November 28, 2007
What Becomes a Yoshi's Most?
BeyondChron has a civil point/counter-point debate going on about Yoshi's SF, which opens its doors today. But let's go back a bit, shall we?
If you didn't know, San Francisco has the most cheery pockmark on its record: the "Negro removal" period. During this time historic buildings were torn down and black Western Addition residents were shooed out of the city. A movement that "never succeeded in driving all blacks from the Fillmore," but instead "destroyed the African-American community’s strongest neighborhood economic base," according to BeyondChron.
To simplify things (and presumably outrage others), Yoshi's San Francisco is now one of several efforts to restore the neighborhood back to what it once was. Whatever that was.
One perspective on the new jazz club's branch -- an "African-American perspective" -- is Harrison Chastang's. He points out that venues like Yoshi's San Francisco, the Sheba Lounge, and Rasselas already bring in a black audience. What's more, said clubs will encourage younger black audiences to drop on by. He says that "[t]he key to attracting African Americans to Yoshi's depends on the effort Yoshi's makes to inform African Americans about events at Yoshi's; and to support education programs to cultivate the next generation of African American Jazz fans." Which sounds good, but we can't imagine any amount of outreach would transform young kids into jazz aficionados. At least not in 2007.
As we pointed out yesterday, jazz is a dead form of music. Period. We didn't mean that in a disco-sucks tone, but more in a Latin-is-a-dead-language way. (Disco, by the way, does not suck.) That's not a critique of a certain sound -- believe us, our iTunes library is littered with music that many would consider unmitigated crap -- but anytime scholarly types start fetishizing or picking apart a music genre, said genre is well on its way to the grave.
But Mr. Shaw points out SF Magazine's Chris Smith's point out (so meta!):
As Chris Smith observes in the current San Francisco Magazine, "if you want to revitalize a black neighborhood, a hip-hop preservation district would make more sense." But the Agency would be afraid to expand hip-hop for the same reasons that it would not have backed jazz in the music’s heyday -- incendiary and often subversive art forms are what Redevelopment Agencies are created to extinguish, not promote.
O! To be in the room when someone suggested opening up a hip hop venue in the Wester Addition! (Also, why not? It's well overdue.) But the point is this: more venues geared toward a younger audience with more, um, modern music need to open in the area to bring the neighborhood back to life. (Although we never really thought of it as dead.) There are enough jazz clubs in the area at this point, and any more of them runs the risk of turning the district into an amusement park of the past. And no one wants that.
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not in 2006?
tangentially, look what's been happening at Berkeley's Jazzschool for years (now relocated downtown from a walkup on Shattuck). lots of young people are getting into jazz and music instruction there.
oops. thanks. fixed. (what can we say, we have a fondness for yesteryear. sad.)
but anytime scholarly types start fetishizing or picking apart a music genre, said genre is well on its way to the grave.
That's simplistic and incorrect. I just returned from an academic conference w/ multiple sessions analyzing pop music -- Gwen Stefani, etc. -- and yet, nobody has made this claim about them. Theodor Adorno analyzed jazz during the '60s, while Coltrane was selling out venues across the globe. Academic "fetishizing" really means nothing about a genre's life.
This doesn't address your point as to whether jazz will bring in the "typical black person." Not sure how this confirms or denies a genre's death. I've attended jazz festivals w/ over 2,000 in attendance. Dave Chappelle sings the praises of Thelonious Monk. The Roots play at jazz festivals alongside James Carter. Oh, but black people don't like the Roots either -- "it's just coffee shop chicks & white dudes" -- so hip-hop is apparently dead, too.
As I mentioned yesterday there is U street in DC, which does have a mix of both jazz clubs as well as rock, dance and other venues. There isn't an entertainment district in DC that doesn't have a good jazz club in it -- Georgetown, U street, Adams Morgan, Dupont. And they are attracting you and old. Now sure, we are hard pressed to find a Go-Go club (don't ask, it's a DC African American music that no one else has ever heard of... it's just as big as Hip Hop is anywhere else), but there is at least one near U Street. Of course, every time one opens there seems to be a shooting at it at some point -- which of course leads to the whole thing being shut down. And that's probably the big problem -- Go-Go and Hip Hop both seem to attract more than its fair share of violence. A fight is one thing. A shooting is a whole other.
That doesn't mean that the music isn't enjoyable, but it does usually mean that the analyzed genres have hit a ceiling. (And, yes, IMO, hip hop is on its way as well.)
here's the litmus test i have regarding jazz: ask yourself and people you know and meet, when was the last time you paid money to see a jazz gig/band/concert?
if you don't have a recent answer, then surprise, there isn't a good market for the music. not to trivialize the work of DJs, but they've got a lot of business these days -- bars, clubs, parties, even in stores.
