Talk:Zodiac Suite

Did you know nomination

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by Kavyansh.Singh (talk) 08:38, 3 September 2022 (UTC)

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Mary Lou Williams (top)

• ... that nine songs from Mary Lou Williams's Zodiac Suite were composed during a live radio performance? Source: Dahl, Linda (1999). Morning Glory: A Biography of Mary Lou Williams. New York: Pantheon Books. pp. 160–161. ISBN 978-0-375-40899-1.
  • ALT1: ... that music inspired by astrological signs was performed on Vatican Radio in 1969? Source: Cramer, Alfred W., ed. (2009). Musicians & Composers of the 20th century. Vol. 5. Pasadena, Calif.: Salem Press. p. 1626. ISBN 978-1-58765-512-8.
  • Reviewed: Template:Did you know nominations/Rowan Taylor (composer)
  • Comment: Article was moved from draft 12 August and replaced a redirect.

Moved to mainspace by Vladimir.copic (talk). Self-nominated at 23:19, 14 August 2022 (UTC).

Interesting music on fine sources, no copyvio obvious. I prefer the original hook, especially as mentioning the composer's name. I'd prefer an image to show her, and the period. This piece was a first fusion music, but the hook doesn't even mention jazz, - could we? Perhaps say "improvised" instead of "composed"? What do you think about an infobox? I bet there are categories about artworks related to the Zodiac. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 20:22, 16 August 2022 (UTC)

@Gerda Arendt: Thanks for the kind and constructive review. Give me a couple of days to work on the recommendations! Vladimir.copic (talk) 23:50, 18 August 2022 (UTC)

@Gerda Arendt: I've now added an infobox (although I don't really think it adds anything to the article). I suppose we could add an image but I'm not that fussed about it - there are plenty of public domain images of Williams in the 1940s. Did you have one in mind? How about the following alts?:

ALT0b: ... that nine songs from Mary Lou Williams's (pictured) Zodiac Suite were composed during a live radio improvisation?

ALT1b: ... that music inspired by astrological signs was performed by Mary Lou Williams (pictured) on Vatican Radio in 1969?

Vladimir.copic (talk) 00:39, 20 August 2022 (UTC)

Thank you, I like all of it. We can now stop and I approve the original hook. (I don't see a difference between the two ALT0 with my naked eye, please explain.) Or we can still work on it, - your choice. Image: if we want it for the Main page, it has to be in the article, so at present it has to be the lead image. I like that it almost shows some kind of "fusion", and it shows that she is a woman of colour, and the period. - We can't expect our mixed readership to know any of that just by her name. There's a CBS photo of her on the commons that's impressive, but I'd prefer the lead image. Hook: it would not hurt to give the year, and/or that she is a jazz pianist who played/improvised herself. Otherwise, she could just be only the composer, and all might have happened in the 21st century. - I found this recording, - endearing ;) - I added a YouTube to the article but am never quite sure about copyright. 1945 - that should be out of it, I think. Article: If you want to go for Good article, you'd need a bit more about the music itself, and recordings. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 06:23, 20 August 2022 (UTC)

@Gerda Arendt: ALT0b differs by using "improvisation" instead of "performance" at the end of the hook. I've added the image now for you to approve. I had hoped to add a non-free use sample of the recording into the article but haven't found the time to do it yet - hopefully I'll get to it this weekend. Thanks again. Vladimir.copic (talk) 23:24, 24 August 2022 (UTC)

thank you so much! The image is licensed, and - as said above - picturing the fusion a bit. Perhaps we should name the other person in the caption, - something for the prep builder to decide. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 18:41, 25 August 2022 (UTC)

"Landmark" in lede

@EddieHugh - thanks for reading through the article and your comments on the lede. I believe landmark in the history of jazz (landmark meaning an important stage or event in something's development) is accurate based on the following (referenced) content in the body of the article:

• Dan Morgenstern considers the Carnegie Hall concert to be the first time a symphony orchestra performed jazz compositions.
• Zodiac Suite was considered novel in jazz music when it was first performed, both thematically and musically, due to its references to and use of classical music.
• The suite was seen as an accomplishment by the black community at the time and one journalist said the Carnegie Hall concert "completely eroded the whites-only barrier to the Carnegie Hall stage."
• In 2020, the album was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.
• The Town Hall performance is placed by The Penguin Jazz Guide as a "key moment in the recognition of jazz as an important twentieth-century music".

Your comment does highlight that the lede doesn't summarise the middling contemporary reviews of the live performances. I've put in a sentence to reflect this in the lede along with some edits in the body. Vladimir.copic (talk) 23:12, 6 September 2022 (UTC)

Thank you for the response. I added the tag having read the relevant section. I'm still not convinced that "landmark in the history of jazz" is justified. Going through the points:

• Morgenstern's comment is about a symphony orchestra, not jazz itself.
• I haven't looked at these sources (I might not have access to them), but there are certainly earlier examples of this in jazz. Even if it was first, being first doesn't make something a landmark. (e.g., Kind of Blue is a landmark recording and is often discussed in relation to modal jazz, but it wasn't the first recording to contain modal jazz.)
• "seen as an accomplishment by the black community"...I'm not sure what this means. Carnegie Hall refers to a performance of the suite, not the suite itsefl.
• Grammy: this is more supportive, although it's for an album, not the suite itself.
• Penguin: again, that's referring to a performance (or appears to be... I haven't seen the context of the source).

In summary, the lead asserts that the suite itself (not a performance, not a recording, etc.) "has been described as a landmark in the history of jazz", but that isn't supported by the body. I'd drop the "landmark" and describe more neutrally the reaction to the different things that the article describes – the composition (i.e., the suite itself), the performances, the impact of one or more of the performances (socially, culturally?), the recordings – and leave the readers to reach their own conclusion about all of that collectively. EddieHugh (talk) 17:45, 7 September 2022 (UTC)

Great - I think this is a fair interpretation. I've changed the lede to be more specific to the recordings and concert and used "breakthrough" rather than "landmark". Zodiac Suite has been referred to as a "landmark" (by NYT, Jazz Times, ABC ) but these are usually in passing and it would be UNDUE to add these refs just to support the lede. Vladimir.copic (talk) 23:24, 11 September 2022 (UTC)