"Let me be a dreamer / Let me float,” Layers of Laufey's deep, hazy voice, full of longing and nostalgia, hit the ears of thousands as they hit play on her sophomore album, Bewitched. A soft melody of piano deepens into a jaunty baseline joined by gentle cymbals as the first verse of "Dreamer" begins. The Icelandic-American artist, Laufey Lin Jónsdóttier, has been recognized widely for her authentic, jazzy sound. This unique sound and the relatability of her lyrics about modern dating, Laufey has become one of the most popular faces in current American jazz.

However, such a title does come with contention. Some jazz lovers find difficulty in giving Laufey such a label as representative of the jazz genre. Though she incorporates jazz instruments like the French horn, trumpets, piano, bass, and drums, and a deep alto voice, she still receives comparisons to indie pop artists like Clairo and eclectic artists like Thundercat. These comparisons stem from the modernity of her music, combining pop and classical elements not seen in early jazz. Her musical background helps explain this theme throughout her releases. Laufey's musical training in instruments like the piano and cello was influenced by her family's musical background. Her mother—who is a classically trained pianist—urged her children to hone and sharpen their skills in orchestra performance, resulting in many opportunities to play with sophisticated artists like the Iceland Symphony Orchestra.

Besides her classical training, Laufey also grew up listening to old jazz figures like Ella Fitzgerald, Chet Baker, and Bing Crosby. These artists represent an era of jazz in the mid-1950s in which romantic music with entrancing expressions of love and loss was mainstream. Additionally, the effects of popular music constantly playing throughout anyone's day-to-day life and their catchy, addictive verses make up a significant part of any artist's musical world. With different sounds coming from all different directions and eras, it's no wonder Laufey's so-called jazz music sounds unlike her old figure inspirations as well as those that came even before them.

So, what is jazz music, then? What is it supposed to sound like? And how has the genre changed so much over the years listeners are no longer able to come to a consensus on who and what represents it? For starters, jazz is a style of music that originated within African American communities predominantly in New Orleans. Early focus remained on improvisation and movement of sounds, often described as "swing." Imagine a stuffy, cramped room along the Cotton Belt, a woman standing atop an improvised stage adorned in gems and feathers, gleaming with sweat, and using their authoritative voice to entreat their audiences to respond. They did not sing not about love, but instead about being wronged, nor did they discuss sparkly stars or the warm sun, instead they discussed work and pain. This is 1920s jazz, a subgenre that sounds completely unlike Laufey's music, and yet they fall under the same category.

20s music was grittier, louder, and more guttural than any jazz following it. It was also much more conversational. Bessie Smith's 1927 hit "Trombone Cholly," for example, is known because of her commanding voice and the responding melody of the trumpet. What makes this song extraordinary is the natural and argumentative dialogue between Smith and her accompaniment. At the time, it was revolutionary that most players and singers were non-classically trained, representing an older jazz that is very different from later artists like Fitzgerald and modern ones like Laufey. Players would learn to play only by ear and their compositions were instinctual, responding to the leading voice. When listening to "Trombone Cholly," you hear Smith jibe, "I know a fool who blows the horn," and the trumpet player proclaiming his contempt in the background, as if exclaiming, "I know you're not talking about me!"

A switch occurred into the 1930s as more classically trained musicians started to take over jazz. Recording labels sought a smoother sound reflective of more precise sound technology. Thus music became much more structured, and so the Jazz Age moved into the Swing Era, and so on, and so on.

Movement in music occurs frequently, more than once in every decade as music evolves. The 40s brought Bebop and the beginnings of R&B with artists like Charlie Parker and James Brown, respectively. The 50s were defined by the Cool Jazz genre, pioneered by Miles Davis. Suddenly music began to slow down, rhythms became calmer and the emphasis on voice control and organized composition was essential. The 1960s were all about Hard Bop which was characterized by its Gospel influences which then branched off into an even more popular genre called Soul Jazz.

