing factor for doing the endeavour, the embodiment. This done with sincerity, has to be enough…because there are so many gatekeepers, including the one inside us.
Great points, Andy. Looking forward to more discussion on this topic. Cheers.
Great stuff Andy. Encouraging free flowing debate. Ultimately, we all learn something from this, however small. Long may it continue.
Great food for thought! I’m a big Louis Coke fan, myself - and I agree - that’s jazz!
It´s not only about Jazz music. Adorno wrote about the coming loss of individuality in the 50s and 60s. He said, that it is even an effrontery, when some people say "I".
He meant, that we need a special charakter, to function in a capitalistic society. We pay with our individuality.
20:30 Words of wisdom right there.
I enjoy your videos and I would say that I could binge watch them except there is a lot of substance and content that gets me thinking. I'm not complaining. On the contrary, videos or streams that are like this I consider educational material and often I'll listen to them or a part of them more than once to get an idea and maybe write it down and store it in a large file I have for a lot of ideas I consider valuable. It's just that I have to take my time and can't rush through them like say watching old tv sitcom videos.
I think this is the same in other forms of music, not just jazz. Individuality and originality become a millstone in 'popular music'. Artists like Peter Hammill, Bill Nelson, Graham Parker (and thousands of others) alienate their core audiences and record companies along the way by insisting on doing something new and often fail to pick up a new audience and spend the rest of their lives eking out a small living rather than making the money their art deserves.
Good to see your 'philosophical' videos getting the attention they deserve.
There is a lot of great jazz out there period. There are a lot of great young players.
Right? Not only young players, but bold and original players, mixing up genres, bending the rules, not afraid to ruffle the feathers of the old guard. I really don't understand this argument that jazz is out of ideas - it's full of ideas. I see more jazz these days than I have in 20 years.
The forest and the trees.
You only have to read the comments and you will find more than 10 mentioned.different own voices. Only one candidate without own voice, because he want not have a voice. He intends to be aromatic.
Good idea.your first jazzvideo with exploding clicks😊happy the man is happy for you
It is funny, if you name Guitar Players with an own Sound, I really think you were only listening to a very narrow Pool of Guitar Players. If it comes to Jazz Guitar Players with an own Sound in the 80 ties it is James Blood Ulmer that sparks up on my Radar first. Then Vernon Reid, Kelvyn Bell, Brandon Ross and since he had his biggest Success in the 80ties: Sonny Sharrock. Ronny Drayton of Material comes to my Mind and in the 90ties: Jef Lee Johnson and Dave Fiyoucinski. Marc Ribot, Arto Lindsay, Elliot Sharp I do not want to forget.
Why I clicked on the original video was because I did a Google search on the phrase. I was prompted to do the search by listening to the Spotify channel "State of Jazz" where I was struck by how much of the music was so very similar. Granted this may be because of the limited number of artists and songs curated by the channel, but it is striking the large number of jazz artists that are on the channel who sound a lot alike. For example, I like the Bad Plus, but almost every song with a piano section on the channel sounds like Ethan Iverson was sitting in.
Fascinating and informed arguments again, Andy. By the way, after the excellent John Poole interviews, I found an Ad Nauseam gig on UA-cam which I enjoyed a lot :)
On the one hand, ordinary people in our internet era have a far greater ability to access a vast amount of music from the last 100 years or so. Also, the changes in recording technology mean that the annual production of recorded music is far greater than it was in the days when you needed equipment that was out of the reach of an everyday person. Yet, with this embarrassment of riches at our fingertips, it seems like many people care less about music than people used to 50 years ago; certainly people seem less likely to talk about music with passion (present company excepted), defaulting to the fact that different people have different tastes, and there is nothing to be said or done about it. I think these two developments are connected. The vast sea of available music makes it harder to map out a linear history for recent decades and identify key players in that history. If we make a small effort, we can still recognize music history from the past, when people were not so overwhelmed by choices, but today's players get washed away in the tide. People find it harder to care about just another musician in the crowd of musicians than they did about the players of the past who were anointed by that industry/critic/cognoscenti cabal that served as the gatekeepers in the past. Today's gatekeepers have more limited reach. The shared storyline and common references have been lost. In place of a shared history, we have shared algorithms. It's not the same thing.
Even better points! And more people need to speak out about the obstacles/downsides of "how the internet works". There could be light at the end of the tunnel. At least there are large numbers who agree with you on the original premise!
