By Nils Jacobson
3. Bringing Jazz Back Into Context: Folk Music
AAJ: It's hard for people in this country to support themselves from jazz. Only about 3% of record sales are jazz, and most of that is made up by a small number of records. So there's not much left for the rest...
ZN: It's amazing that it's that way, because jazz for me is the most contemporary music that addresses the issues of the present day. The present day issues with the music that is always around and moved and accepted and dealt with... but again, we leave that up to the record companies and the marketers. It's their decision. But I believe jazz is the same as other forms, such as Western classical forms are received. It will occupy the position that it ought to occupy.
AAJ: It sounds like South Africa has adopted jazz in various hybrid forms that are popular, whereas in this country it tends to stay separate. It's something special, it's something different.
ZN: Something will happen in the near future. I think this progress between South Africa and the US will bear some results in the near future. And that will come out of collaborations with the musicians over there and here. I feel that coming. We have successfully collaborated in Europe, but I think it's changing now, it's going to the US. I work on this movement. I also believe that we can add value to jazz. The level of technique and other assets within jazz that have been established in the US are going to have to move our music forward.
This interaction is necessary in the 21st century now--to redefine the art form and bring it back to its context. It becomes the music of the people again! At some point it has really gone out to another domain, where it addresses an intellectual aspect. So it needs to be brought back now into the domain where the folks can enjoy it. This music is supposed to be that. All music is folk music! [laughs] We have to become folk music once again, in order to move forward. Yeah.
It can as well become a serious business now, with the recording industry booming. That has always been there from the very beginning of it. And now with the academic institutions and all the other support systems in place, it should really move. We shouldn't be complaining. Especially now within the context of globalization. I read a certain article... why is it that European musicians are not looking to American jazz for inspiration, and the whole attention there has been paid to so-called "world music"? You know, what music is "world music"? We're all operating within this world! So I think the answer for that is to stay close to the practitioners in the US and work on the music. So that again the music can have all of those elements that moved the people in the beginning. Yeah. And the closer it stays to the folk, the more expressive it remains.
AAJ: How has the music changed since 1994 and the decolonization of South Africa (to use your phrase)? Did it change freedom to make music or listen to music?
ZN: Generally, yes. What is happening now is people are exposed to a lot of resources. Let's take for instance a new genre of music which is an equivalent of hip-hop in the States--it's called kwaito here. Younger musicians are able to be signed by record companies in no time and make success out of it. They have their own labels and get rich. I applaud that, you know, it's empowerment. People are getting empowered.
On the other hand, creative music is suffering, because of this new dispensation that people are "free." I think people have to look for real freedom--the one that is not going to be given to them. And that's where the challenge comes. Because again... acquisition of things, amassing wealth, information can also cause stagnation based on complacency. So that hand up for people to discover themselves as a people is now being overwhelmed by what people can get--which is available already.
And I think the same thing in the States, too, you know. People before used to really play in such a deep way that you could feel that they wanted to realize themselves as people. But also now that most of the music is coming out of music schools, there isn't that edge to it. I think we're going to see that in South Africa. Already we are seeing it. There's not many of us who are practicing in this genre. What you tend to see at the so-called jazz festivals is a mixture of everything. So there isn't a specific jazz movement, and I think that can come about again by this interaction with the musicians there [in the States]. There are still great figures there. By just coming out here and do things, we'll restore that. That's necessary.
AAJ: So the changes are not necessarily positive for the music that you love and support.
ZN: Spiritually speaking, not just about the music, as I said... that goes across as effects on language. As well as now people are trading. People are busy. You know, translations are made. And English is the dominant language. Even at schools, people don't think there is a great need to keep up indigenous languages. The radio stations, also, if you listen to the DJs, how they speak... people are losing a lot of things because of this.
On to Part 4-7...
