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Let me play devil's advocate for a second.

At the end isn't it just a matter of taste ?

I mean I love SC music, but I think also that people should be entitled not to like it. That doesn't necessarily mean that they are stiff or rigid. Man, there is so much music out there. It is not often that people will agree on music taste.

For that matter, even people (like in this forum) who like SC, do not like it the same way or for the same reasons, or do not necessary like the same things in his music.

The problem I have with music critics in general is that they do not talk enough about the music itself. I mean by that the compositional or archetectural aspects of the music(which is arguably the stuff the musician will spend most of their time on). Most of the time like in Allmusic or Allaboutjazz the critic just display their own subjective point of view, while there are some objective elements they could talk about.

In classical music composers will get high praise for the complexity or richness of their compositions, even if the music itself is so unaccessible (example Pierre Boulez),. In jazz we are still in the 'judging the feeling' or the 'how much groove' or 'how much swing' mode. Which is really regrettable.

Very few critics could tell you objectively what makes SC saxophone playing different from , lets say Chris Potter's (In this case I'm talking about articulation, choice of intervals, tone, etc not compositions). I remember catching by chance Don Byron on the radio about Eric Dolphy choice of interval, showing that there are some hidden gems in the way each musician is improvising.

I'm surprised there is no blog talking about these kind of things... may be for lack of interest.

P.S: By the way congratulation to the French and Italians for making it to the WC final !

Most of the compositional or architectural aspects of the music are not very interesting for me because I don’t understand them. It is a bit interesting for me to read that Steve Coleman arranged the tracks of “Weaving Symbolics” according to the numerical proportions of the golden mean. But things like this (also to know which odd meters etc.) are not really important for me.

I had a discussion with a guitarist in a German Jazz forum about Steve Coleman’s music. I recommended some tracks of those CDs which can be downloaded from Coleman’s homepage. The guitarist could quickly check out the meters, chords etc. He was really good! But he didn’t really like Coleman’s music. He loves the music of Joe Pass, Pat Metheny, Alan Holsworth etc. Over and over I noticed that he couldn’t understand Coleman’s music in his SENSATION. He didn’t feel it right though he understood the objective elements so well.

MY problem with Jazz critics is that they do not say that their judgement is completely subjective. They pretend to be objective. It would be o.k. if one says: “I can't do anything with this music”. But he says that the music isn’t o.k.
Moreover critics often evidently don’t deal with the subject intensively enough. I think they have too little time for writing … To do this job well seems to be difficult.

>> In classical music composers will get high praise for the complexity or richness of their compositions, even if the music itself is so unaccessible (example Pierre Boulez). In jazz we are still in the 'judging the feeling' or the 'how much groove' or 'how much swing' mode. Which is really regrettable. <<

Maybe there is a difference between USA and Europe: I guess that in Europe there is a (little) audience which also likes quite abstract music, music like so called “Free Jazz” etc. But this preference doesn’t necessarily include a feeling for Coleman’s music. Quite the contrary: these people tend to have no feeling for dance. – I think both sides have to come together: A sense of complexity and richness IN the feeling for dance, groove, swing etc.. I think it is necessary to get a FEELING for the complexity in rhythms – for example like in Afro-Cuban Rumba-music. That’s very uncommon in “western” music.

I never liked a composition primarily because of its complexity. I'm not a musician either (though I plan to pick up an instrument soon just to understand all this stuff better). And my first contact with SC music-- Tao of Mad Phat-- was immediate, at what you called the "Feeling" level.

Nonetheless when I read about how the music is built, it just gave it another dimension to it.

Just like first noticing the beauty of the Egyptian Pyramids, and then learning that the people who built them followed some very precise mathematical principle. It just give them another dimension.

The sound can be beautiful and so are the concepts behind it. I appreciate both aspects. I've found that often Jazz fans tend to emphasize only the former.

>> The sound can be beautiful and so are the concepts behind it. I appreciate both aspects. <<

Yes, that’s also my opinion. I guess our views are rather similar but we frequently point out different aspects – coming from those things which we consider self-evident. Maybe primarily those things are different.

I think that Zeruyo’s aspect is also quite important: Many musicians adhere to Jazz-tradition rather closely. Many musicians try new combinations with other styles but don’t reach the fascinating level of the best of Jazz. I think: At all times there were only a few musicians who could reach that in their own style. From my point of view Steve Coleman is one of these masters in Jazz history. - But I guess that also those who keep on dealing with the tradition are necessary.

I have to leave for some days Crying or Very sad

and I look forward to coming back.

Kind regards
Manfred