Talk:Jazz

Problems with Lede

These do not seem to be helpful -- I doubt any serious work on Jazz would deny that Jazz originated, at least primarily, in African-American communities in the South and that 19th and 20th century American popular music was based upon (with, of course, further developments) European music.

I agree that blue notes and swung notes (which are derived from ragtime) are not of West African origin, although certainly improvisation, syncopation, etc. are (and have other, independent, origins) -- this section should be rewritten, but West Africa should not simply be eliminated as a place of origin Editor437 (talk) 04:04, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

(1) There are many jazz scholars who argue that the music arose in a variety of locales, and some of these scholars are covered in the source cited. (2) American popular music has roots in African, Indian, and Latin American musics as well as European. It's misleading to single out one contributory stream. (3) Most jazz historians distinguish between "ragtime" and "swing" as two different concepts. (4) The source cited states that "...musical practices in the US cannot be traced to specific populations in Africa with any degree of certainty" (p. 7). Since most of these elements have other origins in addition to Africa (which is also addressed in the cited source), it's misleading to attribute them to Africa alone. In general, the lede section should be strictly accurate, and should maintain strict NPOV on issues that are disputed in the scholarly literature.Verklempt (talk) 05:11, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Changing the cite to a source that conforms to the statement hardly solves the problem. In fact, that is downright dishonest. When there is not scholarly consensus, then the article's lede should not take sides, per NPOV.Verklempt (talk) 07:21, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

It's unfortunate that you are edit-warring to remove sourced material on this point. Naturally there has been discussion on these antecedents, but there is scholarly consensus, and this should be reflected in the lead. It is your edit which has difficulties with NPOV. I believe you have been told this many times in the talk archives of this page.

If you wish to have minority views mentioned in the origins section, or, even more appropriate, a footnote, that would be acceptable, probably desirable in fact, for the sake of completeness. But your edit-warring on this point is untenable. 86.44.27.87 (talk) 15:07, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

First, I restored the citation that had been blanked, and conformed the lede to what the cite actually says. That is good editing, not "edit warring". Second, the new cite you added does not support the disputed contention any better than the old cite. Third, you cannot simply wave your hands and claim "scholarly consensus", especially not on the basis of one falsified citation. There are many recent scholars who describe the older jazz history as mythical -- including Shipton. As long as there is controversy, for the lede to take sides is a violation of NPOV.Verklempt (talk) 21:45, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

What you did was make an edit to make the article conform to your POV—of which the talk archives are already full—and then when I changed your edit, reverted it to your version. I call that edit-warring. That you were busy reverting to your version before I even got here is merely more grist to that mill. We now have a lead to our jazz article which doesn't mention black people or Africa. Shall you now get to work on the word "African" that still survives? Will we have to bear more arguments on the level of your "there were no pianos in the Sahel"? Who is doing the handwaving here?

I don't know why I have to put up with your saying I falsified a cite. What's your evidence for saying this? Had you even read Shipton when you made this claim? It sounds to me like you just read a gloss on him. Do tell.

Gunther Schuller's Early Jazz: Its Roots and Musical Development (1968) offered a chapter studying in detail intrinsically African elements in early jazz (endorsed by Shipton). Paul Oliver summarizes extant jazz texts in Savannah Syncopators (1970): "[certain studies in Dahomey, in Ghana and in Haiti] amply supported the contention that the rhythmic character of New Orleans jazz, the multi-lineal structure of its instrumentation and the melodic-rhythmic nature of jazz improvisation were essentially 'African' in origin. These contentions could be borne out and can be explained readily enough in terms of enculturation and acculturation", while the New Grove Dictionary of Jazz (2nd. ed. 2003) defines jazz as "A music created mainly by black Americans in the early twentieth century through an amalgamation of elements drawn from European-American and tribal African musics."

Shipton is indeed careful in inspecting evidence and history. He re-examines the "political" context commonly attached to the development of bebop, for instance. And he expands the range of influences acting on the formation of jazz, by looking at songster repertoires, string bands, familiarity of early figures with European classical music etc. A measure of his caution can be seen in his treatment of call-and-response. He depreciates the idea of it as an African trait informing the formation of jazz because, it exists in sea shanties (dating back at least to 1493), shanties and worksongs were connected to the African-American tradition by dint of the slave trade itself, and early jazz does not show a call-and-response influence to a significant degree. This despite his noting its parallels in African work song and griot practice. But excepting this, he states clearly that there is a consensus view on African traits that he does not depart from. Shipton:

"blue" notes, and their accompanying syncopated rhythms, are the most obvious elements of what the Grove definition calls "tribal African musics." In most jazz literature they are referred to as "African retentions", that is, survivals from the indigenous music of West Africa that was transplanted into the United States and kept alive among the African-American population during and after the era of slavery.

...

