Can you kill a genre?

Earlier this week, an article in the Wall Street Journal pointed out the rising age of the jazz audience and asked if the genre was dead. I understood what the author was trying to say, but I am always amused when a style or artform is rumored to be on its deathbed.

It seems that for every person eager to declare something to be the Next Big Thing, there are two or three ready to deliver its eulogy. Nas named one of his albums Hip Hop Is Dead, even though he’s one of the genre’s most respected artists. To provide another example, Jay-Z’s latest song is “Death Of Autotune.”

In my lifetime, disco, funk, house, jazz, black rock, soul, blues, and broken beat are just some of the musical genres that were declared dead at one time or another. Yet many of those genre’s signature artists continue to work, and a browsing through internet radio or itunes reveals there are still plenty of new acts making music in these styles.

If something is still being produced, and continues to find an audience, can you truly call it “dead” or “irrelevant”?

I believe people confuse commercial success and being “hot in the streets” with viability as an art form, and that is a by-product of the role corporations play in contemporary society.

Pop culture is dominated by a handful of media and entertainment conglomerates. They have a vested interest in constantly changing the definition of “cool” so that people feel the need to endlessly consume in order to maintain or improve their social standing. It’s only when it seems there are no new markets to penetrate, or extra profits to be made, that something becomes “dead” to the gatekeepers.

To be sure, performers fall in and out of popularity. Back in 1968, Andy Warhol predicted a future in which everybody would be famous for 15 minutes, and that certainly seems to have come true. But as Prince sang in “Pop Life,” everybody can’t be on top. A zenith is just that; a peak that cannot be maintained. But just because something isn’t as dominant as it once was does not mean it’s relegated to the dust bins of history.

Will jazz return to the level of popularity it had from the 50s through the 70s? I can’t say. But you have to remember that art is as resilient as the people who make it. As long the need to express oneself exists, art and culture can never die.