The Importance of Jazz

Before taking this class, I had little to no knowledge about jazz, both as a musical style but also as a historically important cultural movement. Jazz goes far beyond the types of notes played and in what specific keys. It is a living, breathing thing that evolves with the people and the times. Very unique to jazz is the way that it easily adds varying musical styles to its repertoire while all the while maintaining its own identity. Jazz changed drastically through the times and places we studied, but it did not cease to be called jazz. Beyond its obvious importance to and inspiration of countless other musical genres, jazz holds very specific cultural significance, particularly for, but not limited to, the African American race and has always been tied closely to racism and slavery as well as civil rights. Additionally, jazz holds a reputation as a “party music” and really seems to be the root of all “kids and their music these days” sentiments, where a distinction is made between “young” and “old” music. The words “cool” and “hip” would have no meaning without jazz, which became the first real rebellion music that such culturally significant movements such as Rock in the 60’s can easily find their roots.
All of this contrasts greatly with my presumptions about jazz before this class. I have always associated jazz with my grandparents, with WWII and other ancient times. However, after reading about the lives of these musicians along with gaining a true understanding of their time, I have come to appreciate jazz for its enormous contributions to the musical as well as historical community. Though for me jazz seemed so old and foreign, by reading the autobiographies and learning the context as well as listening to the previously unheard of musicians, I began to understand the significance of the style and came to recognize the sources of much of my own culture. Though I had heard the names Thelonious Monk, Miles Davis, Duke Ellington, and Louis Armstrong, I had no idea what their music actually sounded like, or what their environments were like. Jazz was born out of these various communities with conflicts between race and class recurring throughout.
What was of particular interest to me was the mob influence in cities like Chicago and New York and the overall “low life” prejudices that jazz, like many musical styles later, had to fight its way out of. I was not very surprised to learn of this connection between jazz and the nightlife, including the drugs, alcohol, and parties that were associated with it. New music has always attracted the “sinners” of society which is pretty much everyone, and because of this, jazz became the perfect precursor to today’s music industry laden with rock stars. Jazz was always associated with black society and as such has had to overcome many obstacles in order to survive to this day. Though in today’s society jazz is finally respected and, for me at least, held as a classic style of music as opposed to contemporary, but the style and the musicians had to fight for every bit of respect it has earned and I can fully appreciate this when I look at younger musical styles that are continuously denigrated because they have yet to become an accepted style. The story of jazz is really the story of rebellion and counterculture and appeals most to the younger generation. These ideas and concepts of jazz were previously unheard of for me, but now I can see the importance of the history of jazz in the history of America.
All in all, I thoroughly enjoyed this class and learned a lot about jazz. Having almost no knowledge before hand, it was easy to take a lot from the course. I was either entirely or almost entirely unfamiliar with every musician and now I can confidently talk about the various jazz styles and their proponents as well as make connections to my own music tastes.

Bebop in San Juan Hill

Though Thelonious Monk was born in North Carolina, he was raised on San Juan Hill. This area of Manhattan almost entirely populated by African Americans became a central part of the development of jazz and particularly the bebop style. Anywhere there is a vast diversity of cultures and people, we see the jazz style expand and morph in order to accept more variety, which it then feeds off of. As in New Orleans, the black community within San Juan Hill may have seemed united from the outside perspective, however, the members of the community came from all over the United States and included immigrants from the Caribbean as well. As Monk says: “You go in the next block and you’re in another country” (Monk 19). Because of all the different people found within the Hill and Manhattan in general, there was a definite cultural clash that was perfectly encapsulated by the bebop movement with its heavy dissonance and unconventional modern approach to jazz. The community that raised Monk was also in return greatly affected by the musician whose genius and unorthodox musical style became central to the theme of the community and the culture.
Monk was not an especially active voice for civil rights or against racism, and though he definitely encountered his fair share of the latter, he never emerged as an activist and his relationship with the white woman Kathleen Annie Pannonica Rothschild, or “Nica” shows that race was not at the forefront of his mind. Nica was a great patron for jazz musicians and Monk, like Charlie Parker, lived out the remaining years of his life with her. In his arrest in Delaware with Nica, the police had found drugs in Nica’s car and after Monk refused to answer questions he was beaten. This was a perfect example of the type of racism Monk faced, and yet he did not hold any special resentment that he voiced. Instead, his musical styling proved to be the real source of his rebellion. As professor Stewart said: “His success in transcending race and class lines is perhaps embodied in his affectionate relationship with Nica, but also the way in which he adopted and became adopted by a young generation of Blacks and Whites who were rebelling against the strictures of American society” (Stewart 11/18). It was Monks musical style, not his actions that acted as rebellion. The bebop movement was all about changing from the simple dance music to a more complicated as well as personal style that allowed the musicians the most freedom and improvisation. It changed the focus of the music away from primarily serving the audience and towards the musicians own expression as an art form. For this reason, it could never gain the most popular following, but it did help change the previous image of the jazz musician which was mirrored by the change overcoming the nation in relation to the black community. The previous swing musicians were seen as catering to their white audience. This idea of the simple swing musician was almost reminiscent of slavery and the general degradation of the black community, but the beboppers were the symbol of the new way of the world, the new place that the black community was taking with the musicians as artists not as white entertainers. The bebop musicians were the first “hipsters” and were a major part of the counterculture movement that exploded in the 1960’s.
Monk was formed by his community in San Juan Hill and his bebop musical tradition, filled with dissonance and a wholly original approach to the piano, in turn became a distinct part of the community. The modernization of our American culture was fast approaching, and the bebop, hipster movement was one of the first examples of this evolution. Monk is a prominent figure in the history of jazz and especially in the mindset that changed the entertainer into the artist. The counterculture revolution was all about going against the status quo of everything in culture, and where the status quo included racism, the opposition proved especially strong.

