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2 JAZZ
and said, "Oh Mr, Waller, do explain to me: what is rhythm?" To which Tats' answered, "Lady, if you gotta ask what it is, you ain't got it."
'Fats5 Waller was partly right. Much of the best jazz is a direct and natural expression of human feeling and experience. If you go gumming it up with theory and 'rules', the essential spirit of jazz goes flying out of the window.
But it takes all sorts to make a world. Some lucky people—the Fats Wallers and Louis Armstrongs of this world—are born so full of jazz that it spills out of them. Others have a little jazz in them—and a strong yearning to achieve a lot more. Some will never be much good at jazz anyway—but they get a great kick out of trying. Why shouldn't there be room for people of all three kinds?
There's another aspect—that of professional jealousy. Many jazz musicians of great natural talent got precious little out of life apart from their jazz. Jazz musicians tend to be more liable than other professions to die early deaths from drink, drugs, women or overwork. Often their natural jazz genius is the one solid asset they have; and sometimes they resent the idea that any ordinary mortal could work to acquire what heaven has bestowed on them free. Try suggesting to a rabid Trades Union bricklayer that any ordinary mortal who really gave his mind to it could probably pick up bricklaying in half the statutory time—and probably do it faster. You'll mQQt the same kind of resentment. |
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