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Although Patchen has given previous evidence of an interest in jazz, the musical group that he works with, the Chamber Jazz Sextet, is often ignored by jazz critics.

( Downbeat did not mention the Los Angeles appearance of Patchen and the Sextet, although the engagement lasted over two months.

) The stated goal of the CJS is the synthesis of jazz and `` serious '' music.

Patchen's musicians are outsiders in established jazz circles, and Patchen himself has remained outside the San Francisco poetry group, maintaining a self-imposed isolation, even though his conversion to poetry-and-jazz is not as extreme or as sudden as it may first appear.

He had read his poetry with musicians as early as 1951, and his entire career has been characterized by radical experiments with the form and presentation of his poetry.

However, his subject matter and basic themes have remained surprisingly consistent, and these, together with certain key poetic images, may be traced through all his work, including the new jazz experiments.