Blue: The Murder of Jazz

When I started reading this book, it was at a time when I was a rock and blues fan trying to get into jazz and understand it better. One question I always had at the back of my mind was, "Why is it that I usually like jazz records from the Fifties better than jazz records from the Nineties?" Another was, "What separates good jazz from bad?" Nisenson answers those questions in spades. I can understand some of the criticisms of the book in the reviews below, but despite its title, Blue: The Murder Of Jazz is a great book for beginning jazz fans to increase their understanding of the music. Serious jazz listeners will love it or hate it depending on their point of view, but I found it to be a quick read and highly informative.

This book was a lot of fun to read even if the "controversies" of jazz critics seem like a "tempest in a teapot."The theme of this book is simple - that ongoing innovation is an essential part of the history of jazz, and that continued innovation is necessary for the vitality of the art. While the tone of the book is at times a bit polemic, it is also informed by a passion for the music. This makes the book far more interesting to read than a simple lifeless recitation of the facts of jazz history. The book is actually an interesting and informative survey of the of the history of jazz and innovation in jazz. He also makes some very interesting points about the impact of jazz education and record companies on the recent evolution of the music. Artists, he says, are signed too young, when they've been trained in school and not trained through "paying their dues". I found the book to be compelling reading. I don't agree 100% with his assessment of certain artists and developments. Nissenson appreciates "free jazz" and "fusion" far more than I do. But I would definitely recommend this book to any student of jazz, or to anyone who wants to be more informed about the music.

Musicians like myself are frequently amused by polemic like these. In the first place, most workaday (but in many cases, top-drawer) jazz players I know probably couldn't even afford admission into Lincoln Center to hear what all the shootin' is about, a fact that in itself speaks volumes about how little has changed in the BUSINESS of music and how its establishment totally disrespects its practitioners. Having said that, I think Nisenson had a hell of a lot of courage to "tilt at windbags" and go after the high and mighty the way he did. Personally, for what it's worth, I happen to agree with his assessment of things. If he were a musician worrying about career, etc., the smart money would say to keep his mouth shut. There is currently a surfeit of gifted musicians across the stylistic spectrum that can only be termed "disenfranchised", for many of the reasons Nisenson alludes to (eg.: ageism, commercialism, Crow-Jim, control of the industry by the few, critics falling in line with the "sainted one" and his minions the better to advance their own phoney-baloney careers, etc.). Nisenson cuts through this malarkey to expose this. Whether one agrees or disagrees with his assertions, he deserves credit for his courage and for "afflicting the comfortable". He raises issues that need raising. Perhaps after reading this, musicians will finally realize that there is strength in unity AND diversity, and that we are all on the same side in the pursuit of our individual visions of beauty.

Musician and author, Bill Cole writes in his biography of John Coltrane, "In music the course has been to investigate the structural manifestations of jazz and put importance on THAT far exceeding its worth and to call THAT scholarship. 'In structural [mode analysis], where form is held to determine content, its value is inflated beyond all reason, with the result that an analysis of how a thing is shaped or done is virtually now regarded as supplying the key to the essence of its being...'" (page 51) This consideration becomes particularly relevant in regards to the arguments presented by Nisenson in this book. Nisenson concentrates his attention on the work of Wynton Marsalis and those who reside under his banner at Lincoln Center, reprimanding the Wyntonians on many levels. For one, jazz has ALWAYS been the idiom of pioneers: Satch, Hawk, Duke, Dexter Gordon, Monk, Bird, Dizzy, Miles, 'Trane and many others who defied the conventions of their time (which was not often favored by the press.) It has ALWAYS been essential of any significant player to have a style of one's own. When the author consider's Wynton's musicianship in this regard, Mr. Marsalis seems to fall short. This is not meant to imply that Mr. Marsalis lacks overall ability. Marsalis DOES know how to play the trumpet well. His proficiency, however, never transcends technical understanding of forensic "correctness." As a player he aspires for historical accuracy (according to what he and his PURPORT to be "The Jazz Tradition") rather than dauntless individuality which is its own tradition. As a player, Wynton sounds like everyone who preceeded him. The real tragedy of this is that he is lauded for it. Another reprisal posed by Nisenson is of the hubristic position taken by the neo-classicists in that they feel entitled to imperiously ordain to the jazz community what is and is not "authentic." You don't have to be a genius to understand why no single criterion can define a music so diverse... esspecially when the principles are so stringently ultra-conservative. Nisenson takes a detailed inventory of the narrow parameters by which the neo-classicists appraise the value of an individual's work and then spends the majority of the book applying these standards to each generation in jazz's genealogy. The revelation of this is that when this dogma is applied, too many musicians central to the jazz tradition are discounted. One other issue addressed is the overall politics surrounding the situation at Lincoln Center. Nisenson makes an astute observation that the musicians seem to be following the critics which certainly IS NOT indigenous to the jazz tradition and is certainly to the detriment of ANY art form. Another observation is that Jazz At Lincoln Center seems to have hiring policies and programing that tend to exclude white musicians. When the classical establishment was accused of the same practic

Nisenson brilliantly defines the art of jazz as innovation. He sketches the history of the music from Armstrong to Marsalis and explains how innovation has always been at the forefront regardless of its erratic popularity. For the first time ever, Marsalis and the "neoclassicists" are taking the inventive music and merely mirroring what has already been done. This step backwards into hard bop is killing the foundation, the defining concept of jazz; innovation. Nisenson kept me interested in every word. His no-holds-barred style had me wondering what he was going to write next. Not only are his criticisms harsh and straight forward, but he also supports them with many examples and references. This should be a required text for every youth of jazz that has grown up in the "Neoclassicist's" regime. It is truly an awakening novel to the problems of our current situations in the arts.