[Dixielandjazz] Was Jazz ever popular music?

Thu Jan 11 17:28:39 PST 2007

  As  one who grew up in the era  of the Big Bands and the Sweet bands, I recall a definite difference during the late 30s. there were a few who spent most of the time dancing to Swing. I for one, and many who were doing the vertical motion with a horizontal desire. Not to say I didn't, but I enjoyed the faster steps and the opportunity to "Show Off".

  Of course being somewhat of a loner in many respects, listening to late 20s and early 30s records  had a definite influence on my outlook. There was a lot of sentmental songs and many of the war songs were of a gentler nature. Yet if you look at many of the clips from Stage Door Canteen, USO and other service related clubs, there is mainly swing dancing. Mostly New York Style. 

  My Father was very biased. He did not permit any "N" music in the house. Most of my listening was in a schoolmates home where all the Bands could be heard or on the crystal set radio tuned to a local radio station that played mostly swing and early Jazz.

  At th close of WW II, most of us wanted to get back to what we were doing before going to war. Many wanted to get an education, thanks GI Bill, many wanted to marry, raise a family or find a job and continue with their family. Disposable income was not readily available to many and the cabaret tax was still in effect. Making an evening out, an event.Single people with no immediate resposibilities were able to inhabit many of the clubs that were open, ie The DawnClub, for me. Also several "Black" clubs for early R&B..

  I blame my generation for the generation that followed with large amounts of disposable money to cater to their interest in the "New" music, which was not considered jazz. You Musos who have continued to provide a diminishing group and possibly a new and younger group with OKOM are to be congratulated for the effort.      

  The bop era which came about around the end of WW II drove me away from the big bads which were sorta going away. Technically for a musician, all the top performers were excellent and I feel that a lot of so called fans were driven by Hype. High speed fingering, squeezing out the most from the horn although impossible for some was considered JAZZ.

  The Mickey bands and Hokum bands of the late 20s/early 30s were dance bands and continued into the early 40s. You used to be able to go into a record  store and listen to a 78 in a closed booth. sometimes it was necessary for the owner to stop the dancing outside the booth. What memories.

  Listening to records made in the late 1800/early 1900s and following that through to the Jazz era (1920s) there was a definite progression, string instruments disappeared except for some orchestras. then the horns, brass, slowly went away and the sax became the axe, followed by the driving guitars and now with rap, the monotone driving bass. 

  Yes,  there is progression, all in the name of Jazz. 

  Now if you can get me off of Youtube, I can get some serious work done.  

  Slainte

  Ye Olde Mouldy Fygge

  Ed Coltrin

"Larry Walton Entertainment - St. Louis" <larrys.bands at charter.net> wrote:
  Rocky - As far as I can see nothing completely killed jazz because obviously 
we still have it around in all it's forms but the listening public has 
developed an ever changing and at a faster and faster paced taste for more 
and different things. In the 20's things went fairly slow and by ww2, radio 
and more availability of recordings sped things up a bunch. Enter a more 
affluent teen age group. The changes took place even faster.

things are not necessarily moving faster today the splinters of 
each style are proliferating so fast that most people can't even keep up 
with the names of them. I think maybe the line was drawn when people 
stopped naming dances in the 60's and 70's.

A case in point. Early rock and roll such as Buddy Holly, Elvis and Bill 
Haley bears almost no resemblance to today's rock except we still call it 
rock. I think early rock is alive and well we just call it Country and 
Western.

Getting people out of their homes and away from TV is the hope of a large 
segment of the entertainment industry today. Did TV kill the movies? 
Absolutely not but there aren't many theaters either. Why go to the show 
when you can see it on TV for free (??) Why should you go to a venue to 
hear a band when you can have them at their very best for the price of a CD. 
You can also turn them off too if you only want to hear one track then 
listen to another. I can change tracks with just a touch on my IPOD so I 
can channel surf even there. It's a far cry to when you sat and listened to 
a band for several hours. I hate to say it but I don't want to listen to 
anything for more than an hour or so.

