Suzanne Vega

[Niko]

I don't find Vega's presence on Blue Note to be that alarming. It's not like they had a slot open, and she took it over some jazz musician. It is a business and they need to make money. She's artsy, quirky, and bends some ears. hmmm

i don't find it alarming either; it's not long ago that I bought a Suzanne Vega record, I don't put it on that frequently, nevertheless it's not that I wouldn't wish her a good record deal... But: somehow to me it feels wrong to change the course of Blue Note records that much: running Blue Note records means working in the name of Alfred Lion and Francis Wolff - don't know much about their personal tastes in music but judging from the records they put out I don't believe they would be that happy with some of what's being published in their names these days... when those US3 Cantaloop etc things came out, well, I didn't like them, still I think, there was some reason that it said Blue Note on them... this may be real unimportant in the light of a dying music industry (this is the opinion of someone who doesn't make a living in the music business) but I think they could publish Norah Jones, Suzanne Vega, Keren Ann... under some other label than Blue Note...

[Simon Weil]

Blue Note's diversification goes on and on...

From Reuters/Billboard:

SUZANNE VEGA SIGNS WITH BLUE NOTE

....Vega is best known for her left-field 1987 hit "Luka," which reached No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart. ...

I think "diversification" and "left-field" are the two key terms here. Blue Note is trying to stay afloat by "diversifying" by introducing artists that can make money, yet are still distinctive (read "left-field") in the way Jazz ain't. That is Jazz is distinctive but doesn't make money.

What we need is a form of Jazz that reconnects it with its audience.

Simon Weil

Edited June 9, 2006 by Simon Weil

[paul secor]

Suzanne Vega is a not uninteresting talent.

Still, Suzanne Vega is a not uninteresting talent.

I don't detect any enthusiasm behind those sentences. Perhaps none was intended.

[milestones20]

Who is on their active roster these days? Here are my guesses:

Jackie Allen

Anita Baker

Patricia Barber

Terence Blanchard

Robert Glasper

Stefon Harris

Andrew Hill

Dr. John

Norah Jones

Keren Ann

Amos Lee

Joe Lovano

Wynton Marsalis

Pat Martino

Marissa Monte

Jason Moran

Greg Osby

Dianne Reeves

Gonzalo Rubalcaba

Suzanne Vega

Cassandra Wilson

Wood Brothers

According to the most recent issue of Downbeat, Greg Osby's contract was not renewed this year.

[Aggie87]

According to the most recent issue of Downbeat, Greg Osby's contract was not renewed this year.

If so, that's very sad to hear. Roughly half the roster lineup is what I'd consider *not jazz*. Dumping Osby further degrades the ratio.

I'm wondering whether they still have Stefon Harris, Terence Blanchard, and Jason Moran on their roster too.

[JSngry]

Suzanne Vega is a not uninteresting talent.

Still, Suzanne Vega is a not uninteresting talent.

I don't detect any enthusiasm behind those sentences. Perhaps none was intended.

No enthusiasm, but no disgust either.

She does what she does more interestingly than the bulk of her peers, and it's not without some musical interest in/on those terms.

Are there other people I'd rather hear, especially on BN? Sure. But does her signing to the label make me cringe the way that the signing of, say, Michelle Shocked would? No way.

Really, I think we all better get used to this type thing. The market for "real jazz" is not enough for a corporate label to get by on, even when all the (imo) "faux real jazz" and the market for it is factored in. So a corporate jazz label is going to have to come up with some kind of angle to sell product, and if that angle is "interesting alternative pop made by and for an over-35-ish audience", hey - that's what they gotta do.

It's funny, really, how the signings at BN parallel the decline and eventual elimination of "real jazz" at the local NPR station about 20 years ago. Over the space of a few years, that station went from having jazz 6 nights a week to having the music programming become "eclectic" (which meant more and more artists like Vega, The Neville Brothers, Laurie Anderson, etc. and less and less jazz of any sort). Listenership increased for a while, but eventually the staion went to a predominately news/talk format. When BN starts releasing CDs of Diane Rehm, then I'll know it's really all over.

Until then, hey - the number of people making really interesting "jazz of the now" is depressingly small anyway (and often enough isn't even considered jazz by the Jazz Police). Keep the reissues coming for those of us who still want/need to hear the stuff played the way it the way it was meant to be played, let the indies give us the worthy stuff of the new, and let the corpolabels give us interesting (enough) pop music with at least some tangental relation to jazz, either in musical influence or attitudinal sympathy. I'd rather hear a good, interesting pop record that challenges the conventions of its genre than a tired jazz retread that seeks comfort in same any day of the week.

Especially Monday!

