Moyer Needs Jazz Clothes

Moyer needs Jazz Clothes 

               After reading Justin Moyer's article "All that Jazz isn't all that Great",I am truly appalled by some of his claims. Moyer must have a very narrow view of what jazz is. Some of what he is saying is even a slap to the face to a lot of today's current artists like George Benson, Esperanza Spalding,Trombone Shorty, Big Freeda, and Victor Wooten. Take Moyer's claim "Jazz Stopped evolving". I'm pretty sure an artist like Victor Wooter is constantly pushing the envelope of what is possible not only in jazz but music itself,evolving it. Moyer even contradicts him self in a way by saying you can't compare Luis Armstrong to John Zorn. I agree but the reason you can't compare the two is because jazz has evolved, and will continue to do so. I can't compare Charles Mingus to Thundercat, Wayne Shorter to Kenny G, or Miles Davis to Jelly Roll Morton for that matter. The genre has evolved too much over time to compare.

                      Then there is Moyer's claim "jazz takes great songs and abandons the lyrics that made them great" that might be the case for a few jazz songs but thats not what jazz is all about and not all jazz artists do this. Big Freedia certainly has plenty to say on her songs with lyrics like “Slap the wall, shake it like a dog. Slap the floor, make your booty go”. Once again i believe Moyer’s claim to be invalid due to his narrow opinion of what jazz is. Yes, I know Moyer uses jazz giant Wynton Marsalis’s famous line “Often, What is represented as jazz isn’t jazz at all” but I dare Moyer or Marsalis to look an artist like Esperanza Spalding (who has a B.M. from Berklee, the first jazz artist to win a grammy for best new artist, and hand picked by president Obama to play he Nobel Peace prize concert) in the face and tell her she is not jazz.

What I don’t think Moyer gets about jazz the most is it’s a lot like punk rock to me. It’s more of an attitude then a definition of the music. To me jazz is the attitude to push what music is and what it can do. You cant just talk the talk though, you gotta have chops too. No jazz musician wants to be the Sid Vicious of jazz. Attitude and chops thats what jazz is to me.

works cited

Moyer Justin “All that jazz isn’t all that Great”

The Washington Post Original Publish August 8th 2014