What makes a jazz singer?

[gmonahan]

I've enjoyed reading this thread. I wonder if one can differentiate between a jazz singer and a "jazzy" singer. Frank could swing--and does on that cool version of "Serenade in Blue," but if you then listen to Stan Getz's version of the same song from his Cool Sounds record, you see how a real jazz artist does it. As much as I love Sinatra (and I *really* love Sinatra's music), I've never been able to see him as a jazz singer, per se. I think improvisation really is the soul of jazz, and while Frank occasionally embellished a song--especially singing live--he didn't improvise much.

[Rabshakeh]

I recently came across this interesting snippet from an interview with British husband and wife Johnny Dankworth and Cleo Laine:

"The pair will bicker good-humouredly about the minutiae of their biographies. When I suggest that their role in British jazz goes way beyond that of their contemporaries, Cleo immediately says: "John more than me really. Anybody that plays an instrument, and writes music, is much more historically important." "On the contrary, John interrupts, "vocalists draw bigger crowds." "That's got nothing to do with the evolution of a music," Cleo responds, "unless they're iconic figures." "So, strike off Ella Fitzgerald and Billie Holiday and the rest from American jazz history," John replies. "You can't win like that." "All right, dear, I concede, Cleo responds unconvincingly. "You're more important than you think, that's what it amounts to, darling," says John, now turned peacemaker" (Jazz UK, 2008e, interview by Heining).

I thought it was interesting in the light of the above discussion. What I make of it is that Cleo Laine did not really see jazz vocalists as part of the jazz tradition: more a non-jazz accretion from Jazz's days as pop music who continued to be useful to the music from a commercial perspective only. Essentially, the vocalists who sing in a jazz setting (save for a very limited handful who have adapted what they do to jazz) are essentially *doing* pop or show tune style singing over jazz backing.

It is a provocative view with which I do not agree at all.

But it interested me because, if adopted, it would explain the difficulty in categorising jazz vocalists in any coherent tradition of their own, and also go some way to explaining why so many jazz fans don't like vocal jazz. 

The main reason I don't agree with it is I think it adopts value judgements about importance / quality with which I disagree, and because it reflects a view of genre and evolution that I think is restrictive. 

[danasgoodstuff]

12 hours ago, Rabshakeh said:

I recently came across this interesting snippet from an interview with British husband and wife Johnny Dankworth and Cleo Laine:

"The pair will bicker good-humouredly about the minutiae of their biographies. When I suggest that their role in British jazz goes way beyond that of their contemporaries, Cleo immediately says: "John more than me really. Anybody that plays an instrument, and writes music, is much more historically important." "On the contrary, John interrupts, "vocalists draw bigger crowds." "That's got nothing to do with the evolution of a music," Cleo responds, "unless they're iconic figures." "So, strike off Ella Fitzgerald and Billie Holiday and the rest from American jazz history," John replies. "You can't win like that." "All right, dear, I concede, Cleo responds unconvincingly. "You're more important than you think, that's what it amounts to, darling," says John, now turned peacemaker" (Jazz UK, 2008e, interview by Heining).

I thought it was interesting in the light of the above discussion. What I make of it is that Cleo Laine did not really see jazz vocalists as part of the jazz tradition: more a non-jazz accretion from Jazz's days as pop music who continued to be useful to the music from a commercial perspective only. Essentially, the vocalists who sing in a jazz setting (save for a very limited handful who have adapted what they do to jazz) are essentially *doing* pop or show tune style singing over jazz backing.

It is a provocative view with which I do not agree at all.

But it interested me because, if adopted, it would explain the difficulty in categorising jazz vocalists in any coherent tradition of their own, and also go some way to explaining why so many jazz fans don't like vocal jazz. 

The main reason I don't agree with it is I think it adopts value judgements about importance / quality with which I disagree, and because it reflects a view of genre and evolution that I think is restrictive. 

Thoughtful comments, thanks.  

Does anyone here agree with me that Linda does a better job here than with Riddle but she's still not a jazz singer.

[JSngry]

Her time has always been "stiff". That's just her, I guess. Whatever other skills she might have had, rhythmic suppleness will never be one of them. 

[HutchFan]

On 7/31/2023 at 6:47 AM, Rabshakeh said:

It is a provocative view with which I do not agree at all.

