Variety Please?

Give me Ella, Alice, and Sarah any day over Diana Krall, Kenny G, and Chris Botti. I'm talking about a return to real jazz, not the watered-down impressions that lack variety in this modern-day world, compliments of stations like CD 101.9 under the genre heading "Smooth Jazz." While some of it is cool (like Boney James who makes it both soulful and sensual), a majority of it is a total rip-off, in my opinion.

There's nothing like being at home with a snifter containing Amaretto in one hand while incense and candles set the mood for a relaxing bath while Ella Fitzgerald sings, ever so smoothly, "You're My Thrill." No one could have been more creative in blending sounds of the Eastern world with jazz than Alice Coltrane, wife of John, on her groundbreaking album, "Journey Into Satchidananda." (I dare you to sit down and philosophize to that!) And have you heard Sarah Vaughn's version of the Gershwin classic, "Summertime"? Simply bliss, I tell ya. Simply bliss.

I guess the other serious music (with classical being the one that takes the title traditionally) has lost its place in modern-day society, only to be replaced by artists that all do the same thing. While the music they performed was similar, no one can say that Nat King Cole sounded like Frank Sinatra or Billie Holliday sounded like anyone other than herself. While Cassandra Wilson and Dianne Reeves do their thing today, in very different ways, I would love to ask the contemporary jazz musicians a burning question: Can we get more variety please? Thank you.