Bouncing
around on the jazz programmers' email discussion list of late has been a debate
about the place of hip hop – more particularly DJs – in the world of jazz. This is one of those wonderful discussions
about genre and style that jazz nerds become very passionate about. While everyone is entitled to an opinion, of
course, not all opinions are equal – as knowledge of the topic at hand helps in
the sense that one has “earned” that opinion.
There are always going to be listeners – and even programmers – who don’t
listen with big ears and an open mind, and we take their opinions for what they’re
worth. For me, if we’re talking about
hip hop and DJs, if you don’t know Kool Herc from Grand Mixer DXT from Jam
Master Jay from Q-Bert from Cut Chemist, you might want to step to the front of
the room and pay close attention.
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Looking
to the roots of jazz – the spiritual, the work song, the blues – and to jazz
itself, one finds that the music developed in a space apart from, but also
within, a white mainstream culture that had dispossessed blacks of most of
their original materials for making music.
In that dispossessed state, blacks made the best of what was around and
combined that with what could be remembered of the old ways – and out of that
dynamic came something new and original, popular musical forms that dominated
the sounds of the 20th century.
Knowing
the roots of hip hop – rhythm and blues’ roundabout voyage through the dance
halls and sound systems of Jamaica, spoken word poetry from The Last Poets and
others, and the synthesis found in the works of James Brown, Sly and the Family
Stone, Marvin Gaye, and, above all, Gil Scott-Heron – knowing those roots is
only part of the story. Like blues and
jazz, hip-hop was forged in a space apart from, but also within, a
not-so-white-as-before but still mainstream culture. Hip-hop comes from a particular time and
particular places – the decaying urban environments of the late 60s and 70s.
And while I have my own ideas about the causes for the struggles of city
neighborhoods – the problem is systemic and not, in my view, to be blamed on
the victims of the system – hip-hop does come from the city streets. Why are DJing and MCing always so closely
linked to break dancing and graffiti – the so-called Four Pillars of Hip Hop? Because they all come from city neighborhoods.
Those who don’t know these origins of the Four Pillars neglect the Fifth Pillar
of Hip Hop – Knowledge.
With
the incorporation of hip hop styles into the mainstream – for better and for
worse – many people develop a distorted picture of the genre. The superficiality and unsophisticated nature
of what is called hip hop in the mainstream reminds me of how elements of jazz
were appropriated into the mainstream over the years – swing music, crooners of
the Great American Songbook, and smooth jazz.
I’m not saying that Frank Sinatra’s “The Lady is a Tramp” is bad, but it might not be jazz. And Jay-Z’s “Hard Knock Life (Ghetto Anthem)”
might not be bad, either – but it also might not be hip hop. Not really.
There’s nothing wrong with pop, everyone.
So what
do the unversed need to know? The work
of the DJ within hip hop is much more than what some might assume, that is, the
DJ often does much more than spin records.
The term turntablism (coined
by DJ Babu) is more apt to describe the
deep technical knowledge and significant skills needed to manipulate sound by
touching and moving records, the stylus, and mixer. If you’ve actually had a chance to observe
turntable artists at work in a live setting, you’ll likely come away
understanding why it’s not a stretch to think of such artists as true
musicians. They play the equipment, albeit
in a very different manner than one might play the trumpet or piano.
To make
an argument that two turntables, a mixer, and a crate of vinyl aren’t an
instrument is too narrow. The degree to
which turntablists manipulate recordings to make original sounds in original
combinations in live performances is proof enough to me of the art. They are musicians. Are we going to say that only certain
technologies produce “jazz sounds?” Instrumentation? If jazz can incorporate Rufus Harley’s
bagpipes, Bela Fleck’s banjo, and a whole host of synthesizers and electronic
enhancements, then why exclude the tools of the DJ?
A quick
run through some recent documentaries might be useful for those still on the
fence. Scratch is a good
primer, as is Rob Swift’s As The Tables Turn. If you want to follow a group of MC’s
who have a clear sense of craft and purpose, Michael Rappaport’s documentary of
A Tribe Called Quest, Beats, Rhymes, and Life is excellent. And if you’d like a
clearer idea of the technical skill required to DJ, you can read On The Record ,
or consider this old press release from Berklee College of Music.
Even if
the best turntablists are musicians, the question remains as to whether they
are jazz musicians. And we stumble upon the problem of defining
jazz. If you make a strict historical
definition of jazz, as, say, Stanley Crouch does in “The Negro Aesthetic of
Jazz,” you find a music art that has “4/4 swing, blues, the romantic to
meditative ballad, and Afro-Hispanic rhythm as core aesthetic elements” That excludes not only hip hop, but whole
catalogs of musical styles that are often played on serious jazz stations.
But if
we take a broader, postmodern definition of jazz, as even Crouch might in “Jazz
Criticism and Its Effect on the Art Form,” we might consider that jazz contains
the element of improvisation and, to use the phrase, “a sense of infinite
plasticity.” As he puts it, “jazz is
primarily a performance art that takes place in an ensemble context of
collective improvisation.” Now, that’s a
definition that works for me. Actually,
they both work for me – the strictly historical and broad postmodern
notions. Why can’t it be both?
I think, in many ways, the argument is ended on the musicians' side of things. The
fact is that many jazz artists of DJs into their work – Herbie Hancock,
Cassandra Wilson, Wallace Roney, Robert Glasper, Louis Durra, Medeski Martin
& Wood, to name some high profile ones.
And, of course, there are many DJs who effectively use jazz materials in
their performances – yes, even live and improvised: DJ Logic, Rob Swift, DJ Shadow and Cut Chemist. Not all turntable artists play jazz, but a broadly defined form of jazz is played by turntable artists.
Seems a
lot like jazz to me. What do you think?
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