[Dixielandjazz] My takeaway on Latin Influences on early jazz

[Charles Suhor]

After listening to YouTube materials in line with the many of the great suggestions and previewing the books named, my tentative takeaway from this strand is that African music influenced other musics in the New World--but the influences were parallel developments, without strong cross-national communication communication during the pre-jazz and early jazz years…. Brazilian and Carribean musics seemed to be the strongest...I heard some very energetic tangos from Latin countries, revising my view of the repetitive nature of the beat, but in N.O., only the bare bones versions showed up in jazz and popular bands.

There were numerous individual songs that crossed over in U.S. popular music all along, but the complex rhythms weren’t absorbed into the mainstream until modern jazz in the late forties. Finally, it seems that jazz was taken up by performers in Latin American countries more wholeheartedly than other way around. Today, some of the most interesting and rhythmically challenging jazz is is coming from Latin bands. If you have a Latin Jazz channel on your TV or radio, tune them in for great percussion and fine solo work.

Re the claim for Scottish drum rhythm as an influence, a friend of mine sent a tape several years ago of a great bagpipe and percussion ensemble in Chicago, and the rhythms were impressive. Accented eighth or sixteenth notes defined a different “1” that the bagpipes picked up at the brisker pace. But I haven’t heard any convincing evidence that the Scottish music was abundantly present in N.O,. or other early jazz sites. The presence of African drumming in the city is the well documented, and the abundant accents and often elusive and changing “1” are the best candidates for the syncopations that came to animate instrumental ragtime jazz phrasing. Also, the interplay of rhythmic sounds in African drumming (which I’ve studied, but can’t play!) inhabited the sonic variety of drummers like Baby Dodds, Tony Spargo, and Zutty Singleton.

Ask me, “Where y’at?” and I say I’m still learning, but this is where I’m at now, cuz.

Charlie


> On Nov 4, 2015, at 4:47 PM, harold zislin <harold5 at optonline.net> wrote:
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> Pixinguinha didn't sing, but there are singers on some tracks. He played tenor and flute and composed a lot of tunes that became standards in Brazil. He recorded from the 20s until his death which was in the 70s (I think). I have several cds all of which I acquired in the past 8 or 9 years. I think there are some things on You Tube and Amazon mp3. The 20s stuff sounds the closest to early jazz as we know it. The excellent Brazilian saxophonist Paulo Maura recorded an album of Pixinguinha's tunes (titled  Pixnguinha ) in the  90s or early part of this century that is currently available on Amazon in Mp3. Probably the cd is available also.
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