The Music Thread

[ponchi101]

Marvin Gaye at #20.

[Deuce]

The real purpose of the list is simply to provoke discussion in any form, including - and perhaps especially - disagreement.
Controversy sells, people...

[ti-amie]

End of year lists are a marketing tool that almost every facet of the entertainment industry uses to drive viewers to their website(s). Still, they're fun and promote intergenerational, interracial and intercultural conversations about, in this case, music. Celia Cruz and Fela are both on the list as are singers/entertainers from cultures outside of the Western cultural milieu. Who knows, Ashkor's son might be on one of these lists in the future?

[Deuce]

I put zero value in such lists.
I heard that Celine Dion's fans are 'very upset and angry' that she's not on the list. Same with Sting's fans, Dionne Warwick's, Diana Ross's, Billy Joel's, etc., etc., etc...
It just makes me laugh. There are so many much more significant things in the world to be upset about.
This stuff is just gossip.

[JazzNU]

So Rolling Stone released its Top 200 singers of all time list. There is a sliding thing at the top that lets you start from the top.

https://www.rollingstone.com/music/musi ... 234643212/

This is egregious in some spots. Like pitifully so. It's worse because it's Rolling Stone and not like Buzzfeed or something.

In what world is Beyonce a better singer than Adele, Nina Simone, Marvin Gaye, Chaka Khan, Teddy Pendergrass, Toni Braxton and Luther freaking Vandross?!? Her music is great, but it is a joke to put her above any of these singers and quite a few others.

Mary J. Blige is egregiously high, doesn't belong on the list actually and I've loved Mary's music from Day 1, but no. Above Toni? Please!

And man I love Aaliyah's music as well, but again, ridiculously high.

James Brown also too high, like be serious. With him and Beyonce, they are very much confusing Entertainer and Singer. Both are in the conversation for the best of the best entertainers, but not singers.

[ponchi101]

...

James Brown also too high, like be serious. With him and Beyonce, they are very much confusing Entertainer and Singer. Both are in the conversation for the best of the best entertainers, but not singers.

This.

[Deuce]

I was listening to a radio show today where a music critic said that it's very likely that some omitted names - like Celine Dion, Sting, Diana Ross, etc. - were on the original 'list', but Rolling Stone decided to remove them in order to create some controversy, which would get people talking and would make people upset and therefore bring more attention to the list, and to Rolling Stone - which would, in turn, result in more money for Rolling Stone.

Gee... you think?!!?

The general public are viewed as mere pawns in a game much more often than the they seem to realize.
Sigh...

[Deuce]

[ponchi101]

Roger Waters, to me one of the great musicians of the XX century, keeps going more and more insane:
Pink Floyd co-founder Roger Waters says he has re-recorded 'The Dark Side of the Moon'

This is sort of like: we are going to REMAKE Casablanca. Wolfgang Mozart re-writes his REQUIEM. Scott Fitzgerald publishes "The REALLY Great Gatsby".

Why?

[Deuce]

Ego...
Which is a product of deep insecurity.

[ti-amie]

I listened to Samara Joy the other night. She's the young woman who got the Grammy for Jazz singing. She shouldn't have gotten that award.
She has yet to find her own voice. I hear too much of Ella, Billie, and even a bit of Carmen McRae in her interpretations. Her band is made up of her former professors from her music school so she wasn't really challenged by them either.

Does she have a great voice? Yes, but she isn't Ella winning the prize at Amateur Night at the Apollo wayyy back in the day. Give her another 5-10 years. Let her work with musicians who will push her not coddle her, and then we may indeed have one of the great female jazz singers of all time. She isn't that now.

[ponchi101]

Uhm..... lovely voice. (looked her up in YT). Compared to A LOT of other stuff out there, I will keep her.
And if you are asking her to be Ella way back, that's an extremely high bar. I found a tune called "Guess who I saw today". I can live with that.
Indeed, let's wait 5 years. If somebody writes her the right tunes, she could be something.

[ti-amie]

Uhm..... lovely voice. (looked her up in YT). Compared to A LOT of other stuff out there, I will keep her.
And if you are asking her to be Ella way back, that's an extremely high bar. I found a tune called "Guess who I saw today". I can live with that.
Indeed, let's wait 5 years. If somebody writes her the right tunes, she could be something.

I'm not throwing her in the trash I'm just saying right now she's derivative and not singing in her "own" voice. I just hope that she continues to work towards that and that the Grammy doesn't stop her from becoming the singer she can be.

I liked her interpretation of "Guess Who I Saw Today" too.

[JazzNU]

I listened to Samara Joy the other night. She's the young woman who got the Grammy for Jazz singing. She shouldn't have gotten that award.

Who would you put as the winner instead? Was it a strong field?

[ti-amie]

I listened to Samara Joy the other night. She's the young woman who got the Grammy for Jazz singing. She shouldn't have gotten that award.

Who would you put as the winner instead? Was it a strong field?

This was the field.

33. Best Jazz Vocal Album

For albums containing greater than 50% playing time of new vocal jazz recordings.

The Evening : Live At APPARATUS
The Baylor Project

Linger Awhile
Samara Joy

Fade To Black
Carmen Lundy

Fifty
The Manhattan Transfer With The WDR Funkhausorchester

Ghost Song
Cécile McLorin Salvant

The only musicians I'd heard of before are the Manhattan Transfer. I listened to Samara after she won because she's from my borough of the Bronx.

I need to clarify what I meant by saying that she shouldn't have gotten the award.

She's very young. She hasn't developed her own approach to classics or new works. My listening went from "beautiful voice" to "she's using the phrasing and style that Ella used, throwing in a bit of Billie and Carmen McRae. Like I said to ponchi give her five years or more in the real world of jazz, not the one her instructors have put her in. She's just too green despite that beautiful voice to win a Grammy right now in my opinion. I'm hoping that she'll find her own voice, her own approach, and that in another few years she will have become the singer she can be.

I hope that clears it up a bit.