From rock and roll swing
Ellington’s contribution to the art and musical culture of the world is enormous, especially if his various operas are added to his thousands of jazz compositions, a couple of ballets and more than ten musical shows. His individualistic approach to writing was unique and impossible to categorize, since he never got into a specific type of music. Ellington’s jazz was exclusively his, but his influence is evident in bands and musicians from the Swing era to avant -garde composers. His Big Band not only represented the swing band model, but the orchestra prototype for innovation and the creation of new sounds.
Joachim-Ernst Berendt comments in his book ‘El Jazz: from New Orleans Al Jazz Rock ":" The dynamic will with which Duke Ellington imposes on his musicians their ideas without taking them away so the impression that in the background only helps them to developHis hidden capabilities is his most prominent quality. To this relationship between Duke and his musicians – expressable people with words – it is because everything he has written seems to be directed with such exclusiveness for his orchestra that it is very difficult for anyone to touch. Paul Whiteman and his arranger Ferde Grofé were for a night after night to the club in which Ellington played because they wanted to imitate some of Duke’s typical sounds, but they resigned themselves: "Nothing can be stolen".
The other style came from Kansas City, where the Count Basie band influenced by blues and boogie-woogie stood out. In an interview with Count Basie, he answered the question of what is jazz? saying: "That is the set of several good things that come together and that make one mark the rhythm with the foot". Basie’s definition describes the foundation of that sound called swing.
The rhythmic section of the Count Basie band was the best joint in history, made by Duke Ellington, who assured that with Basie’s rhythmic section he would have done wonders.
Unfortunately the black bands, even the most popular, did not enjoy the same equality (they did not have the same time in the radio stations) as the white bands so they faced serious economic and social disadvantages. There were many musicians who had to go to Paris to succeed because in their land they were not recognized.
At that time, despite Benny Goodman’s popularity, jazz was a minority. Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington were famous and sold many albums, but the vast majority of the American people considered that black music for blacks. They were not yet aware that "that music" was going to be the greatest cultural manifestation of the American people in the twentieth century.
Benny Goodman, as we have said, enjoyed popularity: he was Blanco, director of a famous band, clarinetist virtuoso and gained composer’s reputation. I had a radio program at the NBC and later another in the CBS. Radio takes strength as a means of musical expression and musical programs were based from coast to coast and their music filled the life of American homes, but from there jazz did not pass. However, in cities, like New York, the swing enjoyed great popularity where duels were formed between famous bands. One of the most popular was in 1937 between the Benny Goodman Orchestra and that of Chick Webb in the Savoy de Harlem. More than 5.000 Personnel stayed on the street without being able to attend this duel, and after an exciting competition the whites gave a winner to Goodman and the blacks to Webb.
At that time, they advised Goodman to celebrate a jazz concert at Carnegie Hall, a sanctuary of classical music in New York, in order to publicize jazz to a more "cult" audience. At the beginning, the concert for the reaction of the public seemed crazy when they saw on the stage of the Carnegie Hall black musicians mixed with whites. It would still spend some time before integration, which was common in jazz, was acceptable in other places. But
Concert was held on January 16, 1938 and the event represented the first time that jazz dressed in label. The expectation was great and the anxiety that was lived, too. So much so that tickets had already been exhausted weeks before the concert (2.760 seats at 2.75 dollars) and had to place extra chairs in the halls and stairs given the extraordinary public demand. Goodman arrived at the summit of his professional career and the band that accompanied him also went through his best moment. Lionel Hampton (vibraphone), Gene Kruup (drums) and Teddy Wilson (piano) were in the original formation. But musicians from two other groups that were in the center of the swing were also added: Duke Ellington and Count Basie. Saxophonists Johnny Hodges and Lester Young, or the bassist Walter Page were some who appeared in that concert. Even the same Basie was part of some of the songs. In the middle of the concert, people were already delivered, with classic Count Basie themes, Duke Ellington, Gershwin and Goodman himself, among others. The concert was a success for music and the unforgettable atmosphere that was lived in that majestic theater overflowing with that cold January night. The newspapers said the next day.
The Goodman concert, at the Carnegie Hall in New York in 1938, marks the acceptance of jazz as a legitimate art form by opinion creators for the dominant American society.
Jazz, that music that was born as an anti -system and would react, had normalized with swing and now appeared in theaters and shows around the world.
Benny Goodman’s emblematic debut at Carnegie Hall, had excited John Hammond (jazz fan, promoter and producer) to give a concert in the same place, wanted to offer a sample to the white public of the evolution of American black music, fromIts origins in Africa, through the gospel and blues, dixieland and finally swing. And thus organized on December 23, 1938 a great concert: "From Spirituals To Swing" (from the spiritual to the Swig), presenting a Blues, Jazz and Gospel program, with artists such as Big Joe Turner, Pete Johnson, Albert Ammons,Meade Lux Lewis The Count Basie Orchestra, Sister Rosetta Tharpe … among others.
