Kenny G

**robertm2000** · 05-01-2016, 09:30 AM

Kenny G - The 6th Annual John Coltrane International Jazz and Blues Festival

I know that nobody ever went broke underestimating either the intelligence or the taste of the American public, but this .... WHAT is going on??

**zephyrregent** · 05-01-2016, 09:55 AM

I wish that was a satirical site. What did Kenny G say when he rode the elevator? "This joint is really swinging!".

**MarkRhodes** · 05-01-2016, 09:57 AM

The festival is in High Point, NC. Coltrane was born in Hamlet, NC. The name is based on being (near enough) Coltrane's birthplace.

As for the lineup, they want as many people as they can get. I read that 3,000 people came to the festival a couple years ago. It probably does a lot more for High Point, NC to have Kenny G onstage than it would to have Kenny Burrell. (Mind you, I'd rather see Burrell, but I wouldn't be attending this festival in either case.)

**NoReply** · 05-01-2016, 11:59 AM

This is causing a lot of stink as it should. If you are going to name a festival for a legend who spent every breath living on the bleeding edge of creativity you have to think twice about who you book to play that festival.

**medblues** · 05-01-2016, 12:29 PM

Kenny Garrett should have him kidnapped and show up there instead, I would like the see the audience's face. After he starts playing, they would be happy they stayed.

**Stevebol** · 05-01-2016, 12:55 PM

I hate Kenny G.
I used to have some rockin' curly hair back when I had a lot more hair.
I'm jealous.

**Lazz** · 05-01-2016, 01:06 PM

I remember - circa Monty Python - when they were little but the target of ridicule but, nowadays, accountants run the world and dictate policy.

One day.......

**mr quick** · 05-01-2016, 06:09 PM

all i know about kenny g is that pat metheny really f*cking hates him

more from metheny on kenny g:

"But when Kenny G decided that it was appropriate for him to defile the music of the man who is probably the greatest jazz musician that has ever lived by spewing his lame-ass, jive, pseudo bluesy, out-of-tune, noodling, wimped out, fucked up playing all over one of the great Louis's tracks (even one of his lesser ones), he did something that I would not have imagined possible. He, in one move, through his unbelievably pretentious and calloused musical decision to embark on this most cynical of musical paths, shit all over the graves of all the musicians past and present who have risked their lives by going out there on the road for years and years developing their own music inspired by the standards of grace that Louis Armstrong brought to every single note he played over an amazing lifetime as a musician. By disrespecting Louis, his legacy and by default, everyone who has ever tried to do something positive with improvised music and what it can be, Kenny G has created a new low point in modern culture - something that we all should be totally embarrassed about - and afraid of. We ignore this, "let it slide", at our own peril."

more from this letter which was on his website in the year 2000, backed up by a NY times archive post:

http://www.jazzoasis.com/methenyonkennyg.htm

conclusion: pat metheny really f*cking hates kenny g!

**pubylakeg** · 05-01-2016, 06:41 PM

PM (on jazz) "like in Rock 'n' Roll, 95% of it really sucks".

Wow !. 95% of it !. Really ?. That's an awful lot of musicians who "really suck".

Shame.

**Vladan** · 05-01-2016, 07:01 PM

Originally Posted by pubylakeg

PM (on jazz) "like in Rock 'n' Roll, 95% of it really sucks".

Wow !. 95% of it !. Really ?. That's an awful lot of musicians who "really suck".

Shame.

I'd say his figures are conservative and optimistic.

**Stevebol** · 05-01-2016, 07:31 PM

How would shoppers in China know the store was about to close without Kenny G?

**goatrace** · 05-01-2016, 07:34 PM

Sturgeon's Law:
Ninety percent of everything is crud.

**pubylakeg** · 05-01-2016, 07:47 PM

Does that also mean 95% of Metheny's performances and recorded output "really sucks" ?

**DonEsteban** · 05-03-2016, 07:46 AM

Thanks for this thread!

When I saw the festival announcement my first thought was: The Onion

I couldn't be more with Pat M. in what he says about K.G.

**goldenwave77** · 05-03-2016, 09:30 AM

Gee if it were true that all the people who love Pat Metheny and the gospel of true jazz would support the music, then you would have no cause for complaint.

I used to work late at night, and sometimes had a secretary with me who would put on Kenny G....kind of anesthetic, easy listening stuff...but it was melodic and tuneful and she liked it, and I could work without paying too much attention to it, anyway. We got to talking music one time and I said that Kenny G was OK, but kind of tame, and she said she didn't like really wild stuff. I suggested she listen to Sonny Rollins' Saxophone Colossus, or Stanley Turrentine. She was able to borrow them from the NYC library, and she started to get into jazz a little bit...kind of a cautious fan, and she liked something that was tuneful. Got her listening to some Horace Silver. There are a lot of people like that.

I think this was just a way for Metheny to get some cheap publicity.

**Nate Miller** · 05-03-2016, 10:11 AM

well, I'm the American public, too. I drive a pickup truck, own guns, drink beer, and I still salute the flag with more than one finger

but Kenny G has more name recognition than any living sax player I can think of, and I even play this music

I mean, if you want to sell tickets, then who exactly are you going to get? David Sandborne?

