Appreciation for Jazz

Entering into this class, I had virtually no prior knowledge of jazz.  The extent of my jazz background included knowing names such as Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington and Miles Davis, and having listened to some swing music (which I didn’t even know was jazz), but that was it.  I assumed that we would learn about different artist and their music, but never expected to be taken on a road trip across America through different eras to examine how distinct forms of jazz developed and affected American culture.

To begin, I had no idea of how rich the background of jazz was.  One thing that surprised me was that the roots of jazz dated all the way back to the Transatlantic Slave Trade.  I knew that Jazz came out of New Orleans, but I never thought of how it emerged as a genre of music.  Another fact I was ignorant to, was how large an influence African culture had on jazz’s formation.  Elements such as vital aliveness, beat focus, call and response and propulsive rhythm can be seen in the earliest forms of jazz to modern jazz.  It was interesting to learn how jazz spread from New Orleans to Chicago and New York and how jazz affected those cities’ culture.

I expected to learn about different jazz musicians (which we did), but I was surprised to learn how those musicians, and the music they played, could totally transform a society.  Prior to this course, I did not have the slightest inkling of how jazz music shaped the American culture throughout the 20^th century.  Jazz changed the way people thought about race, business and even living conditions.  It went from music for hicks in New Orleans, to the epitome of modernity in Chicago and New York during the 1920s, to music for the masses during the Swing Era then to a counter-cultural movement with Bebop.  Within Chicago, jazz night clubs provided day laborers the means to escape the reality of their hard days, while simultaneously providing mobsters a front at which they could sell alcohol during Prohibition.  In New York, jazz provided a way for people to make rent, popularize jazz under the name of swing and legitimize jazz as a discipline through Bebop.  Jazz as a musical style is not given proper acknowledgement of its importance in forming American culture.

I never knew how important jazz actually was.  It was America’s first original musical form; that everything before it was simply imitations of European musical styles.  The emergence of jazz was a mixture of different cultural influences creating something new that America could call its own.  Without it, music, and American culture while we’re at it, would not exist as we know it.  If nothing else, I have come to appreciate jazz for its contribution of shaping American society to what it is today.

Nonchalant but Not Passive

Thelonious Monk faced environments of racial tensions and traditional racial politics for most of his life.  His quotes regarding “fighting the ofays” [1]and “whites calling us ‘boys’”[2] speak of his relaxed attitude, or rather his transcendence above the baggage of the racial tension that plagued the environment in which he grew up and worked.

Monk’s mother took the serious risk of moving to New York, at the sake of her marriage, for her children’s education among other benefits.   In order to pursue this though, it meant living in the neighborhood of San Juan Hill, a providence that earned the title of the “busiest crime areas in New York City” (Kelley 19).  It was an area so diverse that “every block [was] a different town,” and with diversity came racial tension, so much so that one had to be careful just walking to school.  Within this diverse group of people were immigrants from the South, the West Indies as well as a slew of various European countries.  Even amongst all this strife though, Thelonious never was caught up in any large conflict.  Instead, he found ways of going above and beyond them, such as finding an interest in music.  With this mixture of people, came a mixture of culture which included different styles of music all to which Monk was exposed to.  He was taught piano classically by Wolf, but soon mastered even the most difficult Chopin and Tchaikovsky pieces as he grew found of jazz.  As Monk aged, he found refuge from the racial tension within the Columbus Hill Neighborhood Center, where he could play music along with other activities.  Monk lost a talent contest in which the prize was a Julliard education although his family blamed the judges’ racist views.  Later the winner told Monk that he deserved to win in which he responded, “”I’m glad I didn’t go to the conservatory.  Probably would’ve ruined me!”” (Kelley 30)  Monk never took extreme offense to the racism in his life, but rather assigned it no importance or power over him.  He did rebuke racial injustice though, an example being the time he stood up for Sonny, a guy who would later become a great friend (Kelley 33).  In spite of his mother’s aspirations for her children to get a good education, Thelonious dropped out of school and pursued his newly blossoming musical career.

