Ken Prouty argues that knowledge of jazz, or more to the point, claims
to knowledge of jazz, are the prime movers in forming jazz's identity,
its canon, and its community. Every jazz artist, critic, or fan
understands jazz differently, based on each individual's unique
experiences and insights. Through playing, listening, reading, and
talking about jazz, both as a form of musical expression and as a marker
of identity, each aficionado develops a personalized relationship to the
larger jazz world. Through the increasingly important role of media,
listeners also engage in the formation of different communities that not
only transcend traditional boundaries of geography, but increasingly
exist only in the virtual world.
The relationships of "jazz people" within and between these communities
is at the center of Knowing Jazz. Some groups, such as those in
academia, reflect a clash of sensibilities between historical
traditions. Others, particularly online communities, represent new and
exciting avenues for everyday fans, whose involvement in jazz has often
been ignored. Other communities seek to define themselves as expressions
of national or global sensibility, pointing to the ever-changing nature
of jazz's identity as an American art form in an international setting.
What all these communities share, however, is an intimate, visceral link
to the music and the artists who make it, brought to life through the
medium of recording. Informed by an interdisciplinary approach and
approaching the topic from a number of perspectives, Knowing Jazz
charts a philosophical course in which many disparate perspectives and
varied opinions on jazz can find common ground.
