A. The Music Dixieland developed in the early 20th century (1900 – 1928);1 its four main influences were ragtime, military brass bands, the blues, and gospel music. 1. The usual instrumentation of a Dixieland band was (and still is) trumpet (or cornet), clarinet, trombone, piano, string bass (or tuba), drums, and banjo (or guitar). 2. The primary feature of Dixieland jazz is “collective improvisation,” that is, rather than each musician taking a solo in turn (as in most styles of jazz today), Dixieland jazz musicians all improvise at the same time. Each instrument has its own specific role: trumpet or cornet: plays the melody (jazzed up) clarinet: adds to (embellishes) the melody c. trombone: usually embellishes the bass line but sometimes plays the melody; plays “afterbeats” (adding to the rhythm) and sound effects such as “smears” and “slides” piano and banjo (or guitar): play chords string bass or tuba: plays the bass line drums: keeps the beat steady and swinging 4.

Dixieland bands (excluding piano and using tuba rather than string bass) were originally small marching bands. 5. Besides playing for dances and parties, in the early 1900s Dixieland bands would also play for funerals (marching along with the procession) in celebration of the life of the departed. There were few long solos in Dixieland jazz until the appearance of trumpeter Louis Armstrong . a. Louis Armstrong was the first great jazz soloist (improviser) and one of the most important figures in jazz history. There are those who say that without Louis Armstrong, there would be no jazz today. Almost all early Dixieland jazz musicians were African American. a. Interestingly, the very first jazz record was made by an all white group known as the Original Dixieland Jass Band (this group spelled jazz "jass"). It was entitled "Livery Stable Blues” and was recorded in 1917. c. Most early jazz recordings were made on brittle hard plastic (shellac) records called 78s ; the number 78 refered to the number of revolutions per miniute (RPM) that the record would make when played on a record player of the day.

The collective improvisation of Dixieland jazz represented, in part, African Americans' newfound freedom. a. Although hardly experiencing civil rights, African Americans were no longer slaves and celebrated their newfound freedom through jazz improvisation, playing whatever they wanted; they were not "restricted" to notes written on a page, but instead could play whatever they "heard" in their hearts and minds (the music was not read, it was played "by ear"). Freedom was and continues to be an integral issue regarding all styles of jazz. 2. Early jazz made its way from New Orleans, to Chicago, to New York, to the rest of the country. 3. Dixieland was the musical backdrop of city life during the Roaring Twenties (AKA the Jazz Age) and the early years of the Harlem Renaissance . Jelly Roll Morton Biography at Black History Now - Black Heritage Commemorative Society Jul 25th, 2011 | By BHS | Category: Arts & Entertainment 1890-1941 Jelly Roll Morton brewed a gumbo of musical styles including New Orleans traditional, ragtime, blues, minstrel shows, hymns, spirituals, and classical genres to help create jazz.

He was a prolific composer and one of the first to capitalize on the growing market for sheet music, and to master the art of creating music for recordings. Started in Storyville Morton was born Ferdinand LaMothe to a Creole family in New Orleans in 1890. His father was an amateur trombone player who abandoned the family, whereupon his mother remarried. As Creoles, combining elements of European and African American culture, the family was well educated in the arts. Morton showed an early interest in music and played several instruments before beginning piano lessons. By 1902, he was performing at the bordellos of the Storyville district, perfecting his ability to play in any style. From French Quadrilles and other dance forms, to ragtime and light opera, he was already developing a broad repertoire while also carrying a pistol and learning to drink whiskey. Morton’s mother died when he was 14 years old. He took the name of his stepfather, Mouton, which became anglicized to Morton, and went to live with his strict great-grandmother. When she discovered his occupation, she disowned him. Morton went to Biloxi where his godmother lived and resumed work there.

Biloxi proved to be the first stop on what would become a 15-year odyssey throughout the south and beyond, hustling, card-sharping, and pool-sharking, gathering musical ideas, playing piano, and soon composing. “New Orleans Blues” and “Jelly Roll Blues” were written in about 1905, “King Porter Stomp” in 1906, and “Georgia Swing” in 1907. An uneventful stay in Chicago led to Houston and then California and Tijuana, where he absorbed Latino idioms. Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, Memphis, St. Louis, Kansas City, and even New York were part of his itinerary. In 1917, Morton set up shop in Los Angeles, running hotels and nightclubs with a woman named Anita Gonzalez. By some accounts, she bought him the diamond stud he sported in one of his front teeth, one of several Morton wore.

