Autumn Jazz

The leaves have been turning earlier than usual this fall and I couldn’t be happier. My musical tastes shift with the changing environment, and I find myself wondering, “What music should I listen to?!” It’s jazz, it’s always jazz, the perfect music for any season. Jazz is an incredibly expressive form of music that centers on instrumentalists, allowing them to showcase their craft. Characterized by sweet standards, thoughtful chord progressions, and creeping model music, this autumn jazz playlist is curated to represent all fall has to offer. I’m partial to jazz guitar, so there’s quite a bit of Herb Ellis, Wes Montgomery, and Emily Remler mixed into this playlist.

“Softly, as in a Morning Sunrise” performed by Emily Remler, is a soft, eerie rendition of a song from The New Moon operetta. If you compared Remler’s version to the original track, the two would barely pass as the same song. The tone of Remler’s performance is incredibly warm, with lilting notes that build into a swing groove in the middle of the song. My favorite part of this recording is the harmonics she hits during the main melody, which mimics a rising and falling motion. The woodwind section usually plays this line in uptempo hits, but here the quiet movement of the guitar invokes a melody that creeps in softly. It’s comforting but ghostly.

Haunting jazz can be easily found in the repertoire of musicians such as John Coltrane and Miles Davis. Davis’s song “Moon Dreams” is a perfect song for Halloween. It’s slow and deliberate, with low trumpet notes that create a wonderful sonic tension. This is classic, cool, model jazz ready for midnight walkabouts.

I’ve also been on a Chet Baker kick recently and have been loving his renditions of standard jazz songs such as “Autumn Leaves” and “Autumn in New York.” They are so simple and perfect and had to be included. “September Song,” played by Baker, is slow-tempo and incredibly melodic. The distant plucking of the bass and guitar and the mellow brush of the drums is reminiscent of the slight turning of leaves on a tree, until they brown, curl, and fall to the grass below.

I’ve found that the cool weather brings back memories of playing outside in the leaves and preparing dishes of fairy food with my friends. In “That Old Feeling,” Baker reflects on a lover who will always remain with the singer. The song is a faster-paced swing groove and uses a combination of vocals and trumpet solos to convey the excitement of love, as well as its perennial weight. The breeze of those falls will return each September and the old autumn feeling will always be in my heart.

That being said, I needed to include faster-paced songs on this playlist for the listener who might enjoy jumping in a leaf pile. The song “Hay Burner,” played by Count Basie and Sammy Nestico (among many, many other great musicians, seriously, this track is crazy), is an upbeat rendition absolutely swarming with brass hits. It reminds me of walking around the pumpkin patch, corn maze, and petting zoo at Weber’s Farm in my hometown in Maryland.

I miss many things about my home in Baltimore, but I will admit that Gambier has the craziest falls ever. The reds and oranges of the trees pop so nicely against the blue sky and the campus culture is dedicated to celebrating Halloween. This, in combination with the rural setting of cornfields and the Kokosing River, creates an autumnal scene that I was completely unfamiliar with until last fall, when I first arrived at Kenyon. I am head over heels for Ohio autumns and the jazz that accompanies them.