Jazz and Racial Identity

I enrolled in History of Jazz with only a slight knowledge of the form, and most of this kowledge was merely circumstantial. Miles Davis, John Coltrane, and Duke Ellington--the obligatory classics that I'd learned of through surfing Wikipedia and word of mouth--were the extent of the jazz artists on my iPod; I was excited to expand my taste in music, maybe collect a few gems that I could share with some friends. Instead of getting a pure jazz survey course (which I had expected, and also received, to a certain extent), the readings and Professor Stewart's lectures highlighted the role that race played int he development of jazz. From jazz's roots in African music, to the New World shaping music into spirituals and the blues and then ragtime, and its evolution beyond jazz, race has played a huge role in every step of jazz's development. My knowledge of jazz--that it was born spontaneously, as if from a vacuum--expanded because of the historical context heavily emphasized thorughout the quarter, and proved the most interesting aspect of the class.

It had seemed that many of the most famous jazz musicians were African-American, but I was unaware of the African music tradition's entire influence on jazz. The slave trade brought Africans to New Orleans, and they continued their cultural traditions there. Sunday mettings at Congo Square illustrate principles of African dance and culture, as enumerated by Thompson's African Art in Motion: emphasis on propulsive rhythm and syncopation, lively yet controlled dance, and the call-and-response relationship between perfomer and audience (Thompson 7, 9, 13). The musical forms that jazz influenced--swing, rock 'n' roll, disco--all contain these elements. Eventually, these elements evolved into spirituals, and after the Civil War, into the first uniquely American musical form: the blues. While I had learned before this class that the blues was a distinctly African-American musical form, I was unaware of the historical and political context surrounding the melancholy sound, that "being black doesn't mean being free" (Lecture.1.13). Both spirituals and blues placed the call-and-response mechanic at the forefront of the music, wehre a singer would sing a line and the audience/participants would sing the same line, or a slight variation of it, in response. This emphasis on community plays a huge role in these forms, as well as later jazz and swing. With the passage of legislation in 1890 that claimed that any person with at least one relative of African descent was entirely black, ragtime and jazz emerged. The classically trained Creoles were forced to create relationships with the black community they previously discriminated against, thereby combining their musical knowledge (Creoles: classical; blacks: blues). This resulted in ragtime, based heavily on African principles, which eventually evolved into early forms of jazz.

Eventually, with jazz's migration to Chicago and the proliferation of radio as a means to listen to music, jazz became a cultural phenomenon. As with any cultural hit, jazz had many imitators, most of them white (such as the Austin High Gang). However much they attempted to copy the jazz/swing formula, the imitators never captured the authentic jazz sound, perhaps because they were unaware of the African music principles behind it (as mentioned by Thompson). Jazz gradually changed with the course of history--the Chicago Race Riots of 1919, the Harlem Renaissance in New York--becoming the modern sound we associate it with today. But the most interesting aspect of the course, and what I learned the most from, was its roots in African tradition.

Felonious Monk

The San Juan Hill community that Thelonius Monk moved to in 1922 was especially ethnically and culturally diverse, even for New York. Though whites and blacks lived in the same greater neighborhood, they were still segregated along streets and avenues, as well as internally by country of origin. Many of the whites lived along the avenues, and were mostly Irish, German, and Italian; forty percent of the area's black population came from the South and the Caribbean, twenty percent came from the British West Indies, Cuba, and Puerto Rico, and thirty-five percent were born in New York (Kelly 18). Though there was some racial tension between the Southern blacks and West Indian blacks (Monk later recalled, "They used to call me, 'Monkey,' and you know what a drag that was,"), most racial tension stemmed from the Irish and Italian's mistreatment of blacks. Monk's quote that "There's no reason why I should go through that Black Power shit now," underscores the reality of the racially conflicted San Juan Hill community, where Southern blacks called West Indian blacks "monkey chasers", where New York-born blacks called Southern blacks "possum eaters", and where "It looked like the order of the day was for the cops to go out and call all the kids black bastards" (Kelly 19). Because the tensions between different communities were so high, it really seemed like "every street was a different town" Kelly 19).
Despite its numerous failings, the diversity of San Juan Hill informed and shaped Monk's music. His first piano teacher was Simon Wolf, an Austrian-born Jew that shaped Monk's naturally fine ear with classic and Baroque pieces. His two other main influences at that time were a black jazz musician named Alberta Simmons, who taught Monk stride and ragtime piano, and his mother, Barbara Monk, who occasionally sang church hymns with Monk's piano accompaniment (Kelly 27). These influences, along with the Tango and Rhumba popular among the Caribbean populations, shaped Monk's various musical ear.
Once he became an established musician, playing for nightclubs such as Five Spot, Monk garnered the attention of white bohemians: Frank O'Hara, Joan Mitchell, Jack Kerouac, and Alan Ginsberg (Kelly 228). Aside from the bohemians, the white community largely rejected the presence of blacks, or "spades". By that time, Monk had influenced another black musician named David Amram, who opened up doors for other black musicians to play in venues such as the Five Spot. Eventually, Monk played a gig at the Five Spot on July 4, 1957, but his history of drug use and emotional instability--bi-polar disorder--was a major cause of concern among his fellow musicians club promoters (2.26. Lecture and Kelly 228, 229). Despite his surroundings, Monk went to great lengths to de-politicize and take issues of race out of his music: "My music is not a social comment on discrimination or poverty or the like. I would have written the same way even if I had not been a Negro" (Kelly 229). Ultimately, however, his music influenced the community to be more open to issues of race and discrimination.

