Jazz Is Precise!

This pianist sounds really great. So was most of this article. The beginning, however, gave me pause.

Meticulous Jazzman of the World

The title does not bode well. What does this mean? Also, what does the qualifier “of the world” disambiguate or contribute? Now, if he was from another world, that would be something.

THE Cuban-born pianist Gonzalo Rubalcaba, who over the last 15 years or so has become one of the greatest musicians in jazz,

Huge sweeping broad generalization, but okay, I’m still with you.

is meticulous about music.

What does that mean? His music is precise? Not sloppy? Because, you know, most of those jazz musicians are sloppy, dirty men who only play in dive bars. (As we learned here.)

You can tell this by the first unaccompanied notes of “Avatar”,

I have to wait until the first unaccompanied notes to tell…this (that his music is meticulous, I think)? Or…are the first notes on the album unaccompanied? This is a bit vague, and, I propose, not meticulous.

his complexly beautiful new album.

His new album sounds complexly beautiful! Too bad I don’t know what that means.

He has an almost eerie control over his sound, as if he were playing the strings directly instead of using the keys as intermediaries.

This makes him…meticulous. Okay… Also, qualifying "eerie" with "almost" does not make it sound more meticulous. It, instead, makes it sounds less meticulous. See?

He is also meticulous about ideas.

He is also…what? Perhaps we should finish the paragraph.

He tends to classify music rather exactly,

The qualifier “rather” makes his exactness seem less meticulous. Again. Just saying.

and he talks about jazz in terms of codes and information.

I understand this. It sounds like semiotics of a sort. Semiotics, while (often) deeply cool, is about as inexact and subjective a discipline as any I’ve encountered. Meticulous?

He prepares his records — “productions,” he calls them — with conceptual rigor.

He calls his records “productions” is on the what now?

Mr. Rubalcaba has spent about a decade living in southern Florida in a quiet gated community about half-hour from Fort Lauderdale.

Is his lawn meticulous? The “quiet gated community” thing makes me imagine his meticulously trimmed lawn.

His life looks more like that of a classical-music virtuoso than a jazz musician.

Translation: he does not take lots of drugs and hang out in dives. Great. That’s just great.

He goes to the airport, tours, comes home and dives back into practice.

Jazz musicians hate to practice. And classical musicians? They totally love going to the airport. Don't even get me started on classical musicians and their love of airport-going.

The rest of the article is not bad. I was just confused by the lack of meticulousness of the opening. Mr. Rubalcaba sounds like he is fabulous.

The end.

I'll Make This Short...

because, well, I don't really care. And it's sort of off-topic. But the writing is...wow. So: here we go!


Upholding the Standards of Smooth Jazz Purists

What? Who?

Have you seen the Wikipedia entry on smooth jazz lately?

No. No, I have not. Also, your hyperlink leads to a Times article about Wikipedia, not the Wikipedia page you’re referencing. Do you find that odd? Because I do.

Probably not,

You guessed right!

but it’s a mess. The administrators have tagged almost every section with provisos: “Its neutrality is disputed”; “needs additional citations for verification”; “reads like an advertisement”; may contain “unverified claims.”

These things are true. (I went and looked. Oops.) Here is the link to the page that you should have linked. The one you mentioned in your opening sentence?

Poor smooth jazz, besieged by haters. Being righteous about what’s called traditional jazz is easy. Being righteous about smooth jazz is much more difficult. It is a commercial construct, a radio format more than a style of music. For 20 years it has appealed across race and class and gender, partly because it asks so little. It is a physical presence but an intellectual absence. It is an unverified claim.

If the “it” at the end of your paragraph is a pronoun standing in for “smooth jazz”, which is what all of the other “its” in the paragraph are doing, then you’ve just asserted that:

“Smooth jazz is an unverified claim.”

That makes…little and/or no sense. Let’s see if we can sort this out.

Poor smooth jazz, besieged by haters.

It is true that smooth jazz, being largely awful, has many detractors. I don’t know if I feel sorry for smooth jazz for this reason, but fine. You are free to feel sorry for smooth jazz. That is a strange thing to do, though. Sometimes I feel sorry for sadness. It’s so sad!

Being righteous about what’s called traditional jazz is easy.

I think I get the thrust of this idea. Sort of. “Being righteous” seems to mean something like “being a purist”. Or an advocate? Defender? Right? Maybe? Also: is it really easy? To do that well, you have to know an awful lot of the literature.

Being righteous about smooth jazz is much more difficult.

Sigh. Okay.

It is a commercial construct, a radio format more than a style of music.

Yes.

For 20 years it has appealed across race and class and gender, partly because it asks so little.

Yes. It asks so very, very little.

It is a physical presence but an intellectual absence.

I…sort of. It exists, but is not intellectually challenging. I concur.

It is an unverified claim.

Nope. I still don’t get it. That is an extremely nonsensical thing to write in the leading newspaper in the country. What is claimed? What is not verified? Your metaphor, sir, confounds me.

Oh, well. I will say that I did not know that Kenny G’s real name is “Kenny Gorelick”. Learning is fun!

Bonus: Here is a picture of Kenny Gorelick that is fun to look at!