Is Modern Jazz an Oxymoron?

we who have lived a lot of life and heard a lot of music in our younger more impressionable years are burdened by our memories and our sense of how certain music should sound - that can inhibit our enjoying new forms new creations

btw - the ny times just released a nice list of their top 10 jazz albums of 2020... some old and some new artists... worth checking out

i would also say that to me, the greatest joy of music streaming is its enabling our ability to experience new music

Does everyone define "modern jazz" differently? I listen to I what I consider modern jazz...Boney James, Najee, David Sandborn, Kirk Whalum, Brian Culbertson, Paul Brown, and many more. Some call what I consider modern jazz, "smooth jazz".

@jjss49   Thanks for the reference to the NYT listing.  Going through the titles now.  Liking what I'm hearing so far from Immanuel Wilkins!  The rhythm section is very reminiscent of Hancock, Carter and Williams.  Definitely up my alley.

Since I'm short timing, and don't have forever, I'll go along with my friend Rok; he's been discovering so much new "old" jazz, that we wont have to re-discover what's called "new-jazz". Thank you very much, but we don't need none.

1) we should do and listen to what makes us happy, we all have limited time and attention span

2) najee/david sanborn etc has been out there for 30+ years - imo modern jazz should be defined as currently produced in or near the present day, by artists that are emerging in the present day -- to billie holliday and charlie christian, miles davis in the 60’s was modern jazz... but not today in 2020

3) for best of modern jazz, i would recommend a few names as starters -- ibrahim maaloof (40 melodies), anjelique kidjo (celia), artemis (self titled first album), christian mcbride (quartet and big band releases new one dedicated to wes montgomery), joey alexander (any), cecile mclorin salvant (any)

4) here are some recent albums by wonderful, established artists - eliane elias (dance of time), eddie henderson (be cool), chris potter (dreamer is the dream), bill frisell (valentine), eric reed (such a time as this)

happy listening