Pop-Jazz

The styles of Pop-Jazz are quite varied, but the edges are always brushed clean. The sound is soft, smooth and radio-ready. Pop-Jazz artists take the popular sounds from their period and infuse them with jazz styling and instrumentation, from Herb Alpert's Swing-come-Cocktail brass ensembles to saxophonist Kenny G.'s Adult Contemporary-derived bedroom instrumentals. Many styles of Pop-Jazz approach popular music from a jazz direction. Saxophonist Stanley Turrentine irons the rough edges from Hard Bop melodies, and guitarist Pat Metheny incorporates elements of rock and Latin Jazz. Other artists, such as the British pop group Black and the sultry singer Sade, take as much influence from the Jazz-Rock fusion of groups such as Steely Dan as they do from the classic traditions of American Vocal Pop. Pop-Jazz's claim to fame is its ability to make the often-obscure genre of jazz into a mass- marketable commodity, always selling more units than the rest of jazz combined.