Why are vocalists not great?

[jeremy]

ok, time to open a can of worms. Recently 'jazz fan' decided to post this:
"how about putting great groups led by players like joddrell or paul willy on weekends rather than , for the most part, weak straight-ahead singers?"
on our tagboard thing at the bennetts lane website. Normally I just delete these attempts at taking pot shots at us, but this one got me thinking.

I've noticed in the past that singers seem to get lumped into the 'non-great' musician pile, no matter how good they are, so my question is - why?

There are plenty of great vocalists out there (at least in my opinion), and to be honest i consider their voice just as interesting an instrument as anything built from brass, plastic or wood, so why the common perception of vocalists not being great? Wang ran a vocal competition last year, so they must still be relevent and the quality of the finalists was top notch.

Personally our reasoning for putting on vocalists mainly on fri/sat is because they tend to draw a wider and more general public audience, but it doesn't mean they aren't as good as anyone playing a saxophone or piano, or any other instrument, just less threatening to a non-hardcore jazz audience.

So, thoughts?

[vickijane]

Jeremy, how are you? It’s so long since I've seen you at BL! I saw that post on BL/mambo site.

This can of worms has been opened before here. I agree with most of your points. There are many reasons, I believe, including:

The experience that so many have with lazy vocalists who are not musicians

Jealousy (that even bad vocalists tend to have more attention)

Misogyny

History

Marketing of the 'sexy' torch singer as jazz

Ghastly pop singers who decide to do a 'jazz' album and then sell millions of CDs with terrible versions of their impersonations of far better singers from an earlier era.

It seems that in improvised music, more so than other styles, the vocalists cop it. (I'm still having fun with my experiment, for those following it.) But most of them can't improvise well and of those who can’t, unfortunately some of them do. I believe it is partly self inflicted, partly everything else. It will never change in your lifetime that’s certain. There are many amazing musicians whose chosen instrument is voice but that is another topic altogether.

[johnk]

Misogyny from wikipedia. had 2 look it up mite as well share it!


There are many different forms of misogyny. In its most overt expression, a misogynist will openly hate all women simply because they are female. Some sexual predators may fall into this category.
Other forms of misogyny may be more subtle. Some misogynists may simply be prejudiced against all women, or may hate women who don't fall into one or more acceptable categories. Entire cultures may be said to be misogynist if they treat women in ways that can be seen as harmful. Examples include forcing women to tend to all domestic responsibilities, demanding silence from a woman, or beating a woman regularly. Subscribers to one model, the mother/whore dichotomy, hold that women can only be "mothers" or "whores". Another variant is the Virgin/whore dichotomy--in which women who do not adhere to a saintly, impossible standard of moral purity are considering "whores"
Frequently the term misogynist is used in a looser sense as a term of derision to describe anyone who holds an unpopular or distasteful view about women as a group. A man who considers himself "a great lover of women," therefore, might somewhat paradoxically be termed a misogynist by those who consider his treatment of women sexist. Archetypes of this type of man might be Giacomo Casanova (a historical figure) or James Bond and Don Juan (fictional characters), who were both reputed for their many libertine affairs with women. While a "seducer" like Casanova or Don Juan might appear outwardly charming and to enjoy the company of women, many do not, at root, respect women or find them interesting on any higher plane than mere sex objects.
Misogyny in culture
(n.b. Several entries that follow clearly employ misogyny for ironic or satirical purposes)
• In William Shakespeare's Hamlet, Hamlet chides his mother Gertrude for her decision to marry his uncle Claudius immediately after his father's death with the infamous line: "Frailty, thy name is woman!" (I, ii, 146)
• British poet Robert Gould wrote a number of explicitly misogynistic satires in the 1680s.
• In Mozarts Magic Flute, one of Sarastro's henchmen says to him: "Ein Weib hat also dich berückt? Ein Weib tut wenig, plaudert viel" (So a woman beguiled you? A woman does little, chatters a lot).
• In the 19th century, Swedish dramatist and novelist August Strindberg had a powerful and overt misogynistic philosophy.
• Grumpy, in Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, says "All females is poison! They're full of wicked wiles!"
• Gaston from Disney's Beauty and the Beast first says that it's not right for a woman to read, then later calls Belle his "little wife" and says that Belle and he will have six or seven "strapping boys" like himself.


Rappers UTFO were sometimes labeled as misogynist; here, use of the term "skeezer" may be objectionable. Such material is rather tame in comparison to more modern recordings
• Anal Cunt, a noisecore shock band (in)famous for their intentionally offensive lyrics, often write songs with misogynist themes such as "Women: Nature's Punching Bag", "You're Pregnant, So I Kicked You In the Stomach", and "I Became a Counselor So I Could Tell Rape Victims They Asked For It".
• The heavy metal band Manowar often employ sexist lyrics, most notably in "Pleasure Slave".
• R&B group Bell Biv DeVoe famously sang, "Never trust a big butt and a smile" in their hit song "Poison".
• Some feminists considered The Rolling Stones' "Stupid Girl", "Under My Thumb", "Yesterday's Papers", and "Midnight Rambler" to be misogynistic.
• The goth-metal group Type O Negative have often produced misogyny in their songs. One line claimed, "is there no difference between women and fire? The one burns the spirit, the other the flesh!" The first album, Slow Deep and Hard, is particularly misogynist. .
• Travis Bickle in Taxi Driver quotes "I realize now how much she's just like the others, cold and distant, and many people are like that, women for sure, they're like a union."
• The comedy film How to Murder Your Wife has been criticised for misogyny.
• Rap artist Snoop Dogg has long been criticized for his misogynist lyrics, especially in the 1990s. However, he has made recent strides to distance himself from this previous negative image.
• Rapper Eminem has been labeled by some critics, including electronic musician Moby, as a misogynist. This claim generally centers around the tracks "Kill You" and "Kim" from The Marshall Mathers LP.
• Rapper Nelly has been criticised for his music video Tip Drill.
• N.W.A.'s Efil4zaggin, their last album as a group, was considered excessively misogynistic even by some fans of the gangsta rap genre.
• Final girl theory is a feminist film theory about misogyny in horror films.
• An early rumor, that continues to this day, is that Mae West was born male, and became a transsexual, a myth that is disproven by the 1900 census which lists Mary Jane West with her known family in Brooklyn, New York. The people of her time found it impossible to believe a woman could be sexually forward, or, even, sexual. Adding the fact that she was a writer, she fell too far outside the stereotype of a woman to be believed.
• Punk rock group Silver Head's song 'Misogynist' details a psychotic male's fixation with a prositute.

