Structure, Death, and Silence. A plea for Jazz
Why do people eat burgers? Why do people drink espresso, or obsessively sip chai lattes? Why does one thing shape me while another leaves me cold? What is it that touches me about notes blown into the world by strangers with their instruments? Why am I not drawn to the world of folk Schlager, why don't I dance to the beat of heavy techno bass, and why don't I linger in the silence of meditation lounge? Where is Godot, anyway? I have no answers only three songs that can't even begin to reflect or explain an entire genre.
But:
- John Coltrane - Giant Steps
https://youtu.be/KwIC6B_dvW4?is=vKU2SaN-j3XT2mMm
- Theo Croker fr. Gary Bartz, Kassa Overall -Jazz is dead
https://youtu.be/E-2yje6S8vg?is=vppKkn5XyisXr674
- Nils Wülker - Conquering The Useless
https://youtu.be/uyoh-FhAhMU?is=6ksvvmA8-kA4MLSn
These three songs, these delicate fragments, shake my entire world to its core whenever I listen to them. They explain everything to me.
The structure
With "Giant Steps" Coltrane pushes chord changes to limits that defy physics. As soon as I grasp the root note of the piece, Coltrane is already a universe away, delighting G'd with his saxophone performance that redefines chaos and structure.
The death
Theo Croker declares Jazz dead. Taking Gary Bartz and Kassa Overall by the hand, he creates it anew. He doesn't get lost in cultural snobbery or dusty backwardness. He is the honest answer to the stubborn, canned music of a capitalism spinning out of control, even if he stares me right in the face while doing it, perhaps deeply commercialised himself.
The silence
With "Conquering The Useless", Nils Wülker proves that a single tiny note on a trumpet weighs more than hours of a DJ knob-twisting at the deck. A softly breathed note, a pause in the presence of the scales keeps the noise of the world out of my head for a few minutes.
No law, no rules
My answer to my questions is the acceptance of doubt. While other genres of music often sing of an ideal world that doesn't exist, or drive forward in a rigid beat, Jazz remains cool and uncontrolled. It makes me pause while Miles Davis blowes his soul through tarnished brass. Jazz is alive. And right now, I couldn't care less about anything else.



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