TV stations and some cable channels are in trouble because someone invented 
the clicker. The American public has a collective case of ADHD. They 
demand ever faster, funnier, bloodier, newer, cheaper and I might add more 
potty mouthed and vulgar entertainment. Sounds a lot like the new music 
too.
Larry
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Rocky Ball" 
To: "Charles Suhor" 
Cc: "jazz" 
Sent: Thursday, January 11, 2007 4:14 PM
Subject: Re: [Dixielandjazz] Was Jazz ever popular music?

>
> Maybe I'm disagreeing with you, maybe not...
>
> BUT
>
> ...the PBS Ken Burns' JAZZ series clearly notes that before the 1929
> Stock Market crash JAZZ accounted for 70% of the profits of all
> American Record Companies! I remember reading in one of the Louis
> Armstrong biographies that Louis' record sales (actual platters, not
> money!) were over a million and that was primarily sold through
> grocery stores at a nickel a disk... all in the 20s and 30s. Burns
> makes it clear in his research (and I have read it independently in
> many places before and since JAZZ) that early Jazz (ESPECIALLY before
> the Depression) WAS THE POP MUSIC (most popular music) of the day.
> The country was in the infancy of disposable income in the 1920s (at
> least until the Depression sidetracked that for 20 years) and
> American YOUTH were leading the way in an unprecedented surge of self-
> indulgence. Of course it would take another cycle of that in the
> 1950s for youth and their disposable income to usher in the
> popularity of Rock n' Roll.
>
> To me the evidence is clear that early JAZZ hit the country in 1926
> the same way that early ROCK N ROLL did in 1956 and habits, social
> mores and the music business were forever changed by it. Was Jazz
> ever POPULAR MUSIC? YES! It was THE popular music of its day and the
> repercussions of its innovations continued through the more
> commercial swing era, Rock N Roll era and into popular music today.
> The foreword to the Rolling Stone History of Rock N Roll cites Louis
> Armstrong as the most influential musician that made Rock N Roll
> possible! Ken Burns (and his celebrity contributors) affirm this
> throughout the 10 part JAZZ series.
>
> ~Rocky Ball
> Atlanta
>
>> On Jan 11, 2007, at 5:49 AM, pat ladd wrote:
>>
>>> After WWII the public didn't want the fast pace of
>>> the swing bands that had dominated for a decade but something to
>>> relax
>>> by, romantic stuff.>>
>>>
>>> Not sure about the `fast pace` Charlie. A lot of the WW2 swing Bands
>>> tunes were sentimental ballads. Thousands of people weere away from
>>> loved ones. There was a focus on a `great day` when the war would end
>>> and everyone could return home. Sure there were bands producing
>>> fireworks but Moonlight Serenade was the top tune. Blue birds over
>>> the
>>> White cliffs, Silver Wings in the Moonlight and so on made up a major
>>> proportion of a bands pad.
>>>
>>> Cheers
>>>
>>> Past
>>>
>>
>> You're totally right of course, Pat. And it was the dreamy sweet stuff
>> of the swing bands that people wanted to continue after the war, not
>> the hot swing, so the vocalists held sway.
>>
>> Which raises another point. It's been said that the Swing Era of about
>> 1935-45 was the main one in which jazz was THE popular music. Very
>> true
>> when we think only of the hot big band stuff by Basie, Goodman, Shaw,
>> Duke, Woody, etc.. But sooo much of the sweet material bears so
>> little
>> resemblance to jazz that you can almost call it anti-jazz. A stretch,
>> but not by much when you listen to some of the innumerable icky
>> ballads
>> in the books of lesser and even better swing bands. It served a social
>> function both during and after the war, but it's ever farther from
>> jazz
>> than the post-ragtime/pre-Mickey dance bands of the 20's and
>> before. At
>> least, the latter had a kick to them.
>>
>> Charlie
>>
>>
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