Racism in the Depression

With hard times, racism flourishes, and the Great Depression during the 1930’s was an especially hard time for the whole country. Following the “roaring” party-time 20’s, the 30’s brought a decade of hardships that the music industry proved not to be immune to. Though race and racism had always played a strong role in the development of jazz, the 1930’s saw a wave of modern civil rights reform in the mainstream of liberal America. As racism was getting challenged on all fronts more and more through the years, the music world became an obvious focal point for change that would be viewed on the national and even international stages. The advent and public exposure to technological advances like the radio proved to have significant impacts on musicians and the ever evolving music industry.

As the Great Depression hit America, the music industry, which proved so lucrative during the 1920’s, was one of the first victims of a poverty stricken nation that could no longer afford luxuries such as live jazz entertainment. With the invention of the radio, and the end of Prohibition, jazz was no longer the exciting club atmosphere that it had been, “Not only alcohol, but the whole ethos and ambiance of jazz culture were demystified in the process. Both could now easily be consumed at home: alcohol legally purchased at the liquor store, jazz carried into the household over the airwaves” (Gioia 136).  This fostered very strong competition for the ever dwindling job opportunities for jazz musicians, as few bands being distributed to radios everywhere negated the need for live music at multiple venues. At the same time, the radio allowed the careers of those few successful musicians to really flourish, allowing bands to gain a national fan base.

Perhaps the clearest example of the racism talks in the 1930’s were those between John Hammond and Duke Ellington. During this time, music critic and jazz enthusiast Hammond emerged as a strong proponent of integration of the music world. Hammond was a very important member of the jazz community as not only a noted critic but also as one of the first talent agents and he is credited with beginning the careers of and “discovering” such jazz legends as Fletcher Henderson, Count Basie, and Billie Holiday. Also, Hammond is credited with persuading Benny Goodman to integrate his band. In addition to this, Hammond notably criticized Duke Ellington for his “tact and suave manner [which] disguised a willingness to tolerate racial indignities for the sake of commercial success” (lecture 11/2). Hammond was accusing Ellington of being racially insensitive for continuing to play at the fully segregated Cotton Club. Further, Ellington was accused of catering his music to white tastes. Ellington would retort that Hammond, a white, Vanderbilt was in no place to comment on what it was like for a black musician to survive and thrive during the Great Depression. White musicians enjoyed many advantages in an extremely competitive industry for both whites and blacks. They were paid better, were generally accepted more, and were less subject to having their music stolen (Gioia 142). There was stiff competition throughout the industry but for the African American population, surviving the Great Depression necessitated compromise, however, I do not think Ellington was in any way oblivious to the lack of black people allowed in the club. The simple fact is Ellington had a steady job at the club in a time of great depression that saw many musicians fail.

                The end of the good time 20’s ushered in a new era of solemn depression in America. Jazz, which has always flourished with the exciting party atmosphere, saw a significant evolution to survive the Great Depression. As the nation became more and more modern with its racial integration in society, jazz became a forefront battleground for the fight, with black musicians as a leading group in the public image.

Bow to the Duke

            Both Chicago and New York were essential to the development of Jazz in the 1920’s. Chicago was an urban city that promised a wealth of new opportunities for African Americans attempting to move out of the racist South and capture their part of the American Dream. Chicago was also an incredibly important stepping stone in the overall American migration west. New York was the cultural and artistic capital of the United States, and it was here that the Swing Era can find its roots. Additionally, most of the recording industry, both written and audio, was centered in New York, and so the development and proliferation of jazz was tied to the city. I think New York holds a slight edge over Chicago in its importance to the advancement of the jazz musical style mainly because of the great amount of influence on Swing and the city’s cultivation of some of the finest jazz musicians. Not to mention the Harlem Renaissance which was a full cultural upheaval that went beyond just jazz.

