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EnXia Yu
The influence of Wynton Marsalis on acoustic jazz in the 1990s
Trumpeter and jazz figure W. Marsalis had a significant creative influence on the generation of musicians who came to the jazz art in the 1990s. Marsalis’ successful projects, based on the exploitation of the ideas of acoustic jazz mainstream and post-bop, were perceived by the younger generation of instrumentalists. As a result, the priority of the directions of fusion and jazz-rock, which seemed unshakable for the jazz scene, was reduced. The author’s attention is focused on solo recordings of performers released in the last decade of the 20th century. It is noted that the post-bop component of their works manifested itself in the pronounced chromatic tendency of improvisations, numerous polytonal and modal phrases. Marsalis’ improvisations were based on the ideas of his immediate predecessors, the second quintet of M. Davis. Having thoroughly expanded and supplemented the ideological basis of M. Davis, Marsalis presented material that was then perceived and reinterpreted by a generation of trumpeters who came to jazz art in the 1990s. The article examines the legacy of trumpeters R. Gunn and T. Blanchard, whose work developed in an obvious relationship with the projects of Marsalis. Stylistically, the jazz works of the listed artists belong to the modern jazz style of post-bop. It is suggested that Marsalis is one of the main innovators of modern varieties of post-bop. In turn, T. Blanchard and R. Gunn have an individual reworking of the ideological principles laid down by Marsalis. R. Gunn is more correlated with the models of hardbop improvisation. His improvisations show obvious similarities with the jazz works of both more famous (C. Brown, L. Morgan) and more niche (B. Little) performers. In the legacy of T. Blanchard, a special place is occupied by the work “Wandering Moon”, which is one of the most fundamental artistic achievements of post-bop.
Key words
W. Marsalis, jazz trumpet, models of improvisation, bebop, hardbop, post-bop, R. Gunn, T. Blanchard.
For citation
Xia Yu. The influence of Wynton Marsalis on acoustic jazz in the 1990s // South-Russian Musical Anthology. 2023. No. 1. Pp. 111-116.
