Jazz for people who don't like jazz

So I jokingly suggested I could make a playlist for our office of "jazz for people who don't like jazz", in order to prove that jazz isn't just "noise", which most of my office think is the case.

So I'm thinking super-tuneful stuff and supper-accessible funky stuff, but not twee and obvious. Take Five, Watermelon Man, etc etc, maybe some recent stuff like e.s.t. and Polar Bear. Let's avoid skronk and experimentalism.

Suggestions please!

"Linus and Lucy"

yes!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wwmlg9wF8a4

excellent post-Svensson British pianist

They're a little bit experimental and not really funky, but maybe Jaga Jazzist would fit in here? I only say since I'm pretty ambivalent to most jazz I've heard and love these guys. They're definitely super-tuneful.

Your office should ban jokes.

the sticks : cannonball adderly

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0BayhpwXP70

if their toes aint a tapping to this, then i would not venture further into this project !

The Lounge Lizards maybe?

You could just give your friends in the office a jazz lp for people who are ignorant of jazz like Mingus Black Saint or skip a few steps and go straight to ....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DCek60uzvF0

Jaga Jazzist are straight-up post-rock m8 lol

Uhhh...does Tom Waits qualify

http://i.imgur.com/evdKbQF.jpg

Maybe My Favourite Things? It can get a bit skronky. Something like Mingus Ah Um is totally pop to me, but V still tells me it sounds like dying animals or 'crazy typing music' to her.

Black Saint and Sinner Lady sounds like a Disney soundtrack. try that

and yeah, My Favorite Things basically is a Disney soundtrack. solid pick

jazz isn't just "noise", which most of my office think is the case.

this is weird to me cos noise in jazz is very much the exception ime, cos a lot of the time - and i'm talking about mainstream jazz here - it's just way too tasteful and sonically restrained to hit home with any force. or do you mean the basic sound of e.g. a saxophone is just too grating for them? or perhaps there's too much focus on improvisation rather than pure melody?

anyhow, my contribution - 30s goth jazz:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-W59FzOwYIs

Free jazz and post-bop could be described as 'noise' or 'noisy' but anything before then - Duke Ellington, Charlie Parker, cool jazz etc is fairly pleasant and melodic.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTrZAq7Q8Wk

The most easy-listening Zappa ever got, but a great composition and great soloing.

and then there's all those crappy 'jazz' compilations that are actually just adult contemporary slow jams by people like Diana Krall etc, but I doubt that's what you want.

This kinda reminds me of Earth, Wind & Fire. Latin groove w/congas, and some freaky scatting

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BOVV4_XiHiA

Latin jazz - Stan Getz, Girl from Ipanema type stuff

Don't leave out all-time best sellers like Kind of Blue, (all of) Headhunters - great crossover jazz (which is what you're going for, right?)

This Swedish masterpiece is also for everyone
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CdVUh7mQjWI

Bill Evans if it's not too twee for you (ofc it's not)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=knzFrkdV3ok

Danish guitarist Jakob Bro is doing amazing stuff that's kind of ambient but has lots of tension, great musicianship/writing ime accesible
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ERMx4VFyi10

Danish pianist Nikolaj Hess also does really catchy songs, still has a lot of mood and feeling
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QFU7nkuvWbg

A more contemporary approach to the trumpet incorporating fusion/rock elements see jacob buchanan's amazing armchair gospel

http://buchanan.dk/web/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/05-A.D.Buchanans-Armchair-Gospel.mp3

The instrumentals on Earth, Wind & Fire albums.

Some of Quincy Jones' albums like eg. Smackwater Jack - jazz, funk and pop all mixed together.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zViIajZwH-s

Donald Byrd might work here, partic "places and spaces". Maybe some bob james? Also vocal wise I think Julie London's cole porter album might appeal.

Count Basie and the Kansas City Seven - small combo pop pieces that are catchy as fuck

I can rattle off a bunch of standard jazz for noobs stuff, all of which I think is good and helps people who don't like jazz get into jazz. Is that what you're looking for with the thread though? I mean Coltrane - My Favorite Things, anything from Kind of Blue, any of the Ellington standards, Coltrane/Hartman - Lush Life, Art Blakey - Moanin, Ornette Coleman - Lonely Woman, Getz/Gilberto - Girl from Ipanema, Lee Morgan - Sidewinder, etc.

I mean if you want stuff in the vein of Take Five and Watermelon man, those are all good suggestions I think.

the Brian Blade Fellowship could almost be confused for smooth jazz if you don't know any better, except it's actually just beautiful, through-composed and melodic. the newest one especially, but really all of them.

Art Ensemble of Chicago "Theme de YoYo"
Bobby Hutcherson and Harold Land "Goin' Down South"
Donald Byrd "Slop Jar Blues"
Grover Washington "Mr. Magic"
Bill Evans "Waltz for Debby"
Stan Getz and Joao Gilberto "The Girl from Ipanema"
John Coltrane "Blue Train"

and of course everybody likes Kind of Blue

Maybe a funky Grant Green track -- Let the Music Take Your Mind, e.g.