There is a consensus among historians that by the end of the nineteenth century, three distinct forms of African-American music had started to emerge: ragtime, blues and jazz. All of them shared a similar patrimony: the cross-fertilization of African musics to different degrees with various European forms.

...

The outline presented above is broadly incontestable. There are few precedents in Western music displaying the basic ingredients of jazz, notably polyrhythmic and polytonal ensembles, a strong accompanying rhythm that emphasizes what (in European music) are regarded as the "weaker" second and fourth beats of a four-beat measure, the microtonal flattening of certain pitches of a scale, and collective improvisation over a regularly repeated pattern. These are intrinsically African contributions to the mix.

Later: all the examples i single out are undeniably present in African music

That two or three musicologists may have pointed out that say, improvisation existed in some other tradition, flattening of pitches in yet another, and so on, do not outweigh overviews like these. Like many POV-pushers you by fault or will do not understand WP:NPOV and are trying to force the article to conform to your own. I don't consider you a good faith contributor here and hope that other editors will deal with you. Falsification indeed. 86.44.26.152 (talk) 02:39, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Try to abstain from ad hominem, and instead focus on the issues at hand. Specifically: (1) the "West African pedigree" statement. No one disputes that blue notes and certain rhythmic elements derive from African survivals. However, the lede goes much further than those commonly accepted assumptions. For example, whether or not these elements can be traced directly to a specific African locale or ethnic group is disputed in the literature -- the cite you deleted being a prime example. Furthermore, the other elements of jazz in that list are not all attributed solely to African retentions in the literature -- call and response being a prime example. The lede should not take a side in unsettled scholarly debates. (2) The assertion that jazz began solely in New Orleans or any specific locale has been disputed by many historians -- including Shipton. I think that citing Shipton in support of a geographically specific origins hypothesis is a falsification of Shipton's position. I have recalled Shipton from the library to double-check, but what Shipton says exactly is besides the point. The central issue here, once again, is that the lede should not take a side in an unsettled scholarly debate, and it should certainly be scrupulous in representing the contents of the sources cited. I personally agree with the New Orleans-centric hypothesis. I have been advocating deleting the position that I agree with, in order to improve NPOV here -- which rather invalidates your ad hominem accusations of "POV-pushing". (3) No one disputes the primacy of African American contribution to early jazz, but there is an extensive literature examining the multicultural nature of the early jazz community. To attribute the invention of jazz to AAs *exclusively* is inaccurate, and replicates the outdated approach to jazz history that is generally rejected by most contemporary jazz historians. Again, the lede is not the place to address this complex issue.Verklempt (talk) 09:25, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Commenting on the nature of your edits to the article and the talk pages is not ad hominem. You could do with some focus yourself, as precious little of the above post has anything to do with the edit you reverted and claimed was a falsified cite. Is it your view that West Africa is too specific a locale? I must say I find that an extraordinary objection. 86.44.20.40 (talk) 16:44, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

(1) Yes, "West Africa" is too specific, given that slaves were imported from all over the continent, and given that the literature is unsettled as to the significance of any specific African locale's contribution to jazz. (2) You still haven't addressed the problem with assigning the origins of jazz to the US south, given the objections to that in the scholarly literature. (3) You still haven't addressed the problem of assigning the origins of jazz to "African American communties" alone, given the objections to that in the scholarly literature. (4) If you don't see the relevance of these three issues in the edit I made, then what is the nature of your objection to these edits? (5) Accusing editors of "POV-pushing" and lacking good faith is an ad hominem argument, and it is unproductive. Again, please focus on the issues I raised.Verklempt (talk) 22:05, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

I contented myself merely with rebutting your claim that i falsified a cite. As you can see, the elements attributed to west africa are correctly sourced.

Given the importance of the Ashanti, Dahomey and Oyo kingdoms to the transatlantic slave trade and the studies of Dahomey musics, this doesn't surprise me.

Who exactly, besides you, objects that west africa is too specific? Please give correct representation rather than quotes that may not give the overall shape of the argument presented. 86.44.20.40 (talk) 23:42, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

(1) The quote that you distrust is from the cite you deleted. Pay attention! (2) You still haven't addressed the other issues I raised.Verklempt (talk) 02:08, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

Is there some problem with taking your issues one at a time? Forgive me if I am more interested in the point where you claimed that I falsified a cite before all others.

