[Dixielandjazz] Re: Dixielandjazz Digest, Vol 26, Issue 15

[Steve barbone]

"Bill Gunter" <jazzboard at hotmail.com> wrote (polite snips)

> Much has been made of the claim that the Italians invented jazz.  Give me a
> break.
 
> True, the Italians are a most musical people. Matter of fact, it was an
> Italian monk back in the year 1100 or so who finally identified and
> formalized the musical notation system and tonic scale that characterizes
> ALL of western music!! Guido d'Arezzo was the fellow's name and his
> contribution to all of our music in the western world is enormous.

Yes, and Italy remained THE center of music in the civilized world for
centuries thereafter.
 
> But jazz, on the other hand, is cool, syncopated, bouncy, upbeat, and
> joyous.

Cool? Not always. Jazz started out as HOT, just like us hot blooded
Italians. It only became cool when the pseudo intellectuals started to dig
it. It had to have been invented by a HOT BLOODED group of people who are
syncopated, (check those hand gestures) bouncy, upbeat and joyous. Hey,
that's the very definition of Italians, nobody else fits.
 
> Sure, Italians can play it and even sing it (Prima . . . need I say more?}!
> But, they didn't invent it.
> It had to be a culture with a history of oppression going back millennia but
> never losing its capacity for music and humor. The sad songs and laments of
> this culture reduce us to tears but the happy music makes us wanna dance and
> the humor is so funny that we almost pee in our pants! And, by the way, the
> first musical movie ever made (The Jazz Singer) was not about Italians!

Yes but then, the only folks with a "millennia" history of oppression are
the Jews so buy that rationale, they must have invented jazz. The first
"musical" movie was in reality the first "talking" movie designed to
entertain, not teach musical history of jazz. However, the star was indeed
Jewish so maybe they did invent jazz.

We should realize, however, that the Italians were indeed an oppressed
segment of the population in pre World War 1 New Orleans. Every bit as much,
if not more so, than any other population segment there.

Therefore if "oppression" spawned jazz, then it must have been invented
first by the Jews, then by the Italians and the Blacks.

Italians are getting short shrift here, even today, by the revisionist
historians who blissfully ignore all those Italian Jazz Musicians named in
previous posts all who pre-dated Louis Prima by at least a generation and
some who pre date Louis Armstrong.

Hmmmmm. Does Richard Sudhalter know about this? Yes, he does. He waxes
eloquently about those early Italian jazzmen and their contributions in
"Lost Chords", to the point of suggesting that someone should write a
historical account of it in book length form.

Cheers, (tongue firmly in cheek)
Steve Barbone