If you were Alfred Lion today....

[Pharaohrock]

- Alfred Lion had an aesthetic for his time and was uncompromising in articulating this through the recordings of Blue Note.

Question is, if you were Alfred Lion today- that is, a man keenly aware of what the most happening sounds were, and not someone who merely dwelled in the comfortable environs of past styles, who would be ON YOUR LABEL??? Who would you stake both your money and posterity on for putting out the most meaningful recordings of their time? I'm not asking for who your "favorite young musicians" are or who the most promising musicians are today, I'm asking, point-blank: who, of anyone, would be likely to make records that will have the same impact 20-40 years down the road that Blue Note's 1960s records have today? Who will represent today as well as they did THEN?

[jazzypaul]

Well, that's somewhat of a loaded question. As much as it pains me to say it, I think the music that will have as much of a longstanding "hipness" and "quality" aspect to it as the Blue Note roster did in the 60's will not be jazz. Sadly enough, it WILL be hip-hop. Possibly the new-jack swing stuff that's been coming out of the R&B world. But this is a jazz forum, so Black Eyed Peas and Tha Roots are gonna have to step aside here...

If we have the ability to reach out to the "hip" factions the way that jazz did in the 60's, which is a big hypothetical, then I think this is what we'd get to work with here...

1) For the jazz-funk sector that Blue Note catered to so well in the mid-late 60's (and no matter what Scott Yanow may say, this is still important stuff...) Medeski, Martin and Wood, Soulive, The Greyboy Allstars and Rodney Jones. Especially Rodney Jones. You put Arthur Blythe in your touring band, you get my vote, no matter what. Honestly though, I could see that music having the cult appeal that Big John Patton has now, 20 years from now.

2) For the inside/outside stuff that was Blue Note's bread and butter, integrity wise, this is my forte: Turner/Rosenwinkel, Seamus Blake, Matthias Lupri, Jason Lindner, Brian Blade Fellowship, Brad Mehldau.

3) The straight up hard bop stuff, well, that's a weird one for me. Back in the day, guys like Mobley, Blakey and Silver mined that territory well. The guys mining that same territory today are simply retreads, and it sucks to listen to them.

I think the biggest problem is, when Blue Note does get a visionary group, like Hagans Animation group, it gets lost in the shuffle and they take the album out of print. My Blue Note, honestly, would be bankrupt in a month. I'd treat these guys like rock stars, lose most of my money, and have to start over with new backers every six months. A la Joel Dorn.

[jomina]

I would sign Omar Sosa. His last disc Sentir is a seemless and powerful summation of his beliefs and the various kinds of music he has been blending over the years. Music that is often reflective, often explosive and frequently both at once.
The blending of hip hop, electronica and jazz (wherever it may be found in the music) is interesting, but the little I've heard often seems stuck in a BPM and sample strightjacket (maybe I've just heard the wrong things?). So next on my list would be someone who can take the elements of modern urban African-American music and turn them inside out and upside down, rather than just pay hommage to them and pastiching Jazz.
Next I would look to Africa. There is an incredibly rich and vibrant musical culture there (well, cultures such incredible diversity can't be pigeonholed IMHO). Africa is a deep well of ideas and talent.

[Pharaohrock]

For inside/outside, I think BN has two folks who would stay on the roster, and ARE in my belief rightful heirs to the Blue Note legacy: Greg Osby and Jason Moran. Others I would want to include in an independent, non-corporatized Blue Note though are:

George Colligan
Gary Thomas
Antonio Hart
Uri Caine
Lonnie Plaxico (BN gave him one and out, one of their more spineless decisions in recent years. That band is HAPPENING.)

Geri Allen (was a BN artist, sacrificed to Verve, now unsigned.)

Steve Nelson (critically underrecorded as a leader.)
Terell Stafford
Bryan Carrott
James Hurt
Kevin Hayes (a fine pianist-composer who they had, and shoulda kept. Pianist-composers are at the heart of the BN tradition.)

=As for Steve Coleman, the cat is such a visionary he should have his own indie label, as he does.


- As far as the funky/boogaloo side of Blue Note goes, I would definitely get Larry Goldings on the label, and for guitarists, there is none more funky and with a BN-type aesthetic for the 00s than Russell Malone. They had Javon Jackson, who was hip for his kind of funk/world/pop fusion in organ-based jazz, but I think they axed him...shame.

[jazzypaul]

I've heard the Fresh Sounds stuff, and it's hit and miss.

As for hip-hop, it's been around as an "artform" for over 20 years, and cats like Rudy Ray Moore were doing it another 15 before that. As much as you may wish for it to be a trend, it's not. And when jazz players can play with the polyrhythmic craziness that Jay-Z and Eminem lay down on the filler album tracks, we'll talk. Trust me, I'm a jazz musician, and I want nothing but the best for the music. But I'm not so dumb as to wish for it at the expense of other artists.

[jazzypaul]

The whole hip-hop solely being about swearing and the belittlement of women in our society is SO played out. Yeah, it's there, and yeah, the guys that do that stuff are not looking out for the good of the artform, nor is there a sense of social responsibility there. However, how are you going to make a blanket statement about the artform as long as we have the recorded legacies of Tribe Called Quest, The Beastie Boys, Tha Roots, Public Enemy, Black Eyed Peas, Sage Francis, 3rd Base, De La Soul or even OutKast? There is music there that can be artistically satisfying as well as aesthetically satisfying, if you're willing to look for it.

Personally, the groups I like the best, that hit all of the good nerves (good samples, nice grooves) are not the groups who are doing all of the polyrhythmic gymnastics. Eminem, from an academic standpoint, has to get respect for his elastic sense of rhythm, and I will argue on his behalf on that matter till I'm blue in the face. However, rapping about killing your mom, is never cool.

[omar zamora]

Originally posted by Adam Lozo
I hear the polyrhythms in hip-hop, but don't feel that that alone makes the genre sustainable or even valid.

I don't mean to deviate the conversation, but how exactly can a genre be valid or invalid? I'm not sure what sustainable means, either. And as paul said, it's been around for a while, and as far as I can see, it's not fizzling down.

As for the subject of this thread, I don't think it's possible to have one Blue Note in this day and age. The jazz listening public is so diverse that multiple Blue Notes are necessary. That means that there is no clearly identifiable jazz sound that I relate with what's going on today. Instead, there's a whole bunch of different sounds. Some 'Blue Notes' that come to mind are Hat Hut, Eremite, Emanem, Thirsty Ear, Okka, and on the more mainstream/bop/post-bop side, there's Sharp 9, Criss Cross, Omnitone, Palmetto, etc.

[Pharaohrock]

Fresh sound can afford to take risks because they're paying nothing to get their product distributed. they have some of the worst distribution imaginable...

[Jazz]

Omar, as far as musical validity, I think it depends on where you're coming from.

I decided a long time ago that most modern popular forms of music were unsatisfactory to me. Each genre felt like alot of the same material used over and over again without much variation. SO, I spent years learning music theory, thinking that classical/composed was where it was at, until I discovered jazz (I now feel that straight ahead jazz is the music that has the most potential for freedom while still remaining a cohesive style).

So, from my perspective, any genre that ignores how music has developed over these last 400 years is not valid. Let me add that breaking any established musical tendency on purpose is NOT the same as completely ignoring (or being ignorant of the fact) that a tendency ever existed in the first place. I also don't believe that a musician must be educated in a school to be aware of a large portion of musical tendencies.

Anyway, that's how I think about it.

[jazzypaul]

I agree with that. They only send me stuff out of necessity...