Getting Started
UNIT 8
History of Jazz Overview
Step 1
Answered and turned in during class
History of Jazz Research
Step 1
About(Ken Burns)
Ken Burns states that jazz is free, yet it has to follow some important rules. He refers to jazz music sort of like a democracy in that way. Burns was limited when creating this series about jazz music, he couldn't simply state what is and isn't jazz, but he also had to not neglect where jazz came from, what it started as, and what changes it went through over time. He brought up the fact that Thomas Jefferson stated that "All men are created equal," but still owned 200 human beings. Ken said that jazz was the battle cry for freedom that the African-Americans had when they were not considered free in a free land. When people study America in 2000 years from now, Gerald Earley stated that there would only be three major thing: the Constitution, baseball, and jazz music. All of these are forms of improvisation which were a huge part of American history. This shows the improvisation is a very important part of not only jazz but our country's history as well.
Music 101(Improvisation)
Both improvisation and composition are related in the most interesting of ways. Whenever you hear breath-taking improvisation or jaw-dropping composition, they may even feel as though they switch places. Arnold Schoenberg once said that “Composition is slowed down improvisation,” showing the relation between the two. Improvisation is a major key in the creation and performing of jazz music. Everyone in the jazz band has a general idea of what they are going to play and how it will fit together to create the music. They are all very familiar with their instruments and know their role within the piece that they are playing. It is said that all jazz improvisers in a way are composers as well. This is because they create their solo or melody within the moment of the song, and base it around the context of the song and do their best to make it fit and not seem out of place. Jazz orchestral pieces may have places where they tell the player to improvise, and that is where the gears in their brains start turning to figure out a tune that would best fit the context that the composer wanted to represent through the song. But it’s not just jazz improvisers and composers who do the improvising. Everyone does it every day, whether it be cooking a meal or getting dressed. Improvisation can be simply put as “spontaneously confronting a challenge”.
Roots(Over view of each slide/map)
New Orleans is the birthplace of jazz and where it all started. The music started in places such as the blend of voices on street markets or the music played in whorehouses such as Josie Arlington’s whorehouse. Famous musicians’ names appeared in records stating that they worked at Tom Anderson’s Cabaret and Restaurant, which is also known as Anderson’s Annex. Around 1915, a small jazz group moved to Chicago, which is where jazz started to grow up and spread. The music was familiar to the black Chicagoans, but the whites (or Yankees) were quite disturbed by the loud and obscure noises that the Brown’s Band from Dixieland presented. After this performance and the closing of the restaurant, the band broke up and returned to New Orleans. In 1922, Louis Armstrong boarded a train going from New Orleans to Chicago, where he could earn a lot more money for his services. He stated that playing as a musician in Chicago put you in the position of being treated as a god. The jazz scene in Chicago then seemed to bloom as more people were exposed to the music. This movement later encouraged the end of segregation between races, because the musicians would get together no matter what race. They didn’t care what your race was, they just cared about how you sounded. In 1928 a bunch of cafes were closed due to having liquor on their tables, making it difficult for both the cabarets and musicians to survive in Chicago.
Step 2
1. Count Basie
5. Glenn Miller