The Pendulum Swings

With jazz's transition from New Orleans to Chicago and New York, from bordellos to dance clubs, black culture assimilated into the mainstream of American popular culture. As a largely untapped and unexplored form, musicians saw in jazz an opportunity to gain financial rewards and cultural respect. However, informal and formal racial segregation stifled opportunities for black musicians to grow (in both financial and cultural aspects), while many white musicians prospered. This tension underlined much of the discourse of swing as it developed from jazz.
Formal segregation, where blacks were limited to visiting black-only venues, allowed white jazz bands (such as Austin High Gang) to rip-off black musicians' sounds and styles (Gioia 55). While this band and other all-white bands prospered for a short time on record sales, the invention of the radio changed everything (2.12. Lecture). Gone were many racial barriers; black performers gained more attention, popularity, and respect because listeners judged them on one factor: the music itself (you cannot tell the ethnicity of a performer by their music alone).
Still, this new opportunity did not end the racial tensions of the Swing Era. Duke Ellington recognized the importance of an agent who could advance his career: a white agent, Irving Mills. Where other talented musicians such as Fletcher Henderson were poised for success in the same way as Ellington, many did not see or instead opted out of having a white agent. Mills was able to get Ellington gigs at venues dominated by white audiences, better record deals, and high radio play. As a result, Ellington's band went on national tours, generating them more renown and profits from their records (2.12. Lecture). Though Fletcher Henderson was also an incredibly talented musician and big band leader, he never appreciated the same success as Ellington did, largely because he worked and performed in a segregated black community.
Ellington was criticized throughout the Swing Era, with some critics claiming that he was not being sensitive to the struggles of "his people" (2.14. Lecture). This criticism emerged during the Great Depression, and Ellington was essentially in a place of "damned if you do, damned if you don't" racial sensitivity. His music did not discuss race directly, but was rather implied in some of his song titles ("Black and Tan Fantasy", "Black Beauty").
As jazz and swing reached broad American audiences it became a more respected cultural form. However, white musician Benny Goodman is regarded as the "King of Swing", despite having challengers to that title. Goodman was the first swing musician to play Carnegie Hall in 1938, and though he hired black musicians to play in his band, the primarily white audience in attendance accredited him with being the first master of the form. Competitions between white and black swing leaders (Goodman and Chick Webb at the Savoy in 1937) further encapsulated feelings of racial tension, with Goodman "winning the competition" despite accounts that portrayed the two leaders as comparable (2.14. Lecture).

Chicago: Lord of Jazz

            Quantifying a city’s influence on a cultural form such as music is challenging because the debate hinges on a variety of factors: the social, economical, and political climates of the area, the legendary figures of that scene, and the development of the music itself. While New York may have produced more figureheads than Chicago—Duke Ellington, Fats Waller, James P. Johnson, Art Tatum—New York seems a sidestep in the evolution of swing and jazz.

            Jazz’s move from New Orleans to Chicago began with King Oliver, who sparked the first wave of innovation on the jazz formula. He took the group-performance ethos of Storyville jazz and, upon bringing it to Chicago, made it an individual’s medium (1.31 Lecture). King Oliver’s sound transformed the softer, brothel-oriented New Orleans style with a sound that was bigger, brassier, more aggressive, that prominently featured the soloist, and was engineered for Chicago’s decidedly livelier dance pavilions. Improvisation was encouraged, as bands would play well into the night, and the range of jazz was broadened and deepened. Though stride piano, developed in New York, encouraged improvisation, I believe stride acts as an amplifier of previously existing forms, rather than as a brand new element that existed outside of ragtime or jazz (as Gioia suggests of New York on page 106). However, I do acknowledge the dialogic aspect of stride piano as a reaction to and addition to jazz.

            The Chicago Race Riot of 1919 had social and economical ramifications for the following decades, which defined how jazz spread both within and without the city. Segregation between blacks and whites applied to music venues, allowing blacks access to black-only music venues, while whites were allowed to attend any performance they pleased (Gioia 55). The Austin High Gang, a popular all-white jazz group, copped their style from watching King Oliver and Louis Armstrong play in a black neighborhood. The kids lacked the musical maturity or clarity of their influences (Bix Beiderbeck being one of them), their jazz hit “Nobody’s Sweetheart” became a huge hit, selling thousands of records (The Chicagoans 158). As a result, white audiences began listening to and actively seeking jazz, which was previously associated with vices (Lecture 1.31). Thusly, the jazz scene took hold of Chicago and transcended racial boundaries.

