I Have A Question For You......? - Why has Jazz become less popular?

Why has Jazz become less popular?

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Topic: Why has Jazz become less popular?

Posted By: Grace B
Subject: Why has Jazz become less popular?
Date Posted: 05 Nov 2018 at 7:03pm

Why has Jazz become less popular and less recognized these days than other music forms like Rap, Rock, Pop, etc. ? For many years smooth and eclectic Jazz was the rage and often we could find our favorite artists out there being played on local stations, or many stations that were dedicated to Jazz in all its forms and we could feel the pride in seeing our favorite artists being recognized at the grammy's...Now I feel like our genre has been marginalized to some degree, and I can't figure out why. I wanted to do something about this and share my version of this art form, so I've composed/worked on 23 albums to push this genre forward in the smooth jazz and eclectic/fusion jazz arena, but can't help wonder why Jazz is still relatively strong everywhere else in the world except in the US. Does anyone know why and what we can do about this? Thanks.

Replies:

Posted By: js
Date Posted: 05 Nov 2018 at 7:52pm

The reason why smooth jazz and electric fusion were popular was that they appealed to a lot of people who don't like jazz that much in its more pure form.

Smooth jazz attracted a lot of people who are into pop and RnB, while electric fusion attracted people into rock, funk, RnB etc.

These days, there are a lot of people playing jazz who do not have that crossover appeal with the pop, rock and RnB audience, so therefore the music may be less popular, but jazz fans are enjoying hearing the music they like.

Also, there is a new generation of jazz artists led by people like Shabaka Hutchings, Kamasi Washington, Thundercat, Robert Glasper, Esperanza Spaulding and others that have a strong appeal with a new generation of fans. Its been a long time since jazz connected with young people like it is today.