History of Jazz ⑥ Fusion and Modern Jazz (1970s–today)

By the late 1960s, rock had taken over the world. Jazz transformed once again, embracing electric guitar, synthesizers and funk rhythms. This is the age of fusion — and its current runs all the way to today.

Fusion — jazz charged with electricity

Once again it was Miles Davis who opened the path. On 1970's Bitches Brew he blended electric instruments, rock beats and long improvisation, reshaping the whole terrain of jazz. The young masters from those sessions soon formed their own bands: Weather Report (Joe Zawinul, Wayne Shorter), Herbie Hancock (funk fusion), Chick Corea, and guitarist Pat Metheny.

What actually changed the sound: four tools

"Fusion" was a change of equipment before it was a change of taste.

The Fender Rhodes electric piano. Metal tines struck and picked up magnetically, so it sounds rounder and more bell-like than an acoustic piano. And because it runs through an amp, you can put chorus or a phaser on it. Nearly all of that hazy 1970s keyboard sound is this one instrument.
The electric bass. Clearer and longer-sustaining than an upright, which let the bass stop merely marking time at the back and come forward to play riffs. The line in "Chameleon" is the obvious example.
The synthesizer. Once you can build a sound that never existed, one keyboard starts covering what a horn section used to do. The very idea of an ensemble begins to wobble.
Tape editing. Bitches Brew is not a record of a performance. Producer Teo Macero assembled it by cutting and splicing long improvisations. This is the moment the studio stops being a recording device and becomes an instrument.

The first three all come down to one question: how is a sound shaped? Turn a waveform, a filter and an envelope yourself and this era's keyboard tones become much easier to place.

Shape a sound yourself and hear why — SynthLab→

After that — between tradition and the future

In the 1980s Wynton Marsalis led a return to the acoustic tradition (neo-traditionalism), while jazz kept blending with world music and electronics. Today a generation raised on hip-hop and R&B — Robert Glasper, Kamasi Washington, Esperanza Spalding, plus the UK's GoGo Penguin, Snarky Puppy and more — is making jazz young and hot again. Jazz isn't museum music; it's a living language still changing now.

Essential listening

Miles Davis – "Spanish Key" (Bitches Brew, 1970)

The starting point of fusion — a dark, vast world built from electric sound and endlessly flowing groove.

Weather Report – "Birdland" (1977)

The biggest hit of the fusion era, with a melody anyone can hum and a gleaming sound.

Herbie Hancock – "Chameleon" (1973)

A bass line that lodges in your head on first listen — the moment jazz and funk shook hands perfectly.

Pat Metheny Group – "Last Train Home" (1987)

Lyricism unfolding over a rhythm like a running train. A song that captures the beauty of modern jazz.

Kamasi Washington – "Truth" (2017)

Jazz of right now — spiritual, grand, shaped by the sensibility of the hip-hop generation.

A music that began on the streets of New Orleans is, a hundred years on, still renewing itself. Now it's your turn to pick a favorite era and dig deeper. Happy listening!

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