A Brief History of Jazz The Origins of Jazz in America • African slaves, exploited on plantations in the southeastern United States brought their African background, music included. • They began using European musical instruments in the early 19th century • Three “black” genres were developed • The mixture of them brought the Jazz BLUES WORK SONGS GOSPEL SPIRITUALS • A little influence of European music, both popular and classical, also contributed The place of birth: NEW ORLEANS New Orleans • From +1860´s, with the end of slavery • Main harbour in the Mississippi Delta • Storyville, the red-light district, full of bars where music was played all the time • The main instruments used are wind , piano, banjo, and double bass • White people begin to enjoy “black” music • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m4jU8IQK5b0 Ragtime and New Orleans Style • They are the first styles of Jazz • 1900 to 1920 decade • Fast, rhythmic music, for dancing and fun. Bar music • Improvisation becomes the main feature of Jazz • Dixieland, this style played by white players http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1hSAxCzC4fM Swing and the Big Bands • Jazz music became more popular in the 1920s and 1930s with the rise of Swing music and the big bands, specially in the East coast • Happy music for dancing • Many musicians moved to Chicago and New York... • Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Ella Fitzgerald Bebop The 40´s • Not big orchestras but small “combos”: drums, piano, double bass and one or two solo wind players (guitar sometimes) • Much more difficult music, more virtuosic, faster, for listening in small dark bars... • Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie Thelonious Monk... Cool Jazz 50´s • Miles Davis broke from his early Bebop days and started a new Jazz movement (“Cool Jazz”) . Slow, sentimental... • Chet Baker • This period had the peak and the start of the decline of Jazz’s popularity (Rock ‘n Roll was rising at this time) Jazz moves to the fringe • From the 70´s to today, Jazz music has lost a lot of its popularity • Experimental artists and the Free Jazz movement were not popular with mainstream listeners Jazz music survives in the summer Festivals Present time • Few people listen to jazz nowadays, despite the rising of new and very interesting styles as Afro Cuban Jazz or Latin Jazz, Flamenco Jazz... Chano Domínguez y Niño Josele Chucho Valdés... Some jazz words... • Walking bass: “metronomic” bass line so the soloist can improvise freely above ithttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=693zGPGhpjc • Scat : singing no lyrics but syllabus meaningless, using the voice as an instrument improvising (Louis Armstrong created it...) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4EyGEOJBxBM • Mute: a metal or other materials device in the trumpet´s pavillion to make the sound softer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EZamplraxSo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tmIqJXkEGKY • Brushes: used insted of sticks for a softer and more sophisticated sound https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FFmhMUERW0U Rhythm section • Standard: In Jazz, 90% of the songs are “standards”, meaning that they keep a peculiar structure 32 bars with a main theme, called A and a different part called B A A B A 8 bars 8 bars 8 bars 8 bars.