Hip-hop as "incendiary and subversive?" I'm hard pressed to think of anything that has become more mainstream, commercialized, and hooked into corporate culture than contemporary hip-hop and rap music (of course there are exceptions, but this genre is not what it was twenty years ago with the debut of Public Enemy and company).
That aside, I lived in the Fillmore for two years, and I have to agree that the idea of a "jazz district" seems more like a boondogle than a real attempt to revitalize that neighborhood. The Fillmore has been the scene of multiple ethnic cleansings - let's not forget the Japanese who were moved to internment camps - and any attempt to "create" culture in that area is going to come off as manufactured because everything that has developed there organically has been pulled up by the roots.
Hip-hop as "incendiary and subversive?" I'm hard pressed to think of anything that has become more mainstream, commercialized, and hooked into corporate culture than contemporary hip-hop and rap music (of course there are exceptions, but this genre is not what it was twenty years ago with the debut of Public Enemy and company).
That aside, I lived in the Fillmore for two years, and I have to agree that the idea of a "jazz district" seems more like a boondogle than a real attempt to revitalize that neighborhood. The Fillmore has been the scene of multiple ethnic cleansings - let's not forget the Japanese who were moved to internment camps - and any attempt to "create" culture in that area is going to come off as manufactured because everything that has developed there organically has been pulled up by the roots.
I enjoy jazz, but I have yet to attend a real gig at a jazz club in SF since I moved here 7 years ago... I always mean to, but I usually can't afford it. Plus I don't know anyone else who likes jazz that much.
I have eaten brunch at Rassela's and gotten drinks at Sheba, but that's about it.
I recently noticed the holiday lights strewn about the trees around Yoshi's and thought to myself, "is my neighborhood suddenly being gentrified this month?"
Not so. I have to agree with BeyondChron on this. Aside from the new Pinkberry knockoff (Jubili), the overpriced condos, and Yoshi's, it's still the same Fillmore.
Additionally, to call jazz a dead form of music is a bit harsh. I think Rassela's is great, but I also believe that Fillmore jazz clubs do not attract or cater to a younger demographic, losing much of it's cool factor.
As jazz takes sophistication to understand and appreciate, I'm not really suprised you all don't understand or appreciate it. However, many of us do.
Yoshi's, Pearls et al. are for the white people. We knew this was true once they put up ropes outside of Jack's. It is not about revitalizing the neighborhood, but only about money. Yes, this City would remove all people of color if it could and then what a boring City we would have. Beyond Chron was quite right in most of it's comments. As a senior citizen I've watched the changes. Whites have had their eyes on the homes in the Fillmore for years, but without removal of the African Americans, most are afraid to live, eat or listen to music in the Fillmore except for the end closer to Union Street where the whites feel safe in their little expensive shops and restaurants.
And as to comments about hip hop, I remember when men were beaten and killed for wearing their hair long. I remember when rock and roll was the devil's music.
Yoshi's has framed a few photographs from the "old days," but upon reviewing the upcoming schedule, Yoshi's is featuring music for whites only except for the opening day act...Roy Haynes..fabulous drummer...good band. From there the schedule dives and becomes boring to most jazz fans. Most of us jazz fans (black and white) will never set foot in Yoshi's SF or Yoshi's Oakland as the music they call jazz is really for the white audience only....
Brock, you're wrong. Jazz is not "dead," whatever that term means.
First, there are still many artists doing innovative (and no, I'm not one of those people who confuses novelty with quality) things with the jazz genre, updating the sound and incorporating elements of other genres -- e.g., the loose association of supremely talented local musicians who call themselves the Jazz Mafia, who in various combos mix jazz with hip-hop, pop, rock, and symphonic music. Check them out at Bruno's any Tuesday.
Second, young (like, middle-school and high-school age) people are still getting into the genre and contributing to it. True, young jazz musicians are not as numerous as the kids who are into no-talent-required krep like Green Blink 311 Day and the like, but check out the Stanford Jazz Camp showcase gigs in the summertime or the aforementioned Jazzschool and you'll be impressed. I have a cousin, now 20, who got heavy into jazz as a junior high-schooler, studied under some great local teachers, did Stanford Jazz Camp, and is now an up-and-coming pianist leading a combo of his high school buddies, who play regular gigs in LA and recently played the Lima (Peru) Jazz Festival. I've even seen young fans at his gigs who genuinely like the music.
It is unfortunate that venues like Yoshi's and Pearl's tend to (a) charge a lot for tickets and (b) focus a little much on the safe and stale. But they've got businesses to run and rents to pay, and the local audiences eat that stuff up, though the crowds at those gigs can feel a little stiff sometimes -- you get the sense many of them would be just has happy watching the gig on PBS and calling in for the tote bag. But Yoshi's and Pearls are also venues where younger and newer artists to get heard. Drop in on a random Monday night and see who's playing. You probably never heard of them but you'll likely be impressed.
