Blog 1

History of Jazz – Blog Post #1

           

As New Orleans was major hub of commerce during the 19^th century, its population swelled with the heterogeneous streams of people coming and going from the city. This cosmopolitan history contributed to the diverse cultural setting from which jazz emerged. New Orleans held a deep appreciation for music, as bands performed at almost every social event. This coupled with the city’s local passion for brass bands made it a fertile musical soil, ripe for innovation. Remarkably, the city’s moral atmosphere played a role almost as significant as its musical one. The tales of Storyville, a red light district notoriously started by Sidney Story, purport its sinful influence as a breeding ground for hot style jazz. While these accounts often misalign with the facts surrounding the emergence of jazz, their notoriety and sensationalism produced a desire for the forbidden fruit of this new musical style.

However, the most important factor that explained why jazz emerged in New Orleans arises from the racial relations of the state. The transience of the city’s visitors coupled with the licentious nature of its residents resulted in a rapid racial mixing and the emergence of a distinct group: Creoles of color. “[In 1894], the passage of the Louisiana Legislative Code No. 111…designated anyone of African ancestry as a Negro. Slowly, but inexorably, these Creoles of color were pushed into closer and closer contact with the black underclass they had strenuously avoided for so long” (Gioia, 32.) The joining of these groups connected their previously juxtaposed musical styles – the Creoles’ skilled, classical approach and the “hot,” improvisations of black musicians – which established the unique amalgam of sound that constitutes jazz.

While the blend of European and African practices worked together to create jazz, the style largely grew out of a history of African American musical traditions. While jazz draws influences from several genres of music, it most significantly drew from ragtime and its major innovator, Scott Joplin. Gioia mentions that jazz pianists especially derived style and technique from ragtime artists. “A whole generation of jazz pianists adopted [the left-hand structures of ragtime], using a resounding low bass note or octave (sometimes a fifth or tenth) on beats one and three, followed by a middle register chord on beats two and four” (Gioia, 20). In addition to the appropriation of this four-to-the-bar pattern, jazz’s conjoining of European and African musical traditions mirrored Joplin’s opera, Treemonisha, which utilized a full range of European operatic devices.

The combination of international traditions that cultivated jazz thrived in the distinctive atmosphere of New Orleans. The mobile, ceremonial, and traditionally performative nature of New Orleans music held a special niche for the emergence of jazz in the early 20^th century. The transient nature of the city’s population also greatly contributed to the vast and rapid spread of jazz. While several of the top jazz performers permanently left New Orleans, the traditional “hot” styles of jazz, characteristic of its birthplace, remained widely intact outside the city, immortalizing its legacy. 


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