Jazz has been around since the early 20th century, a genre that blossomed out of the Harlem Renaissance featuring improvisation, delicate attention to dynamics and brilliant technicality from its performers. Artists such as Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington and John Coltrane being example of this first wave of jazz musicians that influenced musicians around the world. Jazz remained popular with the fans who loved it when the records were foist coming out, but by the 60’s popular music began to change drastically with the introduction of Rock and Roll and Motown into the mainstream. While the mainstream may have shifted, jazz still had a strong influence in many aspects of these genres. The tradition of musicians like Duke Ellington were being carried on by performers such as Stevie Wonder and Herbie Hancock who energized a whole new generation of jazz inspired music. A lot of the protest music from the 60’s also had its influence from jazz, with artists like Marvin Gaye.
In the 70’s, funk began to emerge as a new form of improvisational music that had the off-the cuff feel that jazz is known for, with the added effects of modern guitar effects, wha pedals, and slap bass. The formation of Funk feels like an evolution of jazz due to the influence of Rock and Roll and Psychedelia in the 60s and 70s. Bands like Funkadelic and Parliament found a lot of success with their unique live shows, featuring groovy outfits and extra long jam sessions.
Jazz’s influence continues to be seen today, with albums such as Kendrick Lamar’s To Pimp A Butterfly featuring a plethora of jazz musicianship blended with modern Hip-Hop sensibilities and production techniques, illustrating how close the two genres live from one another. Jazz has even worked its way into such genres as heavy metal, much to many people’s surprise. Opeth is band that features many clean, jazz interludes between the guitar players mixed with blistering heavy metal. Many bands have found recent success playing jazz and jazz-inspired music exclusively. Badbadnotgood is a group that comes to mind when thinking about this, being a completely instrumental neo-jazz group. They recently released an album with Wu-Tang Clan’s Ghostface Killah, which features the rapper performing over the bands smooth jazz tracks, allowing the lyrics stand out while the music drives the mood. Khruangbin is another band that has found success fusing jazz with other styles such as latin, indie, and psychedelic rock.
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