A Clean Bill of Health

Jazz underwent its annual physical last week. The 600-plus doctors who converged on the Sheraton-Universal Hotel--record producers, musicians, media types, managers--pronounced the patient generally healthy but in need of further treatment.

During four days and nights of panel sessions, workshops, seminars and live music, the seventh annual JazzTimes Convention (the first to be held in Los Angeles) more time was devoted to lighting candles than to cursing any perceptible darkness. An underlying theme was the existence of two seemingly irreconcilable sets of values, those of the artist and the businessman.

In the keynote address by Ricky Schultz, vice president for jazz at MCA Records, we heard the predictable cliches about the rise of jazz from brothel to officially acknowledged “national treasure” (as inserted in the Congressional Record by Rep. John Conyers and Sen. Alan Cranston). Endlessly repeated was a reference to “the ties that bind us,” as if all those present had an unbreakable bond.

The truth is that for all the ties that bind us there are fissions that split us. Just as the values of an auctioneer at Sotheby’s are not those of the painters whose works he is selling, by the same token the values of a businessman trying to sell records, or gain a rating for his radio or TV show, are too often at odds with those of the artist who created the music.

Stan Getz, this year’s guest of honor, put it succinctly during an hour of very frank reminiscences about his career. Asked about his relationship with the recording industry, he said: “We made records as documents, not as ‘product.’ ” The remark drew a burst of applause.

George Butler, vice president for jazz at CBS Records, in his “State of Jazz Update” report, made several enlightening points that left room for optimism. According to statistics released by the National Assn. of Record Manufacturers, he said, the jazz world’s piece of the revenue pie rose from 3.7% ($163 million) in 1985 to 8% ($352 million) in 1986; figures for 1987 are expected to show another rise.

As Butler and others made clear; the baby boomers represent a vast potential audience among those who, tiring of rock and fusion, are turning in increasing numbers to acoustic jazz. With a growing number of jazz artists in residence at leading universities such as Harvard, academia also is playing a significant role.

Bill McFarlin, executive director of the National Assn. of Jazz Educators, offered powerful evidence of the importance of that organization, which now has 6,000 members, mainly college and high school teachers and students.

A no-less optimistic speaker was Lee Luckett, representing the American Federation of Jazz Societies (local organizations of fans, many of them middle aged and financially upscale). A recent concert organized by the AFJS drew 25,000 in Savannah, Ga.

Corporate sponsorship also is helping: recently a major series of concerts and seminars at the University of Idaho was underwritten by Chevron. Ironically, much of the sponsorship of jazz events during the past decade has involved products harmful, or legally taboo, to part of the jazz audience: cigarettes and liquor.

Ursula Smith, representing the California Arts Council, reported on a current state-operated program to give support to jazz concerts at non-commercial venues. But, as a member of the audience reminded us, the United States does not support jazz at the federal level: U.S. jazzmen working in several European countries are surprised to learn that their visits are being funded by the local government. “In terms of support for the arts,” we were told, “the U.S. is a Third World country.”

A topic that came up at several of the panel discussions was the value of the word jazz. Is it still thought of in derogatory terms? Or does it now, at long last, have a useful connotation? The latter hypothesis was the more convincing. Jazz today has become, in some circles, indicative of all that is upscale, classy, hip, trendy, cool, elegant; why else would a new perfume have been christened Jazz? Why would musicians like Joe Williams and Henry Threadgill be plastered across the back pages of major magazines endorsing their allegedly preferred potions?

Why, for that matter, are more and more rock musicians hiring jazzmen--Stan Getz on a Huey Lewis album, Branford Marsalis and others on tour with Sting? The motive behind this trend is obvious: the sound of jazz has an increasing appeal for the rock world’s purveyors and listeners.

Jazz is no longer the dirty word it was for seven decades. Record companies are jumping on the bandwagon, not only with countless new releases, but with CD reissues of just about every jazz classic back to the 1920s. (Compact discs now account for most of these sales domestically, though during a panel devoted to the popularity of jazz in Japan it was revealed that the proportion of CD to LP sales is far higher there, close to 90% of the market,)

There are, however, pockets of resistance. Pat Williams, the composer who moderated a panel on jazz in the movies and television, told the story of his attempt to persuade a producer to use Joe Williams as singer of the closing theme in his score to the film “All of Me.” The first reaction was: “Joe Williams? Who’s he?”

Later came a nervous question about the score: “It’s not jazz, is it?” Pat Williams has learned that as long as nobody in the studio realizes jazz is being used, it can be employed without objections. The old-line Hollywood studio mentality is among the last holdouts equating “jazz” with “uncommercial.”

It is partly in order to counteract situations like this that JazzTimes publisher Ira Sabin and other speakers stressed the need for an umbrella national trade association for jazz, to deal with the problems it still has to face both at the creative and sales levels.

Will such an organization come to exist? Noting that similar ideas had been advanced at earlier conventions, Orrin Keepnews, the veteran record producer, observed: “It’s great to hear all these helpful ideas, but we have to maintain a healthy cynicism. We must translate words into action.”

Leaving the hall after the final session, one had the impression that allowing for this modicum of skepticism, the willingness of so many concerned citizens to attend an event such as the convention was a healthy sign. Perhaps at long last a National Trade Assn. will come into being and develop into as strong a power base as is the Country Music Assn. in that area. Perhaps jazz, after all its roller coaster rides through the years, will ultimately prevail on a note of triumph.