[Dixielandjazz] forming a Band w/o knowing how to play - Was Why American's Don't Like Jazz

[Steve Barbone]

"Jhopkins" <jazzclarinet at cox.net> wrote (polite snip)

>In High School Dabney
>(my son) and a few of his friends decided to form a rock band, write their
>own songs and make a CD. The only problem was, none of them knew how to play
>a musical instrument. So they each picked an instrument....guitar, bass,
>drums and vocals.  In six months they had taught themselves to play, written
>several songs (created them..... they never wrote anything down, they didn't
>know how), and did indeed make their CD. I was dumbfounded.......they had a
>pretty good, competitive, rock and roll garage band after six months. Their
>friends would show up every time they played and loved the band. If they had
>chosen jazz and had picked trumpet, clarinet, trombone, tuba, banjo, drums
>and piano they would have quickly given up, realizing that it would be
>impossible to do in a short amout of time (or any amount of time). This made
>it clear to me why so many kids gravitate towards the R&R garage band
>mentality....it was easy and they had a blast doing it.

Sounds very much like how jazz got started among blacks 100+ years ago.
Didn't they come into possession of instruments they didn't know how to
play, learn to play them on their own, and start playing dance/jazz music,
based upon what they heard? According to historians, Bolden, Bechet,
Armstrong et al, all originally learned how to play on their own, without
benefit of reading music and/or formal instruction.

Those early blues, and early jazz 3 chord tunes were also quite easy to play
if one had ears. Perhaps the only difference between the start of Jazz and
R&R was the peer group pressure (during the different times) that moved the
players towards the the genre?

Cheers,
Steve Barbone