Dennis Green talked to KCCK’s Middle School Jazz Band Camp students recently about how jazz musicians are inspired by the popular music of the day to create jazz versions of songs and music they like. He played several examples of songs that have become jazz standards, whose origins come from Broadway and even Disney movies, like “Someday My Prince Will Come,” to groups like Postmodern Jukebox, who take tunes like “All About The Bass” and translate them into swing style.
He also talked about how contemporary artists like Lady Gaga feel the need to test themselves against the Great American Songbook tunes that artists have been performing for nearly 100 years.
Here is a YouTube playlist of the different songs we talked about.