The Jazz Lifestyle

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What we can learn from the music

Are we following technology more than our humanity? In this age of unceasing change, we can easily fall into a trap of technological routines and over-programming of our lives. We become stressed and anxious about living in this dehumanizing jungle of technology. Can jazz music teach us anything about living; about survival in a technology dominated world where machines may one day out think humans?

A jazz approach to life could be a powerful weapon and solution in the technojungle because of its deep humanizing potential. The technobeasts can’t do jazz because jazz is analog, not readable by digital technology. It is a continuum of infinities that no digital technology can comprehend. The human spirit can.

Jazz is democratic, inclusive, creative, innovative, spontaneous, intuitive, inspirational, emotional, empathetic, diverse, spiritual. Among these, technology can’t flourish, however, humanity can.

Jazz meanings include, vigour, energy, effervescence of spirit, joy, pep, magnetism, verve, virility, encouragement and happiness. To jazz things up can mean to enliven, liven up, brighten up, make more interesting and exciting, add some colour to, ginger up, spice up, perk up and pep up. It can be enthusiastic or lively talk.

Originally, jazz music came from African and West Indies music containing tribal beats that became slave songs. These blended with some European styles and the musical styles of ragtime, black sacred music, marching-band music, rural blues, spirituals and gospel music mostly from the African-American baptist churches during the late 1800s and early 1900s.

Jazz music is polyrhythmic and polymetric. It has some structure, yet allows for improvised cross rhythms combined with a syncopation that anticipates the beat. To many enthusiasts, jazz must be able to swing.

To play jazz one needs four components shared by many other styles of music. These components are: rhythm, melody, harmony and chords. The order doesn’t really matter. One might choose the melody first which usually comes with chords. Harmony is derived from the chords, however, many styles of jazz use versions of chords that provide a more jazz-like feel. The flavour of the music can be changed by the rhythm. To live a jazz lifestyle one must seek the important components in life and find the right rhythm to follow.

One of the key elements of Jazz is improvisation allowing for free expression and interpretation of the music. When playing jazz, musicians must listen carefully to each other and respect the feel and interpretation each player brings to the performance. The music can change at any time and what one player does can be of great influence to others. It is a very democratic process of life that includes equally all those involved.

Because jazz music is free expression and full of inspiration and emotion, notes may be changed slightly. Certain notes can be added to give a blue texture. Such notes are called blue notes. Some notes may have their tone bent thus creating a different kind of blue note.

There are a variety of ways to make special jazz sounds and some are unique to particular instruments. A piano, for example, can’t really do a vibrato or shake. A saxophone or trumpet can do the vibrato and shake, but can’t play more than one note at a time, so a chord can only be played one note at a time. This is how a melody can be re-composed on the spot following the chord structure of the music. We can each find our own instrument of life to play along with other people and re-compose our world.

While no two performances of any music are exactly the same, jazz performances can differ greatly. Solos are usually never played the same way more than once and all jazz musicians have their own style and sound. There have been many attempts to write down jazz music. Jazz that is written can capture some of the feeling and provide larger groups a structure so they can play together. A jazz band may use an arrangement. However, the arrangement usually allows for individual free self-expression through improvisation, inspiration—even touching the emotions and intuition of the players and the listeners. Many people think jazz music should never, or can’t be written. For them it is all about taking the barest of structure, perhaps only melody and chords, thus allowing the music to come from their spirit.

Jazz is an analog form of communication. Being analog, which unlike digital, is infinite, moving from one note to another can include every pitch in between those notes. Being analog makes music and jazz best suited to the human body and human spirit.

Jazz music has managed to find it’s way into nearly every corner of the human experience. Along the way, it gathered for itself a myriad of stories and perceptions. Many, like tarnished silverware, are dark and depressing. Yet as the definition above shows, jazz is quite the opposite. It is time to de-tarnish jazz and learn what it really is and to make it our life. It can deepen our humanity and free us from the technojungle that surrounds us.

Flappers doing the Charleston dance.

While jazz music emerged in the late 1800s, the jazz lifestyle was born during the 1920s Jazz Age. It was a post war era that ushered in great technological innovation and cultural change to a world of industry and wealth. Until this era, most children would have a lifestyle similar to that of their parents. New innovations, such as the telephone, phonograph and records, movies, radio, popular magazines and the automobile allowed for a new culture to spread across the country. Young women adopted a rather crude lifestyle and called themselves Flappers. Toward the end of the 1920s though, women were becoming more poised, with correct speech and smarter attire, in other words more respectable.

Respectable flappers.

