Jazzdance Music Description

On Discogs, Jazzdance is a vague synonym for Acid Jazz and other music in a similar style.

When first added to Discogs, it was envisioned as another name for late 1990s Acid Jazz, or the slower side of Future Jazz. However, the term is also said to have been used in the 1980s among Northern Soul nightclub DJs, in reference to some of the 1950s–1980s funk, soul, and jazz music they curated for the dancefloor. Relatively obscure selections from that scene became known as Rare Groove by 1985, and the terms Acid Jazz and Dancefloor Jazz were coined soon after to market contemporary acts playing in a Jazzdance/Rare Groove style.

Some background:

In early 2001, former Discogs user SayVegin proposed Future Jazz as an Electronic style tag for bands like Jazzanova, Fila Brazillia, and A Forest Mighty Black. He then proposed Jazzdance "for acts like Mr. Gone, Down To The Bone, Soulstance which have a more dance-oriented tempo".

With these examples, there is little to differentiate jazzdance from acid jazz. At that time, the uptempo bossa and samba-infused nu-jazz/future-jazz music of Jazzanova was very similar to that of Mr. Gone and Soulstance. Meanwhile, Fila Brazillia's midtempo, funky, sometimes-housey acid jazz sound was not much different from the music of Down To The Bone.

In mid-2017, Discogs user cheebacheebakid, a former DJ in the genre, provided the broader definition, saying Jazzdance encompassed all styles of jazz that were dancefloor friendly in the 1980s and beyond: "Jazzdance (without the space) was one way Gilles, Forge, et. al. referred to Rare Groove in the early 80s as played at Dingwall's, Ronnie Scott's, The Jazz Cafe, etc. Like Northern Soul (from which it kind of branched off), they were catch-all terms for highly danceable jazz (usually Latin or Brazilian inflected). Often Dancefloor Jazz was used as well, moreso by labels like Mojo, LuvNHaight, etc.. It morphed into Acid Jazz as a marketing term when Acid House got huge in late 80s. Then soon after Acid Jazz meant modern acts playing Jazzdance/Rare Groove style music (e.g., Snowboy, BNH, JTQ, etc) and now it iseems Jazzdance is used on anything remotely toe-tappable with a horn or Hammond."


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