Missing A Beat: Jazz and politicians

In 1991, the town hall in Palma, newly under the control of the Partido Popular following twelve years of PSOE dominance, took a musical decision. It wasn't formally decreed, but there was an unmistakably political angle to the decision. Jazz was for socialists.

This, at any rate, was the implication of the scrapping of the Palma Jazz Festival. It had started ten years before. Over three evenings, starting at 10pm, from 27 to 29 July, 1981, jazz fans were able to go to the auditorium to see performances by the Dexter Gordon Quartet, the Dizzy Gillespie Quartet, the Stan Getz Quartet. Later editions of the festival were to include concerts in the cathedral and by an array of internationally acclaimed artists. The festival had come about largely because of the success of a concert in May, 1981, when the American pianist Keith Jarrett had appeared at the auditorium. In terms of star names from the jazz world of the time, these four - Jarrett, Gordon, Gillespie and Getz - were firmly among the A-List.

It is perhaps fair to say that jazz does, or did anyway, have a bit of a political thing going on. Maybe it was all to do with the roots of the music. Maybe it was the nature of improvisation - the freeing of the mind, its liberalising. Maybe there was also an element of the religious: there is many a jazz musician who from times past and times present has discovered Buddhism, for instance.

But to classify jazz as something "socialist" was of course to deny the music to the many who were anything but socialists. Music, as a general rule, doesn't recognise political ideologies as pre-requisites either for its performance or its appreciation. The decision taken, however, and jazz in Mallorca received a distinct kick to its syncopation. The enormous popularity that it had in the 1980s was to take some time to be recaptured.

A generation on from the somewhat bizarre attitude of the town hall, it hasn't been the PP which has been causing disquiet in jazz circles but the other lot. For reasons hard to fathom, the ministry of education, led by PSOE, had decided to reverse a decision taken in the early spring of last year by the Music Conservatory in Palma. It had informed the education (and culture) ministry that, from the start of the 2015-2016 course, it would be including studies in jazz and modern music for the first time. The ministry didn't appear to have any issue with this. Indeed, a year later, the by then education minister, Nuria Riera, was only too glad to appear in the photos taken at the celebration of International Jazz Day. It had been sponsored by, among others, the conservatory, the government and the Council of Mallorca, and had been organised by the UNESCO delegation in Mallorca.

All, therefore, appeared well set for the conservatory to start courses for piano, double bass, drums, vocals, saxophone and guitar. Exams for entry into the courses had already taken place, with assessments made for, among other things, an ability to improvise. Then came the bombshell. The chair of jazz and modern music was to be removed. The new education ministry said so.

It has primarily been the intervention of UNESCO that has led to the decision being reversed again. The course will start, as had been projected, but its future is not secure. The ministry is apparently undertaking a period of "reflection" regarding the conservatory's programme, and the jazz and modern music part of this won't be the same for the 2016-2017 course, assuming it is a part.

It isn't clear if the ministry was guided by any dislike of jazz as such or rather by a wish to consider the entire educational offer at the conservatory. Nevertheless, initially taking a decision to scrap the jazz and modern music chair gave the perception that the ministry had taken a dislike to jazz. It does perhaps say something for the influence of UNESCO that it can get a decision changed. The ministry accepts that the rights of those who had enrolled on the course need to be respected.

An institutional attitude, even if it is not being stated, which seems at least indifferent to jazz is highly reminiscent of the attitude in 1991, and it comes at a time, as was the case at the start of the 1990s, when jazz has never been more popular. You can't really move in Mallorca without stumbling across one form of jazz or another. The current vogue is swing, inspired perhaps by the celebration of the life of one of the greats of Mallorcan popular music, Bonet de Sant Pere.

Music, in all its varieties, offers a considerable amount to Mallorcan cultural life and to the island's tourism. Politicians need to recognise this and to stop messing around, just as they had with the symphony orchestra.