Jazz (697110), страница 4
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52nd Street, a midtown block known as "Swing Street" which featured a
concentration of Jazz clubs and Jazz talent not equaled before or since.
BIRD
Bird, as Parker was called by his fans, was a fantastic improviser whose
imagination was matched by his technique. His way of playing (though
influenced by Lester Young and guitarist Charlie Christian (1916-1942), a
remarkable musician who was featured with Benny Goodman's sextet
between 1939-41), was something new in the world of Jazz. His influence
on musicians can be compared in scope only to that of Louis Armstrong.
Parker's principal early companions were Dizzy Gillespie, a trumpeter of
abilities that almost matched Bird's, and drummer Kenny Clarke
(1914-1985). Dizzy and Bird worked together in Hines' band and then in
the one formed by Hines vocalist Billy Eckstine (1914-1993), the key
developer of bop talent. Among those who passed through the Eckstine
ranks were trumpeters Miles Davis (1927-1991), Fats Navarro
(1923-1950), and Kenny Dorham (1924-1972); saxophonists Sonny Stitt
(1924-1982), Dexter Gordon (1923-1990), and Gene Ammons
(1925-1974); and pianist-arranger-bandleader Tadd Dameron (1917-1965).
Bop, of course, was basically small-group music, meant for listening, not
dancing. Still, there were big bands featuring bop--among them those led
by Dizzy Gillespie, who had several good crews in the late `40s and early
to mid-50's; and Woody Herman's so-called Second Herd, which included
the cream of white bop--trumpeter Red Rodney (b. 1927), and
saxophonists Stan Getz (1927-1993), Al Cohn (1925-1988) and Zoot Sims
(1925-1985), and Serge Chaloff (1923-1957).
BOP VS. NEW ORLEANS
Ironically, the coming of bop coincided with a revival of interest in New
Orleans and other traditional Jazz. This served to polarize audiences and
musicians and point up differences rather than common ground. The
needless harm done by partisan journalists and critics on both sides
lingered on for years.
Parker's greatest disciples were not alto saxophonists, except for Sonny
Stitt. Parker dominated on that instrument. Pianist Bud Powell
(1924-1966) translated Bird's mode to the keyboard; drummers Max
Roach and Art Blakey (1919-1990) adapted it to the percussion
instruments. A unique figure was pianist-composer Thelonious Monk,
(1917-1982). With roots in the stride piano tradition, Monk was a
forerunner of bop--in it but not of it.
JAZZ-ROCK FUSION
In the wake of Miles Davis' successful experiments, rock had an
increasing impact on Jazz. The notable Davis alumni Herbie
Hancock (b. 1940) and Chick Corea (b.1941) explored what soon
became known as fusion style in various ways, though neither cut
himself off from the jazz tradition. Thus Hancock's V.S.O.P., made
up of `60s Davis alumni plus trumpeter Freddie Hubbard, pursued
Miles’ pre-electronic style, while Corea continued to play acoustic
jazz in various settings. Keith Jarrett(b. 1945), who also briefly
played with Davis, never adopted the electronic keyboards but flirted
with rock rhythms before embarking on lengthy, spontaneously
conceived piano recitals. The most successful fusion band was
Weather Report, co-founded in 1970 by the Austrian-born pianist
Joe Zawinul (b. 1932) and Wayne Shorter; the partnership lasted
until 1986. The commercial orientation of much fusion Jazz offers
little incentive to creative players, but it has served to introduce
new young listeners to Jazz, and electronic instruments have been
absorbed into the Jazz mainstream.
New York - The Jazz Mecca
New York City is the Jazz capital of the world. Jazz musicians can be found playing at jam sessions, smoky bistros, stately concert halls, on street corners and crowded subway platforms. Although the music was born in New Orleans and nurtured in Kansas City, the Big Apple has long been a Mecca for great Jazz. From the big band romps of Duke Ellington and Count Basie at The Savoy Ballroom in Harlem to the Acid Jazz jam sessions downtown at Giant Step, New York continues to serve as the proving grounds for each major Jazz innovator.
