Do Black Artist get Too Much Credit for the Origins of Jazz ? Or Not Enough? Part 1

[@TioMaui]

We owe african Americans so much for all the music here in America. they get all the credit in my book

[@lf1496]

Too much credit?????That's a silly question. Did you watch the Ken Burns documentary? Even without watching one minute of it, it's pretty self evident. Black people created jazz, Brazilian samba, Afro Cuban music birthed salsa, hip hop, gospel, bomba, pleina, blues, reggae,soul, merengue, r&b, jump blues, rock n roll, etc... pretty much all popular music in the Americas🙄 Africa 🌍

[@mymixture965]

If you think you are well informed with Ken Burns, I can tell you your are not. Not to say that Afro Americans did create Jazz...for the most part.

[@lf1496]

@@mymixture965 Your comment is irrelevant, like I said without watching one minute of that documentary, it's self evident that jazz is a black artform, not for the "most part" completely . Whatever non black person plays jazz, they are participating in a black cultural creation🙄💪🏿

[@warrendoris9669]

​@mymixture965 For the most part huh Wolfgang? Why don,t you just enjoy the gift of Black music ,say thank you and move on. Who da hell made you an authority on the subject?

[@mymixture965]

@@warrendoris9669 Actually I am an expert, I am a Jazz musician and I teached Jazz at the University, bad for you, but I know what I am talking about.

[@mymixture965]

@@lf1496 I understand that you have to make this statement, as Jazz is the most important cultural contribution of afro Americans, so you hold on to that, that's ok. And I am a Jazz musician myself and when I look in my record collection of 5000 records, the afro American artist dominate, no question. But you are denying the fact, that other ethnic groups also contributed mayor parts and that will not help you to find your identity. No one denies, that without Afro Americans, there would be no Jazz and all popular music would sound totally different, but to claim it all to one race, is stupid, sorry.

[@KtotheG]

Jazz is the blues and swing. Jelly Roll Morton and Buddy Bolden were actually the first creators of "jass," which later became known as jazz. They called it 'jass," due to the jasmine perfume that the ladies of the evening wore in the cathouses in New Orleans.

Wrong

[@KtotheG]

Right

@@KtotheG it was called “jass” because the children at church would create posters that announced the service times and date of the places where there would be funeral processions. The posters often said “Jesus amen save our souls” at that bottom which was sometimes abbreviated as an acronym “JAZZ” (because the literacy capabilities of young blacks wasn’t very good at the time).

[@KtotheG]

That's cap. Christians hated jazz. They called it "devil's music," because it was played in brothels. It came from the jasmine perfume.

[@skld-xm]

sounds very backronym-y (talking to no-name over here.) but again i don't think either explanations have anything definitively saying they're true

[@cordoviche]

Great content. Just one thing, in minute 3:54 that's not Buddy Bolden. That photo of all band in fact is the only photo known of Buddy Bolden, but the guy you zommed in is not him.

[@albertjanvanhoek294]

What the excellent musician Johnny Otis said about some of his contemporaries, is true of many (mainly black) musicians, men and women. They are "national treasures and the way they’ve been treated is a national disgrace". (Quote in "Walking to New Orleans", 1974:1-24 / John Broven.) Whatever the theories (nobody was there in the American South to document the birth of Jazz on film): there would be no Jazz (and no other form of "black music") without the African Americans. Without them, white orchestra's would still play the marches of De Sousa.

[@davidwicks9538]

EXACTLY!!

[@Guyboulton]

Great photos! Thank you for this, i really enjoyed it.

[@CurtisBooksMusic]

Wow. Quite the inflammatory opening. 🤭 I'm getting my popcorn. Hehe

[@brianpite0893]

Excellent analysis!

[@bobtaylor170]

Read Richard Sudhalter's brilliant, masterful, nearly 1,000 page book, "Lost Chords." The short answer is yes, they do. Sudhalter begins his book by stating that only a fool would deny the indispensablity of blacks to the creation and progress of jazz. The problem is that as the comments here show, people tend to think jazz is the sole creation of blacks. It isn't true and it never came close to being true. Right from the beginning, despite segregation, guys of all races and racial mixes found ways to play together. There was one criterion: was the guy a good enough musician? It's a fascinating book.

[@brendanmcnally9145]

Again, good stuff! If you haven't done it already, please cover James Reese Europe! the man who brought Jazz to Europe..... Cheers!

