Drafts



(first draft of front cover for Nü Jazz)



I decided to call my magazine Nü Jazz as it is a play on era. Nu Jazz is a genre of jazz which emerged in the 90's. It is defined as:

'music that blends jazz elements with other musical styles, such as funk, soul, electronic dance music, and free improvisation'.

Bearing this in mind, I thought it would be clever to twist the term 'Nu Jazz' into something even more modern (Nü Jazz). Without opening the magazine, a person with high knowledge of jazz would be able to recognise that the magazine includes articles about jazz covering many different styles thus widely enjoyed by audiences of different styles.


The front cover shows Hannah playing her sax while leaning against the piano. This minimalistic image allows effects to be added without worrying about the overall image. I chose this image of Hannah as she is deep in thought as she plays. It shows a real passion and love for what she is doing. The white walls could be seen as a limitless world or as being in a world with no boundaries. Alternatively it could be seen as a reflection of her imagination, as jazz is very much often a style based on real imaginitive 'colourful' playing. Her age shows that she is still young and exploring a new world of music and, as she progresses, the walls of her imagination would (metaphorically) become more colourful as she explores further and further into it discovering her own 'colours' of jazz. I added an effect to the main image whereby the left hand side is in colour (only real reference is the gold hinges on top of the piano) and fades into black and white by the right hand side. We see Hannah sat in this black and white side of the picture and we can connote, from this, that perhaps she is indulging in the history of jazz and how she has 'stepped' from modern day into the past. The modern style of the saxophone (made out of non-reflective material) further carries on the idea of modernism

The font of 'ON' and 'HANNAH.B' are stylised as so as established jazz musicians will recognise the font as 'Reprise Rehearsal'. This font is typically used in jazz music books and on leading professional music writing programmes such as Sibelius when addressing the title of the piece.

Photos (selection of 12 from over 100)

Demographics - Gender, Age and S.E.G.

Gender & Age

The gender audience for this magazine is mixed however the very nature of the magazine may result in a slightly more interest from males. As most of the very best jazz musicians in the world were male, most of the greatest artists of jazz featured in the magazine will be male. This may appeal to male jazz musicians more as they inspire to be like them.

Age-wise, this would be aimed at anyone from the age whereby they are studying jazz or listen to it as well as accomplished jazz musicians themselves. So the target audience age is very varied. However the language used inside may be more understood by people over the age of 20 and is aimed equally at males and females.

S.E.G.

Because the target audience age is so varied it means that my target audience in respect to the National Readership's Survey Social Grades would come under more than one category. With regards to the younger audience, they may be categorised into C2 (semi-skilled manual workers) whereas the more advanced musicians who would read the magazine would be categorised in B (Intermediate managerial, administrative or professional)