An Introduction to Jazz

Jazz music, while some may not realize, is a staple of American culture. It's musical impact as a style has forever changed the world, as we know, creating a wave of different genres that we enjoy today. To say this is even a brief overview wouldn't do the genre justice, but let us examine its beginnings on a superficial level.

Jazz, in true American fashion, was a melding of many different genres. We usually pinpoint this melding to New Orleans, Louisiana. The inception of slavery is what truly brought all these musical ideas together. African slaves brought complex rhythms from their home country in addition to the blues and spirituals. Immigrants from Central America brought a Latin flavor as well. Cajun and Creole influences, European waltzes and military marches, mixed with ragtime, the popular genre of the day, created a cacophony of sounds that resulted in the first type of New Orleans jazz that we know today:

As you can hear, this style of jazz is very brass oriented, with each instrument improvising their own dedicated melody line. Another fun element is the "call-and-response" sung between a soloist and the rest of the band. This style has been borrowed through all styles of music and can be seen in today's genres, especially Southern rap.

Solo performers such as Jelly Roll Morton captured the brass band sound on just the piano. You can hear ragtime influences (the use of stride piano in the left hand) mixed with the rigidness of a military march, syncopated African and Latin rhythms, sandwiched with the improvisatory style of the brass bands:

The name jazz itself is speculated to have come from brothels. Women would be in a room alone with their clients while a pianist would look through a peep-hole in the wall and would improvise based on what was going on. The better you improvised, the better you got payed! It is rumored that the perfume these ladies wore was called "jass". Trumpeter Wynton Marsalis has stated that it was changed to jazz because if you wrote "jass" band on a bass drum and someone scratched off the "j", well...you get the point! This may be more of a joke, but we're actually not certain!

As stated, this is just scratching the surface of what jazz was and has become. I encourage you to listen more and to check out jazz shows. Jazz has never been the most popular genre, nor has it paid that well for most; check out a show in the city on the west side at one of the legendary clubs - they're surprisingly inexpensive!

Clubs to Check Out:
Birdland
Smalls
The Blue Note