Jazz music followed the Mississippi on riverboats from New Orleans up north to Chicago and then East to New York. It was adopted by young people from the African-American slaves of the South. The jazz movement captured the youth who were eager to break away from the stiff Victorian lives that seemed to have trapped their parents. It was a time full of excitement and spontaneity.

Early New Orleans jazz bands used guitar and string bass instead of louder banjo and tuba used for marching and recording.

The Original Dixieland Jazz Band, a white band from New Orleans that made the first jazz recording. They were issued on the Victor label.

“Fine and Mellow” with Billie “Lady Day” Holiday, considered one of the greatest female jazz singers with Lester Young, Coleman Hawkins and Gerry Mulligan and others from a 1957 CBS TV show “The Sound of Jazz.”

Louis “Satchmo” Armstrong, considered the greatest jazz musician of all time.

Jazz living got into trouble sometimes, leading its followers into drinking and riotous living during a time when the evils of drinking were being curtailed by prohibition. Jazzers were left to follow the music into private and secret night clubs, called speakeasies, run by gangsters.

Like a person of youth, the jazz lifestyle, inspired by the music, needed to do some growing up—to mature. Since jazz music has eventually gained world-wide respect as a unique art form, it is time to take a look at what the style of music can teach us about living in a world of anxiety and unrest where humanity can be buried by the demands of technology.

Jazz is a journey of intimate shared experiences, describing the world and telling stories from the perspective of, developing the authenticity and identity of, each participant. It strives to leave behind the world of stress and anxiety by transforming the moment with peace and harmony. Jazz is an adventure of impulsive spontaneity and self-expression with surprises at every turn. Jazzers compose, recompose and instantly invent and reinvent their life by changing their actions. As an inclusive approach to life, the jazz lifestyle can be lived anywhere by anyone.

Jazz music is about freedom and liberty from oppression allowing self-expression, usually lively, that can swing and lift the human spirit. Yet it adheres to certain structures and is true to its history and legacy. The music has gained respect and is considered the classical music of America. As a lifestyle, jazz living should be compatible with most belief systems and world views since it is a way of living and acting that has the goal of allowing people to be more human.

Jazz music insists that all participants listen and pay attention to each other and to the music, and the music brings life. It draws together in harmony the human body, mind and spirit to function as they were created. One will find that the influences on their life that dehumanize and bring stress and anxiety will become less important. A jazz life should help people to break away from the bondages of modern life and focus on the human experience and the things that God has given them.

Jazz music was born in the depths of human misery and despair. It was given to slave people with nothing and is here now to help us living in an enslaving world of technology. With a jazz lifestyle, we can protect ourselves from becoming absorbed by our machines; to keep technology from replacing humanity.

This exploration and discussion about a jazz influenced style of living needs to continue. I am not finished, this article is not complete and I welcome the input from readers.

Quotes

“I sincerely believe that jazz is the folk music of the machine age.” — Paul Whiteman, popular 1920s orchestra leader dubbed ‘The King of Jazz’ due to his orchestra having so many famous jazz musicians playing orchestrated jazz.

“There was every reason why this music sprang into being about 1915. The acceleration of the pace of living in this country, the accumulation of social forces under pressure (and long before the war, too), mechanical inventions, methods of rapid communication, all had increased tremendously in the past 100 years— notably in the past quarter century. In this country especially the rhythm of machinery, the overrapid expansion of a great country endowed with tremendous natural energies and wealth have brought about a pace and scale of living unparalleled in history. Is it any wonder that the popular music of this land should reflect these modes of living? Every other art reflects them.” — Paul Whiteman

Wynton Marsalis, considered to be one of the leading jazz performers and experts.

As long as there is democracy, there will be people wanting to play jazz because nothing else will ever so perfectly capture the democratic process in sound. Jazz means working things out musically with other people. You have to listen to other musicians and play with them even if you don’t agree with what they’re playing. It teaches you the very opposite of racism and anti-Semitism. It teaches you that the world is big enough to accommodate us all. — Wynton Marsalis

The never to be left out of jazz…

Archaic—where are we going?

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Today, I watched as somebody was attempting to access a website over the data connection on their smartphone. It was slow. Even though what he was trying to do would have been nearly unthinkable ten or twenty years ago, it was now looking archaic, particularly since someone else was getting ready to write down the website address on a piece of paper—now, that really is archaic.

Yesterday, I was sorting out some difficulties with my smartphone and computer being able to synchronize through my cloud account. This is a very useful possibility, however, my personal stuff is being stored on a server that is out there somewhere and that makes me wonder how safe it is from hackers. Probably something similar struck folks the first time they put their money in a bank.

