And.... discuss (as DWbass would say)

http://www.popmatters.com/pm/column/56880/rip-smooth-jazz-1985-2008/

I personally think the writer comes across as elitist.... probably watching on the fringes while the rest of us loved this music and felt the rush from it.

Yeah, it may be dead... but that doesn't mean he gets to trash it.

Kat and everyone,

Woody Harrelson played Mark Twain in an episode of "Cheers."

In that show, Harrelson reprises the Twain standard, "Reports of my death are greatly exaggerated."

Smooth jazz isn't dead.

It's just morphing back to a time when fusion and improvisation mattered much, much more than simply putting out a homogenized product.

Wow, I haven't shared an actual OPINION like that in years in here.

Well, that's how I feel.

Signed,



Eric Viccaro
Ready for Wayne Brady to shock you all on Sept. 16!!!

Scathing review of Smooth Jazz. Here's a quote from the article, saying the genre:

"ushered in a long era of mushy fusion from bands like the Yellowjackets, Spyro Gyra, and the Rippingtons; melodic guitarists like Earl Klugh, George Benson, and Lee Ritenour; buttery pop saxophonists like Mindi Abair; keyboard noodlers such as David Benoit and Bernard Wright; and schmaltzy trumpeters like Arturo Sandoval and Tom Browne."

Personally, I think a better title for this article would be:

"R.I.P. The Traditional Business Model".

I often wonder if the deletion of the format from radio is more a symptom of the fact that you can listen and get exposure to music in so many different ways now. Rather than listen to the radio, or tolerate your Sony Walkman CD player skipping as you walk around, you can download hundreds of songs onto your skip-free MP3 player and listen to your own, commerical-free, 24-hour "Best-of-Everything I Like" "radio" show. And you can link it into your car stereo, which is a key place people used to listen to the radio. Plus you can use headphones and not have to annoy everyone else in the car by forcing your genre on them by selecting a radio station.

We hardly need the radio anymore, in my view, when we have flexible media like You Tube, Limewire for the unscrupulous, Amazon, the ability to try songs for 99 cents, lots of free samples and of course, the skip-free, portable MP3 player. Then there's CD Baby where you can click up anyone you want to hear that sounds like your favorite artist.

I always react negatively to these people who consider styles of music "evil" or look down on people who like a particular style. As Esperanza Spalding said, musical tastes are similar to tastes in food -- how can anyone be critical of one type of food than another when it's all relative?

And last of all, his reasons for the 'death' of the format -- the economy is weak -- pure speculation.

As a student and player of jazz, I still think the immortal tunes like Curves Ahead, Catching the Sun, Together Again, are far better than the older jazz tunes in terms of engendering loyalty and passion for music for me personally. I'll listen to smooth jazz tunes (many of which never got radio) over and over again where the older tunes like Scrapple from the Apple by Charlie Parker have historical, theoretical and intellectual interest to me, but mean far less to me personally.

And I think the author of this article leaves out the fact that traditional jazz is dying on the vine as well -- I think even fewer people like it than smooth jazz, and I suspect there are even fewer radio stations out there that actually play it all day. If it wasn't for universities teaching it and the commitment of the older musicians who were steeped in it, I think it too would go the way of many genres.....largely forgotten except for the most immortal tunes or among die-hard musicologists and super-fans.

There's live in the old dog. I never observed so many new smooth jazz releases than nowadays. R.I.P. The Traditional Business Model that would be ok. The smooth jazz genre is still growing. This writer has no insight view.

While I agree with some of what was said in the article, I agree with ALL of what was said above in this thread. Hopefully what is dying out is the muzak-like stuff (I won't name any names).

I have not listened to radio as a source of music for about twenty years; maybe I was just ahead of the curve (for the first time ever, LOL).

Long live artists who continue to play jazz with a back beat. Peace.

There is the quote from that article that summed it up. But the fact that the guy is coming from the "it's not straightahead" perspective makes the article irrelevant. What would make it relevant is if he went in deeper about how the radio folk ravaged the music that used to be called "contemporary jazz" and tried, mostly successfully, to eliminate every interesting element it had in it.