52nd Street - The Street That Never Slept
Between 1934 and 1950, 52nd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues was the place for music. The block was jam-packed with monochromatic five-story brownstone buildings in whose drab and cramped street-level interiors there were more clubs, bars and bistros than crates in an overstocked warehouse. 52nd Street started as a showcase for the small-combo Dixieland Jazz of the speakeasy era then added the big-band swing of the New Deal 30s. Before its untimely demise, hastened by changing real estate values, The Street adopted the innovations of bop and cool. So in just a few hours of club hopping, a listener could walk through the history of Jazz on 52nd Street. Favorites included pianist Art Tatum, singer Billie Holiday, tenor saxophonist Coleman Hawkins, Count Basie and his Big Band, trumpeter Roy Eldridge, pianist Errol Garner, trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie and alto saxophonist Charlie Parker.
Minton's Playhouse - Birthplace of Bebop
In the early 1940s, a group of Jazz revolutionaries gathered at an uptown club called Minton's Playhouse. Through a series of small group jam sessions frequented by musicians in their teens and early twenties, a new music called Bebop was born, sired by alto saxophonist Charlie "Bird" Parker, trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie and pianist Thelonious Monk. Bird was generally regarded as the intuitive genius and improviser of the group, his magic sound and awesome technique changing the face of Jazz. Diz was the conscious thinker and showman, a man who spent a lifetime charming audiences worldwide. Monk was the creative clearinghouse and refiner, a musical iconoclast whose compositions became legendary.
At first, Bebop's eccentric starts and stops, and torrents of notes played at machine-gun tempos jarred listeners and proved devilishly difficult to play. But by the late 1940s, when big-band swing had declined, bop matured and became the Jazz standard.
Birdland - Jazz Corner of the World
Miraculously, just as 52nd caved in, Birdland opened on Broadway. For more than a decade, from 1949-1962, the survival formula was memorable double and triple bills, commencing at 9pm and sometimes lasting untill dawn. Descending the stairs to the jammed basement nitery, a listener would encounter a racially mixed throng, primed for an evening of high octane musical invigoration. To add to the excitement, Birdland's colorful host was Pee Wee Marquette, a uniformed midget. Riding the final crest of the Bebop wave, Birdland was a musical oasis for accomplished improvisors where the finest jazz on planet earth was presented with a minimum of pretense. The club has let it all hang out ambiance encouraged musicians to stretch the boundaries with spirited audience encouragement. Live radio broadcasts from the club, hosted by Symphony Sid, compounded the excitement.
JAZZ TODAY
Diversity is the word for today's Jazz. Various aspects of freedom have
been pursued by the many gifted musicians connected with the AACM
(American Association for Creative Musicians), a collective formed in
1965 under the guidance of the pianist-composer Richard Muhal Abrams
(b. 1930). Among the groups that have emerged, directly and indirectly,
from the AACM are the Art Ensemble of Chicago and The World
Saxophone Quartet, and notable musicians of this lineage include
trumpeter Lester Bowie (b. 1941), reedmen Anthony Braxton (b.1945),
Joseph Jarman, Julius Hemphill, Roscoe Mitchell and David Murray,
and violinist Leroy Jenkins, Ornette Coleman has continued to go his own
way, introducing a unique fusion band, Prime Time, collaborating with
guitarist Pat Metheny (b. 1954), and celebrating occasional reunions with
his original quartet.
Quite unexpectedly, but with neat historical symmetry, a new wave of
gifted young jazz players has emerged from New Orleans, spearheaded by
the brilliant trumpeter Wynton Marsalis (b. 1961), who joined Art Blakey's
Jazz Messengers--a bastion of the bebop tradition--in 1979. Also an
accomplished classical virtuoso, Marsalis was soon signed by Columbia
Records and became the most visible new Jazz artist in many years.