Tim Warfield is even from my county here in PA and guaranteed if you stand in the parking lot of Rutters and ask whoever drives up they'll recognize the name Kenny G more then Tim, and he's a monster contemporary sax player

so hate on Kenny G all you want, but please don't insult Americans and the American public while you are doing it

its not our fault all the great ones are gone

**Stevebol** · 05-03-2016, 10:14 AM

Jazz musicians have no game. Don't ask people if they like jazz, ask them what kind of jazz they like. You might want to give that Charlie Parker stuff a rest. Put on some Dexter Gordon or Stanley Turrentine.
PM is being a hater.

**Stevebol** · 05-03-2016, 10:16 AM

and leave Kenny G alone!! he's hardly what's wrong with the world.

**ronjazz** · 05-03-2016, 10:26 AM

Actually, he, and his defenders, are EXACTLY what's wrong with this world (that is, this world of jazz). Metheny is on the money with every word, and he's certainly not a hater (if you knew him, you'd know that). He's a defender of the art form.

Courageous creativity has been bleached from American art by accountants; mediocrity has been accorded status. I saw Gorelick's lame, cheap act when he was still an opener (for Anita Baker). He was a pandering suck-ass then, now he's a rich pandering suck-ass.

**Jazzism** · 05-03-2016, 10:26 AM

Originally Posted by Stevebol

How would shoppers in China know the store was about to close without Kenny G?

China doesn't like him either now, since he came out in support of the Hong Kong democracy movement!

**goldenwave77** · 05-03-2016, 10:37 AM

And if you took Kenny G away, then you would still have the same monstrous indifference to legitimate jazz that you have today.

People like a tune...people like a melody....and until the jazz world reacquaints itself with this fact, it will continue to suffer. I've listened to a lot of bop, and a lot of classic jazz, and the stuff that sticks....is the stuff that sticks....you can remember it, and actually hum it, or sing it...."Groovin High", "Ornithology", "Scrapple from the Apple", "Oleo", "Cape Verdean Blues", "Song for my Father", "Countdown", "Naima", "Afro-Blu" are all straight ahead memorable jazz vehicles, and I haven't even touched on Great American Songbook stuff given a jazz treatment, or bluesy stuff that is taken uptown for a more sophisticated treatment.

But so much of modern jazz is just not memorable...when music is played to be danced to...it is also accessible. People posted that White House concert, and you know what, the male vocalist (Cullum ?!), I thought was killer...the Latin band was killer....Metheny's stuff----weak in comparison.

Sorry, I don't even like Metheny...a lot of it sounds like overprocessed elevator music.

**grahambop** · 05-03-2016, 10:57 AM

Originally Posted by goldenwave77

Sorry, I don't even like Metheny...a lot of it sounds like overprocessed elevator music.

Like Kenny G?

**robertm2000** · 05-03-2016, 11:08 AM

It is all pretty much OPINION ... I'd say informed opinion in the case of Mr. Gorelick.

Reminds me of the old story about a politician who said he thought another politician was an ass. The second politician sued for slander and the first politician said, "Slander would mean that I said you were an ass. I did not say you were an ass, I said I thought you were an ass. I know of no case in which someone has been successfully sued for what they thought." The second politician conceded, saying. "My colleague's knowledge of the law vastly exceeds his sense of propriety and tact." Same here, I would say!

**Jabberwocky** · 05-03-2016, 11:12 AM

Originally Posted by goldenwave77

...Sorry, I don't even like Metheny...a lot of it sounds like overprocessed elevator music.

You have the biggest pair of brass danglies daring to put that out in the open. Now, what do you really think about Pat Martino?

Anyone who thinks it is easy to be popular and accessible and make good money at it, just you try it.

I tried humming the head to Ascension. And got lost on the second note.

**goldenwave77** · 05-03-2016, 11:13 AM

But you're missing the point.

My college's film professor, Jeanine Basinger, wrote a really good book about Hollywood entitled "The Dream Factory". She talked about stardom, and defined it simply as receiving top billing, and more importantly, bringing people into the movie theaters, i.e. putting fannies in the seats, esp. when they might not otherwise do so---"I heard the movie was just OK...but Bogart/Cagney/Cary Grant is in it...and I like him, so I'll give it a shot."

Now Metheny has got a lot of supporters. Is he playing at this festival?! Was he available? Everyone agrees that jazz popularity is in a bad situation....Old Pat M. is not the savior of the music...if Kenny G. gets enough people into the festival, they'll hear the other acts, and there will be some cross-fertilization.

A lot of the British Invasion stuff was about appreciating black American blues artists that the American public had passed by in the early 60's....Muddy Waters--career on the skids. I think Cheech and Chong or Firesign Theatre, or maybe Monte Python had a satirical bit about "Blind Melon Chitlin'" the great, but forgotten blues artist, whose career was resurrected by playing on college campuses after the British Invasion, and after some white blues act got big (Mike Bloomfield, etc.). You know what...Muddy Waters and Albert King, and Buddy Guy's careers got a shot in the arm from this crossover stuff that British bands were playing. The same thing later on with Stevie Ray Vaughn.

I don't own Kenny G CD's and don't plan on buying any....same thing with Lady Gaga...but if they get people listening, maybe they'll rediscover the good stuff. That is the point.