[Dixielandjazz] What is Trad Jazz?

[Don Mopsick]

This brief essay was commissioned by Don Jones. The opinions expressed
herein are my own. If you don’t like them, “gey shtipn in tukhes arayn.”
Just kidding.
 
WHAT IS “TRAD JAZZ?”
 
By Don Mopsick
 
The question is posed by Don Jones, Editor and Publisher of the American
Rag. 
 
Like the term “jazz” itself these days, “trad” or “traditional” has as
many different meanings as there are tastes and preferences in jazz
amongst various sub-sets of consumers of music. 
 
Among the general public, “traditional jazz” is increasingly being used
to describe any older jazz that is not of a relatively new commercially
successful genre known as “Smooth Jazz.”  “Smooth” became a popular
radio format in the 1980s characterized by mainly Rhythm and
Blues-inspired instrumentals (typically featuring the saxophone and
George Benson-style electric guitar) utilizing relatively simple,
stylized and formulaic chord changes played over electrified Rock or
Soul rhythms. 
 
Similarly, “Traditional” or “old-school” would be terms used by younger
fans of the various current hybrids of jazz, Funk, and “hip-hop” to
delineate the older forms.
 
In this sense “traditional jazz” would include virtually the entire
spectrum of jazz itself as understood by those who began listening to
jazz before the advent of “Smooth” or “hip-hop,” especially any jazz
played with an uneven 12/8 swing rhythm as opposed to the
even-eighth-note rock, Funk, hip-hop, or Latin feel. From this point of
view, for example, such 1960s “avant-garde” jazz artists as Ornette
Coleman, John Coltrane, and pre-electric (about 1971) Miles Davis would
be considered “traditional.” For most listeners familiar with older
jazz, however, “Smooth” falls outside of the more conventional “jazz”
classification and should more properly be called “contemporary
instrumental pop,” and such a “traditional” classification would be
considered ludicrous and misinformed. (Thankfully, hip-hop/jazz hybrids
very rarely attempt to mis-appropriate the “jazz” label, thus saving the
public even more confusion). 
 
Among knowledgeable jazz fans, however, “trad” is used in a variety of
more or less inclusive ways to describe even older jazz styles. I will
describe these beginning with the most restrictive, least inclusive
meaning and continue on with those whose tastes tend to be more
inclusive and tolerant of later developments.
 
1. The absolute “hard core” of traditional jazz as understood by its
most “purist” adherents refers to the early New Orleans style of Joe
“King” Oliver, Sidney Bechet, Louis Armstrong, and Jelly Roll Morton.
The period covered is roughly between 1900 to 1930. Some also include
the Original Dixieland Jazz Band and the New Orleans Rhythm Kings, white
New Orleans bands. All of these bands gained their first national fame
through recordings made in Chicago in the 1920s. Since this style
features mostly group improvisation as opposed to virtuosic soloing, the
later group-ensemble-style “revivalist” bands of San Franciscans  Lu
Watters and Turk Murphy, and the New Orleans styles of Bunk Johnson,
George Lewis, as well as the Preservation Hall Jazz Band of the 1960s
are also considered “traditional jazz” by these folks. 
 
Within this group of fans there is a large constituency for including
blues singers such as Gertrude “Ma” Rainey and Bessie Smith since they
used jazz accompanists like Louis Armstrong and Clarence Williams. Also
frequently included are Boogie Woogie blues pianists like Meade Lux
Lewis, Pete Johnson, and Jimmy Yancey. 
 
My feeling is that traditional blues and jazz, although closely related
and often intersecting, are not identical entities. Jazz has a much
wider range of tempos and repertoire and was played by a more diverse
group of musicians than strict blues, although Bessie herself recorded
many “pop” tunes. In any case, this distinction was rarely made at the
time the music was new.
 
2. A “trad jazz” fan with a slightly more inclusive sensibility would
add to the above the spectacular advances in soloing made by Louis
Armstrong, Sidney Bechet and Bix Beiderbecke during the 1920s. This
would include Louis’ Hot Five and Hot Seven records (with Earl Hines)
and Bix’s Wolverines and the records he made with Jean Goldkette and
Paul Whiteman, as well as those under his own leadership. 
 
3. Even more inclusive are fans that revere the New York “hot” band and
session leaders of the late ‘20s and early ‘30s such as for example Red
Nichols, Fletcher Henderson, Eddie Condon, Miff Mole, Joe Venuti/Eddie
Lang, and “hot” vocalists like the Rhythm Boys, Boswell Sisters, Mills
Brothers, etc. Knowledgeable fans of these later developments of the
1930s and on into the big-band Swing Era of the late 1930s and ‘40s
understand, however, that the later music, although derived from the
driving rhythmic feel of traditional New Orleans jazz (and the later
innovations of Louis Armstrong), is not strictly speaking of that genre
since the rhythm sections play in a modified style that came to be
associated with the “Swing” label—guitar as opposed to banjo, string
bass as opposed to tuba, and more use of cymbals to keep time
(especially after the advent of the great Count Basie Orchestra in the
late 1930s).  Further, the advances in horn playing exemplified by Benny
Goodman, Bunny Berigan, Jack Teagarden, Tommy Dorsey, etc. are
recognized by these fans as beyond “traditional” but directly descended
from earlier New Orleans models. 
 