If you have read some of my other writings or have been following my blog, you will know well that I tackle technology issues often. I think we all need to consider carefully about where the technopath is leading us. One very important question I feel we should be asking is, does it make us more human and truly improve our lives? Just about everybody I meet and talk to about technology is excited about what it can do. It is undoubtably amazing.

My purpose here is to look at what has happened in recent history, where we are, and to urge you to consider and to think. Then, I want to take a stab at extrapolating to determine where we might be going. Let me start with a few observations.

I’ll just quickly mention that my first experience with the telephone was with the one phone we had in our house and the line we shared with neighbours. It was known as a party line. I remember when the digital calculator came along. Mechanical calculators had been used for years. Many were huge and all were too big to carry around. Digital, hand-held calculators allowed people to carry them around and use them in all situations. People seemed to lose the ability to do simple addition in their heads. My parents and aunts could add rows of figures fast on paper, usually faster than I could punch the numbers into a calculator. I was among the last of high school students who were not allowed to use calculators in math classes.

I also remember life before the personal computer. The manual typewriter reigned and typesetting and graphics were produced by industry experts with special equipment. Eventually, the typewriter became electric and one day, it got a very small screen that could show a few words that had just been typed and, most importantly, allowed one to back up and make a change to what had just been typed. I’m sure you can see where that led. The personal computer debuted from Apple, invented by Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, changed the world by a huge leap.

It didn’t take long before these individual computers started to be connected together. We’ll take a jump here to mention the next major change. Many groups of connected computers existed, however, the Internet prevailed as the largest. The Internet was born during the cold war and was designed to provide a way of communicating that could not be interrupted. In other words, the Internet can’t be disconnected or destroyed. This is a characteristic we should all keep in mind. Another original segment of the Internet was used by educational, scientific and research institutions to store and share information.

There are a few other pieces to the puzzle that I should like to mention. Cameras have become digital, no longer requiring film that had to be processed before a photograph could be seen. Photography has not only become instant, but cameras have been shrinking and gaining quality. This also applies to video cameras. Most people wear a wrist watch. While the phone has morphed into a multifunctional digital computer device, I find it amazing that it is only now the wrist watch is about to be replaced. Perhaps replaced is not the correct word. Absorbed might be better. The cell phone has been absorbing many devices we use.

Here is one more and probably the most important piece of the puzzle. Our information. We are living in what has been described as ‘the information age.’ All this, the devices that have been getting absorbed, is about storing and sharing our information. As this becomes faster and easier, we find we have more of it. It is mind boggling. We need more technology to help us remember, manage, organize and use all the information we have.

Thus, here we are, most people carrying around a small device that is a computer and communicator. It is cumbersome in that, we have a very small screen to look at, a small keyboard to enter information and it often fails. Sometimes, some of us revert back to using paper in conjunction with the digital device. It is difficult for us to read large amounts of information on screen so we print it. We wear a separate device to tell time. Our pockets and our purses are filled with everything from money in the form of cash to sophisticated credit cards with computer chips in them.

I have watched as computers that used to take up entire rooms became terminals connected to a central computer, to computers that sat on or under a desk, to computers that could be held in one’s lap, to a computer/telephone/camera/multifunctional digital device that fits in one’s hand. And that, as it turns out, is beginning to look awkward, cumbersome and slow, in other words archaic.

So, where are we going?

We all love our digital devices. I like to think that we feel we can turn them off whenever we want, although this seldom happens. While they seem handy in many ways, technology always seems to find new ways to get closer to us, to infiltrate our lives even more.

My prediction, actually it is already beginning to happen, is that we may soon be looking at the ability to have our digital devices implanted in our bodies binging all the capabilities we now enjoy with our current technologies and much more, much faster and without the awkwardness and cumbersomeness we experience today. Why would somebody want to do this?

Why would somebody want to carry a telephone around with them 242/7? Why would somebody want to be able to have complex math, complicated problems and simply be able to store and access vast amounts of information without much thought? Why not have images and video display instantly in your mind? Who would not want to get rid of their wallet full of valuable information and money that can be stolen or lost? You would not need a passport. Nobody else could use your device and you could not lose it.

The world, through the Internet, is becoming a giant brain. Sometimes I see an image of a human head that looks like the Earth and has web-like lines covering the brain. As we feed it more information about us, it grows and grows smarter about us. Why would we not want to tap into this huge vastness of human experience? Why would we even need our awkward, cumbersome physical bodies?