Edited June 9, 2006 by JSngry

[ghost of miles]

Nothing against Norah Jones--in fact, my wife & I have both of her CDs. And I haven't heard the particulars of the Osby non-renewal yet. BUT--hasn't the argument been that the Norahs will subsidize the Osbys? It's a slippery slope, folks; at some point, the suits somewhere say, "Why bother subsidizing anybody? We're in this to make money." Now sure, Blue Note's a company out to make a profit like any either, but part of their appeal is supposed to be that they take other, more aesthetic-oriented matters into consideration.

Basically, I don't buy the "Norah will subsidize the jazz acts" line anymore. I think that's a transitional mentality, and that we may be seeing the beginning of the end of Blue Note as a label that produces any new/modern jazz. Hope I'm wrong... and hey, nothing against Suzanne Vega either; as I said, I agree with Jim's assessment. But if BN is adding singer/songwriters and dropping Greg Osbys, what else can it be signifying but a declining interest in maintaining a roster that's either all or primarily jazz?

Bound to happen, I guess--Blue Note has been the last refuge for major-label jazz.

[andybleaden]

Her website says that "Tom's Diner" has been remixed 30 times. Maybe we will finally get a big band version

I thought it at least warrents the RVG treatment

Actually I always liked Suzanne Vega when I was about 18-19 way back when she did Small Blue Thing and Solitude Standing

I also liked Edie Brickhall ( or however it is spelt) AND never fell out with my Norah Jones cds which I have to say I always think paid suits enough cash to help Blue Note sneak out a few nicities like the Andrew Hill reissues etc....even if it ain't true....

I mean ...they had Van the Man , before that they had Marlena Shaw after Dodo Greene and other singers....

At least she can sing....

Shame they missed Ian Dury in my opinion

[milestones20]

A sidenote in response to the whole "jazz-to-pop ratio" on this thread: Downbeat also said that Jacky Terrasson will be coming out with a solo record on Blue Note soon, so there's one more for the jazz side.

[fasstrack]

Wow. Not one person commented on my points (page 1 of this discussion). Does that mean no one thinks I made any sense or that it was so off-point as to be out to lunch, or can you smell halitosis over the Web?

Edited June 10, 2006 by fasstrack

[CJ Shearn]

::bored voice:: I am standing on the corner

[JSngry]

What we need is a form of Jazz that reconnects it with its audience.

Which audience?

The audience who's only/mostly interested in reissues and/or retreads? I'd say that that audience is pretty much already connected. It's a small one, but hell, what do you expect?

The audience who wants to hear challenging new music that doesn't replicate the old? There's an audience for that, even if it is smallish and fragmented, but everytime you call most of that music "jazz", cries of righteous indignation are heard across the Land Of The Guardians.

The audience who wants to hear entertaining instrumental music that's not too unfamiliar/complicated/confrontational? That type of jazz is already pretty well connected with its audience, be it Smooth or Jam or whatever.

The audience who wants jazz to serve in the role of Official American Cultural Triumph? Again, connected. Lincoln Center's doing good business.

Jazz as we've known and loved it is pretty much dead as a vibrant musical form of today. Evolution works. But jazz as a mindset/spiritual vibe will never die. Hell, it existed before jazz as a musical form ever did, and it lives on today.

It's the jazz audience that needs to reconnect with today, not jazz music with its audience. I could someday maybe even be persuaded under the right circumstances to say that it's the audience that's killing the music, not the other way around.

Do we want our children to know and appreciate the great musical and spiritual legacy of jazz? Damn straight we do. But what do we want them to do with that knowledge and appreciation? Regurgitate it in perpetuity, or do something of their own with it? We say that we want the latter, but then too often recoil in horror when the results aren't comfortably similar to what's gone before.

Bodies dying is natural and healthy. Spirits dying isn't.

[jazzbo]

Jim, you've distilled that down to fit in a nutshell! Kudos!

[Simon Weil]

What we need is a form of Jazz that reconnects it with its audience.

Which audience?

The audience who's only/mostly interested in reissues and/or retreads? I'd say that that audience is pretty much already connected. It's a small one, but hell, what do you expect?

The audience who wants to hear challenging new music that doesn't replicate the old? There's an audience for that, even if it is smallish and fragmented, but everytime you call most of that music "jazz", cries of righteous indignation are heard across the Land Of The Guardians.

The audience who wants to hear entertaining instrumental music that's not too unfamiliar/complicated/confrontational? That type of jazz is already pretty well connected with its audience, be it Smooth or Jam or whatever.

The audience who wants jazz to serve in the role of Official American Cultural Triumph? Again, connected. Lincoln Center's doing good business.