In fact, a few of the more popular small hot Swing bands of the late
‘30s used trad jazz tunes and group improvisational models. Foremost
among these were the Bob Crosby Bob Cats, Eddie Condon, and Muggsy
Spanier. Small groups contained within the big bands led by Goodman,
Shaw, and Dorsey also used some trad tunes and principles, albeit in an
updated setting. 
 
To sum up, Swing and Trad shared many musical aspects, including a
driving, explicitly stated (mostly 4/4) rhythm played on all rhythm
instruments and bass drum, sliding blue-notes in the horns (in fact the
entire approach to the blues), and some of the same tunes or riffs based
on the older tune structures(such as “Tiger Rag,” “Panama,” etc.). The
main difference was that Swing used updated song material comprising
what is today referred to as  the Great American Songbook (show tunes by
Berlin, Gershwin, Porter, Warren, Arlen, etc.) and much more formal
composition and arrangement. 
 
The great dividing line in jazz happened during and just after WWII with
the advent of be-bop. The most important changes in style:
 
1. The music no longer functioned mostly for dancing, so tempos became
much more wide-ranging.
2. The guitar changed from an acoustic rhythm instrument to an
electrified solo voice. The rhythm guitar sound gradually disappeared
from jazz.
3. Rhythm section sound changed drastically. Time was kept only on the
ride cymbal and the string bass, and pianists no longer explicitly
stated 4/4. From this point on, the ground beat in jazz was “assumed” or
implied and rhythm, especially drumming, became vastly more complex.
4. The horn solo style, instead of featuring hot syncopation and sliding
blue notes, used an eighth-note-based rhythmic pattern and much more
complex harmonic changes. Blue notes were approached melodically like a
piano or other fixed-pitch instrument. Blue note bending was now frowned
upon as passé and “corny.”
 
I would say that the majority of today’s jazz artists look to be-bop,
not Trad and Swing, for their inspiration. Idiosyncratic melodic
fragments first played by Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Clifford
Brown, Miles Davis, and Thelonius Monk some 60 years ago still can be
heard in the playing of jazz artists in their 20s and 30s. Countless new
jazz bands are still emulating the artistic principles first recorded by
Miles Davis, John Coltrane, and Ornette Coleman in the 1950s and ‘60s.  
 
My impression is that this is because of  the dominance of Baby-Boomer
jazz educators who found their first inspiration in this “modern” jazz.
In fact, a case can be made that today’s jazz financial “establishment”
is based in academia. But, while this constituency is much larger in
numbers than that for the older “trad” styles, it too faces a crisis of
dwindling popularity and sales. Their larger numbers mean that they have
more air to breathe before the water reaches the ceiling, but the ship
is taking on water nonetheless. 
 
“The Future of Jazz” is a hot topic at jazz gatherings of all stripes. I
think that Baby Boomer jazz fans, players, and educators are finally
coming to realize what we in the Trad community have known for a long
time—in order to be true to jazz, you have to learn to speak the
language of its history. And, from our point of view, that language is
about hot rhythm, swingin’ and stompin.’
 
Recently, at the Annual Conference of the International Association for
Jazz Education in New York, Jim Cullum and I spoke to a small group of
college students and faculty about the importance of New York City to
jazz history. Toward the end of the presentation, a student asked each
of us who inspired us to dedicate our playing to early jazz.
 
We both talked at length about Armstrong—the emotional directness, the
warmth of the sound, the feeling that he played directly to me, and the
happy feeling I got from that horn. Purity, authentic feeling,
simplicity, “what you hear is what you get.” In fact, these were the
same things that attracted kids to Rhythm and Blues in the 1950s and
propelled the evolution of Rock and Roll. 
 
A few of the students asked us to explain what they might be missing or
not understanding about the complex, “modern” jazz they were being
exposed to at the Conference. Here’s how I explained it to them:
 
Older jazz, intended for dancing, always stated the beat explicitly,
either in a bouncy 2/4 or a hard-driving 4/4. Before WWII, roughly from
1920 to 1940, an entire generation of dancers and listeners knew where
the beat was at all times, and the melody, too. If the kids couldn’t
groove to your beat or follow your jazz, you just didn’t make it. 
 
But after the war, be-bop caught on with kids for whom the stated beat
was old-school. It became very hip to “imply” the beat, which by that
time had become a “given.”
 
Now, 60 years later, pre-war jazz, played authentically, is virtually
unknown in school jazz programs. Very few kids know what the frame of
reference was at the moment bop was born. The chord changes come at you
at light speed, the drummers rarely clue you in on where beat “1” is.
For the player, it’s a wonder of technical accomplishment, but for the
young listener born after a certain point, it’s too often a blather of
rootless, glazed-eye bewilderment.
 
After our concert for about 3,000 educators and students, a high school
jazz music teacher told me that he found our traditional sound
“refreshing,” and that he felt that he and his students were able for
the first time to “connect the dots” about where jazz as it’s played
today comes from.  
 
But, if we are to believe sales figures published by the industry, the
vast majority of music consumers have not yet heard any kind of jazz. I
would think that this is the audience we need to be going after to
revitalize festivals, and for this purpose the music, if well-played
with authenticity and conviction, can sell itself. All it needs is
exposure and the message that, by the way, you can dance to it. 
 
As the great Ralph Sutton was fond of quoting Fats Waller, “You get that
right tickin’ rhythm, and man it’s on!”
 
© 2006 by Don Mopsick