JAZZ – THE AMERICAN ART FORM
18.12.2013
Jazz Has a very complex history, and thus it is 100% American, not black or white, just the only true American art form.
Approaches to jazz history:
- tracing cultural (African, European and West Indian) influences
- tracing social trends which influenced jazz history
- tracing demographical trends which influenced jazz history
Jazz was called ‘race music’ – it’s not accurate, though race did play a role in its history
NEW ORLEANS – dramatic and colorful history, the most ethnically diverse and racially integrated American city of the 19th century, with French and Spanish influences and Creoles as well as Caribbean culture’s significant presence.
(Katrina, the hurricane, uncovered numerous problems – many documents were made about it)
Creoles of Color – descendants of French, Spanish and African slaves
You cannot separate the history of the music and of the people who created it.
Some major influences on the creation of jazz
1) Created by slaves who preserved the rhythms of African music (syncopation)
Christian themes and music mixed with significant African elements in slaves’ religious celebrations.
Syncopation – breaking of the rhythm
Mardi Gras -> military orchestra (became popular after the Civil War) <szczegóły niżej>
African traditions were preserved by dance -> in Congo Square after the service on Sunday evenings they were dancing long hours accompanied by drums
2) Plantation work songs – strict rhythm; thus the rhythm in jazz is controlled, though syncopated; easily recognized structure (call and response)
3) Baptist church’s Gospel spirituals -> call and response (some say that this structure was present in African music), ring shouts which make Gospel so energetic
4) Blues – provided jazz with chords and melodic structure; music about something, telling depressing stories meant to be uplifting. It usually uses only 3 chords – almost primitive, but thanks to this individual skill of the performer may be noticed; jazz took it from blues.
At that time blues was folk, not popular music.
The first black musicians performing for white audiences were minstrels in minstrel shows (origins of American pop culture); performed by white people with their faces painted black (blackface). Sometimes they couldn’t find white musicians to accompany them, so they engaged black musicians who also were forced to paint their faces in order to look the same as the blackfaced white performers. These shows were racist. Nevertheless, it was in the minstrel shows that banjo was introduced to the public. They used a wide repertoire of hugely popular songs, such as ‘Jim Crow’.
European influences on jazz:
- military bands popular un New Orleans after the Civil War -> songs about revolution, often stolen from Europe, e.g. ‘Dixie’ originally is a European song
- music based on drums and pipes (creed instruments)
One day someone decided to use a military orchestra on Mardi Gras with syncopation (the brass band)
When the legal status of the Creoles of color changed, classically trained musicians were expired from orchestras and had to find other artistic forms or audiences. This is how ragtime appeared – with Caribbean, European and African influences. It became an ultimate hit. (one of the most important musicians was Scott Joplin)
Confusions – Creole culture
Creole musicians combined brass band traditions with syncopated ragtime, blues, West Indian influences; it is the earliest form of JAZZ
These are also the roots of New Orleans Jazz Band.
08.01.2014
The first recorded jazz (jass) – 1917, Original Dixieland Jassband (only white musicians)
A massive commercial success, other recordings followed this time. At the same time recording industry was born and prices of recordings dropped, which helped in the development of jazz and its popularity; if hip hop existed in the 1910s, it would probably become popular instead of jazz, but it appeared 60 years later
Jelly Roll Morton – the first to record a solo piece of jazz
(Jazz is traditionally played in New Orleans during funerals)
The Jazz Age 1920’s
A hugely controversial period; the rise of religious conservatives on the one hand, and moral revolution and liberating women on the other; labor unions were created; many organizations with different viewpoints had the same goal, thus prohibition and suffragists appeared more or less at the same time. (America had a significant problem with alcoholism, and this is why prohibition was introduced under the influence of conservatives (including women who had just got the right to vote). What is interesting, by the end of prohibition the number of alcohol drunk in the USA dropped, while the number of alcoholics increased; it probably meant that those who drank from time to time stopped drinking completely, but the rest was drinking more than before).
These events coincide with massive migrations of blacks to the north – mostly Chicago and New York.
Prohibition forced alcohol to be drunk in illegal clubs (speakeasy), so they evolved and jazz music began to be played for the customers.
Such musicians as Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington were moving between Chicago and New York.