The other gaping hole in his logic is that he confused the music with the format. Sadly, so many musicians have become safe and comfy in their role as content providers for a format they they are even afraid of the music they create, preferring to bury it in the live sets and only come out of the studio with covers and songs that sound like reconfigurations of other songs that have "tested well" . Then you look at the fact that live gigs are where people go crazy over this music and as for the toned down recorded stuff..well it sure isn't selling. Fortunately there are artists like Ken Navarro and Steve Oliver who are not coming from fear or playing into corporate radio's fear of music. Hopefully more artists will realize that the audience matters more than 7 spins a week between 10pm and 5am. (which is all an instrumental is going to get on smooth A/C)

As far as those who hate smooth jazz I would venture to say its their hatred
of disco music that fuels it even more. All the criticisms of the smooth jazz
genre are the same criticisms of disco by the then disco critics.
The REAL origins of "smooth jazz" WAS/IS the fusion of disco and jazz.
As far back as LOVE UNLIMITED ORCHESTRA,MFSB,etc,. do a disco jazz
search on youtube and you'll find that a lot of late 70's early 80's
"disco" instrumentals,NOT necessarily chart toppers mind you,one good
example THE DUKES-MYSTERY GIRL.Give that a listen,and you'll see its
an early smooth jazz "pioneer" of a song,BUT called "disco" at the time.
Not an instrumental is mystery girl but you'll see what I mean.

Now the sound eventually fused to the point of not hearing disco
overtones or characteristics directly thereof,but the characteristic of
its"soul" being no more deep than disco everwas is certainly where
the critics are coming from. No disco+jazz fusion,no smooth jazz
evolution.

One can also not ignore the fusion of jazz w funk,soul,and r and b
as well as to the origins of what smooth jazz came to be.All those
being blended elements of what made disco,disco too.

As far as it being dead,the ol' plant seeds of thought in the general public's
mind what you want them to think,and then turn around and offer as
evidence of your premise,the "talk" going around about it when you're
the one who STARTED the gossip in the first place,it's the same ol'
same ol' trick used to influence many a pop culture trend away from
this or that.Just get the word started as a rumor,have it repeated enough,
ACT AS IF you were "onto" this before anyone else and VOILA, it ends
up looking like you made a correct prediction.

That's exactly what this author is intending,hiding behind a pseudo
intellectual rationalization,he's just trying to plant seeds of gossip,
"DID YOU HEAR SMOOTH JAZZ IS DEAD" and they tell two friends,
and they tell two friends,and so on and so on and so on.

I'm not quite sure who the author is talking to? Yes, he sounds somewhat elitist. He lists many good points but as Shannon points out he is also missing other key points. Maybe there is some over-analyzing going on too? Granted I listen to music on commercial radio only about an hour a week (just too turned off by the dial overly dominated by classic rock, lite contemp and rap) so I may be somewhat out of touch but....could the average music listener even identify what a smooth jazz song is these days? Twenty years ago it seemed to be able to be pegged pretty well (Kenny G) but look what it morphed into as far as what the "smooth jazz" stations play? Perhaps this is what the author is getting at?

I don't think this author is responding to the morphing of smooth jazz over the years - I think he's part of that group of
"elitist" traditional jazz players who have always beat up smooth jazz.

I see him as an opportunitist -- taking this opportunity to perpetuate this attitude now that there is solid evidence the genre is losing radio popularity.

As a Smooth Jazz Recording Artist, I love to tackle idiotic comments like:

"ushered in a long era of mushy fusion from bands like the Yellowjackets, Spyro Gyra, and the Rippingtons; melodic guitarists like Earl Klugh, George Benson, and Lee Ritenour; buttery pop saxophonists like Mindi Abair; keyboard noodlers such as David Benoit and Bernard Wright; and schmaltzy trumpeters like Arturo Sandoval and Tom Browne."

Mushy fusion?
LOL!

These guys are GREAT players!

But more importantly, their music is emotional, every note means something, DYNAMICS ARE THE NORM - NOT THE EXCEPTION and when I listen to this most amazing music I am moved to chill bumps and a smile.

Forgive my lack of "Real Jazz" appreciation, but listening to Chick Corea bang out Hanon exercises at 120 BPM to fill in a 45 minute "song" does NOTHING for me!
Do I respect Chick's technical abilities?
ABSOLUTELY.
Will I, or have I ever bought a Chick Corea CD?
ABSOLUTELY NOT!

You sound just as biased as the author? Do you think "real jazz" players music isn't emotional? Seriously? As a musician I would think you are fully aware that the emotion is open for interpretation by the listener. To each his own. As great a players they all are, I am much more emotionally moved by recent releases from Chris Potter than I am Boney or Koz.

