Jazz

Bebop

Cool

Hard Bop

Free

Avant-Garde

Fusion

IV. Bebop Revolution and Participants

A. Changing America

1. Post-WWII into Cold War

a. Suburbs and Eisenhower Interstate System

b. Narcotics flood inner city via organized crime

2. “Salt Peanuts” by Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie

Freeing jazz from constraints of popularity [Bird]

IV. Bebop Revolution and Participants

B. Changing Interests

1. teens chase vocalists

2. big bands struggle to survive

a. Duke Ellington and Count Basie are two exceptions

b. Benny Goodman begins to play classical music

3. Rhythm and Blues began to take many former jazz

fans

jazz audience becomes alienated from the art by bebop

musicians

C. Bebop Revolution originates in New York (Harlem)

1. Musicians migrated from other jazz locations

Kansas City, Chicago, etc.

2. a style of music that would be impossible, or at least

difficult, to “commercialize”

IV. Bebop Revolution and Participants D. The Bebop Jam Session

1. Minton’s Playhouse in NYC and others

2. artists playing for themselves and not for “squares”

3. start as popular songs but played very fast with awkward chord progressions Dance band rhythms were broken up with change in drumming

style

rhythmic beats played with cymbals rather than snare, base, or other

4. no dancing

5. audience shrank

6. early sessions were not recorded due to Record Ban and absence of radio play

“the art won’t come to you, but you must go to it” –Wynton Marsalis

Big Band Swing vs. Bebop Big Band Swing

Composed arrangements

Little improvisation

Large groups

15+ members

Controlled and predictable

Same every night

Commercial

Catered to the “market”

Danceable styles

Bebop

Short Melodies

Emphasis on solos

Small groups

5-6 members

Spontaneous

Extremely improvised

Very artistic and free

Not audience-driven

Extreme tempos!

IV. Bebop Revolution and Participants

E. Charlie “Bird” Parker [1920-1955]

1. Intellectual genius

2. from Kansas City, brought the blues to NYC

3. solos based on general chords, not melody

4. the other half of Dizzy Gillespie

5. found style during 1939 recording of “Cherokee”

6. played and recorded with a string ensemble

7. like Louis Armstrong, redefined what it meant to play

saxophone

8. acquired terrible and debilitating addictions

addicted to heroin since age 17

IV. Bebop Revolution and Participants E. Charlie “Bird” Parker [1920-1955]

9. 1945, Bird and Diz set out for California [Billy Berg’s Nightclub] a. parker walked out into desert for a “fix” [no mans land]

b. sold plane ticket for heroin and did not return to New York

c. began recording drunk, wandered naked into hotel lobby, passed out smoking, caused fire, and sentenced to mental hospital

10. determined to have another breakthrough a. 2-year old daughter dies

b. tried to kill himself by drinking iodine

c. rode subway all night…to nowhere

d. “why don’t you save me diz” – CP, over and over again

11. 1955, refused to go to the hospital, laughed, choked,

and died a. [pneumonia] coroner said 55-65 but he was really 34

b. everybody was crushed, buried in Kansas City; mother

said no jazz at funeral

12. “Bird Lives” slogans all Over New York City

IV. Bebop Revolution and Participants

F. John Birks Dizzy Gillespie [1917-1993] 1. played trumpet - central organizing figure in the bebop era [the

public face of bebop]

2. brought in Afro-Cuban elements what Jelly Roll Morton called the Spanish Tinge

3. a teacher of jazz

4. iconic berets, black-rimmed glasses, bent trumpet, puffed cheeks and affable personality

5. struggled to make bebop available to everyone – failed with wide audience

6. NOT MUSC FOR DANCING [Lindy Hopping strictly forbidden]

7. Dizzy and LA did not agree on what Jazz was – LA a has-been, bebop not jazz

8. CREATES A HUGE SCHISM IN JAZZ

IV. Bebop Revolution and Participants

G. Also during the late ’40s

1. 1947 - Louis Armstrong and Jack Teagarden have an

integrated performance in New York [month after Jackie

Robinson]

Louis not buried in NO because his integrated band was not

allowed to play

2. 1949 – Birdland Nightclub named after Charlie Parker

IV. Bebop Revolution and Participants

H. Influence of drugs

1. “jazz was born in a whiskey barrel, grew up on

marijuana, and is about to expire on heroin.”

– Artie Shaw

2. heroin entered inner cities via organized crime

3. some musicians thought that if you acted like Charlie

Parker you could get to his level

4. Drugs really destroy many of the relationships within

the jazz society of NYC and jazz music in general

V. Jazz in the ’50s

A. The Modern Jazz Quartet

‘52

1. reaction against negative drug

related life

2. wore tuxedos

3. concert halls,

4. did not interact with the

audience – no drugs, with dignity

5. vibraphone, piano, stand-up

base, and drums

“Django”

V. Jazz in the ’50s

B. The Birth of Cool Jazz

1. America enters a nervous golden age a. science conquers polio

b. Russians send Sputnik

c. black Americans pressure for integration during civil rights

d. many Americans moving to California

2. Miles Davis formed a nine-piece band featuring Davis on trumpet,

Gerry Mulligan on baritone, saxophone, trombonist Mike Zwerin, alto saxophonist Lee Konitz, Junior Collins on French Horn, tubist Bill Barber, pianist John Lewis, bassist Al McKibbonand drummer Max Roach.

Cool or west coast becomes jazz by mostly white musicians played on college campuses

V. Jazz in the ’50s

C. Dave Brubeck [b.1920] 1. played in an integrated band during WWII

2. while in Turkey, he heard improvisation in 9/8 time

3. played with saxophonist Paul Desmond

4. album TIME OUT [time signatures that were not a part of jazz]

sold over 1 million copies [#2 on US Pop chart]

Brubeck’s picture was featured on the cover of Time magazine, only other jazz musician was Louis Armstrong

“Take Five” and

“Blue Rondo a la Turk”

V. Jazz in the ’50s “Take the A-Train”

D. Duke Ellington [1899-1974]

1. finest musicians had left him

2. out of money

3. band was operating at a loss

4. 1955 – played his tunes for an ice show in New York, embarrassing

5. 1956, outdoor jazz festival at Newport in Rhode Island a. chance to reinvigorate his career – gave band a pep talk

b. finished with “Diminuendo and Crescendo in Blue”– huge hit

C. woman started to dance during Paul Gonzales sax solo

D. 27 chorus’s – crowd demanded 4-encores

E. record of concert sold hundreds of thousands of copies

f. band got more money and gigs

V. Jazz in the ’50s

E. Also during the 1950s

1. 1955, Ray Charles blended jazz, blues, and sounds

of the southern church

black teens went crazy for this new soul sound

2. Elvis Pressley sings the same thing months later

rock and roll - white teen craze

3. both take audience away from jazz