# How do people view jazz?
**URL:** https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/t/how-do-people-view-jazz/85433
**Category:** Art, Music, and Entertainment
**Created:** [May 18, 2026, 2:33pm UTC](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/t/how-do-people-view-jazz/85433 "2026-05-18T14:33:34Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@KnoxsterLobster](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/u/KnoxsterLobster)
#### Post date: [May 18, 2026, 2:33pm UTC](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/t/how-do-people-view-jazz/85433/1 "2026-05-18T14:33:34Z")
I am a jazz musician. Not that I gig professionally or get paid, but I spend hours daily just playing music. I love jazz with my whole heart and feel it is one of the best forms of artistic expression, which is why misrepresentation of jazz pains me so much. To all of you on here, what is jazz to you?
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### Author:  [@Flannel\_Jesus](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/u/Flannel_Jesus)
#### Post date: [May 18, 2026, 2:34pm UTC](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/t/how-do-people-view-jazz/85433/2 "2026-05-18T14:34:54Z")
I typically hear it rather than see it.
Jokes aside, I don’t listen to much traditional jazz (though I don’t dislike it when it’s on, usually). I’m drawn to jazz-influenced hip hop beats, like the album Cosmogramma by Flying Lotus
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### Author:  [@KnoxsterLobster](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/u/KnoxsterLobster)
#### Post date: [May 18, 2026, 2:37pm UTC](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/t/how-do-people-view-jazz/85433/3 "2026-05-18T14:37:44Z")
Always nice to hear about others’ music taste, but I’m looking for more opinionated stuff.
What would you classify as ‘traditional jazz’?
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### Author:  [@Flannel\_Jesus](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/u/Flannel_Jesus)
#### Post date: [May 18, 2026, 2:41pm UTC](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/t/how-do-people-view-jazz/85433/4 "2026-05-18T14:41:30Z")
> [@KnoxsterLobster](#):
>
> but I’m looking for more opinionated stuff.
Isn’t musical taste opinionated?
Traditional jazz I guess is stuff like this:
https://open.spotify.com/embed/track/3qYjbnBAnYp9P6UuiS03xs?si=lbN9CaZjTLGUbWnB80KNaw&utm_source=oembed
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### Author:  [@KnoxsterLobster](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/u/KnoxsterLobster)
#### Post date: [May 18, 2026, 2:43pm UTC](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/t/how-do-people-view-jazz/85433/5 "2026-05-18T14:43:06Z")
Music taste is opinionated but instead of making connections to different topics, I want to hear your opinion on jazz itself, even if it’s '‘I don’t really listen to it’.
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### Author:  [@Flannel\_Jesus](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/u/Flannel_Jesus)
#### Post date: [May 18, 2026, 2:58pm UTC](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/t/how-do-people-view-jazz/85433/6 "2026-05-18T14:58:35Z")
I’m curious about what you said in your op, about misrepresentations of jazz paining you. What exactly are you talking about here? Can you give an example of a misrepresentation that would pain you?
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### Author:  [@pseudoai](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/u/pseudoai)
#### Post date: [May 18, 2026, 4:42pm UTC](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/t/how-do-people-view-jazz/85433/7 "2026-05-18T16:42:10Z")
Musical circle-wanking that doesn’t sound very displeasant
Tonally simplistic yet structurally complex uncatchy audio.
Like a selection of books that are about how to write books.
Like a building with a lot of very weirdly shaped rooms, mostly impossible to be used in normal ways, but a coherent construction (and even worthy of applause) for architects alone… the decorations of each room are very gauche - so, like **musical backrooms**.
Tho, there is jazz that is very easy to listen to, and that strips what is most particular about it (the weirdness), and focuses on the corny.
