Jazz
RELATED CONCEPTS THAT YOU NEED TO LEARN
RAGTIME - JAZZ - SWING - BLUES - WALKING BASS - CROSS RHYTHMS - INSTRUMENTAL BREAK - SCAT SINGING - SYNCOPATION - IMPROVISATION - IMITATION - WOODWIND - BRASS - STRINGS - PERCUSSION - MUTED - ACCENT/ACCENTED - RIFF - SOLO - CHORD - CHORD CHANGE
What is Jazz?
Jazz is a kind of music in which improvisation is typically an important part. In most jazz performances, players play solos which they make up on the spot, which requires considerable skill. There is tremendous variety in jazz, but most jazz is very rhythmic, has a forward momentum called "swing," and uses "bent" or "blue" notes. You can often hear "call--and--response" patterns in jazz, in which one instrument, voice, or part of the band answers another. Jazz can express many different emotions, from pain to sheer joy. In jazz, you may hear the sounds of freedom-for the music has been a powerful voice for people suffering unfair treatment because of the color of the skin, or because they lived in a country run by a cruel dictator.
Watch this clip to learn a brief history of jazz music
Jazz Music Playlist
THE NATURE OF JAZZ
Jazz musicians place a high value on finding their own sound and style, and that means, for example, that trumpeter Miles Davis sounds very different than trumpeter Louis Armstrong (whose sound you can hear in Louis's Music Class.) Jazz musicians like to play their songs in their own distinct styles, and so you might listen to a dozen different jazz recordings of the same song, but each will sound different. The musicians' playing styles make each version different, and so do the improvised solos. Jazz is about making something familiar - a familiar song - into something fresh. And about making something shared - a tune that everyone knows - into something personal. Those are just some of the reasons that jazz is a great art form, and why some people consider it "America's classical music."
Jazz.mp4THE GROWTH OF JAZZ
Jazz developed in the United States in the very early part of the 20th century. New Orleans, near the mouth of the Mississippi River, played a key role in this development. The city's population was more diverse than anywhere else in the South, and people of African, French, Caribbean, Italian, German, Mexican, and American Indian, as well as English, descent interacted with one another. African-American musical traditions mixed with others and gradually jazz emerged from a blend of ragtime, marches, blues, and other kinds of music. At first jazz was mostly for dancing. (In later years, people would sit and listen to it.) After the first recordings of jazz were made in 1917, the music spread widely and developed rapidly. The evolution of jazz was led by a series of brilliant musicians such as Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington (listen to Ellington in Duke's Music Class), Charlie Parker, and Miles Davis. Jazz developed a series of different styles including traditional jazz, swing (listen, for example, to Benny Carter, who got his start in swing music, in Benny's Music Class) bebop, cool jazz, and jazz?rock, among others. At the same time, jazz spread from the United States to many parts of the world, and today jazz musicians--and jazz festivals--can be found in dozens of nations. Jazz is one of the United States's greatest exports to the world.
Learn about the British Music Scene of the 1950s
This clip is a fascinating fusion of some British Jazz legends with Radiohead.
RAGTIME
A style of dance music which became popular at the end of the 19th century and which helped to influence jazz.
It features a strongly syncopated melody (meaning the notes don’t always fall on the beat) against a steady, simple accompaniment played as a vamp, often played on piano, e.g. Scott Joplin rags.
Ragtime.mp4The video clip on the right is a modern day piano player using an iPad. No need to load and unload paper rolls nowadays!
PLAYER PIANO
These grew in popularity in the late 19th and early 20th centuries until the rise of radio in the 1930s.
Player pianos could be played in the same way as a conventional piano, but they also contained a roll inside which could read perforated paper. The information contained on the paper not only mechanically operated the notes of the music but could also contain other information such as dynamics, tone, tempo and expression.
Swing.mp4