IntroductionWhat is Jazz?

Trying to define jazz is like trying to describe the color green to someone who is colorblind. A lot of ink has been spilled and arguments raised on this subject. My personaldefinitions of jazz and jazz composition are presented here not as dogma, but rather togive you some sense of where I am coming from in this book.

In my view, jazz is a unique and important American musical art form with nineteenth-and early twentieth-century African-American origins that, over the past one hundredyears or so, has developed into a highly sophisticated musical idiom with improvisation,rhythmic swing, and individual expression at its core. Jazz is characterized by instrumental solos, syncopated melody and rhythm, idiomatic voicings and chord progressions, characteristic instrumentation, and a highly personalized approach to vocal and instrumental performance.

What is Jazz Composition?

Jazz composition involves writing down specific combinations of melodic, harmonic,and rhythmic elements that, in turn, produce idiomatically recognizable jazz forms (such as the blues and other song forms) or longer works in which motivic developmentmay play an important role. Jazz composition has evolved, along with jazz performance,into a disciplined art that often evidences great emotional depth and breadth of sophistication.

When I think of jazz composers and jazz composition, I immediately think of DukeEllington. Then other names come to mind: Billy Strayhorn, Don Redman, JimmyMundy, Jelly Roll Morton, Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Tadd Dameron, TheloniousMonk, Charles Mingus, Horace Silver, George Russell, Gil Evans, Dave Brubeck, Chick Corea, Thad Jones, Herbie Hancock, Wayne Shorter, Bill Holman, BobBrookmeyer, Jim McNeely, and Maria Schneider. These composers (and so many others) have made significant contributions to the jazz legacy, whether with memorabletunes or with elaborate extended works. This book is about what they do.

Prerequisites: What Do I Need to Know?

In order to take full advantage of this text, you need to have a working knowledge ofbasic music theory. You should be familiar with pitch notation in treble and bass clef,major and minor scales, modes, intervals, and chord spelling of triads and seventhchords. It will also help if you have had experience with lead sheets and/or piano sheetmusic, and that you have access to some legal fake books.

The author assumes that you have at least a modest jazz record or CD collection, andthat you have been listening to major jazz practitioners, both past and present, for sometime. Most important to your gaining the maximum benefit from the text is that youhave had some experience playing jazzor at least some experience improvising on theblues and other simple jazz forms.

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