Modern Jazz vs. Trad Jazz

Imagine a pie. 

Now imagine you get a piece (yay!), but not 1/6th or 1/8th of the pie, but rather 1/70th of the pie. How would that piece look? Could you even remove it from the pie? Now picture taking your thin slice and trying to slice it even further, into say a dozen pieces. Could you do it? What would those tiny slices look like? Now imagine gathering all those wispy micro-slices on your plate in a sad little pile.

That’s jazz.

At a whopping 1.4% of American music consumption¹, jazz is that slice of 1/70th of the pie, and its subgenres—traditional, Afro-Cuban, modern, fusion, etc.—are those all-but insubstantial slices of slice.

1. Nielsen 2014 U.S. Music Year-End Report: http://www.nielsen.com/content/dam/corporate/us/en/public%20factsheets/Soundscan/nielsen-2014-year-end-music-report-us.pdf
 
I say all this to demonstrate the microscopic scale on which we operate when we talk about  TRADITIONAL JAZZ vs. MODERN JAZZ.

PSA Venn Diagrams

Well, it’s time again for another installment of visual aids!—this time, Venn Diagrams for the benefit of the General Public. Yes, through the exciting drama of circles that do and do not overlap, we will find the beginnings of true wisdom.


[UPDATE: a response to the ‘being a better person & musician’ diagram has now been posted at http://pwuth.blogspot.com/2015/08/better-person-better-musician-responses.html!]

Let’s start simple:

White ‘chocolate’ is not chocolate at all. It does not contain any cocoa solids. It may have cocoa butter, but then again, so do your chapstick and body lotion. NOT CHOCOLATE.

Swing Out New Hampshire 2013 Skit

AKA "The Completely True Story Behind This Year's Musicality Clinics"

Swing Out New Hampshire is a week-long swing dance event held at Camp Wicosuta each fall. Here was my contribution to the camp talent show, in which I somehow convinced the organizers and other key people involved (Mark Kapner, Gordon Au, Gordon Webster, and Mike Thibault) to mercilessly mock themselves. Thanks to them for being such good sports about it, to Josh and Cassidy for the video (see it HERE), to Kelsey for brainstorming, and to the wonderful cast:

~ FEATURING ~

AS THEMSELVES...	Mark Kapner, Mike Thibault, Gordon Webster, Gordon Au, Emily Vanston
NARRATOR...	Gordon Au
DR. LIVINGSTON...	Nathan Bugh
DOCTORS...	Walter, Cassidy Holden
HEAD MONK...	Aurora Nealand
MONKS...	Kari, Rob Adkins, Natalie D, Isabel Hagen

 *     *     *

NARRATOR: We are now proud to present our reënactment of the absolutely TRUE story behind this year's musicality clinics. The following are the COMPLETELY true events of exactly one week ago. Our first tableau is somewhere in the jungles of Africa...