Description of Jazz Music
Jazz, along with the blues, is one of America's earliest musical inventions. Starting out as folk music passed down by word-of-mouth, it went on to become America's most popular musical genre in the first half of the 20th century. Jazz's many interpretations lead to a variety of subgenres and new instrumental possibilities over time. One of its most important elements, improvisation, emerged after the popularity of arranged big band music.
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Roots
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Jazz music developed in the southern United States during the latter 19th century. A descendant and contemporary of blues, jazz began as a sort of folk music for black Americans. One of the earliest forms of jazz exists in the form of ragtime, popularized by artists like Jelly Roll Morton, self-credited as the "Inventor of Jazz" and Scott Joplin. New Orleans played a big role in the development of jazz, when well-off Creole musicians were forced into poorer black communities and the two cultures' music influenced each other.
Instrumentation
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Jazz music, influenced by European classical music, shares much of the same instrumentation. Early jazz consisted of big brass bands which included trumpet, trombone and saxophone. Other instruments typical of jazz include the tuba, clarinet, upright bass, piano and drums. As jazz developed in the 20th century, it became electrified, and the electric bass and guitar became prominent jazz instruments. Jazz's adaptability has opened its doors to a variety of instruments, including bagpipes and steel pans.
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Popularity
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Jazz became America's most popular form of music from the 1920s until the 1940s. Big bands consisted of groups of usually more than 12 performers playing arranged music intended for dancing. Swing music, based on a shuffling kind of rhythm, became very popular, played by famous band leaders like Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Glenn Miller and Artie Shaw. After a renewal in interested in Dixieland music in the 1940s, jazz music as a popular commercial force was eclipsed by rock and roll.
Improvisation
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While early jazz music was based on blues structure and was a popular structured dance music during the 1920s and 1930s, jazz music went back to its earlier less structured roots into a more widespread focus on improvisation. While jazz groups may play what are considered jazz standards, each member in the group will improvise different parts of his performance, making every jazz show a unique experience.
Types
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Jazz's place in American music and its transformations have lead to a variety of subgenres beyond swing, ragtime and big band music. Bebop, a style characterized by fast rhythms, dissonance and intricate melodies developed in the 1940s as a counter to mainstream jazz. Free jazz broke down jazz conventions even further, lead by artists like Ornette Coleman and Charles Mingus. Jazz fusion developed in the 1960s and 1970s, as musicians blended jazz and rock music. Other jazz types include Latin jazz, smooth jazz and jazzcore.
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References
Resources
- Photo Credit jazz estate image by UFOFABRIK from Fotolia.com