Finally, you're also wrong about disco: it most certainly does, did, and will always, suck. The larger category of funk is a different story, but disco's inability to branch out beyond that single awful monotonous beat that every single song had made it akin to, as George Clinton once put it, "makin' love with one stroke."
"Most of us jazz fans (black and white) will never set foot in Yoshi's SF or Yoshi's Oakland as the music they call jazz is really for the white audience only...."
It's perfectly fair to argue as to whether Yoshi's opening in the Fillmore is really going to benefit those living within the neighborhood, but assertions like this undermine the other points one may make.
While I'll agree the initial calendar of Yoshi's SF could be more inspired (though Cassandra Wilson- who's not played a club level venue here in my memory- should be a treat) claiming that Yoshi's is only about jazz for white people is wrong. Over 10 years I've seen Ahmad Jamal, Art Farmer, Frank Morgan, Oscar Peterson, Shirley Horn, Abbey Lincoln, Charles Lloyd, Billy Higgins, Elvin Jones, MCCoy Tyner, Branford Marsalis, Don Byron, and Roy Hargrove amongst many other first class African-American musicians at Yoshi's in Oakland. Which among these is just "jazz for white people"?
"Jazz is the last refuge of the untalented. Jazz musicians enjoy themselves more than anyone listening to them does.
It's what you do when you can't get a gig. Like theatre."
-Tony Wilson in 24 Hour Party People
I hate to pile on, but I have to agree that "jazz is dead" is too simplistic. Jazz's profile is definitely lower now than it was as recently as the 60s or 70s when the old giants were still doing new things. But the grass roots of jazz is alive and well. There are all kinds of bad ass young players out there these days. The New York Times did an article earlier this year about the explosion of jazz schools:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/07/arts/music/07chin.html
And there's a lot of interesting crossover jazz-electronica things going on. Thirsty Ear Records is an epicenter of that scene. Afrolicious (Elbo Room Thursdays) is a great local example, with DJs and jazz players sharing the stage.
But like everyone is saying, you won't see much of that at Yoshi's. Just down the street, the Boom Boom Room brings in a lot of young people with their funk/jazz/new orleans/jamband mix. I love how they let bands play past 2.
It would be great to see a hip-hop club in the Fillmore. Maybe if it was a hip-hop/jazz/dance club, that would keep people from freaking out about it.
Agreed on the Boom Boom Room. Also agreed on the off-base-ness of the bigoted comment about the Yoshi's audience. Shows I've been to at Yoshi's Oakland have had every color well-represented in the audience. I expect Yoshi's SF to be the same, if SFJAZZ audiences are any indication. Hopefully once they get past the initial few months and get established, Yoshi's will start bringing in some fresher talent.
As for the Tony Wilson quote: my first reaction was "Who's Tony Wilson and why should I give a crap what he thinks?" Then I looked up the movie and had a good laugh. If jazz is "what you do when you can't get a gig," I guess we can all look forward to EMF's upcoming jazz album then?
Avatar Alex is spot on. "Jazz is ' what you do when you can't get a gig'" is a very cute line written by some twit who thinks the bell of a sax is the place you empty your cigarette ashes.
Ouch, right?
When I heard Steve Coogan say the line in the movie, it stung --not as a jazz aficionado, but as a theater major.
It took me years to accept the basic truth of the quip.
Face it, by the time Ken Burns is doing a documentary on the subject (Civil War, Baseball, WWII), it's so past the zeitgeist that even other sharks are jumping your shark.
Saying 'jazz is dead' implies that relevance is granted only when a young, commerical target audience embraces the genre. Sorry. I disagree. But, of course, I'm a geezer in my 40s so what do I know.
It's also ignoring the vast spectrum of jazz, and its historical and technical roots which seep into so much music. Like it or not, jazz retains its life through that osmotic effect if not through its own endeavors.
There is such a thing as timelessness in art. I happen to believe jazz stands up well to the test of time.
As far as the Fillmore's revitalization, I do agree about the difficulty in creating an organic experience on top of historical displacement -- not just the wretched redevelopment program but also the tragic internment of the Japanese who occupied the area prior to the 40s and 50s 'jazz era.'
But I also think that some revitalization can be done with a consciousness that doesn't necessarily undermine diversity and cultural history. If a good hip hop club is the answer to that, there's certainly enough money behind most commercial hip hop to make it happen.
Hip hop died when little white girls started getting into it, and by little white girls I mean Sean "puff daddy diddy dootie" Combs. My 11 year old niece drops it to soujah boy, lil mama AND gwen stefani (??!) - lol. It's what the little kids dance to these days - so much for "thug life" forever tupac. I think that it has come full circle with Travis Barker doing a remix of "crank that" which brings rap back to it's roots which all point to - you guessed it, Aerosmith back in 1971. haha! ;)