The effects of Thelonious’ childhood can be heard in his music and seen in his performance.  Just as the racial politics created strife in Monk’s childhood, he uses dissonance and timing to create a tension in his music like in “Trinkle Tinkle.”  The influence of the variety of cultures within San Juan Hill can be seen in works such as “Epistrophy,” while his more common attitude of calmness are present in songs like “Ask Me Now.”  His nonchalant demeanor was on display during his bandstand performances where he would at times get up and dance to his own music, while other times he would get up for a drink and be gone for 10-15 minutes.  This created a relaxed environment; a place where he felt comfortable bringing his family.  His mom’s sacrifices for him also played a huge role in shaping his musical career.  Despite rumors about him, Monk was a family man often times inviting his young nieces and nephews to the Five Spot where they “were given the royal treatment” (Kelley 235).  Although Monk had a nonchalant, passive-aggressive approach to traditional racial politics stating that his “music is not a social comment on discrimination or poverty,” he did stand up when racial discrimination stared him in the face.  This was exemplified no better than by the events that occurred in Delaware with Nica in 1958. 

Similar to when Monk stood up for his friend Sonny, he made a stand against the Delaware police officers having done nothing wrong.  Monk was already having one of his “bad days” and the injustice of the incident just made it worse.  When faced with the decision of passively letting the police beat him for nothing that he had done wrong or defending himself, Monk decided to fight back defending his dignity at the consequence of being arrested.  He was in defiance to prove his point: you could discriminate against him, but you could not control him.  Even though all this though, Monk did not hate whites as he was quoted, “They tried to get me to hate white people, but someone would always come along and spoil it,” rather he hated the traditional racial politics that haunted him all his life.

                                      

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[1] “There’s no reason why I should go through that Black Power shit now.  I guess everybody in New York had to do that right?  Because every block is a different town.  It was mean all over New York…besides fighting the ofays, you had to fight each other.  You go in the next block and you’re in another country.” (p. 19)

[2] “contrary to that attempt to portray him [Thelonious] as some people did as being weird or whatever, he was a very bright person…I remember telling Thelonious how I was sick of whites calling us ‘boys; and stuff like that.  He said, ‘Ain’t no drag, Larry, ‘cause everybody wants to be young.’”(p.417)

Competition Induces Racial Tension

From the conflict between the creole and black musicians of New Orleans to the segregated night clubs of Harlem, race has always played an important role in the development of jazz.  It isn’t until the 1930s though, that race is ever discussed explicitly in relation to jazz.  The reason this occurs in the Swing Era is due to the correlation that was made between jazz and the Popular Front, the relationship that developed between critics and musicians, and the competition that was created between white and black musicians.

All throughout the 1920s, jazz is denigrated by both whites and blacks of middle and upper class.  By the 1930s, however, this perception of jazz, under the title of swing, shifts as people from upper and middle class communities begin to see jazz as a way of liberating self-expression instead of a way of promoting social rebellion.  Jazz was no longer seen as the uncouth, primitive music style of the black lower class, but rather as a medium that described “all-American values and progressive leftist ideals” (Stowe 53, 73).  Through its correspondence with the Popular Front, jazz was able to reach an entirely new audience.  It suddenly became alright to partake in black activism, take for instance the Communist party’s involvement in the Scottsboro case (Stewart 11/2/10).  For the first time in American society, “black culture had become, for many of [America’s] young people, the American culture of choice” (Stowe 54).  