Maybe "emulating" is a better term than "copying". Also, social media is constantly bringing "similar" music into attention based on their algorithms, therefore, in order to ascend to a certain level of attention, musicians are forced to emulate certain type of playing. I believe, demise of magazines devoted to music fans like Kerrang, Rolling Stone etc. also influenced this sameness, because there are less platforms devoted to certain types of genres which used to champion new and different artists.
Maybe there is a feeling like all the great stuff has already been done
There's still the WIRE magazine.
In the old days we bought records to own a copy of music we loved and keep coming back to. A lot of music today is made to go viral, get streamed, and forgotten.
Thank you for this video, I was commenting a lot of things against you on original video, but you explained in this one most of things I didn't get you were talking about, you are just generally talking about music industry and expectations, not musicians themselves
Wise words! Thanks a lot!
That’s really funny literally just after I watched this a vid popped up with the title “ such and such the next Allan holdsworth “
erm...yes.................
Thanks for mentioning this. An entire genre of music based on a handful of recordings of one artist!
I saw that in my feed as well - haven't clicked on it yet.
As a Blues , Rnb , funk , and Rock fan . What i like about Jazz is how they mix down their sounds like a flat clean signal gives it a more earthy mono type sound sure ya have exceptionns like Frank Zapoa . But even though i dont follow jazz . I do respect the sound .
Awesome views, thanks for it!
It all comes down to the bureaucracy inherent in any sort of modernism. People feel more safe when they are in a box, whether that’s at work, school, or promoting music that’s within a specific framework. Why take a risk to step outside the box when you can have a pretty good career within?
Now, I believe it’s important for artists to be aware that a canon and standards exists. But artists’ education in history has become flash-in-the-pan, and they do not know the influences of the people that they themselves are influenced by. You can only step out of the box you’re in if you know the how and why the box was constructed.
There's only so many unique sounds, and techniques to realize them. Jazz and rock have run out of ideas, we are at the end of the road, because there have been so many trying out all the different sounds and ideas. This happens to all musics eventually, I guess.
We need a new musical form, in the way that jazz and rock were once new. It needs to shock us!
Well as a young musician, the question is now how does one develop their own sound and create something unique?
Stay the hell out of music school, for a start.
Composition and tonality . You don’t need to reinvent the wheel. Learn the wheel and the gear. Make it your own voice. Harder said than done. It can take up months,years, a decade but it’s worth it
Definitely agree with what you said at the 5 1/2 minute mark. People are just trying to make videos that go viral, and most people will do anything to do that, even if it means trying a bunch of different stuff and really not developing a personal sound. People are allowing the algorithm to dictate their personal sound. Back in the day when record deals were the main way of getting discovered, people needed to have a personal sound so the records could be sold. And if they changed their style, it was because they wanted to or the record label to wanted them to. It wasn’t a quilt of a bunch of different stuff that you could scroll through. Obviously there are some exceptions but I haven’t thought about this before and thanks for bringing it up. TikTok has accelerated this because videos go viral by being stitched together or combined. Everyone is a special guest on everyone else’s thing x infinity forever. Again in the pursuit of virality, mostly.
Hey Andy, first off, GREAT to hear you! This was the first time happened across the channel. This was great, man!
When I was at new school, this was something that we would discuss. There was a big difference between being there in 2001 and being there in 2005 even.
But, it feels like a lot of us are being given the same ingredients. The musicians that I noticed at something different transcribed a LOT, and then examined what they like and borrowed from the components of that. I have found some unique things in looking for ‘why’ my favorite artists have played something instead of just settling for what it is…not that there is anything wrong with that.
In any case, I personally enjoyed this vid. Thanks man!
“I used to be 'with it. ' But then they changed what 'it' was. Now what I'm with isn't 'it' and what's 'it' seems weird and scary to me. It'll happen to you!”
“I liked Bill Conners when he sounded like Bill Conners.” ~ Alan Holdsworth.
Agree, recognising something new can be hard, I had to listen to "Are you Experienced" twice before my brain could open to what was going on !
Well said!
Great discussion go on
19:04 Important distinction
A lot of musicians go for the blizzard of notes or a wall of distortion usually with the treble rolled off, well thats so called guitarists. The likes of Barney Kessel, Pat Martino, Wes Montgomery, Joe Pass, Terje Rypdal were great guitar players because they were actually quite frugal with the blizzard of notes. Quite a few of them were largely self taught and they made records which were listenable as well as having their own individual styles. Totally agree about the masters of the past having their own originality the above mentioned certainly were very original. The same applied to the early 60s rock bands they wanted to be totally original.
Terje Rypdal is pretty cool.