Jazz as we've known and loved it is pretty much dead as a vibrant musical form of today. Evolution works. But jazz as a mindset/spiritual vibe will never die. Hell, it existed before jazz as a musical form ever did, and it lives on today.

It's the jazz audience that needs to reconnect with today, not jazz music with its audience. I could someday maybe even be persuaded under the right circumstances to say that it's the audience that's killing the music, not the other way around.

Do we want our children to know and appreciate the great musical and spiritual legacy of jazz? Damn straight we do. But what do we want them to do with that knowledge and appreciation? Regurgitate it in perpetuity, or do something of their own with it? We say that we want the latter, but then too often recoil in horror when the results aren't comfortably similar to what's gone before.

Bodies dying is natural and healthy. Spirits dying isn't.

Well, actually I meant something quite simple.

I intuit that there are enough people out there who would connect up with Jazz if we offered it to them in the right way to make a renewed audience. I have RSI and I go to a massage lady who normally plays New Age while she does her stuff. One day I was going on about Albert Ayler and she suddenly said bring some in. So I did, thinking , well she can take it off after ten seconds. Except she didn't, she listened to the whole thing, CD2 of Live in Greenwich Village. She loved the stuff, was going on about how it expressed life and was full of pent up emotion -and ended up by dancing around to it. And this is from someone who would normally be playing New Age, which is pretty much as far as you can get from Ayler. So...

For a long time (ca 5 years) I've intuited that this stuff, the intense emotionally charged, life-derived music that Ayler exemplifies is just what this repressed, oppressed age needs. Only, we in Jazz are so bloody scared of being called primitivists if we vote for it, that no-one (or barely anyone) will try and play it/market it to the wider audience.

Well, yes, one swallow doesn't make a summer, but that's still what I think.

Let's have some life.

Simon Weil

[Brownian Motion]

I don't know Vega or her music, but I find it unsurprising that she doesn't correspond in the least to the aesthetic vision of Lion and Wolff, any more than books published today under the name of Alfred A. Knopf, who died in 1982, correspond to his aesthetic vision.

I don't believe the era of the individual entrepreneur-visionary, in music or in other creative spheres like publishing, is over, but I do believe that expecting Corporate Blue Note to promote jazz musicians and jazz rather than adult pop music--which after all is where the $$ is--is wishful thinking.

[Niko]

I don't believe the era of the individual entrepreneur-visionary, in music or in other creative spheres like publishing, is over, but I do believe that expecting Corporate Blue Note to promote jazz musicians and jazz rather than adult pop music--which after all is where the $$ is--is wishful thinking.

how many Suzanne Vega / Norah Jones fans really care about the Blue Note label on their Vega/Jones discs? Would it really cost that much $$ to write green note on it and a little square or octogon...

[RonF]

Blue Note isn't the only label rearranging furniture. Over the past year, Concord has signed Rita Coolidge, Debbie Boone and Michael Bolton.

[montg]

Jazz as we've known and loved it is pretty much dead as a vibrant musical form of today. Evolution works. But jazz as a mindset/spiritual vibe will never die. Hell, it existed before jazz as a musical form ever did, and it lives on today.

Geez that's depressing. Doesn't mean it isn't true, but it's depressing nonetheless.

Was jazz really vibrant/relevant to people after the 30s? There was the populist moment of glory in the swing era, but after that....? How many records did Sonny Rollins sell in the 50s compared to say Patti Page or Dion or whatever. Jazz is always going to appeal to maybe 3-5% of listeners and for us--that small percentage-- it still maintains its vibrancy. I mean, I'm on the edge of my seat these days when I listen to Kenny Garrett. And someday Kenny Garrett will be in the canon and our grandkids will be collecting Mosaic selects of him.

The problem with Blue Note and all the other megalabels is that 3-5% ain't enough anymore. Quality acoustic jazz is somewhat profitible over time but that's too modest for the corporate mentality.

[JSngry]

Was jazz really vibrant/relevant to people after the 30s? There was the populist moment of glory in the swing era, but after that....? How many records did Sonny Rollins sell in the 50s compared to say Patti Page or Dion or whatever. Jazz is always going to appeal to maybe 3-5% of listeners...

It's been my experience that jazz had a larger following in the "blue-collar" African-American community then than it does today. Ammons, Stitt, Jimmy Smith, Blakey, Silver, a.o., these were all artists who definitelyhad an appeal beyond the "hardcore jazz fan". Not syaing that it was a broad appeal, but it certainly was more of one then than analaogus artists are today. Still might have been a "niche", but yes, I do believe that the niche was bigger then than it is today. Witness the steady decline of the number of jazz clubs and commercial stations airing jazz.