            The social, economic, and racial conditions played an integral role in shaping jazz in New York. The conditions of the time saw African Americans still very much segregated, even within the black community. Similar in attitude to the Creole presence in New Orleans, there was also a significant amount of middle-class African Americans who attempted to separate themselves from what they considered the lower-class jazz partiers. This class distinction within black society, combined with the already segregated black and white society of the 1920’s, led to the creation of this Harlem style of jazz that was a fusion of different styles and tastes. The Harlem Renaissance was a time of great artistic flourishing in a wide variety of black intellectual and cultural subjects. However, even though Harlem was undergoing this great renaissance, it was at the same time becoming a poverty-stricken slum. This conflicting environment became a perfect mixture for fostering the development of jazz. The jazz style began to benefit both from the increase in classically trained musicians and the Harlem rent party and nightclub environment that created such stiff competition along with raw, passionate music. The Cotton Club was the epitome of these two societies coming together. This Harlem club owned by organized crime became one of the hottest white only venues in town for white people to venture out and listen to black musicians in Harlem, but behind the safety of segregation.

            The influence of the European musical tradition, particularly with the piano, was also very important in creating the jazz climate in New York. Here we see the evolution of jazz from the smaller, solo-happy bands in Chicago to the birth of the big band, orchestra sound that heavily included the stride piano. Same as in New Orleans, New York successfully combined different musical forms in order to further evolve jazz. This evolution that took place in jazz was essential “to expand audience for African American music in the face of discrimination from the cultural elite, both within and without the black community, and despite a severe economic downturn” (Gioia 96). The combination of the previous ragtime and blues jazz with the more classical, and specifically piano, styles further changed the sound of jazz. The new celebrated skill was in band-leading and orchestration rather than soloing. Band-leading included finding and keeping great talent. This unique Harlem style was an important precursor to the Swing Era. The main band-leaders who epitomized the New York style were Fletcher Henderson, Benny Carter, and Duke Ellington. The leaders in the stride piano movement comprised of jazz legends: Willie “the Lion” Smith, James P. Johnson, and Thomas “Fats” Waller. These musicians were some of the very best in the history of jazz.

            To me, Duke Ellington fully encapsulated the New York style, both in his musical career as well as his personal life. He was fairly well-educated and of a higher class then most of the jazz players who came out of New Orleans. Being a very intelligent and suave man, Duke Ellington was the perfect New York City guy and had all the tools necessary to attract some of the biggest names in jazz to come play in his band, Louis Armstrong most famously. In addition to this, he was a brilliant musician and as his band became the headliners at the famous Cotton Club, he became the face of jazz in New York. Not only this, but because he was playing for a white club he kind of became the face of black society in general. There are very few names in jazz that command the amount of respect of Duke Ellington and this alone is why he edges out Fletcher Henderson in importance.

The Birth of Jazz in New Orleans

Around the turn of the 19th century, New Orleans was unlike any other city in the world. It’s unique combination of people created a strong fusion of many different cultures. New Orleans was founded as a French colony before being ceded to Spain less than fifty years later. Another forty years found New Orleans back in French hands before finally being obtained by the United States in the Louisiana Purchase. In addition to these strong French, Spanish, and English influences, there was also a widely diverse black population. Many had been brought from various parts of Africa in the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade, still others came from islands in the Caribbean. Jazz came out of a mixture of many different musical traditions and styles from vastly different cultures and this “cultural gumbo,” as Gioia put it, was unlike any other in the world and it is therefore unsurprising that it facilitated such a strong revolution in music (Gioia 7). 

Because of the incredibly diverse nature of the city, there was a tolerance unmatched almost anywhere for the time period. Nowhere is this more evident than in the city council’s decision to make Congo Square an official area where slaves could sing and dance. This contrasted to most other areas of the country where slaves were, at best, discouraged from any musical inclinations. This area allowed for all the different African subcultures to interact and mix. Additionally, the creation of the red-light district or Storyville was an integral aspect of the emergence of the jazz tradition. This area of New Orleans was set up to contain all the “uglier” sides of society including gambling, prostitution, and drinking. Known as The District, this side of town attracted musicians, especially the newly freed slaves, who could earn a living playing music. Because of Storyville’s obvious popularity, it proved to be a breeding ground for competitive and talented musicians.

Perhaps the most important aspect of New Orleans that allowed it to harbor such unique musicianship was the Creoles. The Creole society was very separated from the black society. Many of the Creoles had been freed thanks to the Code Noir in 1724 and as such they generally thought of themselves as part of a high class, European tradition rather than acknowledge their slave roots. Jelly Roll Morton, one of the more important innovators and self-proclaimed creator of jazz, was a Creole who as Gioia puts it: “would have been horrified to see himself lauded by posterity as a major black musician” (40). Many Creole were relatively well educated and had training or lessons in the European musical tradition and for one were able to read music. However, once the Civil War ended, there was no longer a difference between the Creoles and the blacks. As these cultures were thrust together, and Creoles were dropped down the social hierarchy to the level of blacks, the raw and emotional African musical traditions became intertwined with the structured European classical music and the result was a brand new sound that became the roots of jazz.