Key words "aesthetic target". This is "performance" versus "artistic expression". And innovation (by trying the new) versus perfecting (by repeating the canon).
Some would say "academic" versus "popular"
They’re turning into jazz technicians instead of artists.
In the late 80s a cook that worked for me played base in a speedmetal band he gave me a cassette tape of their music it sounded like some one put a
Microphone a bee hive.
I agree that the modern world/ social media rewards players that imitate others. The framing of your argument has shifted in this video to one I resonate with more so. I understand the youtube title is for views, but hopefully you agree that it doesnt represent the argument you are putting across. I still disagree that Parker came along and then everyone started copying. Lester Young and Colman Hawkins were an evolution of 2 drastically different schools of sax playing, just like the German and Russian school of violin players which differ greatly. Music is always a progression. Holdsworth (my fav guitarist) himself was a progression of his influences, which he worked into his own context just like the elite musicians of the modern day. As you will know, he was influenced from outside jazz and rock (namely Slonimsky) but does this make him more original, or just drawing from different progressions of music. I think that question is best left unanswered. Keep the videos coming Andy.
Bill Connors was a perfect example. With RTF he had a very personal sound. Then some years later, he attempts to clone Allan. Allan thought is was really wierd and was baffled by it.
Also I lived w/ Louis Cole for a few years and yes, he could totally play swing/ jazz - but with his own projects, was constantly writing and that was and is his thing. Knower also started by doing pop covers too, like 10+ yrs ago.
I would also add that many musicians today are too academic. For example, many play scales that simply fit into the musical puzzle rather than hearing the notes they want to play and then actually transferring that to their instruments. Or they imitate their favorite musicians rather than taking elements from them and making their own voice with them.
What's hilarious is that your criticism boils down to the same vague American cultural conservatism you despise in Wynton Marsalis' aesthetics. Both of you are pining for an idealized, bygone era of jazz. Marsalis is preoccupied with the stylistic veracity of a more culturally homogeneous era of jazz and American culture. Thus, the suits, institutions and focus on pre-1970s styles and performance practice of jazz. Whereas, you've deluded yourself into believing previous jazz icons came from a culture that recognized and rewarded virtuous paragons of individualism.
In either case, contemporary jazz will never be as impactful as jazz was when you were most impressionable. You both cherry pick the cultural trends that confirm your romanticized versions of that time and formulate criticism using these filters. It's why both your criticisms are so predictable.
Contemporary jazz may not be as impactful as what we might remember when we were most impressionable. The point is that all the most impactful jazz is not contemporary. It comes from unexplored territory. All the most exciting stuff almost never gets heard.
Anything that surprises will always have an impact, however Impressionable we might have been in the past.
And I'm not hearing anything that reflects any despising of wynton marsalis. Marsalis is the one who actually despises; and despises anything that he considers "impure." As if he were the only legitimate gatekeeper and protector of the purity of jazz as a black art form. Or at least he used to.
I think the flipside of this is that more people are participating in playing instruments and the general standard of average players has been raised. There's less of a musical elite as more people can achieve the level of what was formerly an elite level of playing. This may be a stage in jazz/music's evolution as we move from imitation to innovation again.
100% on the copying argument
Interesting stuff 😎
So many are simply regurgitating scales (brilliantly) but not playing a damn thing with any real soul or invention.
Particularly bass players.
Well done.
Sketches of Spain
Good point on today's musicians "copying" in order to sell their music, rather than being original like in the old days.
My musician buddy calls them "replicators." For example, we're judging today's top guitarists based on how well they can replicate older musicians' music, tone, etc. There's been no originality, no great new songs for quite awhile now.
The entire spirit of the musical enterprise has shifted. And not for the better.
The only thing "better" about music today, is not the current music itself (which is abysmal and completely forgettable, for the most part)---but the delivery mechanisms through which music can be conveyed (i.e., digital media).
Agreed mate.
The method of music learning pre-Internet vs post-Internet is so different. Old days you really had to develop an ear to be able to copy or mimic your idols, and I think that spawned more individual expression. These days you can quickly find dozens of tutorial videos on how to play a song (with MIDI rolls displaying every note), and this really seems to encourage copying/mimicking over self-expression.
Andy, love your more arcane, nuanced discussions. Not a big jazz fan, but you really made this discussion interesting for me.
Also Berkeley changed the whole harmony behind things.