[tuggsey]

There is a formula at work here - you might say that vocalists bring in a larger cross section of the audience to BL - thats ok -but how many of these artists break away from the traditional singer out the front approach? The thing that distinguishes most improvisational groups from most vocal led groups is that most of the time, the singer is "backed" by the band and remains detached- thats the cabaret formula. When a singer is involved with the music at all times - (which doesnt mean singing all the time) and interacting spontaneously with the band -they are part of the group - thats a jazz formula. I think we should be honest about what constitutes a cabaret /pop artist from an improvising creative musician - scatting does not a jazz singer make....
sponteneity,musicality and musicianship, awareness, and rapport with other musicians is what counts. I guess that maybe there are instumenalists who might consider that paradigm too.

[barbara1]

Re Vicki's comment of mysogyny
From this statement, I believe that you are taking the standpoint that all vocalists are female, which in itself is innacurate.
I think that you perhaps are pigeonholing vocalists yourself (female who stands at the front of the band) which obviously does them a disservice. Can't we remove gender from this issue??
I am so sick of the argument that the musicians are the blokes in the band and the singer is the chick up the front.
There are some fantastic women instrumentalists in Australia, as there are equally amazing male vocalists.
Maybe you are just referring to BL weekend policy, in which case I think Vince Jones, amongst others, can hardly be described as a victim of mysogyny.

[tomj]

Vocalists can be great but only if their name is Aretha Franklin

[jeremy]

actually, so far this year the male/female vocalist ratio is going to the male side by far (Harry Angus in Conglomerate, Vince Jones, Martin Breeze). Granted this is a little unusual for us, but we tend to find more female vocalists asking for gigs than male ones.

and hi Vicki, sorry I didn't respond to your tagboard question, didn't see it till late last night.

[johnnymastropaulos]

Yep. It's basically jealosy.

there are a number of truly awful singers doing gigs around town (myself included) who actually GET gigs.

There are probably MORE truly awful... say.. sax players around town but they don't get any gigs.

I think this is a good thing as I find bad saxophone playing far more offensive than (even) bad scat singing.
another good thing is that bad singers often don't attempt the scat sing in the first place, where-as bad saxophone players seem to have no trouble soloing for months on end.

just because this is funny doesn't mean it's not true.

I should also point out that the attitude of singers not being "real" musicians comes from a musical culture (the jazz scene) that doesn't value melody or text to the same extent that other musical cultures do. (I"m not saying this is a bad thing, at all, but rather that with a different set of musical values it is often hard to understand what is good about something so seemingly simple like singing a song)

ALSO that the majority of Jazz tunes have INCREDIBLY STUPID LYRICS. lets not forget that.
There will never, ever, be a-noth-er YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The way you wear your hat?
those tin pan alley guys must have been hell stoned.

[ironguts]

I'm jealous of singers

Singers get more

More gigs

More money

More fame

More turns at singing

More words to say

More love

More sex

More, much more than the rest of us.

Singers are great

Just because they sing

They use words

do be do be do

Melodies

sca bip da shplong

They tell the audience when to clap for solos

hooray hooray for them as well

back to singers

Tell us a story

Make me feel nice

Yes singers are great

More for them please

[johnnymastropaulos]

ironguts said:

I'm jealous of singers

More money

More fame

More turns at singing

More words to say

More love

More sex

More, much more than the rest of us.

C;mon Irons. as if thats true. we all know that you're the hugh heffner of Melbourne.
and whats more we all appreciate sincerely your efforts at
dragging yourself away from the champagne fuelled orgy that is your life to inspire us with your heartfult poetry.

[ironguts]

you know me too well my little buddy.

[betty]

barbara1 said:

Re Vicki's comment of mysogyny
From this statement, I believe that you are taking the standpoint that all vocalists are female, which in itself is innacurate

duh!

[johnnymastropaulos]

but... one could say that all men that sing are in fact; big girls.

[march]

some singers are good: chris tanner, ben gillespie, julie 0'hara, paul williamson that eamon guy isn't bad, Gian slater, Michelle Nicolle
some are overrated: yadayadayadayadayadayada you all know who im talking about

i reckon you all know who is decent and are not so much

then again if you ask ironguts he'll tell you they're all shit

then again why do no singers sing like elliot dalgleish plays?

[shaggaz]

i have thought about this topic a bit. last year a good friend of mine (who is incidentally a great vocalist) did some weekend nights at bennetts and performed her original material (shoop be dops pretty much excluded). consequently, she had the awful experience of being hassled by some punters who laughed through her first set and then told her that the music she was performing 'wasn't jazz' and promptly left the club.

HER STUFF IS A FRIGLOAD BETTER THAN MOST WEEKEND VOCALIST SHIT