It wasn't until the 1970s that things started to get crazy: there were sub-genres like jazz-funk, jazz-pop, jazz-rock, and punk- jazz, and even later in the 80s and 90s came the emergence of cape jazz (from Cape Town,) ethno, non-western jazz, neo-swing jazz, and ska-punk-alternative-rock jazz-because why not? At one point in the 90s, a sub-genre called jazz noir emerged which can only be described as musky and full of impending doom. There really is a category for every kind of jazz.

Every era of jazz has its own definitive properties that form unique combinations. So, how and why do these changes occur? If you ask Berklee student Noa Zebley, she would say it's the people who influence the genre. "The way jazz moves, there are always influential people that help move it into a new era..." she explains. "Every time music has moved forward has been because people said 'fuck the money.'" She's referring to traditional trailblazers like Miles Davis, Charlie Parker, Joe Henderson, Dizzy Gillespie, and Alice Coltraine who were greatly influenced by

the improvisational origins of the music. In discussion of these origins, Zebley admiringly explains that "being able to improvise is the root of what jazz music is," she also adds, "It's a big musical conversation, and it's so beautiful when you all know that language,' speaking of her first experiences playing with other musicians.

Thinking of jazz as a conversation is helpful to figure out how it has changed over time. Pioneers in the genre get their recognition by creating something akin to a new vernacular within the genre through unique rhythms, sounds, and techniques. Charlie Parker, for example, created a more intuitive and fast-paced mode of communication between players known as the bebop style. Although ways of playing have changed throughout time, almost unrecognizably, it doesn't mean music of today cannot be defined as jazz. After all, we still call the English from centuries ago the same language we speak now, even if they sound completely different. With this knowledge in mind, perhaps a jazz artist like Laufey should not be regarded as one who rejects the genre's origins, but as one who embraces them. Because isn't experimenting with new sounds the foundation of what jazz really is?

However, there are differences between improvisational music and jazz that help in distinguishing what does and does not fall under the genre. Zebley observes that experimental influences are still present in modern music as well, this time citing the work of Thundercat and DOMi & JD Beck, though she explains, "There is improvisation within that music, but I wouldn't call it jazz." Taking the exploratory foundations of jazz and applying it to other forms of music helps create new sound, but it does not necessarily mean this new music is jazz in itself. Contrastingly, Laufey may more easily fall under the genre as she uses traditional jazz instruments and performs with orchestras, while other modern experimental artists play themselves with technologically and synth-based instruments, lending themselves to alternative categories. Still, the musical world of modern mainstream artists like Laufey and these improvisational artists is very different from the old ones of Charlie Parker and Miles Davis, of Ella Fitzgerald and Bing Crosby, and of Bessie Smith and 20s artists. Music students like Noa Zebley are exposed to various forms of playing music in education and in life. Though Zebley grew up playing within the jazz genre, she finds that studying at an institution like Berklee with so many different types of music has exposed her to diverse ways of playing.

Laufey, too, was a Berklee student of the 2021 graduating class and a beloved member of the school's community. Zebley endearingly regards her, saying, "Seeing how Laufey's education culminated in her music and how it influences what she does is fascinating...and it's so good!" Berklee's multi-approach method to teaching genres of jazz and pop combines with Laufey's classical training to form the authentic sounds of Bewitched. Such combinations represent a natural response that occurs within music. Jazz needs to evolve in order to adapt to audiences' tastes, and there needs to be people moving that conversation onto new topics. Furthermore, these conversations should be fresh. It would be unfortunate if Laufey directly emulated an already existing type of music, then this conversation wouldn't be had at all.

So, jazz is complicated, often bewildering in its tendency to change so rapidly. New decades bring new eras, and now, in 2023, Laufey's whimsical and romantic sound seems to represent the current state of jazz. The amalgamation and fusion of multiple forms of well-loved music, both old and modern, has given the young Icelandic artist the opportunity to form new audiences in jazz and bring it back into the mainstream. Bewitched has been the most popular jazz release in the past years, and the most popular jazz debut on Spotify, receiving almost 6 million streams on its release date. Music, especially in a genre as flexible as this, inevitably changes with time. But has it changed too much? Again, who can say? The fact is, jazz that people enjoy is still being created after over a century, and that's something extraordinary. As Zebley says, impassioned in her discussion of a cherished form of music, "When people follow what they love, I don't see music dying."