Essays on Jazz

The year 1959 was marked a monumental year in American music history. Many American jazz artists made recordings that influenced society profoundly and left a lasting impact that still is present to this day. Musical experimentation during this year is considered the apogee of American...

What is seen through a jazz aesthetic is what is seen now by many: conflict, difference, failure, mistakes, suffering, meaning, beauty, commitment to justice, grief, outrage at suffering and injustice. The form of jazz can provide a modality of critique, of social engagement that enables...

Early 1920s ragtime music had a heavy influence on dance. In the late 1920’s jazz started to have a heavy influence. The big music in the 1920’s was dance bands, Jazz, Blues, and Broadway. Some of the big musicians in dance bands were Paul Whiteman,...

Ella Fitzgerald, an icon in the music industry, brought the styles of scatting and bebop to new heights in Jazz music with her unique talents. As a young African-American girl from Virginia growing up in a struggling home, she held a spirited passion for Jazz...

Ella Fitzgerald, also known as the First Lady of Song, Queen of Jazz, and Lady Ella , was without any doubt one of the greatest, if not the greatest, jazz vocalists of the 20th Century. With a vocal range spanning three octaves, she was noted...

I attended the Matthew Yeakley’s Jazz Session at The Continental Club. It was a cloudy cold dark night, which put me in a mood for being indoors in a jazz event. Yeakley’s jazz group consists of Matt for piano, Aaron for drums and Cooper for...

For rock legend Jimi Hendrix to have spoken these prophetic words may come as a surprise to some. He was at the height of his career; he was wanted by women worldwide; he was living a rags-to-riches fairytale. Yet Jimi’s dying wish was to jam...

Racial segregation was extremely common in the first half of the twentieth century. During the 1940s segregation was enforced by law. The Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution states that everyone should have equal rights, but the meaning could have been taken many ways. Until fairly...

“If you have to ask what jazz is, you’ll never know.”- Louis Armstrong (Boujut, Michel) Louis Armstrong was a man who certainly knew what jazz is, without ever having to ask. For the greater part of the 20th century, Louis Armstrong was a central part...

From when I was a toddler mashing piano keys to now as a high school band student, music has always been a hobby of mine. But it was not until last year that I realised it was more than just a hobby, and that I...

Among all the music genres, jazz places a significant role in art history. The American jazz critic Ted Gioia states that “Jazz has always been a music of fusion. ‘Nothing from New Orleans is ever pure’ — so goes an old throwaway phrase”. If speaking...

Jazz is a music genre that has existed for many years. Women in jazz have had a great impact on jazz and the larger music world. Some of the greatest women jazz composers include Mary Lou Williams, Billie Holiday, and Ella Fitzgerald. These women shaped...

I’m sure that in 40 years, I’ll have some great memories about my younger years. One of them will definitely be the jazz concert I attended that Thursday night on the Fez, located at 380 Lafayette St, right under the Time Caf. That as any...

Charles Franklin 6th Hour Jazz Band Thelonious Monk Thelonious Monk was born on October 10, 1917 in Rocky Mount, North Carolina. When he was just four, his parents, Barbara and Thelonious, Sr., moved to New York City, where he would spend the next five decades...

On Friday night the 19th I was fortunate enough to attend a concert with multiple jazz combos made up of UO music students preformed at the Jazz Station here in Eugene. This was my first time seeing a Jazz ensemble live. The venue was extremely...

I decided to go to the “Dimensions in Jazz” concert which was directed by Wade Judy, Dr. Eric Bush, and Marko Marcinko. Before the performance started, there was a wide range of people entering. Some were students and some were adults; however, there were no...

Billie Holiday was one of the most famous jazz singers of the 20th century. Billie Holiday’s innovative phrasing about her life experiences in her music makes her one of the most influential jazz lyricists of the 20th century. The emotional intensity that she brought into...

I adjusted the drum throne one more time before looking at my conductor, nodding my head to signal that I was ready. As she counted in the tempo feelings of nervousness began to take over; doubt, fear, and the urge to play every passage, every...

The origin of jazz dance can be traced all the way back to Africa. In Africa, it was custom for natives to dance as a celebration of cycles in life such as birth, puberty, marriage, and death. This was to express their cultural beliefs. Drums,...

Bop jazz divorced itself from its mainstream predecessor when musicians like Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, and Thelonious Monk began to emphasize fast tempo and improvisation over the predictable music of the swing era. These renegade musicians valued spontaneity and inspired many listeners. It is no...

Ross Murfin defines postmodernism as, “A term referring to certain radically experimental works of literature and art after World War II” (Murfin 397). According to Murfin, postmodernism, like modernism that preceded it, involves separation from dominant literary convention via the “experimentation with new literary devices,...