Why would anyone really want to do this? As with most technologies, there might be some resistance at first, however, it usually does enter our lives. Online banking is one. I remember thinking I would never trust my banking to be done online. Somehow, perhaps by charges or by convenience, I have adopted online banking. The RFID chip credit card was thrust upon us without choice. There are instances where one can’t make a purchase without a credit card. Will the day arrive when the only card accepted is a chip card? Can you see where I am going with this?

In considering these issues and situations, I have wondered if a revolt by a large group might change the path we are on? Might some people withdraw from allowing deeper infiltration of technology in their lives? Could there end up being two or more groups, such as those with implants and those without? Can technology completely replace the human brain, or is the human spirt what truly make us human and what can’t be absorbed or infiltrated by technology?

There are prophecies in the Bible about the sorts of predictions I have written about here and Bible prophecies have always come true.

Poodle doodles

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As you can see my blogging efforts dropped off a bit. Is this due to the winter doldrums of no holiday break? After all, this is the longest stretch of the year without a holiday. There are efforts at hand to add a family day, but, that is met with resistance from the business community. I’m not going to let this blog entry get carried off on the topic of adding a new holiday. Daylight Savings Time started last weekend and this weekend holds the first day of Spring, thus, it seem the stretch is over. My sister, however, finds that she gets SAD in the winter, that is ‘seasonal affect disorder’ and any disorder deserves special attention in search for a cure. So it is, that we have not had Christmas together for a few years as they are always vacationing in Hawaii. In the old days, Christmas morning often included a long distance telephone call, these days, it is Skype. Now, I am getting closer to the topic of this blog entry.

It seems that Hawaii at Christmas is not enough, now they are looking for property in Palm Springs and with just over a week away on the search, I was offered the doggie sitting chore. I guess this passes through a few candidates and my turn came up. “You can stay at the house and I will stock the fridge.” My wife agreed for me to take the job, even though it would mean the longest time we have been apart in our nearly 20-year marriage.

Whew, I finally got through the preliminaries for this blog, the balance is taken from my responses to my sister’s message ‘…checking in…’:

Check out the toe nails – pretty Tessie

HI Bob,

Hope all is well and Gryphie and Tessie weren’t too much trouble this weekend Everything okay? Are you finding what you need?

Let me know if you have any mysteries or dilemmas to be solved, otherwise, hope you have fun and give them a hug for us!

Paula
🙂
PS – Very sunny here, half of Vancouver is here!

I ended up getting sick again, not as bad as before, but enough to slow me down a bit Saturday night and all of yesterday. I’m not sure yet about today. I watched curling and movies and Le Mis 25th.

The first couple of days were a bit confusing as I figured out where everything was. I had to get out to work, so I was in a rush. Tessie piddled a couple of times, once at her food dish and the next day in the upper hall. Now there is a stain, because I could not find what to use to clean it up, so I did the best I could with soap and water. If you have something, I could try to get more of the stain out. Often it is hard to get Tessie up from sleeping, so on that day, I was rushing to go to work and I woke her up, but, she just rolled around rubbing her face, so I went to get the food ready. When I went back a few minutes later, she was standing in the hall with her mess. I took them to daycare, because I was going to be gone all day. On Saturday, I watched about half an hour of one of Malcolm’s soccer games at Ambleside and then took the doggies to run in the park. Gryph got a bit muddy, so I used a towel in the garage to wipe his feet.

Patti and Malcolm came for dinner on Friday and Saturday nights, so I have been making it through quite a bit of the food you left, but, will have to buy a few things like veggies, etc. today.

Thus, things seem to be in some sort of order, or whatever. At least we are all carrying on.

B

Just out for a trot at Ambleside

Hi

Don’t worry too much about the carpet… I will get the cleaners in when I get home… (the pet stain remover is in the closet in John’s bathroom, on the floor, across from the sink)…

For future reference… Tessie needs to go out as soon as you are going to leave the room I always carry her from the bed to the front door and make sure she has a pee before she comes in for breakfast… (remember she is OLD….)

Give Gryph and Tessie lots of hugs…..

Glad you had fun with Patti and Malcolm

Made it to the dog park at Ambleside and are now back getting ready to start dinner. Tessie is snoring somewhere across the room and Gryph is sprawled out at the bottom of the stairs.

When we went out, all the neighborhood poop was collected and deposited on newspaper at the foot of the driveway. Surely I did not miss that much poop. I don’t know who it was, but, I hope they are not angry.