Musicians, going back to the 20s and 30s used to have avenues to play, literally morning, noon and night. Bunny Berigan (look him up, Louis' favorite Trumpeter ;) ) would play on radio shows from the early morning on, til noon, then record as a sideman on records for the Dorsey bros, Ethel Waters, Billie Holiday, etc, then work in the pit of some Broadway show, or clubs in the evening, and perhaps play all night jamming with fellow musicians til dawn. Anyone able to do that today?
There are plenty of copycat musicians who got record deals in the 20th century. Original artists are not necessarily rewarded by record companies. They’re rewarded by history remembering them. Now in the internet age we have thousands of musicians auditioning for fame and notoriety on UA-cam and Instagram for everyone to see, instead of in nightclubs.
You raise some interesting points, but I don’t think most jazz musicians sound the same. Even the people that are trying to emulate someone else can’t really do it because they’re not the same person. If you listen carefully, there’s just too much nuance and variation in people’s personality and playing. In every style of music their becomes an established canon of vocabulary that every aspiring player is expected to know. In jazz, it would be things like playing through the changes, chromaticism, enclosures. We could for example, play through the changes using nothing but pentatonic scales but that would not sound the way that people have come to accept as jazz. So really, it’s the listener’s expectations of what jazz is that informs most people’s way of playing. You always have people that are individualistic and do their own thing despite the pressure to conform.
Nice video Andy, very thought-provoking! BUT! I have many issues with the stance that "all modern jazz musicians sound the same". Firstly, referring to the greats of the past by name while not doing the same for modern greats seems to both entirely gloss over and exacerbate the problem. I know that you don't want to rustle too many feathers by naming the implied culprits but I genuinely have no idea which 'generic' musicians you are referring to (more on this later). Do you think that James Francies' sound on the piano is not distinguishable from that of Tigran Hamasyan? On trumpet, is Christian Scott not distinguishable from Theo Croker? Is Kush Abadey's drumming not completely different from Tyshawn Sorey's? Are Immanuel Wilkins' compositions overly similar to Melissa Aldana's? Is Christian Lillinger shooting for the same aesthetic as Yussef Dayes? When I start actually thinking of the big names of modern jazz, I don't see any lack of originality (though I agree to some extent that there is an aesthetic shift away from originally due to jazz schools and the Wynton school of thought). Immediately labeling all of the great musicians that I named above as 'the same' without providing any clarifying evidence, analysis, or direct comparison to the greats of the past seems to be quite speculative and insubstantial. This could be cleared up or expanded on by examining particular case studies or asking more specific questions.
Secondly, on a similarly speculative note (not necessarily in disagreement with any of the points raised in the videos), perhaps the perception that many modern jazz musicians sound the same is a result of the easy-to-use, instantaneously spread nature of social media. In other words, the problem of unoriginality and conformity isn't necessarily worse, though I do think that this idea is valid to an extent. Rather, homogeny is likely just much more visible than it ever was before. I do think that tastes can and are becoming dangerously homogenized over time! Such safe, unoriginal yet technically dazzling 'blah' is the goal of profit-driven industry (for example, Marvel movies)! But does the existence of these well-circulated 'blah's mean that there is less great music out there? I tend to think that there is more amazing, original, boundary-pushing music being made now than ever before. It is not in the interests of profit-driven platforms to spoonfeed anyone this music. I think that there are many important questions that should be asked about shifts in public preference in music (and media in general) over time but I completely disagree that the low (?) visibility of groundbreaking music on social media platforms is directly proportional to the originality, or lack thereof, of modern musicians.
My 2 cents worth: As a rock musician who discovered classical and jazz as I continued studying music in high school and college, I noticed that in the 80s the rock music became hyper-produced. The musicians were uber-talented, but if you listened to their work in the 70s and then in the late 80s the "feel" got more and more lost through the sound engineering. That's a huge generalization, but take the band Yes as an example, or Kenny Loggins, or even Michael Jackson - great musicians, but the sound in the 80s onward became hyper-produced and lost, in my opinion, some of that feel. I think the same holds true in the fusion/contemporary jazz world. When I listen to Watercolors on Sirius XM I find the same trend - the music tends to be so hyper-produced that the virtuoso drummer or guitarist or sax player actually sounds generic (drummers sound like they're playing the same electric kit - yet I know they are playing real drums for the most part, but there is no distinct sound or vibe because of the engineering) - and yet when I listen I know that what these musicians are playing is amazing! UA-cam and Spotify and Sirius XM (etc.) are amazing ways to reach the world with music, but live music is king for expression - no need for exaggerated compression and EQing and effects to compete with the next song that will be played or streamed, just good quality music and more open dynamics and expression. Just a random observation from a random musician. Peace and God bless...