Thanks to this concert, both Lewis and Ammons and Johnson, Turner and Rosetta;They had the opportunity to show their art to the crowd that filled the most important New York theater. The themes that the musicians interpreted, especially those of the trio of Pianos de Lewis, Ammons and Johnson (which became known as the Boogie-Woogie Trio), the Johnson and Turner duo, as well as the singer of Gospel Sister Rosetta Tharpe with hisVibrant way to play the guitar next to the pianist Albert Ammons, produced the most numerous applause of the night and stimulated the fashion of the Boogie-Woogie throughout the country. Also, the scenic movements and musical ecstasy of the artists of Gospel (Mitchell´s Christian Singer) were new for the white public and foreshadowed much later later the Rhythm and Blues.
The success of this concert was such that, John Hammond repeated another similar one at Christmas next year, and these concerts, together with Goodman’s, strengthened the music of American blacks.
The fashion of the Boogie-Woogie dominated the panorama of American black music (which increasing. During those years they practically invaded each club, each radio station and every jukebox in the country.
Two recordings of Albert Ammons Dan Cuenca of the evolution that the style was suffering and that would not be checked until about ten years later, but our ears already recognize in it the sound that will characterize pianists such as Little Richard and Jerry Lee Lewis. These recordings are: ‘The Boogie Rocks” of 1944 and ‘Doin’ The Boogie-Woogie ”of 1946.
Also religious music, through the pioneer work of Fush Jubilee Singers, evolved, in the same way that it had happened in jazz, as a way for American blacks to thrive in a multicultural society dominated by whites. In the late 30s the Gospel began to cross with what was being done in dance halls, bars and concert halls. For those dates Sister Rosetta Tharpe, a dynamic Gospel singer who had grown up in a traveling evangelical company, acquired fame acting at Cotton Club with the Lucky Millinder orchestra and after acting at the Carnegie Hall (from Spirituals To Swing)He shot, "Rock Me", "Rock! Daniel ”and“ This Train ”were his first successes. It was a star in the 1940s;A black woman who sang Gospel music with the accompaniment of her own electric guitar. His 1945 recording “Strange Things Happening Every Day has been recognized as the first song of Gospel to appear on the“ Race Record ‘list (later called’ R & B ‘): it reached number two and became an early model forthe rock and Roll. Rosetta is considered the grandmother of rock and roll and was a model and inspiration for Elvis Presley, Chuck Berry, Little Richard, Carl Perkins, Jerry Lee Lewis … Johnny Cash called her her favorite singer and her greatest inspiration. (Concert at an abandoned Manchester station on the European tour of the "Blues Caravan and Gospel in 1964").
The Homeland Harmony Quartet group took the “Gospel Boogie” market in 1947, the song was very criticized (it bothered some pious listeners), but 200 were sold.000 copies at the time of its launch and became the first national success for a white Gospel quartet and marked the pattern of very popular music.
With the success of "Gospel Boogie" Rosetta herself took her version "Everybody’s Gonna Have a Wonderful Time Up There", also The Pilgrim Travelers interpreted her, with the elegance and swing of the black quartets. By the end of the 40, the Gospel music was thriving, providing innumerable artists who began to record records where they mixed sacral music with the secular, examples of that time were, among others: The Dixie Hummingbirds with "Amazing Grace" in 1946 and "EzekelSaw The Wheel ”in 1947. Mahalia Jackson (considered the Queen of Gospel) took out "Move on Up to Little Higher" and "Dig a Little Deper" in 1947. The Fairfield Four recorded "Just a Little Talk With Jesus" in 1949.
Simultaneously, swing continued to enjoy good health. From 1938 several very popular successes appeared, which occupied the top positions of several popular music lists. It was the orchestra of Glenn Miller, who quickly achieved the public’s favor, to a large extent, for the issuance of his performances by a radio program transmitted from Coast to Coast.
Miller, a trombonist and orchestra director, led one of the most popular bands of his time with tuadas as popular as "in the mood", "Chattanooga choo choo", "Moonlight Serenade" and others more. Miller’s music became the example of American music par excellence, so much so that the patriotic director did not hesitate to enlist in the Air Forces in World War II. His work as an entertaining of the troops was more required than his services as an aviation officer. With Army members he formed an orchestra that had the main objective. A plane crash ended his life, just at the time his music toured the world. Miller’s music moved away from the black molds (it was more commercial), although he kept a lot of swing inside and a careful orchestration by the leader. From 1939 to 1942, Miller’s orchestra was the most popular dance band in the world, beating records in record sales and in concert assists.
Glenn Miller and Benny Goodman were, at that time, at the celebrity’s cusp and became world success figures. Goodman and Miller bands made it possible to "sell" jazz to a mass audience. Songs like In The Mood turned around the world.