Articulate and outspoken, he has rejected fusion and stressed the
continuity of the Jazz tradition. His slightly older brother, Branford
Marsalis (b. 1960), who plays tenor and soprano sax, was a member of
Wynton's quintet until he joined with rock icon Sting's band for a year. He
has since led his own straight-ahead jazz quartet. As his replacement with
Blakey, Wynton recommended fellow New Orleanian Terence Blanchard
(b. 1962), who later formed a group with altoist Donald Harrison also
from New Orleans, as co-leader.
Many other gifted players have emerged during the present decade -- too
many to list here. Many have affirmed their roots in bebop, and some have
reached even further back to mainstream swing (such as tenorist Scott
Hamilton (b. 1954), and trumpeter Warren Vache, Jr. [b. 1951]), but
almost all, even when choosing experimentation and innovation, operate
within the established language of jazz. As in the other arts, Jazz seems to
have arrived at a postmodern stage.
We ought not to overlook the increasingly important role being played by
women instrumentalists, among them Carla Bley, JoAnne Brackeen, Jane
Ira Bloom, Amina Claudine Myers, Emely Remler and Janice Robinson.
The durability of the Jazz tradition has been symbolically affirmed by two
events: the Academy Award nomination of Dexter Gordon, the seminal
bebop tenor saxophonist, for his leading role in the film Round Midnight,
and the widely acclaimed appearances of Benny Carter, approaching his
90th birthday, at the helm of the American Jazz Orchestra (an ensemble
formed in 1986 to perform the best in Jazz, past and present) both as a
player and composer.
And one may also take heart at the qualitative as well as quantitative
growth of Jazz education in this country, and the active involvement of so
many fine performing artist in this process.
SUMMING UP
No one can presume to guess what form the next development in Jazz will
take. What we do know is that the music today presents a rich panorama
of sounds and styles.
Thelonious Monk, that uncompromising original who went from the
obscurity of the pre-bop jam sessions in Harlem to the cover of TIME and
worldwide acclaim without ever diluting his music, once defined jazz in his
unique way:
"Jazz and freedom," Monk said, "go hand in hand. That explains it. There
isn't anymore to add to it. If I do add to it, it gets complicated. That's
something for you to think about. You think about it and dig it. You dig it."
Jazz, a music born in slavery, has become the universal song of freedom.
Jazz History - Periods, Styles
Batchelor, Christian: This thing called Swing ; a study of Swing music and the Lindy Hop, the original Swing dance. London 1997.
Belaire, David C. G.: A guide to the big band era. 1997.
Bergerot, Franck & Arnaud Merlin: The story of jazz ; bop and beyond. New York 1993.
Berlin, Edward A.: Ragtime ; a musical and cultural history. Reprint (1980). Berkeley, Calif. [etc.] 1984.
Boyd, Jean A.: The jazz of the southwest;an oral history of Western Swing. Austin, Tex.1998.
Budds, Michael J.: Jazz in the 60s ; the expansion of musical resources and techniques. Expanded ed. Iowa City, Ia. 1990.
Carver, Reginald & Lenny Bernstein: Jazz profiles ; the spirit of the nineties. New York 1998.
Cockrell, Dale: Demons of disorder ; early blackface minstrels and their world. Cambridge 1997.
Collins, R.: New Orleans jazz ; a revised history ; the development of American music from the origin to the big bands. New York 1996.
Corbett, John: Extended play ; sounding off from John Cage to Dr. Funkenstein.Durham, N.C. 1994.
Dean, Roger T.: New structures in jazz and improvised music since 1960. Milton Keynes 1991
Deffaa, Chip: Swing legacy foreword by George T. Simon. Metuchen, N.J. [etc.] 1989.
Deffaa, Chip: Voices of the jazz age ; profiles of 8 vintage jazzmen. Wheatley 1990.
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