The racial tension, which was for the most part covered up during the 1920s, starts to emerge during the 1930s through a new avenue of discussion, journals dedicated to jazz.  It is through these journals that the relationship between jazz enthusiast and jazz musician blossoms.  John Hammond was one such jazz enthusiast who was credited for “discovering” musicians such as Benny Goodman, Billie Holiday and Count Basie (Stowe 54).  In lieu of these contributions, Hammond felt he had a certain authority to critique musicians and it was easy to see from his critiques that “Hammond’s notion of musical authenticity was clearly rooted in his attitude toward race” and commercialization (Stowe 61).  He believed that racial equality could be brought about through jazz and cultural awareness, and criticized any music that was not working towards this goal such as Duke Ellington.  Hammond believed that Duke “disguised a willingness to tolerate racial indignities for the sake of commercial success” (Hammond).    Although Hammond wanted jazz to be a racial melting pot, where the color line was blurred and the black musician could be as successful as the white one, he did not want it at the cost of racial injustices (Stewart 11/2/10).  One recurring issue discussed in the journals, was the question of who the better swing musician was: the black band or the white band.  Hammond’s stance on the issue was clear: he believed blacks were the superior swing players, although he opposed black separatism within the swing industry (Stowe 60-61). 

Although much of the competition between black and white musicians stemmed from the comments of critics, another important factor was the commercialization of swing.  By the time swing became popular, it became exceedingly difficult for big band leaders to manage the business side of their band.  It was at this time that many bands, such as Fletcher Henderson’s, began to fail.  The bands that were able to make the transition were musicians who had agents help them manage the band such as Duke Ellington who hired Irving Mills.  In fact, by 1936 having an agent was the rule not the exception (Stowe 103).  Although agents were expensive, it was a necessary cost especially for black bands that did not get the playing opportunities that white bands received.  Ironically, it was swing’s mass popularity that worked to the detriment of black bands.  After 1935, swing played by whites sounded identical to swing played by blacks and as a result whites bands dominated the market since they had more resources.  As the popularity of swing increased, the disparity between white and black bands also increased (Stowe 122). 

Through changes in American society’s political views, the development of the jazz critic and the mass popularity of swing, race issues, explicitly in relation to jazz, are expressed during the Swing Era for the first time.  Investigating racial issues surrounding jazz opened up the possibility for further discussion and could have even played a large role in the civil rights movement.

Chicago: The All Important Stepping Stone

By the early 1920s, the center of the jazz world had clearly shifted its focus from New Orleans to the cities of Chicago and New York.  This shift allowed jazz to cultivate in a new environment developing different styles.  Although jazz started in New Orleans and by the 1930’s swing era jazz was most popular in New York, Chicago was the all important stepping stone and without it New York would not have become the jazz haven it did.  The culture, community and music that came from Chicago in the 1920s forever shaped the future of jazz.

Chicago provided the perfect cultural environment for jazz to thrive.  Between 1915 and 1920, over half a million Black people moved from the South northward (Gioia 45) and of those about a tenth moved to the South Side of Chicago.  This Great Migration, due in part from the job openings created by the start of WWI, spurred tension between the whites who live in upper Chicago and in 1919 a violent race riot broke out.  Through this riot, the Blacks in Chicago learned that in order to survive in this world of racial hierarchy, they needed to be self-reliant.  This created a sense of commercial racial nationalism, a sense that “mass culture... offered blacks the ingredients from which to construct a new urban black culture” (Lizabeth Cohen).  It was through this new urban black culture, of black entrepreneurialism and modern attitude, that the Chicago night clubs are born in which jazz first thrived.

The unique community in Chicago of night clubs and dance halls, helped nurture jazz and allowed musicians to experiment with different sounds.  After the close of Storyville in 1917, Chicago’s cabarets, night clubs and dance halls like Lincoln Gardens offered musicians long term employment not found elsewhere.  Most of the time, these places were owned by gangsters, who restricted the travel of the musicians and in a sense were like “jazz musician slave masters” (Travis).  This restriction of travel, however, was not all bad.  By not travelling, it not only made the jazz musicians versatile, since they had to play back up for other acts, but allowed them to experiment with different styles.  It was said that Chicago was a “jazz laboratory” (Travis), an open university where different musicians shared techniques building off one another creating all new styles of jazz (Steward).  Sometimes white patrons, though, would in essence “steal” the music of Chicago musicians and represent it as their own.  Although not authentic, the reproduced jazz was able to reach audiences otherwise unreachable by Black musicians.  In this sense, jazz was made more popular bringing it to the mainstream. 

