So, this is new: I think I might like jazz. This is not to say that I'm about to scour the record store for jazz classics anytime soon, but I get it, I think I get jazz.
I used to think that people claiming to like jazz were full of it, that they were putting up a front in order to come over as sophisticated because, based on what I've been exposed to, jazz is unintelligible, it's boring. This view changed on one Friday evening during which I got to see a live jazz performance held behind a shopping mall, and during which I figured out what to look out for in jazz.
The ensemble was made up of five players: a percussionist (compact congas + egg shakers), a guitarist, a drummer, a bassist, and a keyboardist (w/ keytar). They appeared to be playing in disarray, one disconnected from the other, but out of this whirling chaos emerged a column of music swaying this way and that as a single coherent vortex.
From what I could discern, the whole thing starts and ends with the drummer: he's the cue-giver, everybody else follows, including the bass player, who's the boss, apparently, the conductor who decides whose turn it is to solo.
Very cool. \m/
