Confession: I like SMOOTH JAZZ

This is going to upset my progressive rock and jazz-loving friends, but I have to admit that, at age 62, I’m starting to listen to and better appreciate smooth jazz. This is not unprecedented for me; in the mid-to-late 1970s I was firmly a “Disco Sucks” kind of guy (though I secretly enjoyed the Saturday Night Fever album), whereas a number of years ago, disco became nostalgic enough to tug at me emotionally. It might never have been my favorite genre of music, but it was an unavoidable part of the soundtrack of my youth. As such, I took pleasure in listening to songs like “Heaven Knows” by Donna Summer, “If I Can’t Have You” by Yvonne Elliman, and just about anything by KC and the Sunshine Band – and I still do.

The turn towards smooth jazz has been a lot more fraught, though. I got into progressive rock when I was about 16 and when I got to college I was introduced to jazz and jazz fusion. A key point of connection for me was seeing that Chick Corea appeared on two albums that I was digging at the time: Miles Davis’ In a Silent Way and Return to Forever’s Romantic Warrior. The latter in particular seemed just a short stone’s toss from being prog. The electronic instruments, long and complex compositions, virtuosic soloing, and cool album cover art aligned it more with Yes and Emerson, Lake & Palmer than traditional jazz. But then In a Silent Way wasn’t trad either, and it certainly crawled up the crack of conservative jazz critics like an old pair of underwear.

Excited by these discoveries, I ventured out in all directions, buying albums from fusion groups like Weather Report and Mahavishnu Orchestra, and jazz greats like John Coltrane and Charles Mingus. After college, I started a progressive rock newsletter but ended it after three or four years because I wanted to explore jazz more. Hell, I realized, I could spend the rest of my life just going through all of Miles Davis’ works and phases, and that would be a life well spent. But I wanted to know more. I learned about free jazz and bought albums of completely improvised music that seemed to lack any sense of melody or time. I heard ferocious wailing and bleating from musicians like Peter Brötzmann (I saw him in concert once and feared his head would explode, he was blowing so hard) but also more impressionistic “out” works like Marion Brown’s Afternoon of a Georgia Faun (Chick Corea again).

Free jazz was never a favorite of mine but I respected the freedom and ingenuity of artists like the Art Ensemble of Chicago and Sun Ra. This, like prog, was music to pay attention to, music that challenged your senses – and even your sense of what is and is not music. So when smooth jazz came to my attention in the 1970s and 1980s it was not something I was drawn to except when – as with George Benson’s “Breezin’” and Chuck Mangione’s “Feel So Good” – it was presented to radio listeners as a pop instrumental. I recall hearing Spyro Gyra’s “Morning Dance” played under college football scores on local television news programs. When Bill Withers’ “Just the Two of Us” came on the radio, we got the three-and-a-half-minute hit single version, not the seven-and-a-half-minute version with Grover Washington, Jr. playing his lyrical sax during the extended instrumental break.

I guess my “Smooth Jazz Sucks” phase came to a head in the late 1980s and 1990s. I was then even differentiating Pat Metheny’s “good” albums from his more commercially successful “smooth” ones (largely, the Geffen Records-era Pat Metheny Group albums). At the time I had a roommate who was obsessed with David Sanborn. I owned a couple of Tom Scott albums but they weren’t smooth enough for him, I guess. I did, however, stumble upon a 1975 album by saxophonist John Klemmer called Touch that was definitely smooth jazz – yet I liked it because for years it was also my go-to sex album as it was so sultry and sensual. Of course, it was very popular to hate on Kenny G and I was happy to jump on that bandwagon (with, famously, Metheny himself).

For years after, I didn’t even think about smooth jazz. You’d hear it in shopping malls and elevators but otherwise it was easy enough to avoid. Occasionally, I’d hear of something that startled me, as when I realized that smooth trumpeter Chris Botti had also played with Bill Bruford and Tony Levin from King Crimson. But it was not unknown to me that some very talented musicians would move into the mainstream, where the money and fame were.

In the last few years, though, I’ve been really enjoying soul and R&B from the 1970s. I always dug that music, especially the Thom Bell/Gamble and Huff “Philly Soul” productions, but as a drummer I was noticing for the first time how infrequently those old-school timekeepers used ride or crash cymbals. They were almost always on the hi hat, never feeling the rock and roll impulse to accentuate the end of every line or verse with a cymbal crash. I decided it was a practice worth emulating, and I would sometimes just take the cymbals from my kit to avoid temptation. Additionally, these drummers strongly emphasized the snare as opposed to rolling across a rack of tom toms. I thought it was all very cool: less is more.

Then I happened to hear some smooth jazz again. It was a cable TV music channel devoted to the genre. I was wanting to take a nap and was too lazy to pick out an album so instead I decided this would put me to sleep. I was wrong. I realized that just as classic jazz fusion music was a blend of jazz and rock, smooth jazz was a blend of jazz and R&B. The same austere rhythms, rich melodies, and sexy sounds that I like in pop and R&B were present in smooth jazz. I started to listen to the channel more frequently so I could hear different artists. Yes, it all pretty much sounds the same, but that is also true of Sade albums and I have no shame in admitting that I love Sade.

Of course, there’s nothing in smooth jazz that approximates the passion and skill of Coltrane’s A Love Supreme or the innovation of Davis’ Bitches Brew, but the music I choose to listen to has a lot to do with the mood I’m in – or want to be in. I don’t always want to be challenged aurally, to hear a skronking saxophone or improvised music with no tonal center. Sometimes I just want something nice, something akin to a musical hug. Even if it’s just background music while cooking, cleaning, fucking, or sleeping. It’s not that smooth jazz artists aren’t talented, it’s just that they’re most comfortable coloring within the lines.

And that’s fine. Art doesn’t have to be pretty to be good art, and it doesn’t have to be ugly, either. There’s room for both. Same with music. I can listen to and thoroughly enjoy both James Taylor and Black Sabbath – ditto for both Kirk Whalum and Eric Dolphy. So I’m out now. I’ve admitted to liking disco and smooth jazz. What’s left? Modern country? No thanks, that’s still a bridge too far for me. But I’d take Merle Haggard records with me to a desert island. And John Klemmer’s Touch, in case I find someone on that island who wants to have sex with me.