As a result of swing popularity, more than half of the albums that were sold between 1935 and 1945 were made by large dance bands. Swing music took the American music industry from the Great Depression. They say that at the beginning of 1940, there were several hundred Big Bands in the United States.
In the dance, the same thing happened, the Lindy Hop was not only danced in the United States, but had crossed the borders and was very popular in Europe, especially in Germany, Great Britain and France. At the beginning of the forties, several films were released, among others: Hellzapopin ’and Swing Fever where Lindy Hop has a great prominence. It was so popularity that Life magazine announced in August 1943 the Lindy Hop as a national dance.
Indeed, in the early forties the world of jazz was fully immersed in the phenomenon of Swing Bands, a flourishing business had developed around the swing, which was one of the main leisure sources of American society:Thousands of young people longed to deny themselves in dance halls where the orchestras chained one after another their most swingling arrangements for enjoying an audience eager to dance tireless.
However, many of the young talent musicians who integrated these orchestras brought musical concerns that were increasingly accommodated in them: they wantedstereotyped the rhythms and artificially oriented to dance the melodic phrases. But it was not easy to get out of that gear: the money was in the orchestras, and where the money was the opportunities to play.
However, orchestras as an essential element of jazz were about to disappear. The arrival of World War II and the Americans entering the conflict, made the effects of the war physically decrease to the orchestras (with the mobilization of much of his musicians) and plunged the country into an economic crisis that forced the worldFrom leisure to severely adjust the belt. The majority of the big stores that had been the home of Swing in the previous decade closed their doors. And the Big Bands disintegrating, because the commercial circuits have sunk and it is difficult to maintain such large formations, so there are very few that survive. Musicians disperse in an infinity of small groups. It was therefore a conjunction of diverse circumstances that motivated that they arise in New York a few tugures (Minton’s Playhouse and “Monroe’s Uptown House” in Harlem, and several others on 52nd Street (Manhattan) where the most restless musicians gathered and,Finally, free from the orchestal corsets, they investigated musical possibilities that would take them by new paths of freedom: in sessions that lasted until dawn in exchange for little or no money, they experienced with more advanced harmonies and new improvisatory possibilities, their music did notHe focused on the consumer, they sought to express and surprise, rather than entertain. And from those long night sessions the Bebop emerged.
But the baby is not an invention of a few transnochadors: the bebop was a coherent evolution of the swing from which boppers longed to get away. His models were fundamentally the bands from Kansas City (with Count Basie at the head) and their energetic and uninfined arrangements, which left musicians much more space than the sophisticated machinery of Ellington, Goodman, etc … and musicians likeColeman Hawkins, Lester Young, Roy Eldridge, Art Tatum or Charlie Christian, among others, had been looking for new expressive forms that the boppers would investigate some time in depth. As a sample of the Swing Reio that inspired Bebop this “One O’Clock Jump” recorded by Count Basie and its orchestra on July 7, 1937.
Babop musicians aspired to be considered artists and not a mere entertainment without cultural value. The reasons after this claim had a lot to do with racism that black musicians traditionally suffered: they could succeed as a means of fun for a white audience, but not being respected as truly important creators, apart from suffering all kinds of discriminations and vexationsthat his white colleagues did not suffer. Until then, very few black musicians had publicly intended such a thing but, by becoming aware of the importance of music they were creating, a whole generation of young musicians began to rebel more and more noticeable against these discrimination, and to demand that theirMusic (which had moved radically from the danceable jazz of swing orchestras) was considered an artistic form to the level of the avant -garde cult music of European tradition. Consequently they should be considered artists with all of the law.
It goes without saying that this effort did not enjoy excessive success, rather on the contrary. In fact, what was done was to steal the usual jazz public his favorite environment: dance (the bop could not dance, he had to sit and listen). The consequence was relentless: the Bebop seemed incomprehensible to almost everyone, and almost all its potential audience turned its back on its creators. The reaction of these was also resolved: they locked themselves and excluded from their world those who did not understand the validity of their musical proposal. It also influenced the strike of the musician union that interrupted recordings between 1942 and 1944, and the fact that a huge number of musicians remained in the war front during the war motivated that, when the bulk of fans accessed the first albums ofBebop, discovered radically, revolutionary and fully developed music, full of fast temples, eccentric and advanced harmonies rhythms. An example of this were the songs: ‘Ko-Ko’ and “Salt Peanuts” by Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie respectively.
Many swing figures were taken as a personal insult. Fletcher Henderson said in 1948 "Among all the cruel indignities of existence, Bebop is the worst of all". Even the affable Louis Armstrong lost the patience when talking about the bop "such rare chords that make no sense … nor there is melody to remember or rhythm to dance". Benny Goodman in 1948 he publicly praised the new style, but a few years later in statements to New York Times, he said: "What is heard in Bebop is a lot of noise".
However, the Bebop was very successful in a public segment that ended up being called hipsters, such as the Beat Generation. And some argue that the Bebop was the beginning of civil rights movement.
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