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### Author:  [@KnoxsterLobster](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/u/KnoxsterLobster)
#### Post date: [May 18, 2026, 5:02pm UTC](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/t/how-do-people-view-jazz/85433/8 "2026-05-18T17:02:20Z")
Pain may be a slight overstatement, but many people just have a skewed understanding of jazz. Many people associate jazz with just ‘sounding bad’ by taking Thelonious Monk’s ‘There are no wrong notes in Jazz’ out of context; Thelonious Monk mainly was just talking about using tension and release in music, not consistently sounding bad. Many people don’t understand the variety of jazz either; Jazz essentially has no common features across all sub-genres, but people often create a schema, often smooth jazz or neo-bop, and generalize that to jazz as a whole.
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### Author:  [@Flannel\_Jesus](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/u/Flannel_Jesus)
#### Post date: [May 18, 2026, 5:04pm UTC](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/t/how-do-people-view-jazz/85433/9 "2026-05-18T17:04:47Z")
> [@KnoxsterLobster](#):
>
> but people often create a schema, often smooth jazz or neo-bop, and generalize that to jazz as a whole
i’m probably a little bit guilty of that myself. I’m definitely unaware of the myriad forms jazz takes. I have two things i think of with jazz: stereotypical jazzy basslines (which you can find in a lot of non-traditional jazz influenced stuff like that Flying Lotus album I mentioned earlier") and jazzy saxophone. When I was looking it up earlier, I found that jazz includes a whole bunch of soft piano stuff I wouldn’t have necessarily labeled “jazz” before.
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### Author:  [@promethean75](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/u/promethean75)
#### Post date: [May 18, 2026, 5:05pm UTC](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/t/how-do-people-view-jazz/85433/10 "2026-05-18T17:05:57Z")
From a chair at a cocktail table in Vegas? I dunno, what’s the answer.
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### Author:  [@KnoxsterLobster](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/u/KnoxsterLobster)
#### Post date: [May 18, 2026, 5:09pm UTC](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/t/how-do-people-view-jazz/85433/11 "2026-05-18T17:09:07Z")
I feel like a lot of this again comes from misunderstanding. I do see where you’re coming from with the ‘circle-wank’ stuff, but that’s almost always situational; If I’m playing with a bunch of other cats, I might do some out-there stuff, but performing for a crowd is an entirely different story. I only play for jazz musicians when playing for jazz musicians.
I would say simplistic and uncatchy are both untrue. Listen to something like ‘Giant Steps’ or Jesus Molina’s ‘Night in Tunisia’, you’ll definitely see the complexity.
Contrarily, listen to ‘Stompin at the Savoy’, a standard version of ‘Cherokee’, or ‘There Will Never be Another You’, and you’ll likely notice the catchy-ness .
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### Author:  [@Flannel\_Jesus](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/u/Flannel_Jesus)
#### Post date: [May 18, 2026, 5:23pm UTC](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/t/how-do-people-view-jazz/85433/12 "2026-05-18T17:23:35Z")
If you have Spotify, would you do something really cool? Please make a playlist of jazz that you think represents a good variety of the forms jazz can take. Start the playlist with the most stereotypical jazz and then add stuff that goes further and further from that stereotype. I want to get a taste of what you think jazz is, how jazz sounds to you.
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### Author:  [@KnoxsterLobster](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/u/KnoxsterLobster)
#### Post date: [May 18, 2026, 5:31pm UTC](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/t/how-do-people-view-jazz/85433/13 "2026-05-18T17:31:57Z")
I can definitely provide; I’ll probably be able to get it done today or tomorrow.
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### Author:  [@pseudoai](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/u/pseudoai)
#### Post date: [May 18, 2026, 5:32pm UTC](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/t/how-do-people-view-jazz/85433/14 "2026-05-18T17:32:10Z")
Giant Steps is very uncatchy. Compare it to “I’m blue” by Eiffel 65 for something catchy, or “Hey Bo Diddley”.
The fact that you glossed over that it is “tonally” simplistic tells more about it that anything else. It seems the complexity of tone -how instruments sound apart from the choice of notes and figures- escapes you. Jazz has very very simplistic tone, even when delving into electronica. To quote Lars Ulrich, it sounds “stock”. Like forever using the setting “Piano 1” in a keyboard. It lacks tonal depth and complexity. Compare what you referred to with some growly rock like, say Rama Lama Fa Fa Fa by MC5, or even Bangarang by Skrillex.