I'm with you, Rab.

I think (good) jazz singers are (good) jazz musicians -- just like instrumentalists.

Not less than.  Just different.

 

[Teasing the Korean]

On 3/13/2023 at 6:00 PM, gmonahan said:

As much as I love Sinatra (and I *really* love Sinatra's music), I've never been able to see him as a jazz singer, per se. I think improvisation really is the soul of jazz, and while Frank occasionally embellished a song--especially singing live--he didn't improvise much.

If we are talking about jazz singers of the Great American Songbook and similar, I think we would have to define improvisation in this context.  A singer's main job when singing this kind of jazz is to deliver the melody and lyric and in a compelling fashion.  This will include a singing with a sense of swing, interesting phrasing, tasteful melodic embellishment, and responding to the instrumental setting.  All of these collectively add up to what I would consider improvisation, but not necessarily at the level of improvisation that you typically hear from an instrumental soloist.  In my opinion, this is not the singer's job in this context.  Some singers can do it - Ella, for example - but there are probably a dozen reasons why I consider her to be a jazz singer aside from her ability to scat, the latter of which barely factors into my assessments of jazz singing.

Now if we are looking at jazz singers outside the realm of standards, such as Leon Thomas or Ursula Dudziak, my criteria would be very different.

[JSngry]

Or Betty Carter. Or Andy Bey. Or Joe Lee Wilson. Or Cassandra Wilson. Or... Etc 

[gmonahan]

2 hours ago, Teasing the Korean said:

If we are talking about jazz singers of the Great American Songbook and similar, I think we would have to define improvisation in this context.  A singer's main job when singing this kind of jazz is to deliver the melody and lyric and in a compelling fashion.  This will include a singing with a sense of swing, interesting phrasing, tasteful melodic embellishment, and responding to the instrumental setting.  All of these collectively add up to what I would consider improvisation, but not necessarily at the level of improvisation that you typically hear from an instrumental soloist.  In my opinion, this is not the singer's job in this context.  Some singers can do it - Ella, for example - but there are probably a dozen reasons why I consider her to be a jazz singer aside from her ability to scat, the latter of which barely factors into my assessments of jazz singing.

Now if we are looking at jazz singers outside the realm of standards, such as Leon Thomas or Ursula Dudziak, my criteria would be very different.

I take your point. I guess I differentiate between what I'd call a jazz singer and a singer who is occasionally "jazzy." Sinatra was often the latter. Ella, on the other hand, as you point out, was very much a jazz singer, improvising on the melodic line. Billie Holiday did that too, and so did a number of those Jim has mentioned. I'd call Mel Torme a jazz singer in that sense too. But Tony Bennett, for example, who loved jazz and often was backed by jazz group, was more a jazzy singer than a jazz singer, IMHO. 

Not that it makes much difference. I enjoy all of them. They were/are great artists, marvelous at doing what they did, and I listen to all of them often.

[AllenLowe]

I just want to mention - and maybe somebody else has - that Louis Armstrong was mentioned in only a passing way on the first page of this thread - and he INVENTED jazz singing. I exaggerate not. The whole concept, phrasing, time, treatment of lyrics, comes from Armstrong.

And I should mention that early Bing is to my ears a great jazz singer, though I think in later years he compromised his style to hit the mainstream.

Also, no one has mentioned Al Bernard, of New Orleans, who had it all - time, phrasing. And Marion Harris, who many early listeners mistook for black. She was wonderful, had a terrific, firm approach that swung.

Edited August 1, 2023 by AllenLowe

[JSngry]

3 minutes ago, AllenLowe said:

I just want to mention - and maybe somebody else has - that Louis Armstrong was mentioned in only a passing way on the first page of this thread - and he INVENTED jazz singing. I exaggerate not. The whole concept, phrasing, time, treatment of lyrics, comes from Armstrong.

And I should mention that early Bing is to my ears a great jazz singer, though I think in later years he compromised his style to hit the mainstream.

This 

[Teasing the Korean]

1 hour ago, JSngry said:

Or Betty Carter. Or Andy Bey. Or Joe Lee Wilson. Or Cassandra Wilson. Or... Etc 

I don't have any records by them. If this was in response to my post, I don't catch your drift.

