Some Thoughts on City Newspaper mail commentary

So, in the April 25th issue of City Newspaper (yes, I realize that it's May 16th, but I've been thinking about how to address this), there was a letter--well, more of an essay--in "the mail" regarding our upcoming Jazz Fest. Here is the title "Jazz? Or music for elderly suburbanites?" of the piece that got my blood in a bubble. How dare this young whippersnapper call me an elderly suburbanite!!! I thought I knew exactly how I was going to lambaste this Ian Downey of Field Street, Rochester, who is probably in his 20s which makes anyone over 40 "elderly." I take umbrage.

Anyway . . . I decided to read this article before jumping to conclusions and firing off a blog about disrespect to jazz, disrespect to the suburbs and disrespect to the elderly, uh, I mean "mature music consumers." Apparently this mail was in response to an article in the April 4th edition which he quoted as saying that the RIJF has "grown in both breadth and quality" to which he inquired, "City Paper, I understand that you want to foster and support what few outlets of culture seem to be growing in Rochester . . . support implies doing the work of criticizing our community's projects when they appear to be headed in the wrong direction."

So at this point, very early in the article, I was feeling righteously indignant. Then I read on. He wrote, very eloquently actually, about what the true essence of jazz was--that the genius of the music lay in its originality, spontaneity, creativity. He then contrasted that with his perception of this year's Jazz Fest lineup which he saw as "smoothed over cross-over music made palatable and safe for a mainstream audience, pushed very far in the direction of pop, away from jazz." Downey goes on to critique some of the upcoming Jazz Fest acts like King Solomon Burke, Dr. John, Jerry Lee Lewis, Rusted Root, Shooter Jennings and others as being as far from jazz as, well, Rochester is from NYC.

He has a valid point. I saw Sonya Kitchell last year. Her music wasn't jazz. It was teen angst in a different type of package than Alanis Morrisette's teen angst. But quite a few of us saw her in the Big Tent. Quite a few people paid for that show alone--I had a pass--and quite a few of us were paying $7 for glasses of wine, buying unspeakably expensive food, and sharing in a "scene" that Rochester only offers us once a year. So, here's where us "elderly suburbanites" come into play. We can afford a $7 glass of wine, or two, even. We can afford to buy a jazz pass for $100+ and tickets to see Jerry Lee Lewis (good God, kid, I'm with you there!) and King Solomon Burke et al. We "old folks with the bucks" are what supports this festival, and John Nugent and Mark Iacona know this and have to play to that.

That's not to say I don't agree with some of your points. Last year, in addition to Sonya Kitchell, I saw Kenny Garrett. I think you might agree that he's real jazz. I think he is. I saw some other acts that were true jazz. But here's the thing. If you narrow the scope of this festival to real, true jazz, you are not going to get 100,000 people pouring into the city streets of Rochester nine days straight. Last year, I went to see one of my favorite local jazz bands at the Big Tent. There was quite a good sized crowd. One week after the jazz fest ended, this same band was playing at Cucina Pazzo, a new restaurant in the city right around the corner from where 80,000 people were the week before. The restaurant was pushing a 5:00 - 9:00 Jazz Happy Hour. Sadly, there was only a handful of us. Where were all those hip jazz cats with their backwards RIJF hats that night? Probably home in the 'burbs sipping from a $25 bottle of wine and wishing they were back at the Jazz Fest "scene" of the week before.

So, my young friend, Ian, my point is that while you have some very valid issues with the quality of the acts coming to our Jazz Fest, this "scene" is a business, and that business has to make money to continue. So, my advice is to do just what you did--listen to the artists's clips and try to get to the (relatively) few true jazz acts that will be here. Then, soak up the vibrancy of the Rochester city streets for those nine nights because you won't see that again until next Jazz Fest.

yours in music,
Tracy