8th Nordic Jazz Conference 25th-27th August 2009, Aalborg Universitet Conference Report ‘National and local jazz history writing in the Nordic countries’ ‘Future collaboration between the Nordic jazz archives’ D O F Det Obelske Familiefond Conference Report, 8th Nordic Jazz Conference 25-27. August 2009, Aalborg University, Denmark © 2009 Authors and Center for Dansk Jazzhistorie editor and layout: Thomas A. Jakobsen, CDJ Center for Dansk Jazzhistorie Kroghstræde 6 9220 Aalborg Ø, Denmark web: www.jazz.aau.dk tel: (+45) 9940 9104 e-mail: [email protected] The 8th Nordic Jazz Conference was supported by Det Obelske Familiefond, Aalborg and The Danish Research Council Printed by UNI.PRINT, Aalborg ISBN 978-87-993531-0-1 8th Nordic Jazz Conference 25-27. August 2009 The 8th Nordic Jazz Conference was hosted by the recently established Center for Dansk Jazzhistorie at Aalborg University, Denmark 25-27. August 2009. The conference was organized as an activity within the Netværk for Dansk Jazzhistorie, funded by the Danish research council. The main focus of the conference was the recent research into national and regional jazz history in the Nordic countries and whether there is compliance in the way that we view our national jazz histories. Our respective national jazz archives play a vital role in this issue, and a discussion on future collaboration between the archives was scheduled for the last day of the conference. This years conference had a number of representatives from outside the Nordic countries. Dr. Wolfram Knauer, the head of Jazzinstitut Darmstadt, was invited as keynote speaker to discuss European jazz history (of histories?) and to moderate the discussion of archive collaboration, both in Nordic and the European perspective. Participants from the Baltic countries and Australia also helped to bring a broader scope to the conference. This report reflects a number of common issues in the research of national jazz history writing within our region. It contains all contributions at the conference which – for the first time - was held mainly in English for the sake of the non-Nordic participants. Aalborg, November 5th 2009 Tore Mortensen Head of Center for Dansk Jazzhistorie Aalborg Universitet Indholdsfortegnelse History or Histories?! 1 Wolfram Knauer Jazz in Norway! 30 Hans Weisethaunet ‘On the margins’! 32 Bruce Johnson Race Consciousness in Danish Jazz Reception! 42 Christen Kold Thomsen From a local jazz club to the best venue in the world! 56 Frank Büchmann-Møller Jazz into the Art Fields in 60’s Sweden! 62 Alf Arvidsson Jazz og dansk ”kulturradikalisme”! 75 Peder Kaj Pedersen Lembit Saarsalu “Music Saved Me”! 89 Heli Reimann Play Your Own Thing! 104 Ole Matthiessen Uffe Baadh! 107 Lars Westin Johann Emile Dændler! 122 Morten Hein Centre for Danish Jazz History! 138 Tore Mortensen et al. History of Jazz in Latvia! 143 Indrikis Veitners Globalizing Perspectives on Norwegian Jazz History! 150 Tor Dybo Jazz Biography – Jazz Cronicle – Jazz History – Jazz Science! 161 Olav harsløf The Photograph as a Storyteller! 162 Finn J. Kramer-Johansen Future Archive Collaborations! 178 moderated by Wolfram Knauer Conference programme! 182 List of participants! 183 History or Histories? Why it is so difficult to draft a European jazz history WOLFRAM KNAUER If European jazz has developed an own identity in recent years and decades, it is an identity of diversity. Yet, diversity in European jazz is quite different from diversity as present in American culture. It is a diversity based on century-old cultural traditions, differences and cross dissemination. The word "glocalization" has been used to describe this specific idea of a regional dialect within a seemingly globalized musical idiom. In this paper I will ask about the implications of local, regional or national aspects of the jazz development for the drafting of a European jazz history. The Perception of European Jazz by Americans and Europeans The main difficulty in writing a European history of jazz is also one of the most fascinating aspects of that history: the fact that European jazz history as European history in general is informed by Europe's political, cultural and national diversity and different identities. I remember that only ten or fifteen years ago, and even during the half year I spent in New York City in 2008 teaching at Columbia University, I encountered American jazz lovers who, when they heard that I came from Europe and was working in the jazz field, told me something to the effect of: "Oh, you have really great jazz over there. I was in Italy last year and I heard a band there, they played just as good as…" and then usually came a reference to some 1950s or early 1960s hard bop ensemble. For them, European jazz was nothing but American jazz played by European musicians. There are other Americans who see Europe