Another thing is this - the audience and the music have both changed. The aforementioned "blue-collar" African-Americans are more likely to go for Smooth Jazz today. It's more relevant to them. The older forms of "straiaght-ahead", "modern" jazz are more likely to appeal to a (mostly) white, middle-aged audience, many of whom have only relatively recently discovered the music. The more "avant-garde" styles (including those that incorporate electonic(s)(a) are going to have a limited audience, if for no other reason than even pop music which stretches boudaries is a minority taste these days.

And along with this, outside of the Smmoth & Jam scenes, how many jazz musicians really see it as a part of their mission/function/whatever to attempt to "relate" to anaudience beyond what they know already exists? Sure, everybody wants a piece of the pie, but how many people who consider theselves "serious" jazz musicians are contemplating that maybe instead of getting a bigger piece of the pie, they need to be trying to make that pie bigger by adding some different ingredients (not all of them musical, btw)? You do that, and you're in risk of losing your "jazz cred" among the powers-that-be.

Either that, or the other powers-that-be get hold of you and don't turn you loose until you have lost said cred. So we end up with musicians who really don't know how to relax and just put it out there for the people in a genuine way, and we end up with audiences who aren't too much interested in hearing what the musicians are putting out there because they don't see any need to. And honestly, quite often I can see thier point. "Relevancy" to today's "average person" is often at best marginal.

Which is not to say that it's the musicians' fault that there are so many people who don't get it, don't want to get it, and don't even want to want to get it. But ask yourself this - in 2006, what is the overriding compunction of a 26 year old of average or above intelligence to listen to, say, Hank Mobley, other than to feed an appreciation of fine music? Not much, really.

Now, you take the same 26 year old of average or above intelligence in 1956, and he's got a helluva lot more reason to be checking out Hank. That shit was hip in several time-specific ways then that it's not now. It's still hip, but not for all of the same reasons, and not all of the same types of hip. Times have changed, and for better or worse, there ain't a damn thing nobody can do about that.

So, what's hip today for people today who are "tuned-in", but who are not Pavlovian chasers of the latest media-fabricated "stars"? Well, lots of things, but how many jazz musicians would make the list? More importantly, how many jazz musicians would scoff at anything/everything that's on that list? For the few remaining Old Masters, that's really not that much of a concern. But for everybody else...

Of course, hipness in and of itself is nowhere near being the be-all & end-all of ultimate worth (and no, I'm not going to try and define what that is ). But hipness does play to relevancy, of ultimate meaning to the world that anything exists in, and on that count, a lot, a helluva lot, of today's jazz falls woefully short.

Didn't used to be that way.

[JSngry]

Quality acoustic jazz is somewhat profitible over time but that's too modest for the corporate mentality.

Well, yes and no. I think it depends on how much buzz/mystique/whatever builds up around any given artist over time. And for that to happen over time, there had to be something at least "above average" happening in the first place, something that will make people in the future curious about that artist at that time at that place. And their curiosity will need to be rewarded with either real substance or a kind of sense that the artist was somehow "different". Or "relevant". And once you get too farremoved from the original time, somebody almost always has to create/sustain the "image", because without it, who's really going to care other than a handful of geeks like us?

Old-school BN, Verve, OJC, etc. yeah, that rewards. Classic pre-bop, yeah, that too. Because there was some different, there was some relevant. But 20-30 years from now, if I listen to a Harper Brothers, am I going to get the same reward? That'll take some serious myth-making!

Otoh, I agree completely that the corporate mentality is no longer interested in having any size piece of a small pie, especially one that takes time to come out of the oven. It's a microwave economy, not a crockpot one.

[montg]

how many jazz musicians really see it as a part of their mission/function/whatever to attempt to "relate" to anaudience beyond what they know already exists

Interesting points. It seems like in the past jazz related to big questions--questions about race, democracy, freedom, art....I mean even the State Department in the 50s thought that jazz related to these deep American values. I agree the relevancy of jazz to these big questions seems to have diminished, and so the opportunity to relate to a larger audience is also diminshed.