[gmonahan]

16 minutes ago, AllenLowe said:

I just want to mention - and maybe somebody else has - that Louis Armstrong was mentioned in only a passing way on the first page of this thread - and he INVENTED jazIz singing. I exaggerate not. The whole concept, phrasing, time, treatment of lyrics, comes from Armstrong.

And I should mention that early Bing is to my ears a great jazz singer, though I think in later years he compromised his style to hit the mainstream.

Also, no one has mentioned Al Bernard, of New Orleans, who had it all - time, phrasing. And Marion Harris, who many early listeners mistook for black. She was wonderful, had a terrific, firm approach that swung.

Well, yeah, Satch was THE jazz singer! Don't know about Bing. I'd have to listen again to the early things.

[JSngry]

33 minutes ago, Teasing the Korean said:

I don't have any records by them. If this was in response to my post, I don't catch your drift.

Just that there is an entire other realm of "jazz singing", hell, "jazz" period, that has little if any need to be Great American Songbook in nature. Has been for quite a while now, actually. Not better or worse, but definitely different and definitely real. 

[AllenLowe]

46 minutes ago, gmonahan said:

Well, yeah, Satch was THE jazz singer! Don't know about Bing. I'd have to listen again to the early things.

I would check out the 1920s work like Tain't So; also I'm Comin' VIrginia with Whiteman.

[Teasing the Korean]

11 minutes ago, JSngry said:

Just that there is an entire other realm of "jazz singing", hell, "jazz" period, that has little if any need to be Great American Songbook in nature. Has been for quite a while now, actually. Not better or worse, but definitely different and definitely real. 

Oh, understood.  My point was there was a crossover for several decades between jazz, pop, big band, and the GAS.  So I was really discussing singers of this style and era, in response to what @gmonahan had written above (in March). 

[JSngry]

I would listen to the case that as the decades have passed that the real-time connections between "jazz" and the GAS (as it has come to be branded) have become tenuous at best, often illusory, and, too-often, opportunistically deceptive, if not deceitful.

Repertoire is simply means to an end. Simply engaging a repertoire as being the end itself is... I don't know... is "stupid" too strong a word? Or not strong enough? 

[Rabshakeh]

I find it interesting, from a conceptual point of view, that "Standards" and the "Great American Songbook" increasingly mean something quite different, even if they might be the same songs.

Edited August 1, 2023 by Rabshakeh

[JSngry]

Marketing 

[Teasing the Korean]

29 minutes ago, JSngry said:

I would listen to the case that as the decades have passed that the real-time connections between "jazz" and the GAS (as it has come to be branded) have become tenuous at best, often illusory, and, too-often, opportunistically deceptive, if not deceitful.

Repertoire is simply means to an end. Simply engaging a repertoire as being the end itself is... I don't know... is "stupid" too strong a word? Or not strong enough? 

So it's a singer-not-the-song question?  I think the material and the interpreter are equally important toward the final result.  I am aware that jazz has moved far from that era and aesthetic - some jazz has, not all. But most of my jazz accumulation consists of vinyl from the 1950s and 60s, albums that I lugged home in the 1990s and early 2000s for low dough.  So the GAS is very well represented on the shelves of my rekkid room.

And for better or worse, the GAS is pretty much the center of my musical universe, not necessarily by choice, but because of what I was exposed to in my formative years. I go for long stretches where I don't listen to this stuff much at all, but I always come back at some point.  Tony Bennett's exit was my most recent catalyst.

25 minutes ago, Rabshakeh said:

I find it interesting, from a conceptual point of view, that "Standards" and the "Great American Songbook" increasingly mean something quite different, even if they might be the same songs.

Well, there are standards that are not part of the Great American Songbook - Legrand, Mancini, etc.

And there are Great American Songbook tunes that never became standards, e.g., lots of forgotten tunes by Cole Porter, Rodgers & Hart, Gershwin's, etc.

So if you draw a Venn diagram, you would have two big circles partially overlapping.

Edited August 1, 2023 by Teasing the Korean

[JSngry]

As long as your musical universe doesn't become conflated to THE musical universe, no harm, no foul.