Thelonious Monk - Evidence, Epistrophy, Round Midnight, Blue Monk
Sonny Rollins - St. Thomas or Blue 7

Charlie Parker - Embraceable You, Koko, Ornithology, Out of Nowhere

Wes Montgomery - Four on Six, West Coast Blues
John Coltrane - Impressions

Oliver Nelson - Stolen Moments

Take the Goddamned A Train

Herbie Mann - Memphis Underground

Bad plus
Sarah vaughan
Nina simone
Dinah washington

Jimmy scott

In addition to the Ellington standards ("'A' Train" etc.), I'd actually recommend things like the New Orleans Suite, Far East Suite, and Latin American Suite. Very melodic, orchestrally rich, and they rock. Also, the sound quality is vastly clearer/cleaner than on the 40s material; newcomers to this music might conceivably balk at records that sound like they were recorded on landlines.

I'm guessing by "noise" dog latin is referring to bop-type solos/melodies, not brotzman-ish sheets of noise

Bad plus
Sarah vaughan
Nina simone
Dinah washington

Blossom Dearie!

Oh yeah. And by that token, her friends Bob Dorough and Dave Frishberg.

Another vote for Stolen Moments
Phase Dance - Pat Metheny Group
Astral Travelling - Pharaoh Sanders (non-skronky)
Que Pasa - Horace Silver
Alien Orifice - Frank Zappa (title may be a bit off-putting for your audience but this rocks and swings!)
Something off one of those Jacques Loussier Play Bach albums (Prelude no.5 in D is short and punchy)

Shelly Manne (Swingin' Sounds series)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eXv4BYIQH9s

Most of Dave Brubeck's singles

Your office should ban jokes.

― xyzzzz__, Tuesday, 23 September 2014 12:44 (10 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Journey in Satchidananda.

Horace Silver is 1st thing I thought of

guy I knew derided 'waltz for debby' as "just noise"

...

You've got to be kidding. Was he trolling?

Reaction doesn't really surprise me at all, actually. Lotta people get uptight when they hear musicians improvising over unfamiliar chord changes. And maybe it doesn't literally sound like garbage trucks colliding, but they find it equally distracting/irritating

but Waltz for Debby is so pretty!

The first time I ever heard Waltz for Debby it was actually a little hard for me to process what was going on

smh

I'm sure a music theorist can explain this better than I can, but it seems like a lot of people who can listen to pre-WW2 jazz without obvious pain start to cover their ears when exposed to bebop or anything later ... maybe this is related to rhythm and phrasing, but I think it's mostly the differences in harmonic development

I found a near mint 1964 mono version of Zetterlund/Evans' Waltz for Debby at a local flea market for 3 euros, it's been sold for 290 on discogs. Cool record.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AOTDlBmJons

too good

I'm sure a music theorist can explain this better than I can, but it seems like a lot of people who can listen to pre-WW2 jazz without obvious pain start to cover their ears when exposed to bebop or anything later ... maybe this is related to rhythm and phrasing, but I think it's mostly the differences in harmonic development

― Brad C., Friday, September 26, 2014 9:48 AM (38 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I'm no music theorist but bop bringing in tritone substitutions play a big part I would think. Dissonance.

Always think the uninitiated can't follow jazz because the drums are not playing a backbeat.

Feel like bill evans is very "traditionally" melodic.. These philistines probably mean "improvised/not composed" by "noise", as in "this is just a melody bookending dudes wanking, where is the structure"

I'm no music theorist but bop bringing in tritone substitutions play a big part I would think. Dissonance.

― brimstead, Friday, September 26, 2014 1:30 PM (15 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

They try to play it too darn fast, and subsequently lose the beauty of the melody.

I got no kick against it, though.

Feel like bill evans is very "traditionally" melodic.. These philistines probably mean "improvised/not composed" by "noise", as in "this is just a melody bookending dudes wanking, where is the structure"

Always think the uninitiated can't follow jazz because the drums are not playing a backbeat.

There's some 1960s Blue Note stuff that has a huge beat that anybody can follow. Art Blakey & the Jazz Messengers, and Don Wilkerson, jump to mind immediately.

Yeah, that's a good place to start for people who don't get it. Reminds me, always think perfect place to start is Count Basie w/ the All-American Rhythm Section because Walter Page is pumping out classic quarter-note walking bass lines and Jo Jones is playing a big beat that isn't as broken up as it would later become.

but it has incessant cymbal tapping!

Ah, yes, of course :)

My dad, re jazz: "They're just making it up as they go along, aren't they?" No matter how traditionally melodic "Waltz for Debby" is, it's not a melody he recognizes like "Moon River", and both the pitter-pat brushes and the skittery bass would get his thumbs down. My dad is people who don't like jazz.

IMO, _____ for people who don't like _____ always seems to be the best _____.

We need Geir Hongro to weigh in on this

people like to recognize the music they're hearing

this is why there's such a big divide between, if you will, radio/ambient culture/12-cd listeners and musical obsessives

the latter typically either like to hear lots of new music, or manage to get through the transitional period where they're dealing with lots and lots of unfamiliar music (e.g. at a certain time of life), so they can deal with the confusion and discomfort and boredom that can come with that

when people hear jazz they think it's kind of like never going to sound familiar, which is daunting and distasteful