The proverbial "is jazz dying?" story

[Dr. Rat]

This has been a fascinating discussion. Randy, I'm not trying to single anyone out. You don't wear a baseball cap all the time, only once in a while. And who gives a crap what I think, anyway? I'm just some nutty organist!

Are artists valorized in this society? Depends on what you call an artist. The word is thrown around so much it has lost all meaning. Is Britney Spears an artist? The media would have you believe she is. In my mind she's entertainment, not an artist. Chuck Close is an artist. Jason Moran is an artist. Mia Lynn is an artist. Are they valorized? Not enough, imho.

For my purposes here, Brittany is NOT an artist. She's just famous, and famous is a whole other category of valorization.

But, someone like Jason Moran, he works.

The fact that he doesn't get quite the sort of props we might want to see him get as an artist is a function of how important the category is. Kinda like the messiah. Most everybody thinks the messiah is really important. They revere him in anticipation of his appearance. He will save us all.

But anytime someone comes along and says "I'm the messiah" we stone him to death.

It's like that with living artists. Artist is a really imporant category, but we look askance at people who claim to be one. They might be false artists. They're trying to rise above their stations. They're frauds! They just aren't all that good.

So living artists don't ofetn tend to get all the respect they might otherwise get, but certainly being Jason Moran gets you a lot more mileage that being a steam pipe fitter. And once he's been dead a while, the hagiography can start.

--eric