Louis Armstrong – a son of a prostitute, adopted by Jewish parents who bought him his first trumpet. He re-modeled jazz; he introduced an extensive solo and scat singing – improvising, imitating the sound of an instrument using your mouth (according to an anecdote it was in 1926, during the recording of a song ‘Heebie Jeebies’, when he dropped a paper with lyrics, but the recording wasn’t stopped, so when he forgot the words he started improvising)
Duke Ellington – played background music in restaurants.
Exotic music for exotic dances – ‘jungle music’, a term coined by the Cotton Club. Ellington was the first one to broadcast from the Cotton Club.
He was a much better composer than a soloist; a crisis in the American classic music created some space for Ellington as a composer. His music was elegant, so the term ‘jungle music’ was a bit unfair.
The Blues – 1920s, a major inspiration for jazz; a growing number of blues singers was accompanied by jazz musicians
Bessie Smith, Ethel Waters – ‘the blues divas’; they gained respect, but sometimes were offended by white racist public. According to an urban legend, once when Bessie Smith was performing in the South, the group was attacked by white racist who started offending her. She didn’t break the show, but started opposing them and offending them by singing.
Blues artists often sang about the pride of blacks; the Afro-American culture spread all over the USA.
The Swing Era (end of the 1920s – the 1930s)
Jazz was primarily dance music, to which charleston and foxtrot were danced. Swing evolved from these dances, built in response for the need for dance music:
- more European than blues, with strong rhythm (for dancers)
- attractive, easily remembered melodies
- however, it included improvised solos, a characteristic of jazz
Famous swing players:
* Benny Goodman (a white musician, both swing and classical artist)
* Count Basie
* Louis Armstrong (who was rebuilding his career several times)
The 1930s are widely recognized as icons of American culture – prohibition ended, jazz was no longer played in secret, so it lost its reputation of a suspicious music
Glenn Miller’s jazz band – a group sent to Europe to accompany the soldiers who fought in the 2nd World War; after the war the band disappeared
Towards improvisation – jazz is no longer about dancing
Jazz players were going back to the origins, creating small bands or trios; a power trio – a band consisting of the rhythm section and a soloist, invented with the birth of BEBOP:
- fast tempos (although bebop was mostly inspired by blues)
- simple arrangements
- virtuosity of the player (improvisation matters) -> Louis Armstrong (again!), Art Tatum
- shifts of tempo, departures from the theme
Bebop was the music for musicians, not for the audience. For some critics it is the peak of jazz evolution.
The first piece of bebop ever – ‘Body and Soul’ by Coleman Hawkins
Art Tatum was improvising before bebop was born, he strongly influenced the bebop artists.
Some artists:
Dizzie Gilespie (‘Salt Peanuts’)
Charlie ‘Bird’ Parker – probably the best jazz player in history; ‘Bird’ is also the title of a film by Clint Eastwood
Clifford Brown – a skilful trumpet player; he introduced Max Roach, a famous drummer; for the first time in jazz drums was used as a rhythm instrument
Cool Jazz/West Coast Jazz
- arrangements again were important (going back to swing)
- smoothing out the dissonances of bebop
- yet revolutionary compositional techniques were often incorporated (The Dave Brubeck Quartet ‘Time Out’, 1959)
- not smooth jazz! It’s still ambitious, though accessible
Artists:
* Gerry Mulligan
* Stan Getz
* Lester Young
* early records by Miles Davis
Later cool jazz was massively influenced by Brazilian bossa nova.
Jimmy Giuffre – avant-garde; probably the first free jazz musician, though he wasn’t recognized as such
East Coast – Hard Bop:
- extension of bebop – reaction to Cool Jazz, obviously influenced by it
- simpler melodies, even more blues-based, often incorporating other influences
- rhythm sections often playing outside the 4/4 time signature
- blue note – the birth of the ‘hard bop label’
- supported both by audiences and the music industry
- the golden age of modern jazz (approximately 1955-1970)
- for some critics the ultimate peak of jazz evolution
- some hard bop artists later became major figures of the avant-garde jazz (John Coltrane Giant steps, 1960)
Modal Jazz
- music built from changes of modes – several within one composition, improvisation is then built around not specific key, but the musician’s choice of mode. As the modes are changed, the tonal center of the music is also changed, so these changes of modes are often surprising, challenging not only to musicians, but also listeners. Hence modal musicians often stick to melodic playing, not to make the music too complex and dissonant; constant repetitions
- result – for laymen listeners – more ‘abstract’, ‘meditative’ sound
Miles Davis Kind of Blue, 1959
Herbie Hancock Maiden Voyage