Honestly, today at least as often as not it seems to me that "jazz" is used as a shakedown racket or a bait and switch operation, like they sell you a dictionary that has all of the letters but none of the words, but if you try to shop elsewhere you run the risk of getting mugged in the alley or something.

So...what makes a jazz singer? Apparently just being labeled one. 

[danasgoodstuff]

28 minutes ago, Rabshakeh said:

I find it interesting, from a conceptual point of view, that "Standards" and the "Great American Songbook" increasingly mean something quite different, even if they might be the same songs.

Care to elaborate?  As far as jazz singers and jazz in general, who was the last singer to engage with what was going on in instrumental jazz in general and find a large-ish audience?  Cassandra Wilson did but that was 30+ years ago and her popular work seems far removed from her M-base connections.  No criticism, just an observation.  I found her good songs are where you fine 'em attitude a refreshing change from the GAS-bag fetish.

[Rabshakeh]

23 minutes ago, danasgoodstuff said:

Care to elaborate? 

I just mean from a marketing perspective, really. The two terms have diverged. One refers to a certain kind of jazz education concept and the other refers to a pop marketing concept. But they're often the same songs.

As people in the thread have noted already, jazz standards increasingly doesn't actually mean the older showtunes, though, so maybe the divergence is not so interesting. The showtunes have been ceded to the grim supermarket jazz vocal records and aging pop musicians looking to cash out.

23 minutes ago, danasgoodstuff said:

As far as jazz singers and jazz in general, who was the last singer to engage with what was going on in instrumental jazz in general and find a large-ish audience? 

How large does it have to be? Esperanza Spaulding and Cecile McLorin Salvant are doing well and engaging. Crucially, like Wilson, they know not to get too hung up on the "jazz" side of things. I'm not sure either has the jazz quality and ability to shape a song that Wilson has/had but they make up for it by being decent and omnivorous pop songwriters.

Edited August 1, 2023 by Rabshakeh

[Teasing the Korean]

30 minutes ago, JSngry said:

As long as your musical universe doesn't become conflated to THE musical universe, no harm, no foul.

Honestly, today at least as often as not it seems to me that "jazz" is used as a shakedown racket or a bait and switch operation, like they sell you a dictionary that has all of the letters but none of the words, but if you try to shop elsewhere you run the risk of getting mugged in the alley or something.

So...what makes a jazz singer? Apparently just being labeled one. 

There is one musical universe.  Our respective fixed stars vary, not the universe itself.  

 

Edited August 1, 2023 by Teasing the Korean

[JSngry]

24 minutes ago, danasgoodstuff said:

As far as jazz singers and jazz in general, who was the last singer to engage with what was going on in instrumental jazz in general and find a large-ish audience?  

Esperanza Spaulding, sorta-kinda, on all points?

6 minutes ago, Teasing the Korean said:

There is one musical universe.  Our respective fixed stars vary, not the universe itself.  

 

Only one universe, yes. But how many universes are there in an/the omniverse? 

[Rabshakeh]

2 hours ago, AllenLowe said:

I just want to mention - and maybe somebody else has - that Louis Armstrong was mentioned in only a passing way on the first page of this thread - and he INVENTED jazz singing. I exaggerate not. The whole concept, phrasing, time, treatment of lyrics, comes from Armstrong.

I guess the question that I was trying to put across with the initial post is this: what is it that Armstrong invented and how was this form, and the form adopted by his successors, different to the surrounding non-jazz ecosystem?

I think that we can all hear what you are describing with respect to Armstrong, but I personally have a hard time analysing why it therefore feels natural to put Armstrong in a bag with e.g. Chris Connor and Joe Turner, and not with e.g. Al Green.

This is obviously true for all genres, where relationships between artists can sometimes be merely taxonomic or completely accidental. But it is perhaps more problematised here, because of the unusual split within the genre between vocal and instrumental forms (assuming that one believes vocal jazz is a genuine form of jazz, which I think we all do), which you don't find in most other musical genres.

The best analysis I can come up with is that Armstrong and Holiday, whether improvising or not, are capable of horn-like phrasing. I think that I would posit that, rather than ability to improvise, as the clearest marker of a top tier jazz vocalist. That's a personal view though and I don't think it fits most jazz singers that well.

Edited August 1, 2023 by Rabshakeh