By Darcy James Argue
We've heard it all before: Classical music is dead. Punk is dead. Hip hop is dead. Jazz is dead. Whatever the musical genre, you can be sure that someone somewhere is saying it's dead. Apparently, musical death is, like death in superhero comics, both ubiquitous and impermanent.
That's not to say that a marginal art form like jazz doesn't face special challenges in this brave new post-music-industry era. Online sales of classical music have been surprisingly robust, but jazz has not seen a similar spike to help compensate for free-falling CD sales and a market share that's currently hovering around two percent. EMI, home of the Blue Note Label Group, is in especially dire straits. There are countless organizations that primarily serve the interests of classical music and classical musicians. Jazz had only one such dedicated organization, the International Association for Jazz Education, which recently declared bankruptcy and disbanded. IAJE was also involved in presenting two major awards for jazz composition: the Gil Evans Fellowship and the ASCAP/IAJE Commissions. Their future is uncertain. Record fuel prices are causing groups to curtail their touring. Jazz musicians are accustomed to scrabbling, but dwindling freelance opportunities plus disappearing venues, scuttled ventures, and changing music policies have all contributed to a scene where it's not uncommon to see world-class jazz musicians fiercely competing for the privilege of playing pass-the-hat gigs.
We've heard it all before: Classical music is dead. Punk is dead. Hip hop is dead. Jazz is dead. Whatever the musical genre, you can be sure that someone somewhere is saying it's dead. Apparently, musical death is, like death in superhero comics, both ubiquitous and impermanent.
That's not to say that a marginal art form like jazz doesn't face special challenges in this brave new post-music-industry era. Online sales of classical music have been surprisingly robust, but jazz has not seen a similar spike to help compensate for free-falling CD sales and a market share that's currently hovering around two percent. EMI, home of the Blue Note Label Group, is in especially dire straits. There are countless organizations that primarily serve the interests of classical music and classical musicians. Jazz had only one such dedicated organization, the International Association for Jazz Education, which recently declared bankruptcy and disbanded. IAJE was also involved in presenting two major awards for jazz composition: the Gil Evans Fellowship and the ASCAP/IAJE Commissions. Their future is uncertain. Record fuel prices are causing groups to curtail their touring. Jazz musicians are accustomed to scrabbling, but dwindling freelance opportunities plus disappearing venues, scuttled ventures, and changing music policies have all contributed to a scene where it's not uncommon to see world-class jazz musicians fiercely competing for the privilege of playing pass-the-hat gigs.
For more information contact All About Jazz.
