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Opinion/Editorial
Representing the Jazz Self in Song
Vincent Stephens
Vincent Stephens has written about music for Popular Music and Popular Music & Society, and completed a Ph.D in American Studies in May 2005 from the University of Maryland, College Park.The emergent folk aesthetic in jazz exemplifies the way singers can articulate themselves using new melodies and words that reflect their aesthetic and cultural context. If the Great American Songbook represented the musical and emotional sensibilities of the pre-WWII generation what emotional and tactile imprints represent contemporary sensibilities? Pre-rock jazz singers often wrote ephemeral songs (check out Dinah Washington's "Lingering ) or added lyrics to instrumentals (Ella Fitzgerald's "Shiny Stockings ) and there are plenty of well-established writer-performers whose songs are broadly performed (e. g. Mose Allison, Blossom Dearie, Bob Dorough, Dave Frishberg) While some singers have translated rock-oriented material into jazz arrangements I see great promise in the Abbey Lincoln-inspired emergent songwriting aesthetic of Patricia Barber, Dianne Reeves and Cassandra Wilson, and folkish pupils like Norah Jones and Lizz Wright.
The romantic, escapist themes of Broadway, and the cheeky quirkiness of Allison, Frishberg, etc. is something quite apart from Lincoln's anthemic "Bird Alone, Reeves' "Endangered Species, and Barber's pointed "Whiteworld. A female songwriter overtly asserting her autonomy apart from a romantic relationship ("Bird ) or her status as an artist ("Species ) embodies decades of cultural change in compact, hummable form. Just as folk-rock expanded rock's focus from cars and courting, jazz is not immune to the emotional and social tenor of its singers. The modern language of "love in contemporary jazz songs is also a bellwether of the era especially in tone. Desire still seduces, allures and confounds but is no longer an omnipotent force—singers can be incredulous, ambivalent, or hostile without being read as "cold or sociopathic. The fact that few songs from the new jazz writers have become "hits or inspired interpretations is not inherently a mark of inferiority. Rather it might indicate the particularity of some contemporary songwriters whose work is intricate in ways that defy the logic of theater composing and other songwriting-for-hire. If rock ushered in an era of self-contained writers and performers, the folk-oriented singer-songwriters of the 60s and 70s galvanized pop songwriting with urgent political anthems and highly personal (and often narcissistic) lyrics. Generally contemporary jazz songs often have a minimalist folk feel and their writers seem less interested in writing for radio, catalyzing a revolution or opening their diary.
To use Wilson as an example her original songs often have a ruminative, media res quality as though she is processing emotions and visions unavailable in the words and music of other composers. Lest this sound turgid the sensuality of 1995's "A Little Warm Death, the sly humor of 2002's "Drunk as Cooter Brown and the hip-hop elements on 2003's Glamoured and 2006's Thunderbird speak to changes in emotional perception and modern musical technology that emblazon the contemporariness of jazz. Listeners may not immediately detect or recognize the "jazz in her imagery, attitude or textures—but they can't help but recognize her in everything she does and what could be more "jazz than that?