THanks for the videos. I saw the first one and now this one.
Just wanted to ask if you've heard Dirty Loops
As far as bass guitar goes I'm struggling to find any new gen bass players that really put their own stamp on their style. As a bass player myself I must say that it IS hard to come up with something really original that sets yourself apart from anything that has been done before (like Jaco or Stanley Clarke). The last bass players that really created something unique and who I can recognize in an instant due to their ideas and phrasing are:
Mick Karn (no, he didn't sound like Jaco), Michael Manring, Victor Wooten, Les Claypool, Carles Benavent and Dominique di Piazza.
There are some interesting new gen players like Hadrien Feraud or Junior Braghuina from Brazil. Still, these guys borrow heavily from Jaco.
Talking about Jaco, what he did was something that only happens once in a life time (or may not even happen again). I tried not to be influenced by him myself but that' s impossible if you want to get into the more melodic side of bass playing. Ergo, to come up with a truly unique voice is very hard nowadays.
It’s hard to post things to instagram knowing that I would get many more views if I consistently played similarly to other people more often, but then I would get bored and not post at all
Modern society rewards narcissists. It's a lot easier to have the appearance of technical mastery and come out of the chute fully formed at age 22 than it is to spend time working on your own voice. Bill Evans has a great video on this where he's having a discussion with his brother on developing style and not being a poor copy of others.
In rock guitar, Mike Varney and his "finds" were the beginning of the end of the musicians gaining notoriety through their compositions. Prior to Varney, guys became "guitar heroes" due to their songs or live reputations. Post-Varney, the material was largely crap, just tossed together - it all became about songs for the sake of the guitar solo. He may not have been the cause of it, but he was a symptom.
BTW - I'll never forget the first time I heard "Satch Boogie," by Joe Satriani, everything you'd expect from a "modern player." The song sounds like a rip-off of everything Van Halen ever did, then you get a blatant rip-off of Billy Gibbons. Not one big of originality anywhere to be found. And it was a big seller. That's when I knew we were doomed!
Thought of a good example django rheindhart where basically every gypsy jazz guitarist copy’s django. Even rosenbergs nephew was headlining jazz festivals and copying djangos solos note for note
Younger players are very advanced technically but I think most lack paid bandstand dues !
Spot on. I want to see some trend reversals in jazz. Have someone who's not afraid to appear human or flawed, making mistakes and hitting wrong notes, for the sake of reaching something unique. Or to find new forms, influences. I don't feel a lot of blues in the modern jazz musician, it's become far too academic for my tastes, and I went to Berklee.
Coming from experience here, social media promotion as a musician is an anti-creative pursuit. You only have 7 seconds of someone's attention if you're lucky, so what's the point in spending hours on a 4 minute composition? I put time into social media to promote, but in the shadows I diligently work on full compositions (albums even!). What I want to, and can, say with music simply can not be expressed in an Instagram reel. Thanks again for saying it!
I think if you are left o find your own way, you will make your own mistakes and develop a unique style, but if you go through college and are being told the right and wrong way to play, you are going to end up all sounding the same. Players with a unique sound and style don't tend to make good session players and vice versa.
I had a very unique way of interpreting tempo and rythm in classical music, never passed more than one entrance exam on piano because of this. And got kicked out by some teachers. I stayed well with a russian teacher who had no big problem with it. She said " it is amazing how you still bring the music expressively togheter" . Is this not about telling the story? Today you have 100000 pianists imitating the same Andreas Schiff interpreation, or even this can be bad, they have to imitate the teachers view, that is normally bureacratic and coward on academia
Jazz, like fusion or whatever rock are labels. And like Shorter used to say..
"don't forget to create, I dare you to create, go forward..". There are a lot of things going on in all the scenes, but you have to find them, even dance music or funk. I missed Prince, but I like Steve Wilson or M'shell D'eongcello.. Or so many others working in Asia or Africa, we need to open up ourselves to a more eclectic sound.
Imho, the problem is the labeling « jazz ». There’s so much music out there that is not labeled as jazz and is great. I think we just have to stop using this word. I do agree on some degree that there is a lot of technical « jazz » nowadays that has like a classical music play it in a theatre vibe to it, but there’s also tons of other stuff.
because they are polishing an old table, not building a new one.
i agree...now....what do you think the possible future of drumming could be?..i always found Ari Hoenig to be unique, albeit quirky...
I now have to dig this Louis Cole, it sure sounds interesting. Tomorrow i will start. Promised😂
Louis Cole is the only artist that means anything to me in these times. I'm glad you mentioned him.