Jazz - A Film By Ken Burns

Rating:
Summary: fascinating but incomplete
Review: This was a great but flawed documentary. The primary person being interviewed throughout the documentary is Wynton Marsalis. Strangely enough, according to this documentary Marsalis (or one of his former sidemen) are the only jazz artists to emerge in the last thirty years worth mentioning in any detail as doing anything significant in jazz. Apparently the great fusion pioneers like Chick Corea, Pat Metheny, Weather Report, Michael Brecker are of no significance. Even more traditional jazz artists like Freddie Hubbard and McCoy Tyner get no mention at all. And sorry Arturro Sandoval. Cuban jazz doesn't count either. And apparently big band died after the forties. All the progressive big band sounds of the seventies from Toshiko Akiyoshi and Stan Kenton don't even get a whisper. And sorry Dianne Krall. If you weren't a side man for Ellington or Marsalis, your not in the club either despite the significant popular appeal you are gaining for the art form. I respect and admire Wynton Marsalis but I don't consider him the last word on Jazz history. Obviously Ken Burns does. I still recommend this film however despite its bias if you are interested in music and American history. Just don't expect too much from it on the history of jazz past 1960.