[david weiss]

Lots of good points here and maybe when I have some real time, I'll try to address some of them individually if you care. There seems to be a lot of different things happening now in the jazz world. Certainly there is the push to institutionalize it, treat it like classical music, make it about performing classic repertoire a la Jazz at Lincoln Center and that seems to be working. People are dressing up to see Ellington performed for the millionth time but what's wrong with that, you see Beethoven's 9th performed a million times why not Ellington and Armstrong? Perhaps the problem is that it's too soon? Or is the problem that Jazz at Lincoln Center is becoming the face of Jazz for many (more so for the uninitiated of course) and if this repertoire stuff is becoming the face of jazz, what of the new music that is happening out there. How much talk is there of new classical material, for example. Is this leading jazz down the same road? A concern certainly. But there are young jazz artists that the youth seem to flock to (and just not music students), Kurt Rosenwinkle, Brian Blade and Chris Potter to name a few have huge followings and young too. What they play is some semblance of jazz so there is a future there and what can you say about most of the guys I mentioned? They don't wear there influences on their sleeves so it doesn't sound like some rehash of the same old, same old. JSngry is right, twenty years from now (or actually just ten as ten years have gone by already) I don't think we are going to be listening to Harper Brothers records as the creative voice of that generation but perhaps we will listen to Ralph Peterson's V or even Wynton's Black Codes From the Underground or Rodney Kendrick's Dance World Dance or a few others that don't come to mind at this particular moment. There were some very good records being made the last 20 years that will stand the test of time and be of some importance in the overall history of this music. I just hope time will sift these out over the years just like every other classic record rose to the top over the years (remember Speak No Evil got a ho hum 3 star review in DownBeat when it came out).

Now, Blue Note, yes signing Suzanne Vega should make some eyes roll to the back of our collective heads but yes, Blue Note is now part of a huge corporation so if you succeed with Norah Jones, they are going to want more of those. Who knows how this is all going to turn out and if Anita Baker, Al Green, Dr. John or any of them make a splash and make them the money they are expected to make. If they don't, then what? However, in the overall scope of things and with all that's going on in the business today, it's remarkable that Blue Note is still going strong. They are the only major label left that is still recording new acoustic jazz with very few exceptions and for this alone, they should be applauded. As far as I'm concerned they can sign all the Suzanne Vega's they want as long as they keep the re-issues coming and make a sincere effort to find the best jazz acts out there and sign them as well. One new signing in five years (Glasper) is a pretty sad track record perhaps but hopefully they are just being cautious. There are a few other emerging artists that they should perhaps have taken the plunge on in the last few years (and five to ten years ago would have) but no clear cut no-brainers. Besides, as I've mentioned elsewhere, they did sign the Charles Tolliver Big Band so that makes them the smartest label in the world at the moment to me.

[JSngry]

Rodney Kendrick's Dance World Dance

Now that was a good record!

Is Rodney still in France? He's a cat I felt was just starting to get into something really exciting when he booked.

[david weiss]

Rodney Kendrick's Dance World Dance

Now that was a good record!

Is Rodney still in France? He's a cat I felt was just starting to get into something really exciting when he booked.

Rodney never lived in France, just recorded for the French wing of Polygram. He fell off the scene for many reasons but in reality he never really fell off the scene completely. I know he just recorded again, for an independant label and I've done a few gigs with him over the last couple of years, one with his wife, Rhonda Ross, a vocalist like her mother and another with Rodney last summer in Brooklyn. It was an OK gig and Rodney still plays great but lets just say it wasn't Dance World Dance

[felser]

Suzanne Vega is a not uninteresting talent.

Still, Suzanne Vega is a not uninteresting talent.

I don't detect any enthusiasm behind those sentences. Perhaps none was intended.

No enthusiasm, but no disgust either.

She does what she does more interestingly than the bulk of her peers, and it's not without some musical interest in/on those terms.

Are there other people I'd rather hear, especially on BN? Sure. But does her signing to the label make me cringe the way that the signing of, say, Michelle Shocked would? No way.

Fascinating string! No huge insights to add, but just a couple of thoughts (or statistics). I own all of Suzanne Vega's regular CD and DVD releases, and find her fascinating. I own all of Michelle Shocked's regular CD releases, and find her riveting, so not sure why the shot at her (btw, I have huge respect for JSngry). She is a true original (as is Vega), and is "worthy" of a Blue Note slot (though it won't happen after her Mercury experience, and she would never sell enough to have it appeal to the label). I have had many Greg Osby and Jacky Terrason CD's run through my hands over the years, have dutifully listened to every one of them, and have kept none. Don't "get" either of them. And I'm a "jazz" guy through and through,have thousands of jazz CD's. I'd rather see Blue Note signing top-flight singers (Van Morrison, Anita Baker, Vega) than running less-compelling "jazz" talents at us. And, to dispel the myth a little, some of the roots of the break from the purity of the jazz on Blue Note run back to the Alfred Lion days. Remember how, after the success of "The Sidewinder", Blue Note musicians were often told to come up with one tune of that ilk on their albums? And how that tune often ended up being the title tune? You'd get these albums with five masterpieces and one "Son of Sidewinder" from these brilliant musicians.