Hi SH,

Exceptions exist... meaning not ALL Smooth Jazz players 'reach' me. To be honest, I have invested my "hard-earned" on precious few Smooth Jazz CDs.
I, just as every music buyer, have standards and that intangible 'something' that stirs my emotions enough to pull out my gold card and buy.

To answer your statement "As a musician I would think you are fully aware that the emotion is open for interpretation by the listener."
YES - I fully agree.

Music is subjective; and that's the precise reason I DON'T think ALL Smooth Jazz has it over the purist variety. I think most Smooth Jazz sucks. But I've heard and listen to a lot of INCREDIBLE music most people would categorize as Smooth Jazz.

Enough rambling: I do agree with your premise - "beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder".

And this surprised y'all? Stories like this are long overdue since the BA of radio killed it almost 10 years ago. The only thing I truly disliked was mentioning groups like Yellowjackets and Spyro Gyra the way he did.

Now what will happen?

Honestly, a lot of this article rehashes points made here often over the past ten or so years, just said in a more snarky way. The delivery of the author is abrasive, to be sure... but a lot of the content is familiar.

There are those who make enjoyable instrumental music with a pop or soul bent to it that could just not be one's taste perhaps, and then there are those who have been making elevator fare to please The Format. I saw that as what the author was responding to. But once again, like Shannon said the radio format name Smooth Jazz is confused with genre and I'm so over it. New name plz. kthnx!

Ah, but as we have discussed before: what should the new name be? I prefer contemporary jazz. Peace.

Funny rock music doesn't have this problem but then the rock music they played in the 70's is pretty much the same as what is played (and commercialized) still today. Not such the case with jazz. None of what is commercialized today sounds like what was commercialized back in the 60's and 70's and this is why we have this issue today. Call it what you want but... a band like the Yellowjackets to me seems like textbook contemporary jazz and they have been that way since Mintzer joined them. It's laughable to refer to them as "smooth" (perhaps Pre-Mintzer?) and just shows how out of touch some "critics" are. I wouldn't even call YJ's a fusion band. Definitely contemp jazz. Having said that I couldn't put Ripps and YJ's in same category. The music is quite different IMHO. I would classify most of what the Ripps play as pop/smooth yet over their discography they do tend to touch on many aspects of jazz which is great. Spyro falls somewhere in between Ripps and YJ's.

Well said, Steve. Particularly after "call it what you want". I agree totally.

I agree too. Yet, those are three of my favorite bands. Peace.

The hammer hit the nail yesterday. There was one satellite fed network that was competing with BA's smooth jazz network. Jones Network smooth jazz sounded a little "elderly" for my taste with their focus on relaxation and mood over song but they did play a lot more original instrumental music and at least two new songs an hour. New owners, syndicator Dial/Global are streamlining Jones' operations and have eliminated three formats, one being Smooth Jazz. So of course BA jumped right in..as the press release reads:
In a joint statement, Dial Global Programming president Kirk Stirland and Broadcast Architecture president Allen Kepler announce a cooperative initiative to move Dial Global's smooth jazz programming, formerly under Jones Radio Networks' aegis until its recent sale, into BA's Smooth Jazz Network. The announcement impacts Dial Global's 17 smooth jazz affiliates and goes into effect on Sept. 30, bringing BA's SJN affiliate count to 40 stations.

This pretty much caps Keplers "we want the world and we want it now" quest. BA now controls all but about 5 fulltime SJ stations in the country and as of now there are no alternatives out there.

Believe it or not this is a good thing. Tough love. BA is moving toward a vocal driven "Smooth A/C" format that will mostly play old music from the 70s and 80s and new vocals from neo-soul artists who are under 30. (preferably females who wear lingerie in their videos or guys who sound like Al Green circa 1970) This means artists are going to have
to create and exploit other ways to get their music heard and that this instrumental music and vocal music that doesn't fit the retro cookie cutter is now back to being what it was before BA took over. Adult Alternative. It was exciting then and lots of fun.

Yep, sometimes what seems bad can turn out to have good consequences. If very little instrumental smooth jazz is played on the radio, there will not be so much pressure to make music that fits the what-radio-wants formula. I used to hate the term "smooth jazz", but now I am coming close to embracing it. If most of the muzak-like stuff goes away, I could become one of smooth jazz's biggest fans. Peace.