            Both Chicago and New York were controlled by the mob scene in the late 1920s, but Chicago ultimately favored jazz musicians. Mobsters controlled jazz musicians in terms of their wages, where they would play, and when they would play. This mutated form of slavery, though highly restrictive, tended to favor Chicago’s jazz musicians more than New York’s, in a roundabout way. Duke Ellington’s received heavy radio play because he signed away fifty percent of the rights to his music to his manager Irving Mills, thereby losing much of his profit (2.12 Lecture). Also, New York had a much higher concentration of Italians, many of who were mobsters that controlled jazz performers (The Jazz Slave Masters 49). 

First Blog Post

            I took world history in my sophomore year of high school. My teacher was a young African-American woman from New Orleans who had just returned from several years serving in the Air Force, and she ran the class with a rigidity and formality that reflected the time she spent in service.

            One day, during what must have been a particularly exasperating lesson, she stopped speaking and gave the class a hard stare. “America is not a ‘melting pot’,” she said, “like the history textbooks are so eager to point out. The phrase ‘melting pot’ implies that all the ingredients have melded into a uniform substance, or identity. This is not the case.” She stared out the window for a few seconds. “You still look at someone and see white, black, Asian, Latino. America, in this sense, is not a melting pot. If America were a culinary dish, I’d say that it resembles a mixed salad. All the ingredients are there, next to each other and very much part of the same dish, but you can still pick out the carrots and the lettuce and the tomatoes. That’s the reality.”

            American history is rooted in questions of ethnicity and racial identity, and New Orleans figures prominently in that discussion. Today, metropolises such as Los Angeles and New York seem like the cultural hubs of the United States, while New Orleans remains largely a novelty figure, a relic of the past. In the 1800s, however, New Orleans was a cosmopolitan city that played a large cultural and economic role for the United States. After changing hands numerous times between Spanish and French rule, Napoleon eventually sold the port city of New Orleans as part of the huge mass of land that was the Louisiana Purchase (1803). The influences of Spanish and French culture can still be seen in New Orleans’ architecture and culinary arts. In 1804, the Haitian Revolution ended, and was the first revolution that the rebellion had won. Fleeing French colonizers arrived at New Orleans, further solidifying the French presence and culture in the port city.

            New Orleans was the main economic vain for the United States for over a century. The Mississippi River connected the Midwest and the east coast cities of Philadelphia and New York to Louisiana and the rest of the southern states. The New Orleans delta provided oceanic access to the Gulf of Mexico, the Caribbean, Africa, and Europe. As a result, French, African, Spanish, and Caribbean cultures developed and syncretized in Louisiana. Because of its climate and position on the Northeast, New York didn’t have the same ready access to Caribbean goods and peoples as had New Orleans. The Caribbean culture that came to the south had already begun to develop separately from its African roots, which had already taken a unique space in New Orleans culture.

            Gioia cites Congo Square, a plaza in New Orleans, as a primary source of African-American music culture. On Sundays slaves were allowed to congregate at a plaza in the center of the city, where they performed songs and dances that featured the musical styles of their African roots (flexible syncopation, time signatures, and rhythms). With the later proliferation of Catholicism and the Latin code that came with the arrival of the French, slaves took on the Catholic faith, and with that, Gospel music.

            Work and Gospel music coalesced and transition into blues, which is a unique genre of music that originated in America. The hope of escaping daily backbreaking labor, either through inconspicuously phrased lyrics about rebellion or belief that God will save them, proved primary themes in African-American music. The new musical mode that was the blues scale took these themes and transformed them into something new. Creoles of Color that were trained by in the French Classical tradition had a repertoire of different musical styles—ranging from classics to dancier tunes—often played their music for parties, where they were expected to be fluent in all types of musical styles. Ragtime originated from this tradition, where the classical modes were “ragged” on: the piano music was syncopated more, time signatures played around with. In the 1890s, a state-wide code of law was passed that caused increasing segregation between groups of various ethnicities. As a result, the Creoles of Color were no longer allowed to play for the white audiences they previously aligned themselves with ethnically, and were forced to play for African-American audiences. The ensuing blend of musical styles led to the creation of Jazz: the syncretism between blues and ragtime.

            Jelly Roll Morton claimed that, without the right inflection of Spanish music in your music, you’re not playing Jazz music. This paraphrased quote points heavily to the mixed salad nature of New Orleans jazz, where different cultures brought their traditions—in terms of human rights ethics and music—together. To me, the lightning-rod infusion of French culture into New Orleans that was brought on by the Haitian Revolution represents the single most important ingredient involved in the creation of jazz. Without the influx of Catholicism and the musical education that was part of the Latin code, the proliferation of music in the poorer and more segregated areas of New Orleans wouldn’t have happened. Storyville, the claimed origin point of jazz music, hinges on such a proliferation. 

Anita O'day performing at Newport Jazz Festival.

Note to clubs: more dancing like this