[@kevinsplinter8595]

Cool. Thanks for sharing

[@deetee4403]

Why is there such debate on this now? What am i missing that has been found by others? It's simple, jazz is a gumbo of styles that was funneled through the black communities (primarily african american and creoles) and was later codiefied as jazz by the record companies. To show the prevalence of the black involvement, 90% of the early jazz Gods...were black. Now, what other reason could there be for that?

[@kharmalade544]

Maybe we owe the city of New Orleans? It can't be any coincidence that it was such a melting pot of cultures and music and that's where it all started.

[@HellsKitchenFunk]

I'm not really sure what the purpose of this question is. Most musicians that play the improvised music you are referencing to just prefer it be referred to as creative music.

[@jerryweber1768]

The answer is....YES!!!

[@huh2818]

“does 1+1=8?” 🤔

[@37BopCity]

There is no debate --- what we call "jazz" is a uniquely Black/African American invention. The basic foundation of jazz is Black Rhythm. Nothing in previous white musical history compares. Native African rhythm was transported to North and South America by black slaves, then fused with the white culture that slaves were forced into. In addition African harmonies and the IV-I resolution predominated, over the V-! resolution of European classical harmony. Add to this something entirely African and "black" that was completely unique and never heard before in the history of music ---- dissonance in the form of the b3 and the b5 and the "blues" scale. This enormously powerful musical form expressed and defined the experience of millions of black people through both their terrible sufferings and their joyous jubilations. Through black Christian churches we got gospel music, that added to the incredible mixture. For me the whole story of the birth of Jazz is a miracle.

[@davidwicks9538]

EXCELLENT!! Accurate and Comprehensive!!🪕🎹🪘... ✊🏿💯✊🏿

[@Three-Chord-Trick]

I've always thought jazz sounds much more like klezmer music than traditional West African music. 😮 Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Duke Ellington, and Pat Metheny owe more to Gershwin than to anyone else. 😲 And doesn't the story go that Louis Armstrong, as a youngster, was taken under the wing of a Jewish family? He was delivering coal to them, and they gave him some lessons in music. 🤔

[@albertjanvanhoek294]

And from where do you think Gershwin took the "blue notes" in his music ? In the opening of “Rhapsody in Blue” for instance. From medieval Andalusian Jewish music ? Some West African music (that of the :"griots") and the early Country Blues have a lot in common. Even as regards the tunings of some West African instruments and the banjo (an essentially West African instrument, "stolen" in its sophisticated USA form by white rural C&W musicians) and the Blues guitar in open tunings (although in the early 20th century the Hawaiian guitar was also influential).

[@Three-Chord-Trick]

@@albertjanvanhoek294 These "Blue Notes" we hear about (or blue anything else) are no more or less than the sad sound of the Minor scale - particularly the harmonic Minor or the Pentatonic Minor. The opening of Wagner's Tristan and Isolda has a "Blue" feel to it. Who would say that Wagner stole his material from Africa? The Nazis 😲 didn't like jazz because they thought it sounded jewish, not because they thought it sounded black!

[@albertjanvanhoek294]

@@Three-Chord-Trick If you can't hear the difference between the "blue notes" in Blues and Jazz and - what you call - a "blue feel" in some of the music of Wagner (and a lot of Renaissance music) then this "minor" discussion ends here. By the way: Jews and Italians (both - like the African Americans - hated by "The Klan") are very important in American Music (although they often used "Americanized" surnames). But Jazz as Jewish music ? Next you'll tell me that the Nazis hated Jesse Owens because they saw this winning African American Olympic athlete as an American Jew ... Thank you for your reaction.

[@davidwicks9538]

@@albertjanvanhoek294 "Your" statement displays "YOUR" .et al. Ignorance and or, whitesupremacy philosophy as usual!! Covering and stylizing a popular 'song' Does "NOT" change the genesis, substance, and evolution of "BlackAmericanDOS/ FreedMen 'FineART', "JAZZ" 🎶in particular!! ✊🏿💯✊🏿

[@37BopCity]

There is another factor in the melting pot that is almost totally overlooked iin the history of the birth of "Jazz" ----- while we know that it was the experiences of Black people that created this musical phenomenon, the "Blues" that it came out of is also born out of the intermingling with Native Americans too. There is definitley Native American harmony which resulted because of the intermarriages of Blacks and Native Americans. If you really study the history, you can hear it.

[@k-chill8428]

skip to 00:20 for the actual start

[@JohnTravena]

Let’s not give em credit for Kenny G but without African American music American culture would be sitcoms, county fairs, and cartoons.

[@bobtaylor170]

Congratulations on an inane line.

[@JohnTravena]

@@bobtaylor170 was almost joking but snowflakes gonna melt.