opus 2, no. 1; overview & history (early jazz)

Hello, and welcome back to Jazz With Jazz(mine)! haha. please laugh.
Anyways, this post marks the beginning of the monumental

Finally. We're here - the fateful Week Two of this project. Fortunately, I haven't gotten too far behind on what I wanted to do. Unfortunately, I've spent far too long on this project so far than any sane person should (I'm so sorry for the overflow of posts. I should probably combine them into one post).

Either way, I should probably just go with it and try to make the most out of this sudden bout of productivity. Which is why I shall stop getting off topic and get straight to...

the overview: what will I learn this week? what will I do?

• History: I will learn the early days of jazz. This will actually be included in a summary below, so stay tuned!
• Musician: I did not do my Bud Powell one last week (oops), and I am not making it up this week. Maybe some other day. Based on the history I'm doing this week, I've decided to go along with it by doing Scott Joplin. :)
• Actual Playing: I will try to learn another section of jazz theory and choose my short piece this week. This will be in a separate post. 
• Other Things: I have arranged an interview with Mr. Conahan, which I will be completing on a Day 6 workday. I will probably include that in my Musician Biography post, assuming everything works out.

Alright! Now that that's over with, let's get onto some actual progress stuff.

this week on jazz history

My main question for this week was 'how did jazz begin?' As I mentioned in last week's post, the large creole population was very important for jazz to begin. Last week we were around the time period before the 1850s, but this week I'm focusing on late 1800s to the early 1900s. 

We've all (hopefully) already learned about this period of time in middle school: the American Civil War happened, emancipation happened, people died, and other notable things happened.

an inaccurate representation of the american flag, because i didn't feel like counting to 50

Another cool thing: remember the 10,000 hours article we read, and how there was that One Section talking about the Ideal Time to be born for something? And the part where it mentioned how most tech geniuses (Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, etc.) were born in this Ideal Time? Yeah, well, this is pretty relevant for jazz, too.

Because, as it turns out, a bunch of successful jazz musicians were born around the same time, too, around 30-50 years before the 1920s, or the jazz era. Here are a few.

a comprehensive list of successful jazz musicians born in the late-ish 1800s

• Scott Joplin (a jazz pianist!!). Born on November 24th, 1868.
• Buddy Bolden (first player of New Orleans Blues-style Jazz). Born in 1868.
• Jelly Roll Morton (another jazz pianist!!). Born on September 20, 1885.
• Mamie Smith (blues singer). Born on September 16, 1890.
• Duke Ellington (another piano player!!). Born on April 29, 1899.

That's a brief list, but there are a ton more. If you're somehow interested in Collecting Them All, check out the website I'm using (the All About Jazz link in my intro post). Although I highly doubt any of you will want to know that many people.

So what else is important to know? Well, in this same time period, Edison expands on the phonograph, which means music can spread a whole lot easier. Thanks, Tom. 

Plessy v. Ferguson happened, which led to segregation, 'Jim Crow', and all that jazz. It was very Not Good.

The rise of ragtime was also a pretty notable event. The term is first coined in 1893, reaches full-on craze around 1897, and continues on for a while, with a few great pieces by Joplin, Gershwin, and the lot.

So how did jazz actually, well... become jazz? Unlike what I previously believed, it was more a slow evolution than anything else. Ragtime and blues, both highly popular styles at the time, start to mix together. Jelly Roll Morton is one of the first people to mix these two. Add in some swing, and jazz is finally born.

the jazz king

Since I've already (sort of) answered the question I wanted to, I've decided to go a little more into detail and see some really important events around the time period I'm researching. (I will leave all Scott Joplin events out, and those will be in my biography post). Alright, so let's begin.

Louis Armstrong is born on July 4th, 1900 (according to him). He's actually born August 4th, 1901. Swing is generally credited to him, and he went on to write several famous pieces such as the well-known What A Wonderful World and the English version of La Vie En Rose.

At the time, ragtime, brass bands, and blues are already very popular in New Orleans. Improvisation begins as musicians start to change up pop songs.

Lincoln Park opens in New Orleans in 1902. It serves as an open venue for ragtime music. It also becomes a center for early jazz performances.

sorry for the terrible editing T_T

Around 1910, the dance craze begins. This leads to all the fantastic jazz dancing that we know now - with styles like the Foxtrot and the Charleston. These will all be pretty important during the Jazz Age, and also for 21st century guard routines.

There are obviously many other very important events during this time period, but I've decided just to mention these four for now. Like I said, if you're interested in knowing all of the other events, feel free to check out both the 'All About Jazz' and the 'Jazz in America' links in the introduction.

That's it for now. Tune in later (haha. I'm sorry. I'll stop) for some cool theory, low-quality piano recordings, and (hopefully) informative Scott Joplin info. 

Thank god. This was a shorter post, wasn't it? I think it's easier to read when it's around this length, but sometimes I just have too much information to include.

Sources:

 "Jazz History Timeline." All About Jazz. All About Jazz, n.d. Web. 23 Feb. 2017.

"Timeline." Jazz in America. Jazz in America, n.d. Web. 23 Feb. 2017.