From Traditional to Experimental: WikiProject Jazz
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This week, we sat down for a jam session with Gyrofrog, a member of WikiProject Jazz. Started in July 2006, WikiProject Jazz has grown to include 15 pieces of featured content and 27 Good Articles. The project maintains a portal, a list of resources, a lengthy to-do list, and a variety of templates and categories.
What motivated you to join WikiProject Jazz?
- I would say that it has been a good way to coordinate efforts, solicit feedback, and alert fellow editors to any issues concerning jazz-related articles.
Do you prefer a specific subgenre of jazz?
- I listen to jazz from all eras, though I have increasingly found myself working my way back through the music's history. I might listen to Jelly Roll Morton one day, Clifford Brown on another, and Edward Vesala on another.
Who is your favorite musician?
- I don't think I can, or want, to answer that. At some level my favorite artist is the one I happen to be currently hearing.
Do you feel jazz is as well represented on Wikipedia as other music genres?
- Probably not: although I'm interested in other types of music, my assumption is that they have more fans, and that this will correspond to a higher level of involvement on Wikipedia (see WP:CSB). Thus I feel like my efforts are better spent on jazz topics, because my assumption is that it's less likely that someone else will pitch in. (However, this might not be fair for me to say, as there are other WP:JAZZ participants who I believe put in a lot more time and effort than I do.)
Does the project maintain a style guide, infobox, or any other standardization for jazz articles?
- For articles about jazz albums, I think we generally inherit stylistic guidelines from WP:ALBUM. As far as standardization goes, the one thing that comes to mind is a discussion we had about what was considered within the scope of WP:JAZZ, and what was not (the latter including the King of Thailand and Charlie Daniels). The guideline was that WP:JAZZ is not really an article categorization scheme (after all, we have categories for that). The analogy I liked to use was, "would I find this album, or recordings by this musician, in the jazz section of a record store?" The problem with that was that fewer and fewer people know what a record store is, much less that some of them had jazz sections. A better rule-of-thumb, perhaps, is that if we were building a (print) jazz encyclopedia, how important would it be to include a particular subject?
How well do broader style guides for music cover the needs of WikiProject Jazz?
- For the most part I think they're more than adequate, and why make things harder for ourselves by re-inventing the wheel? One instance where I saw a difference, though, was with {{Infobox album}}. The guideline was to (generally) omit live recordings from album chronologies; however, some jazz artists' discographies consist of large numbers of live albums (compared with other styles of music). (This wasn't a big deal; just wanted to identify where I had seen a difference.)
How does the project handle biographical articles about jazz musicians? Has the project dealt with any issues about biographies of living people?
- I think we've found ourselves trying to overcome obscurity on the one hand (this stuff generally doesn't show up in, say, Parade) and truly establishing notability on the other. I don't want to cite specific examples but we've seen issues where it was evident that the editor had some kind of relationship with the subject (or was the subject) and/or cited heavily from the subject's own website.
Does WikiProject Jazz collaborate with any other projects?
- WP:ALBUM, for one – maybe not a formal collaboration, but often I'll see an issue that would be of concern to both WikiProjects. Speaking for myself, when I work on an album article I figure I'm working on behalf of both projects. Also WP:RSM but, again, nothing formal.
What are WikiProject Jazz's most pressing needs? How can a new member help today?
- We could always use help with the Cleanup listing for WikiProject Jazz. Currently, approximately one-half of all WP:JAZZ articles are tagged for cleanup. More than half of the WP:JAZZ articles are stub-class and need expansion (see Category:Stub-Class Jazz articles); another 3,000 need assessment (Category:Unassessed Jazz articles).
Next week, we'll toss back a cold one. Until then, see what else has been brewing in the archive.
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