You're talking about "...musical practices in the US cannot be traced to specific populations in Africa with any degree of certainty" (p. 7)? This is one partial quote from Chapter One of the Oxford Companion to Jazz. I'd be interested in what the rest of that chapter says, since the cite was to the entire chapter. But taking that quote in isolation, it clearly doesn't support your argument, especially in light of the stuff I patiently typed up for you. Who exactly, besides you, objects that west africa is too specific? 86.44.20.40 (talk) 05:59, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

What, basically, have you to suggest we should overturn Shipton's In most jazz literature they are referred to as "African retentions", that is, survivals from the indigenous music of West Africa that was transplanted into the United States and kept alive among the African-American population during and after the era of slavery 86.44.20.40 (talk) 06:18, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

One of the passages you quoted from Shipton makes the salient point: that the call-and-response aspect of jazz cannot conclusively be attributed to African cultural retention, much less a specific region in Africa. There are many other authors who also interrogate various elements of the received origins myth, including call and response, blue notes, the false dichotomies "black/white" and "African/European", etc. A few samples from the extensive literature on the topic might include (besides the cite you deleted): Tagg, Philip, 1989, “Open letter: Black music, Afro-American music and European music”, Popular Music, Vol. 8, No. 3, pp. 285–98; van der Merwe, Peter. 1996. “The Italian Blue Third”, in Hautamäki, Tarja and Tarja Rautiainen (eds), Popular Music Studies in Seven Act. Department of Folk Tradition, Tampere University and Institute of Rhythm Music, Seinäjoki; Martin, Henry and Keith Waters. 2001. Jazz: The First 100 Years. Thomson Wadsworth; Martin, Denis-Constant, 1991, “Filiation or Innovation? Some Hypotheses to Overcome the Dilemma of Afro-American Music’s Origins”, Black Music Research Journal, Vol. 11, No. 1, pp. 19–38; Low, Augustus and Virgil A. Clift, editors. 1984. The Encyclopedia of Black America. New York: Da Capo. Pp. 591-596; Palmberg, Mai, ed. 2001. Encounter Images in the Meetings Between Africa and Europe, Nordic Africa Institute.Verklempt (talk) 09:04, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

I've read Tagg and van der Merwe (for interested readers, Tagg's letter is online here). "The Italian Blue Third", "... Some Hypotheses to Overcome the Dilemma of Afro-American Music’s Origins", these are exactly the kind of discussions I've already referred to. They don't change the fact that there is a consensus position outlined by Shipton.

(Call-and-response isn't in the lead, btw) 86.44.20.40 (talk) 17:51, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

You're still not addressing the issue at hand: the lede should not take sides in a scholarly dispute. There is no question that a consensus jazz origins narrative was developed in the first half of the 20th century, that most jazz histories replicate that narrative, and that elements of that narrative are still common even in more recent scholarship. However, it should also not be controversial to observe that many elements of that origins narrative are crumbling in the face of recent scholarship, and that many jazz historians today (including Shipton) are crafting new, more complex narratives of early jazz history. These are all issues that should be addressed in the body of the article. However, the lede should not take a concrete position on these unsettled questions. You are claiming that a scholarly consensus exists, when I've given you a number of cites that demonstrate the opposite, and could easily come up with more of the same. The existence of such counternarratives in recent scholarship proves that there is no settled consensus today, and that the received narrative has been undergoing extensive revision over the past two or three decades.Verklempt (talk) 20:36, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

As the article stands now, my view is that these discussions merit a footnote or a parenthetical comment in the body. If you want to expand the Origins section or spin it into a sub-article to explore these issues further, I would encourage that and help with that. It's an interesting topic. But since Shipton is aware of these discussions and has already summarized the consensus position for us and endorsed it to the extent it is as in the lead, there is no problem there. The lead is the article in summary, and it gives the correct weight to things. 86.44.20.40 (talk) 23:39, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

We've already established that the old consensus position has been undermined by recent work. For further evidence of this, see the cite you deleted, pp. 41-42: "If recent scholars have refuted many of the established jazz myths, they have not yet replaced them with a cohesive story of thier own." Also see Terry Teachout, Commentary, March 2007: "By 1950, “legendry” had hardened into a widely accepted narrative not unlike a creation myth. In the baldest form of this myth, jazz was created at the turn of the 20th century by a group of black New Orleans musicians descended from slaves who “Westernized” the polyrhythms and microtonal melodic inflections of their African ancestors, thereby bringing into being a new form of improvised folk music played by small instrumental ensembles [...] Virtually all of the earliest general histories and analytic studies of jazz—including Robert Goffin’s Aux Frontières du Jazz (1932), Wilder Hobson’s American Jazz Music (1939), Frederic Ramsey and Charles Edward Smith’s Jazzmen (1939), Hughes Panassié’s The Real Jazz (1942), Marshall Stearns’s The Story of Jazz (1956), and Martin Williams’s The Jazz Tradition (1970)—took the broad accuracy of this myth more or less for granted. Even though it simplified and misrepresented history in any number of significant ways, the absence of serious primary-source research into the origins of jazz made it inevitable that “legendry” would get the better of fact. Indeed, to this day the creation myth continues to be espoused (albeit in a more subtle form) by amateur historians like Stanley Crouch and Ken Burns." Teachout goes on to describe the more recent revisionist scholarship. Shipton is not the last word on what the current consensus is, since there really is not yet a new consensus position, per the quotes above. I've demonstrated this repeatedly, with multiple cites.02:12, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

