Jazz Land

Jazz Music Origins

Origins of the Red Hot Mama, 1910-1922 $18.45 Gathered for the first time, here are Sophie Tucker's earliest recordings, from Edison wax cylinders and impossibly rare discs, chronicling the rough and ready rise of this lasting icon of the double entendre. A master of self-marketing, Tucker learned long before she became known as The Last of the Red Hot Mamas that the key to her success lie in controlling--and changing as needed--the facts of ...

The Art Of The Piano $11.25 One of America's great musical treasures, pianist Jessica Williams returns with her third in a series of superlative solo piano recordings for Origin Records. Here, in performance at the Triple Door in Seattle, according to Williams, 'There was so much love in the audience that it actually drew the music out of me. I have the best audiences I know of: never loud, raucous, or challenging. They're w...

Into The Light $16.26 With pianist Bruce Barth, bassist Rodney Whitaker, Terell Stafford on trumpet, and Tim Warfield, Jr. on saxophones, the Chicago-based drummer hits for the seats on his debut recording as a leader. Performing a set of mostly original material along with several rearrangements of jazz and popular standards, Hall's fertile and agile drumming propels the group of longtime friends (they've all been, ex...

Jazz: From its Origins to the Present $90.00 This entertaining one-volume comprehensive history of jazz and the artists who made it popular contains musical examples so that students who do not read music will not be inhibited. Combines a rich detail of the origins of jazz with insightful biographies and contributions of jazz legends, including Duke Ellington, Count Bassie, Charlie Parker, Miles Davies, John Coltrane, and the jazz bands of...

Origins of the Popular Style: The Antecedents of Twentieth-Century Popular Music (Clarendon Paperbacks) $47.77 Analyzing popular music from a musical, rather than a sociological or political viewpoint, this book examines the nineteenth-century split between classical and popular music and surveys all styles of Western popular music to uncover the musical language uniting them....

Exploring Early Jazz: The Origins and Evolution of the New Orleans Style $20.23 One night around 1897 they say Buddy Bolden stood up in a New Orleans Dance Hall and played the first hot blues. It was not until 1917 that the Original Dixieland Jazz Band made the first jazz recording. By 1927, after becoming the popular hit music of the Jazz Age, what we now call Classic Jazz was giving way to a new type of hot music; big band Swing. This book tells the story of the hectic thi...

Jazz/ World- Origin Series $35.00 Superbly recorded, engineered and played, "Jazz/World" is a consummate production from Harvey Summers. Sublime playing by some of the best session musicians and African master drummers has led to a truly original concept sample CD that will blend seamlessly into your productions. The CD includes live played saxophones, flute, double bass licks and multis, keys, synths and a superb range of drum ki...

The Last of the Blue Devils - The Kansas City Jazz Story $26.98 Documenting a 1974 reunion of count basie joy mcshann big joe turner and others ricker creates a sense of period by adding rare performance and interview footage. Studio: Kino International Release Date: 08/14/2001 Run time: 90 minutes Director: Bruce Ricker...

Bluesland - A Portrait in American Music $16.98 With traditions that variously intersect and parallel those of jazz, the blues has likewise emerged as a uniquely American musical dialect that has powerfully influenced music from the early 20th century forward. Whether tuned to the stark individuality of country blues, with its often-harrowing, adult themes of sex, death, and violence, or keyed to the livelier cadences and more boisterous mood...

Last of the Mississippi Jukes $14.98 ...

It’s a real shame that the entertainment industry has to label things a certain way.

I am very familiar with ECM, having listened to that label for decades and enjoying Pat Metheny, Ralph Towner, Jan Garbarek, Eberhard Weber, Keith Jarrett and a host of other ‘modern’ jazz musicians who emerged in the 1970s. It is a European label (German I believe) and they were a really ‘cutting edge’ sound back in the 70s. If you were to listen to Ralph Towner’s Winter Solstice LP from the mid-70s, you would hear a lot of what may have influenced a New Wave movement.

New Age also began in the 1970s (on a parallel track) with recordings by Oregon, Mannheim Steamroller, George Winston (and the rest of the Wyndham Hill catalog). New Age then evolved and split into: (1) a minimalist movement, with lots of solo instrument recordings such as Alex deGrassi’s guitar and George Winston’s piano works, and (2) A more jazz and fusion sound with bands like Shadowfax, Acoustic Alchemy and others.

Eventually, New Age became so benign and mindless, it was labeled as ‘Elevator Music’ and pretty much dismissed by most serious musicians and listeners. However, there were some really great moments in some of Mannheim Steamroller’s works before they became so mindless and ‘cutesy’.

I do not agree that what you cited as ‘inspirational’ jazz is the basis for New Age. Coltrane’s A Love Supreme is one of the greatest jazz compositions of all time and any New Age music totally pales in comparison – not even in the same ballpark.