I guess it’s more pasta tonight, so, I should start thinking about getting that ready. A feast is a brewin’ in my mind, I think.

That is upsetting, particularly because all our immediate neighbours are away – so don’t know who it might have been, can you be extra vigilant and not let them out on their own…

Enjoy pasta! Thanks for the update….

Tessie likes the beach

Hi,

Hope everything is okay?

Just wanted to remind you to check out the contents of the Freezer in the garage and also the freezer compartment in the fridge (their are some individually wrapped cheesecakes!)

Hope the puppies are curled up next to you… don’t forget to pet and talk to them!!!

These are lazy doggies! I have had Tessie out three time this morning and I think she has yet to do her morning little business. At least she can really eat, sometimes she goes for Gryph’s food when he is not interested. She eats all the soft food she can get. I guess it gives her energy for those occasional times she gets perky and darts off down the street. Yesterday, she stood in the the garden down the street, tilted her head a bit and looked at me as if to say, “come and get me, I dare ya,” or, “you can’t get me in here now, can ya?” I’m never really sure what is going on in her head.

We made it to Ambleside again the other day and to Lighthouse Park yesterday. Got back into the car just as the rain started. We were sure glad about that. When we were at Ambleside, we stopped to visit and the next thing I knew Tessie was high tailin’ it down the sea wall, back in the direction we had just come, trotting along side another fellow with exactly the same orange jacket as mine. What are the chances of that, only Tessie could find such an opportunity to get confused. I thought she would never stop and they were long gone so fast, I could hardly believe it! Gryphon goes to get muddy, Tessie just does her own thing, whatever that is and wherever she is. What a scallywag.

What time are you back on Saturday?

Oh well, it’s a dog’s life.

Gryphon likes the beach too!

Ha ha!
Sounds like you are learning all of Helen Keller’s tricks… She really can’t see or hear, but if she wanders off, try sending Gryphon to go get her you have to make it sound like a fun game)

Back late Friday night, I will email you the exact time

Thanks for update and have fun!

Tessie enjoys the scenery

I don’t completely buy what she is selling, I think she is more with it than she leads us to think. She just likes to be a rascal, a real handful at times. Sleeps all morning, won’t go out, makes me nervous that she might have another accident (see she sensitized me with fear by having two piddles already), gets out finally, then follows me around until we go out to the car for a walk, takes off down the street to poop in someone’s garden, gets back in the house, because I left the door open so I could get my stuff and set the alarm, won’t come back out, wants to play chase, I have to get the leash, finally we get to Ambleside and she runs everywhere, before pooping more and then deciding to settle down. Gryphon gets fed up with all the miss focused attention and decides to try an escape over the bank into the neighbor’s yard.

OLD, my foot, she still has lots of puppy in her and plenty of tricks up her paw sleeve.

Oh ya, I forgot, Gryphon is acting up too. On the way back to the car at Ambleside, I had them go by way of the beach, so that running on sand and gravel might clean some of the mud off his feet. He gets wrapped up with a gang of dogs on the beach, wades in the water (OK that helped wash his feet) and tried to drink the ocean. Then he saw a lady with one of those flinger thingies, throwing a ball for another dog, yup, Gryph stole the ball, found that it was squeaky, decided to keep it and take it back home in the car. The other dogs just looked wondering, ‘who is this snob stealing our ball?’ Everyone tried to get it from him and, of course, this was just more fun than he could think of by himself, then I got stern with him, he stopped, I grabbed him by the collar and another lady got the ball from him. Humf, no manners! The both of them!

Now give back that ball!

Ha ha ha Rodney Fangerfeild, you have to make them respect you!

 

 

 

A bit more…

 

 

Well! I decided that we really needed to get to the Capilano River Regional Park where I used to walk Kyla. I was able to park in the first small parking lot, where I always used to park. I hoped the doggies would be alright with the short walk along the path next to the road, there is a concrete barrier. Gryph seemed to know exactly where to go and jumped over the log into my favorite part of the park. I assisted Tessie and then we were there. What a place!! I sure have missed it. A few deep breaths and we were all invigorated.

So, we followed some paths on a slow stroll so as to let the pooches explore everything they could. So relaxing.

Then, it happened. I heard a voice asking me where the path leads. This lady had two black Irish-doodles (Irish Setter Poodle mix). Well, you never saw such fun. Gryphon ran and chased, and just played, jumping over logs and everything in the rainforest–a pretty rugged place. Tessie watched to make sure the games were safe, ref-ing as best she could. Gryph sure got tuckered. I promised we would go back tomorrow and both agreed it would be a great idea.