You ever hear a brass instrument doing its thing and you think: that’s jazz, baby! And then in another song you hear a brass instrument doing something, maybe not its thing, and you think: is this approaching the concept of jazz? For this International Jazz Day episode, we explore two songs’ proximity to the category of jazz. First up is “Mary Had a Baby” as performed by Wynton Marsalis, featuring vocals by Roberta Gumbel. It’s for sure jazz, but also, more! Then we make another visit to Bill & Gloria Gaither’s proverbial Christmas cabin with “He Drew the Line” featuring Woody Wright and Mike Allen. Is it jazz? Is it jazzy? Is it (jazzy?)? Well.
Our ranking music in this episode is “I’m Gonna E-mail Santa” by Billy Gilman. Thank you to Andrew for requesting “He Drew the Line”!
