Forward Thinking in the Jazz Music

“Jazz is not a style or a rhythm; it’s self-expression of creativity in relation to the time we live in” Although it is unclear who actually said these exact words first, I do know that some variation of this quote has been passed through time from the earlier days of jazz to now. To me it says that the practise of thinking about jazz as only one “traditional” way of doing things is the opposite of what jazz really is. It says that the mission of jazz as a genre is to reach points that haven’t been reached before, and to always strive for progression. The two people I have heard attributed to this quote exemplify this. Miles Davis and Jojo Mayer, two of the most forward thinking musicians for their time period. Miles Davis, a man who has pushed the boundaries of music further than most ever will and Jojo Mayer, a man continuing Miles’ legacy of forward thinking through music. The main topic I want to focus on with this essay is a genre that has progressed music as a whole in a very big way, jazz fusion. Generally thought of as “jazz-rock”, it’s often dismissed by traditionalists as something lesser than “the real stuff”, but to me fusion is much more than that. From its beginnings in the early 20th century jazz musicians were always highly trained and skilled musicians, thanks in no small part due to many early musicians being trained for military marching bands. This tradition of top quality musicians continued on through the timeline of jazz, resulting in some of the most complex and well performed music of all time.

At some point in this musical timeline these musicians began to think of the possibilities of bringing this high level of performance to other genres, and with that fusion was born. It was the 1960s, and outside of jazz, music was progressing in many different ways, you had folk beginning to lead a political revolution, soul was crawling up the charts and rock music was reaching new and different heights, but not without the notice of a few curious jazz musicians. One of these musicians was vibraphone player Gary Burton. Burton, fresh from playing in Saxophonist Stan Getz’s band, felt a need to rejuvenate jazz music for his own sake, to retain a like minded, similarly aged audience. What better way to do this then to fuse with what’s pushing boundaries at that time? “So I asked myself … What do I find interesting or exciting? And right at that time I had become a big Beatles fan. They were really new and different.” From this initial concept Burton went on to form a quartet featuring Steve Swallow on bass, Roy Haynes on drums and Larry Coryell on guitar. Together they recorded the album “Duster”, which is widely considered the first real jazz fusion record, opening the door for endless possibilities in this new and exciting style. From here the style kept evolving, keeping up to date with what was making waves at that time, the next obvious example being the psychedelic fusion records made by Miles Davis, such as “In a Silent Way” and “Bitches Brew”. Released during the climactic period of the hippie movement these albums were big successes in commercially, spiking people’s interests in the possibilities of taking jazz sensibilities and ideas and fusing them with rock inspired aesthetics.

The music in the albums weren’t the only thing that progressed these ideas though; the albums also brought attention to a host of musicians who had their own ideas of how this music could sound and gave them a platform to work off of. For example you had Joe Zawinul and Wayne Shorter who would go onto form monster fusion band “Weather Report”, John McLaughlin would put together “The Mahavishnu Orchestra” and Chick Corea who among success as a soloist formed “Return to Forever”. These three bands among others formed the most noted style of fusion, one that took from progressive and psychedelic rock genres to give a very demanding, technical sound. While this is what fusion is generally remembered for, the extent of the genre stretches much further than this. Fusion was and still is an outlet for jazz musicians to influence other style and broaden the scope of jazz in the process. Building from this we move onto another style of fusion that had been brewing along with rock for a while, funk. Funk was a derivative of earlier soul music with a heavy emphasis on groove. It was music that made people dance, similar to an earlier incarnation of jazz, swing. It was music that connected with a young black audience like jazz once did, and this was a large motivation behind one of the genres influential albums “On the Corner” by Miles Davis. Although not the first of its kind, it definitely set people thinking about using the palette of colours created by funk in a different way. Just as with his rock fusion efforts Miles Davis influenced the funk side of the genre with more than just his music. Herbie Hancock, one of Miles’ keyboard players, is regarded as one of the most influential jazz funk artists of his era. His band The Headhunters recorded many massive jazz-funk songs, most notably “Chameleon”.

A much-unexpected fusion that happened was that of jazz and folk music. Though not as prominent as many fusion styles, it still had an impact on both genres. The most notable example of this is probably With Joni Mitchell and her band, Although it wasn’t always consistent, it generally consisted of Jaco Pastorius on bass, Michael Brecker on saxophone, Pat Metheny on Guitar and Don Alias on drums. Together they made landmark Jazz Folk albums such as “Hejira” and “Mingus”, the latter being a collaborative effort between Mitchell and famed jazz composer Charles Mingus. Pentangle were another group pushing folk outside of its usual boundaries with jazz influences, notably their album “Basket of Light”. Although fusion is a genre generally associated with the 60s and 70s, brand new and innovative fusions of genres continued far beyond then and are still continuing today. In the late 80s and early 90s hip hop started to become more prominent in popular culture, and being a genre that originated in young black communities in America, a jazz influence and fusion was inevitable. From its inception hip hop was generally based around a drum loop and a sampled chord progression or the like on top, and near the end of the 80s sampled sections form jazz tunes started popping up on hip hop recordings. It wouldn’t be until a collective known as “Native Tongues” featuring hugely influential groups A Tribe called Quest, De La Soul and the Jungle Brothers came along that a fully-fledged fusion of the genres would happen.

At this point hip hop was evolving into a serious forward thinking music, using new techniques to produce sounds and constantly evolving. Members from the collective had been releasing jazz influenced tracks for a while but the most influential record released was A Tribe Called Quest’s “The Low End Theory”. This album really took the sound and vibe created by jazz and fused it with the forward momentum of hip hop to give great results. Former Miles Davis bassist Ron Carter features on the album. After this albums release the fusion of jazz and hip hop became much more widespread, and is on the rise in recent times with modern rappers. Most notably Kendrick Lamar is spearheading this fusion, with his 2015 release “To Pimp A Butterfly”. This album features some of the most talented modern jazz musicians such as Stephen “Thundercat” Bruner on bass, Terrace Martin on alto saxophone, Kamasi Washington on tenor saxophone, Robert Glasper on keys and a host of other talents. On the other side of the coin, like in the past jazz musicians noticed that hip hop was a fresh new genre and they wanted some. As you can probably guess from the past, Miles Davis was one of the first to dive into this experiment with his album “Doo Bop”, and not long followed by his former band mate Herbie Hancock “Dis Is Da Drum”.

Neither album was a massive success nor was any musical revolution was started due to either, but I feel that what they were trying to start is coming to fruition now. Going back to a name I mentioned in the beginning of this essay I want to introduce my last and, in my opinion, most exciting fusion genre. The name is Jojo Mayer, a jazz drummer who is leading a revolution of live electronic music intertwined with jazz improvisation. Jojo was influenced by the Jungle and Drum & Bass that came out of the UK in the early 90s and began trying to “reverse engineer” the drum sounds he heard, learning to play them on an acoustic kit. From these experimentations arose his famed “Prohibited Beatz” parties that featured live electronic music performances featuring Jojo on drums, and from these parties grew his band “Nerve”, consisting of John Davis on bass, Jacob Bergson on keys and Aaron Nevezie who is in control of sound and real-time audio deconstruction. This music is to me the most forward thinking music out there at the minute, and it came to be because of jazz fusion. If not history now it will be someday. Many of these attempts at creating any sort of fusion genre outside of jazz were ridiculed by more traditional thinkers, but without them I believe jazz music would have stagnated and the entire musical spectrum would be lagging behind where it is today. Be thankful for jazz fusion as it has had massive implications for the direction of all progressive music, and it will for a long time.