Elements of Jazz: From Cakewalks to Fusion

Good introduction, but serious omissions.

I enjoyed this short course about jazz, and Messenger is a talented piano player as well as teacher. I was disappointed that Thelonius Monk (1917-1982) was omitted. Perhaps less appreciated during his lifetime than now, he was a major innovator. Maybe a "second course" is what is called for, one that includes people such as Monk, Charlie Mingus, George Shearing, Ahmad Jamal, Art Blakey, Wayne Shorter, Herbie Hancock, Christian McBride, all of whom had or are still having a discernable impact on jazz development and evolution.

5 of 5 people found this review helpful

A Disappointingly Distorted, Myopic View Of Jazz

What could have made this a 4 or 5-star listening experience for you?

An honest presentation of the subject!The lecturer's fast forwarding through the segment on modern jazz, brushing aside or even ignoring such universally recognized Jazz Giants as: Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Lambert, Hendridks & Ross, Cannonball lAdderly, Max Roach, Oliver Nelson, J.J. Johnson, Eric Dolphy, and too many more to mention in this small space, and replacing them with time wasting mediocre and mundane musical samples and seeming shameless self promotion is unconscionable , The lecturer mentions Beat author Ferlinghetti's A Coney Island of the Mind. But he reminds me of another book popular around that time, titled Advertisements for Myself. Had I not been a life long lover of jazz - and especially modern jazz - and gotten my introduction to the subject through the lecturer's course, I would not have touched the music with a ten foot pole.

What do you think your next listen will be?

Not Bill Messenger

Who would you have cast as narrator instead of Professor Bill Messenger?

The subject material, not the narrator was the problem.

You didn’t love this book... but did it have any redeeming qualities?

Hard to tell. The author so warped the section on modern jazz, that I can not trust any of the rest of the course.

Any additional comments?

Most of the Audible books and The Great Courses material I have purchased have been excellent and well worth the money. I just ordered a DVD: Great Scientific Ideas That Changed the World course about an hour ago.

23 of 27 people found this review helpful

Very Good Shew

I recommend this course to anyone with an interest in music history who doesn't happen to be a musician. A basic knowledge of music helps, but this class is over my head there at times. What I enjoyed the most was learning how the music of a time reflected everything else that was going on in that time. Sometimes the recording was too...quiet, muted sounding, a technical issue?

3 of 3 people found this review helpful

It's too short!

I enjoyed the course very much but the whole course is too short. In particular the more modern elements were really short changed as well as Latin elements.

This was recorded in the 1990s and could Stan updating.

All that said I learned a lot about the history of jazz.

3 of 3 people found this review helpful

Needed a few more lectures

I enjoyed the course and got stuff out of it, but it would have been improved with a couple more lectures.

An introduction was most seriously lacking, something to set the tone and provide an overview to fasten the rest of the lectures to. A lecture about pre-cake walk music, covering African music and maybe spirituals and gospel would have been helpful.

Maybe it would also have helped to have 2 blues lectures, one in the origins and one on its development and influence on other styles. But because the blues is one lecture with a guest, all of blues is covered in about 20 minutes.

And then breaking up modern jazz into 3 instead of 2, and spending more time on, say, Latin Jazz, or presenting the development in a bit more detail. The final lecture also has guest musicians, but it would have been more helpful and interesting if they would have talked a bit more about what we were hearing.

This is the first great courses music course I listened to that wasn't done by Robert Greenberg, and while it was interesting, it wasn't nearly as good as the Greenberg lectures. I wish I could give it 3.5.

3 of 3 people found this review helpful

Like Jazz, this sounds improvised

Professor Messenger is truly a master of jazz. His demonstrations are entertaining and help the listener with jazz and the historical tale that weaves in and out of the demonstrations helps put the various styles into perspective.

Unfortunately, like the jazz that he is demonstrating, the eight lectures sound improvised.For example, the topics that are covered are many and the argument can be made that not enough time has been given to the topics. Professor Messenger does not deal with the time issues well. Thus we get one half a lecture dealing with one blues artist because she is available, while modern jazz, fusion, free jazz and bebop are all crammed into one lecture.

Also, many references are made to recordings that are never played. Often it seems as if these examples have just popped into Professor Messengers head.

In conclusion, a better "road map" is needed, if the time is to be utilized better. OTOH, the historical information is very good.

15 of 18 people found this review helpful

Get a video course

This course points out charts the professor was displaying on a white board or a projector, which lost me after 3 lectures.

Interesting topic, not so good presentation.

9 of 11 people found this review helpful

good for jazz history basics

It was great, a well balanced but somewhat topical course. Definitely good for non jazzers. No in-depth theory, though.

2 of 2 people found this review helpful

“Life is a lot like jazz. it's best when ...

“Life is a lot like jazz... it's best when you improvise.” George Gershwin


1. Plantation Beginnings
2. The Rise and Fall of Ragtime
3. The Jazz Age
4. Blues
5. The Swing Era
6. Boogie, Big Band Blues and Bop
7. Modern Jazz
8. The ABC’s of Jazz Improvisation

I really enjoyed this class as I have always liked Ragtime and Dixieland Bands and as I grew I, loved going to a place in Portland, Oregon called Jazz de Opus where they would have a trio playing or just some classic records that the owner had. Alas, it is no longer in existence so I have to listen at home. Disneyland introduced me to the Dixieland music because they always had a great band playing at one of their restaurants near Frontierland.

Professor Bill Messenger is a musician who opened for Bill Haley and the Comets, played with Cass Elliott and many other musicians over the years before becoming a professor for The Peabody Institute.

Each class is forty-five minutes in length. Prof. Messenger always includes many musical examples, played by him or guests or sometimes pre-recorded. The class is lively and easy for a non-musical person to follow along.

Every class flows by so fast that I began looking for examples of music he talked about so I could continue my education. The only Jazz variant I wasn’t wild about was fusion, which from some of the examples he played seemed just like a lot of noise. No beat, no rhythm and no blues.

I highly recommend this class for anyone that wants to learn more about Jazz and the different versions it has undergone. The Professor makes his class fun and begging for more.

7 of 9 people found this review helpful

Messenger Needs to Replace Greenberg

This little short course is fantastic. It's better than fantastic. I wish Greenberg would cut the corn and follow Messenger's style.

The course is packed with very interesting history, anecdotes and opinions. The professor is a very talented musician and he plays pieces throughout the course---and he plays brilliantly.

This is a fun and very worthwhile course. I loved it. 6 Stars!!!!

6 of 8 people found this review helpful