mainly as an influence on the history of jazz. But European jazz, of course, is much more: much more diverse, and much more complicated. Why is it so hard to write a consecutive narrative of European jazz? There have been attempts at European jazz histories, but so far no book or study examines in full extend the different developments, parallel and cross influences that jazz had taken in the 20th century. Most European historical studies were limited to regional national jazz histories, and up until the 1970s hardly any European writer found it necessary to include a chapter on European jazz in their general jazz history books. One important change in the 2 Wolfram Knauer consciousness of European writers and musicians was the foundation of the European (later International) Jazz Federation in 1968 and the publication of its Jazz Forum, an English language magazine covering both the US tradition and avant-garde as well as European jazz from the East and the West and musical developments from about everywhere else in the jazz diaspora. In the 1970s more and more writers became aware of the fact that the success of jazz in Europe deserved a mention in the history books, although it was more a history of the reception of jazz than a history of how jazz was creatively pursued and developed in contemporary Europe. Essays in (mostly European) magazines and journals had made the point of a distinctive European development since long, and yet one of the first (yet not one of the best) books on jazz in Europe only was published in 1985, a collection of portraits and interviews with musicians (Bausch 1985). Books on individual musicians were available, but pan-European studies only started to take up momentum in the 1980s. The fact that the publications I will cite in the following paragraph originate from Germany (West and East) may not be purely accidental. Here, national pride was suspect because of the German past, thus Germans always tended to look for allies and partners, for a positioning of their identity within a European network. Writers from other European countries saw no need for such a positioning and could start by taking up their national developments first before looking abroad or even think about pan-European studies. Bert Noglik had collected interviews with European improvisers of the avant-garde scenes in two books (Noglik 1978, Noglik 1981). The first pan-European study concentrating on the music and how (and why) it differed from what was being heard in the USA was published only in 1987 and hasn't really been followed by any substantial studies of similar kind (Jost 1987). The 800 page Darmstadt exhibition catalogue from 1988 (Jost 1988) for the first time tried to dedicate similar importance to the developments both in the US and in Europe. The Darmstadt Jazzforum of 1993 approached the subject in a chapter-to-chapter way, looking at the developments in selected countries both in the East and the West, but hardly took up the task of lining out parallels or interdependencies of specific developments (Knauer 1994). The 1990s saw more studies on national scenes, and only in the last couple of years, with the dissertation of Mike Hefley (Heffley 2005) and especially with Stuart Nicholson's polemically titled book "Is Jazz Dead? (Or Has It Moved To a New Address)" (Nicholson 2005) did the discussion of European jazz arrive at a new level and did the need for a European jazz history become evident on a broader level. These books coincide with a project Walter Turkenburg from the Royal Conservatory in The Hague, James Lincoln Collier, the well-known jazz author from New York City, and myself are pursuing for the last couple of years, a book History or Histories? 3 project entitled "The History of Jazz in Europe" in which we try to do exactly what is described in this paper: outline a European jazz history as a consecutive narrative of European jazz. What, then, makes it so hard to write this consecutive narrative of European jazz? One answer is: Because like the history of the 20th century itself, European jazz history is a history of histories. The 20th century saw perhaps the strongest and most diverse developments in European politics ever: the irreversible end of the feudal system, the fight for what should follow it, the slow and complete break up of Europe into different blocks, and the European reunion, unification. All of these different political systems, all of these developments, all of these social political structures had an impact on how jazz was perceived and could develop in the different countries. Let's simplify, knowing that reality is much more complex: 1920s jazz was dance music of a carefree era, the jazz age, reflecting the hope that technology and democracy as modeled especially in the United States of America was the promise of a peaceful future.