Pop-Jazz

The styles of Pop-Jazz are quite varied, but the edges are always brushed clean. The sound is soft, smooth and radio-ready. Pop-Jazz artists take the popular sounds from their period and infuse them with jazz styling and instrumentation, from Herb Alpert's Swing-come-Cocktail ensembles to Kenny G.'s Adult Contemporary-derived bedroom instrumentals. Many styles of Pop-Jazz approach popular music from a jazz direction. Saxophonist Stanley Turrentine irons the rough edges from Hard Bop melodies, and guitarist Pat Metheny incorporates elements of rock and Latin Jazz. Pop-Jazz's claim to fame is its ability to make the often-obscure genre of jazz into a mass- marketable commodity, always selling more units than the rest of jazz combined.