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This work is protected by copyright and other intellectual property rights and duplication or sale of all or part is not permitted, except that material may be duplicated by you for research, private study, criticism/review or educational purposes. Electronic or print copies are for your own personal, non- commercial use and shall not be passed to any other individual. No quotation may be published without proper acknowledgement. For any other use, or to quote extensively from the work, permission must be obtained from the copyright holder/s. Constructing a history from fragments: jazz and voice in Boston, Massachusetts circa 1919 to 1929 Mr Craig Doughty A thesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of History Keele University June 2017 Page | 0 Abstract Boston is a city steeped in history. Beyond the struggle for abolition, however, the historical experiences of the majority of black Bostonians, especially during the early twentieth-century, are lacking recognition. In this respect, the Jazz Age (represented here as circa 1919 – 1929) serves as a noteworthy case-in-point. For insofar as the impact of jazz music on social, political, and economic climates in cities such as New York, New Orleans, and even Kansas have been recorded, the music’s impact on and significance in Boston is yet to be addressed in any great detail. Simply put, the history of jazz in Boston, and with it an important period for black development in the city, exists in fragments such as discographies, newspaper listings, musical handbooks, potted witness accounts among others. Therefore, the principle aim of this thesis is to piece-together these fragments to form a mosaic history that reveals instances of black struggle, resistance, and progress during a period of heightened racial (Jim Crow segregation), political (the Red Scare), and economic tension. Essential to this process is not only the need to locate the voices of Boston’s black past, whether in text, testimony, sound and beyond, but also to create the conditions to hear them on their own terms. In order to achieve this, emphasis here is placed on tracing instances of voice, and as a by-product heritage, in musical form from the arrival of the first slaves to Boston in the first-half of the seventeenth century and analysing the ways in which these voices were perpetuated through methods of adaptation, appropriation, and evolution. This approach would ultimately assist in enriching the Jazz Age with a black art form that was not only unique but a distinct form of expression for a race lacking a significant voice in America at the time. In this respect, this thesis looks at the ways in which homegrown Boston musicians, such as Johnny Hodges and Harry Carney, and frequenting players, such as Duke Ellington, used jazz music as a way to oppose standard forms of white dominance, cultural elitism, and economic subjugation. Page | 1 This thesis is dedicated to my partner and closest friend, Shreya... Sophisticated Lady1 Page | 2 Acknowledgements Firstly, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to my supervisor, Dr Kate Cushing for the continuous support of my Ph.D study and related research, for her patience, motivation, and knowledge. This would not have been possible without her. Secondly, I would like to thank the Arts and Humanities Research Council, the David Bruce Centre, Keele University, and Lesley University for helping to fund my research. I would also like to thank the many people who supported and assisted me in the research and writing phases of this thesis. In no particular order, special thanks go to Dr. Shalini Sharma and Dr. Philip Morgan at Keele University, Donna Louise Halper at Lesley University, Boston, MA., Bruce Raeburn at the Howard-Tilton Memorial Library, Tulane University, New Orleans, Boston jazz essayists, Richard Vacca and Stu Vandermark, the staff at Harvard University Library, Boston Public Library, and the many other libraries and archives I have visited over the last three years. Last but not the least; I would like to thank my family, in particular, Shreya, for her devotion and positivity; my mother for her continuous support and love; my Grandad for inspiring me to read history and better myself academically; my nana for her unwavering belief in my abilities; and in addition, my step-father, Richard; and my wonderful sisters, Lianne, Lisa, and Claire. Page | 3 Table of Contents Abstract………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..1 Dedication....................................................................................................................................2 Acknowledgements......................................................................................................................3 Table of Contents.........................................................................................................................4 List of Images...............................................................................................................................6 Chapter one: Introduction...................................................................................................7 Chapter two: Historiography, approaches to sources, and methodologies.........27 1. Introduction............................................................................................................27 2. Historiography: sources, fragments, and absence………………………………………….30 3. The History of Subaltern Studies: a Methodological Approach to Constructing a History from Fragments………………………………………………………………….…………..43 4. Can the Subaltern Play: music as rebellion; jazz as voice......................................50 4.1. Subalternity and Music...............................................................................51 4.2. A brief history of jazz analysis....................................................................53 4.3. Can the Subaltern Play: reading jazz as voice and narrative.....................58 Chapter Three: Contextualising the past - Boston, Massachusetts and the year of disillusionment.....................................................................................................................67 1. Introduction..............................................................................................................67 2. 1919: a year of violence and disillusion that defined a Decade................................75 3. The Palmer Raids......................................................................................................87 4. The ‘Red Summer’: class prejudice, strike breaking, and the black struggle..........93 Chapter Four: Music in Boston, Massachusetts - from colony to community, the first three centuries………………………………………………………………………………………………110 1. Introduction………………………………………………………………………………………………..110 2. From Psalmody to slave song and beyond: melding cultures and restricting expression in Massachusetts and New England, 1620-1860...................................115 3. Boston, Massachusetts: initiating taste culture - high-art and the emergence of Cultural Capitalism...................................................................................................131 4. The Brahmin Model and its impact on black cultural production..........................135 5. The Black Brahmins: Boston’s Black Elites and Culture.........................................140 Chapter Five: constructing a history of jazz in Boston, 1919 – 1929.………….…… 147 1. Introduction.............................................................................................................147 2. The formative years: turn of the century musical developments in Boston, Massachusetts..........................................................................................................148 3. 1919 – ‘The King of Jazz is Dead’: opinion as fact - James Reece Europe, the darling of the Boston media.................................................................................................157 4. Liquor Light: Banned in Boston – The Watch and Ward, the Social Evil, and ‘the End of Nightlife .......................................................................................................168 5. The Lambs’ Club, the Phalanx, and the Pickwick: three case studies on Boston Nightlife at the mid-point of the Jazz Age...............................................................176 Page | 4 6. Speaking for blacks in Boston: Early radio voices and developments towards network broadcasting...............................................................................................184 7. Boston Jazz, 1919 – 1924: Boston to New York: first wave migration and the amateur radio craze..................................................................................................195 Chapter 6: Duke Ellington and the Boston connection: establishing a new voice.......................................................................................................................................203 1. Duke Ellington: 1899 – 1923, a short history..........................................................203 2. Duke Ellington in transit..........................................................................................206 3. Duke Ellington and Voice: Boston talking, from the margins.................................214 3.1. Creole Love Call (Instrumental) to Yellow Dog Blues..................................218 3.2. Yellow Dog Blues/Tishomingo Blues..............................................................................................................220