<------outdenting>

We're lucky. We have an extremely recent (1st. ed 2005, 2nd ed. 2007) book on the history that does our synthesis for us. Discussions leading on from Tagg and van der Merwe merit a footnote. 86.44.17.205 (talk) 23:14, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

Shipton's synthesis is contested by the two cites in my last comment. We are starting to go in circles here. You claim there is a consensus in the literature, based on your single cite to Shipton. I have provided multiple cites that demonstrate there is not a consensus -- and could easily provide even more -- and your response is to cite Shipton once again. You are not being responsive to the argument at hand. How about we put Shipton in the footnote, and write an really good encyclopedia article, one based on the entire range of primary scholarly works instead of on one amateur synthesis of dubious validity? Isn't it better to represent the entire range of recent scholarship, instead of just the one guy you prefer? Isn't that what NPOV demands?Verklempt (talk) 23:27, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

How many of your cites are basically discussions of Tagg and/or van der Merwe? How many are from major works? How many making an argument? How many presenting an overview? How many doing both? What weight is given to these discussions in any overviews you cite? ReadWP:UNDUE. 86.44.17.205 (talk) 02:16, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

(1) Are you saying that you cannot be bothered to obtain and read the cites yourself? How can you take an informed position if you're not willing to study the literature? I have pulled the cites you gave me, and I am rereading them now. If you're not willing to do the work necessary to educate yourself on these issues, then stand back and let people who are better informed than you are edit the article. (2) Re WP:UNDUE, your argument that there is a consensus position is based on a single cite to Shipton. My argument that the old consensus is in flux is based on two cites: one to a standard reference work published by Oxford University Press, and one to a synthesis by the New York Times music critic. If anything, Shipton is the outlier here.Verklempt (talk) 06:13, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

lol. Surely you're not referring to Teachout? He's the music critic for Commentary (also the drama critic of the Wall Street Journal), perhaps you were confused? And however radical his take may be, he's not referring to the Grove, to Shipton, to Oliver, or even to Schuller. Shipton seems to be as careful in reviewing the received wisdom as anybody, certainly he makes the point often enough. Presumably Teachout is riffing off Tagg and van der Merwe as with the Nordic Africa Institute paper, and the Oxford Companion takes into account the same to a more moderated degree.

My questions were more intended to suggest a need to put these discussions in perspective.86.44.17.205 (talk) 17:53, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

Yes, Teachout -- he writes for the NYT as well as the other pubs, and is clearly a mainstream source, not at all "radical". Schuller and Oliver are fine, but they are representative of the old consensus that has been reexamined over the past few decades. Shipton is okay, nothing special, and hardly the last word on any topic. And then there is the cite that you deleted from the article -- the Oxford Companion. I agree that these issues need to be put into perspective, which is why the lede should not take sides in unsettled matters.Verklempt (talk) 22:16, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

A Serious Proposal to Deal with Problems with the Lede

So, based on Verklempt's criteria for exclusion, the article should open with something like the following:

Jazz is a American form of making sound which originated around the beginning of the 20th century or late 19th century from a confluence of sound-making traditions.

• Can't say it is music -- some older writers of "serious" music call it noise -- by Verklempt's standards "music" is replaced by the NPOV "making sound"
• Cant say it originated just in the beginning of the 20th century -- some sources call ragtime "jazz", so we add "late 19th century"
• As Verklempt has argued, we can't talk about influences, so we just say "traditions"
• Can't talk about styles -- Is "acid jazz" a style of jazz or rock and roll - there is disagreement here; is ragtime jazz or its own form - again, disagreement

Editor437 (talk) 02:30, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

Sure you didn't mean a modest one? 86.44.17.205 (talk) 23:15, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

Of course - Judging from the discussion here and User talk:Verklempt (an example: "Thanks for the "warning", but such nonsense still doesn't substitute for reason and evidence. Try to learn to construct an argument, and perhaps you'll do better in school"), it seems silly to try to engage in a serious conversation with someone who is trying to push an agenda. Everyone would hate the lede if changed per my proposal, but they will find no factual errors to argue about.Editor437 (talk) 02:33, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

john altman - jazz musician

please check my piece in talk page of John Altman as latter article devoted to british actor whereas the musician of same name is huge and of course huge-r. thanks

check this out: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0022903/ and also this: http://www.jazzcds.co.uk/artist_id_8/biography_id_8 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.4.84.1 (talk) 17:44, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

Jazz Fusion

Wouldn't it make more sense to just mention Weather Report rather than saying Zawinul, Shorter and Pastorius? 71.12.169.10 (talk) 02:01, 7 August 2008 (UTC)