[Dixielandjazz] What Killed Jazz? (Assuming Jazz is dead)

[Steve Barbone]

David Dustin <postmaster at fountainsquareramblers.org>

 >> Steve Barbone wrote:
 
>> I don't agree with the popular notion that Bop started the decline of trad
>> jazz, In fact far from it.
> 
> David Answers:==================

> You're entitled to your opinion.  Mike didn?t ask what killed TRAD JAZZ. He
> asked what killed JAZZ - in the sense of deposing it from its domination of
> American popular music during the 1920s and 1930s/early 40s - and I stand by
> my response. 

What other kind of jazz was there in the 20's and 30's other than what we
call OKOM and/or trad jazz?

> JAZZ was alive and well, through the immense popularity of
> Swing bands, up until the emergence of Bop by the end of WW2.

Maybe, maybe not. Here is a quote from Glenn Miller in 1940  after "Down
Beat" accused him of forsaking jazz: "It's all in what you define as real
jazz. It happens that to our ears, harmony comes first. A dozen colored
bands have a better beat than mine. Our band stresses harmony."

Hmmm. Could as well have been Guy Lombardo talking. And BTW, Lombardo and
other sweet bands had developed huge followings, audience that they had
taken away from the "Jazz Bands." By say 1940, I'm not entirely sure that
"jazz" was still the leading genre of American "popular" music.

You also have to consider that under your time line, jazz was alive and well
until the emergence of Stan Kenton's Band by the end of WW2. Was therefore,
Stan Kenton the one who killed jazz? Certainly, by his own admission his
bands did not swing. He said; "I have always maintained that a thing doesn't
necessarily have to swing all the time to be jazz, because there's a certain
way of playing music that came from the jazz conception that can be applied
to rubato movement in music or any sort of time, any conception of time. It
doesn't always have to be a swing thing."

Kenton had a strong following for a while, and still impacts jazz, but he
never "grabbed" the major popular music audience. Why not blame him?

> Regardless of
> the extent to which Bop represents (to some of us) an artistic triumph on
> the part of players like Bird, Diz, Roach, Trane et al., or offers moments
> of scintillation to some of us, it was not a popular success and set the
> wheels in motion for the resounding eclipse of JAZZ as THE popular art form
> in the United States. Truth be told, I can admire a little West Coast/Cool
> Jazz too, after a few drinks, and have been known even to blow some of it
> myself if I?m in the right company.  But there is nothing ? NOTHING -- that
> can persuade me that Salt Peanuts, Koko, or even Giant Steps is worth
> crossing the street to hear if there?s a hot OKOM band inside a 20-mile
> radius squeezing the grease out of Doctor Jazz, Hindustan, or the Original
> Dixieland One-Step.  I?d rather listen to Hank Williams...or Elvis. And
> history shows a lot of returning servicemen didn?t take long to make a
> similar decision once they got home from the war.  And that?s what killed
> JAZZ, sports fans.

Agree that Bop was never a popular genre. Could care less about "artistic
triumph". Simply disagree that Bop set any wheels in motion that killed
jazz. Glad you admire some "cool". Disagree about Koko, Ambivalent about
Salt Peanuts and Giant Steps. But so what. We are two different individuals.
Thank goodness for that else the world would be a dull place.

As I remember it, those returning servicemen had plenty of "Small Band
Swing" and Dixieland to listen to. Back then, in NYC, I was just a couple of
years younger than they were and grew up listening to Dixieland, Small Band
Swing, Basie and Ellington. And also the sweet bands of Ray Anthony, Ralph
Flanigan and others. Wasn't really aware of Bop until about 1952 when it was
already in decline and I was by then, a wannabe jazz musician. Shoot, Dixie
and SBS were far more popular, and far more available than bop. They got
more air play on the radio, they were presented live in more clubs. So if
folks went to Country & Western, or Elvis, or The Beatles, it wasn't because
they chose to do so in preference to hearing bop, it was more likely because
they didn't want to hear that readily available jazz in Dixieland and/or
Small Band Swing form.

Which leads back to my original thesis. That in the 1930s, Swing and Sweet
Bands got the dancers from Dixieland which had them in the 1920s. And then
when the Swing and Sweet Bands (dance bands) broke up, and small band swing
and  Dixieland were played for "listening" only, after WW2, the dancers went
to C&W  Elvis, etc.

Think back. What did you see on the very popular music/dance show, American
Bandstand on TV back then? From about 1956, kids that had been dancing to
swing, now dancing to R & R, which was simply the Blues early on. Dancing
had always been the key to popular music whether it was jazz or no. And
Dixieland and Small Band Swing, the two most popular jazz forms, as well as
Bop, a much less popular jazz form were not being played for dancing in most
venues. (Save perhaps Dixieland as played by Lester Lanin and other Society
Bands for the moneyed crowd)

Cheers,
Steve Barbone