The music that came from Chicago would go on to shape jazz for the next half century.  Artist like King Oliver, Bix Beiderbecke, and Louis Armstrong were pioneers in a style that would come to be known as Chicago style.  This Chicago style was similar to the New Orleans style but dominated by solos, and more complex ensembles, while individuals were given more room to improvise (Scaruffi).  One of the main contributions from Chicago was the ability for an individual solo to “swing” the entire band, a technique perfected by Armstrong in King Oliver’s Creole Jazz Band (Steward).  It is this technique that Armstrong brings to New York and eventually mixes with big bands and leads to the swing era.   Another important aspect of jazz in Chicago was commercialization.  Chicago was the first place where the focus was on earning a gig at a dance hall or night club in hopes of someday recording (Gioia).

Without Chicago, New York would never have reached the swing era before the Great Depression and jazz might have died out.   Because of how the social, economic, and racial conditions in Chicago shaped and influenced jazz, the next level of the genre, swing, was obtainable.  

New Orleans Unique

Known to rival New York, New Orleans was the “cosmopolitan center of the South” (Stewart) with great cultural diversity as well as influence.  With the mixture of French, Spanish, English and African cultures, a myriad of musical styles that had never been brought together, were kneaded into a style of its own.  This new style would eventually be molded and shaped into jazz, but only after going through many transitions. Gioia states that it is this “dynamic interaction, the clash and fusion” (27) that brings together jazz.

Through the Atlantic Slave Trade, African culture coalesced with the already mixed European society of New Orleans to produce a hybrid of the African pentatonic scale with the European diatonic scale.  This mixture, along with components such as call and response and beat focus, arose from slave work songs and spirituals to create one of the predecessors of jazz, the blues.  Many artists like Bessie Smith took this musical style and excelled with it, taking it to places such as St. Louis and Chicago.  Shortly following the blues, the musical style of ragtime came on the scene.  According to Gioia, there are scholars that will argue that the jazz is merely ragtime that is swung.  Although both styles share musical qualities such as syncopation, jazz is more than just swung ragtime.  Jazz also includes improvisation and blues tonality.  One artist who popularized ragtime is Scott Joplin.  He did so to such an extent, that piano sales in America rose a great deal as well as the number of ragtime pieces published (Gioia 22).  Like the blues, ragtime spread to major cities all over.  This raises the question then, if blues and ragtime where the predecessors of jazz, and they had both spread over the country why didn’t jazz emerge in another major city?  I pose that there was something within the city of New Orleans that promoted the emergence of jazz and not the musical roots of the genre.

There were many unique aspects of New Orleans that could have promoted the emergence of jazz, such as the city’s bordellos within the red light district, its passion for brass bands or even its churches.  It is important to note that ragtime and jazz flourished in metropolitan areas such as the bordellos of New Orleans, but “most early jazz musicians did not play in the District” (Gioia 31).  Also, there were many places in other metropolitan cities that had areas similar to the bordellos of New Orleans.  It then comes to reason that the District was most likely not the main reason why jazz started in New Orleans.  It is well noted that Buddy Bolden, the “elusive father of jazz”, often went to church “not for religion, [but] he went there to get music ideas” (Gioia 31), so it seems that New Orleans churches may have been a major contribution to the emergence of jazz.  This again though can be refuted by the fact that the music performed there was just a small bit of the music of New Orleans.  I would argue that the main reason jazz emerged from New Orleans is based in the city’s intimate relation with brass instruments.  As Gioia puts it “but the birth of jazz would have been unthinkable without the extraordinary local passion for brass bands, an enthusiasm that lay at the core of that city’s relation to the musical arts” (32).  No other city had this, although many others had all the other ingredients.  This is what set New Orleans apart, and this is why jazz emerged there.