Maybe it just happens that tonal complexity is something difficult for you to appreciate.
Anyway, you asked how people VIEW jazz, not how jazz is. Two very different things. I didn’t write up on the snobbery aspect even
P.S.: I got your examples reversed, but then you see that the ‘catchy’ jazz things are gauche. Do you think giant steps is tonally interesting? The other song certainly isn’t.
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### Author:  [@promethean75](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/u/promethean75)
#### Post date: [May 18, 2026, 5:58pm UTC](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/t/how-do-people-view-jazz/85433/15 "2026-05-18T17:58:59Z")
You need to listen to Jaco do Giant Steps.
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### Author:  [@KnoxsterLobster](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/u/KnoxsterLobster)
#### Post date: [May 18, 2026, 5:59pm UTC](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/t/how-do-people-view-jazz/85433/16 "2026-05-18T17:59:40Z")
To say that jazz is tonally simplistic is more baseless than claiming it’s tonally simplistic. Listen to ‘Such Sweet Thunder’, listen to the way the muted brass sounds, the sharp sounds of the straight mutes buzzing, and listen to the direct sound of the saxes. Then listen to ‘Stardust’, notice the saxes’ sound, the subtone, notice how sweet the flugel sounds, and how that contrasts to the sharp, muted trumpets from before. Then listen to the US Air Force’s ‘Take the A Train’, their ‘Cherokee’, their ‘Black Nile’, ect. The brass usually remain unmuted, the brass sing, without harshness, just power with direction, the saxes have no subtones and play with full sounds. These all have distinct, charactaristic sounds that differ on a fundamental level.
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### Author:  [@pseudoai](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/u/pseudoai)
#### Post date: [May 18, 2026, 6:15pm UTC](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/t/how-do-people-view-jazz/85433/17 "2026-05-18T18:15:38Z")
Something is more than the same thing?
Brass has quite a very simple tone structure and evolution. Muting the brass only selectively removes the top of overtones, not much more than that. The run of the mill metal band nearest to you whose only audience is their family has more tonal complexity than anything you named so far. So, keep in mind that maybe you can’t understand what you think is ‘harsh’ tones (it’s just complex), and if you choose to remove that complexity, that is lacking.
What you think is ‘harsh’ has structure inside - it’s not just noise. Those are things you can understand. Yeah, different instruments have differences, but that differences are not much to begin with. Given that recorded music is the norm since about 100 years, and we can since then capture and modify the sound (and not just what can be written down), not focusing on that makes mostly no sense.
ANYWAY, keep in mind that you asked how people VIEW jazz. Your examples are already taken into account
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### Author:  [@Socrates](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/u/Socrates)
#### Post date: [May 18, 2026, 9:26pm UTC](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/t/how-do-people-view-jazz/85433/18 "2026-05-18T21:26:12Z")
My view of it is that it was the only modern equivalent to classical music in terms of complexity and fullness, but it died about 50 years ago.
But it’s there for ever.
If you are a jazz musician, first of all, I congratulate you on your taste. Secondly, though, you will need to find the entry point for life to it, so it isn’t a garage band hobby (and sounds like it) or old copies. Davis and Coltrane both did this, but died.
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### Author:  [@Socrates](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/u/Socrates)
#### Post date: [May 18, 2026, 9:27pm UTC](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/t/how-do-people-view-jazz/85433/19 "2026-05-18T21:27:38Z")
Monk didn’t have to, he was just perennially fresh, but also died.
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### Author:  [@Socrates](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/u/Socrates)
#### Post date: [May 18, 2026, 9:28pm UTC](https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/t/how-do-people-view-jazz/85433/20 "2026-05-18T21:28:45Z")
Listen to Acension 100 times and don’t come out of the studio until you’ve recorded something that hurts.
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