Straight-ahead jazz refers to jazz music that eschews the rock music influences that began to appear in jazz during the late 1960s. Instead, performance relies on walking bass and swinging ride patterns.[1] AllMusic describes how, according to purists, jazz fusion was not "real" jazz, and straight-ahead jazz came to describe music that did not employ fusion's innovations, such as rock beats and electric instruments.[2] Tanner, Gerow and Megill trace the "straight-ahead" aesthetic back to the hard bop era, after which some musicians would continue to be guided by jazz tradition when faced with boundary-pushing innovations.[3]
By 1980, Wynton Marsalis had become widely associated with the straight-ahead concept.[2][3]
References
- ^ Belfiglio, Anthony (2008). "Chapter One: Introduction". Fundamental rhythmic characteristics of improvised straight-ahead jazz (DOC) (PhD). The University of Texas at Austin. p. 12. Retrieved 22 April 2020.
- ^ a b "Straight-Ahead Jazz". AllMusic. Retrieved 30 March 2020.
- ^ a b Tanner, Paul O. W.; Maurice Gerow; David W. Megill (1988) [1964]. "Hard Bop—Funky (circa 1954- )". Jazz (6th ed.). Dubuque, IA: William C. Brown, College Division. pp. 119–120. ISBN 0-697-03663-4.