He combined self-confidence with flair and braggadocio, a dandy whose business cards read “Creator of Jazz and Swing.” Chicago Bound In a sense, Morton was right; as one writer said, “He’d been ahead of his time for a long time before times caught up to him.” Arriving in Chicago in 1922, Morton found a fast-growing sheet music publishing business eager for new compositions, and a new recording industry selling “race music” to African American audiences. He convinced Walter Melrose of Melrose Publishing to take him on after demonstrating his encyclopedic knowledge of music on the piano and an inventory of hundreds of songs. Melrose in turn arranged for the Victor Recording Company to record Morton’s tunes. Within two years, Melrose had become a major publisher largely due to Morton’s popularity, during which time his recorded output was prolific. Morton recorded solo piano, duets with King Oliver, a trio with a clarinet, and with a white group called the New Orleans Rhythm Kings. But his greatest success would be for Victor in 1926-1927 with the aptly named Jelly Roll Morton and his Red Hot Peppers.

Formed largely of transplanted New Orleans jazz men who grasped the fundamentals of Morton’s music, the group achieved brilliance with a new style developed by Morton. He composed tunes for the three-minute length of a 78 rpm side, rehearsed the band in the composed ensemble sections, and then added solo improvisation to the mix. It was the beginning of the big band jazz sound, which Duke Ellington and others were developing at roughly the same time. The initial Victor session included “Black Bottom Stomp,” “The Chant,” and “Smokehouse Blues.” One week later, “Dead Man’s Blues,” “Steamboat Stomp,” and “Sidewalk Blues” were added, with subsequent sessions in 1926 and 1927. That year, Morton met a dancer, Mabel Bertrand, who became his common-law wife. She moved with him to New York City in 1928 where he recorded over 50 songs for Victor over the next three years with a reformulated Red Hot Peppers. But the New York band was not quite up to standard, and circumstances were changing. Duke Ellington and others were dominant, with shifting audience tastes and styles.

The Great Depression hurt the recording industry. Morton’s fortunes declined; he learned that Melrose had cheated him out of royalties. When Victor failed to renew his contract in 1930, he was soon impoverished and invisible, and in 1935, moved to Washington, D.C. Ironically, Morton’s music was still played; Benny Goodman enjoyed a huge hit with his “King Porter Stomp,” credited with launching the swing era. Morton wound up at a seedy D.C. club where he played piano and tended bar. He was found in 1938 by ethnomusicologist Alan Lomax who recorded eight hours of Morton’s oral history and piano for the Library of Congress. A reinvigorated Morton returned to New York in 1939, intent on recapturing his earnings and reputation, but he failed in both quests. Morton was perceived as a throwback to an outmoded style and the salacious origins of jazz. Even his nickname Jelly Roll had such connotations. Sadly, a New Orleans revival was getting underway that would have opened opportunities, but in 1939, he had what was probably a heart attack with arteriosclerosis.

Embittered, Morton recorded several final sides in late 1939 and early 1940. That year, he went to Los Angeles, hoping to start a new band, but became too sick to play. He died in 1941. Morton’s work was posthumously featured in two Broadway shows and many of his songs remain classics today. His role in developing jazz cannot be overestimated. The Library of Congress recordings reveal the authenticity of many of his claims, the virtuosity of his playing technique, and the technical depth and seemingly limitless span of his musicological knowledge. That he was able to synthesize such experience into a form that continues to live, grow, and inspire is his greatest legacy. Ferdinand "Jelly Roll" Morton @ Music Rising ~ The Musical Cultures of the Gulf South Photos About Related Tulane Courses A nimble pianist, skilled composer and arranger, an evocative soulful singer and a classic New Orleans flamboyant character – Jelly Roll Morton embodied all these estimable traits.

Morton (1885 – 1941) was a second-generation New Orleans jazz musician, and the genre’s first important composer/arranger, as heard on such intricate, infectious songs as “Black Bottom Stomp.” Despite his seminal contributions, Morton enjoyed little of the commercial success he deserved because of the dubious machinations of the recording and music publishing industries. Morton’s origins are shrouded in mystery. His real first name was Ferdinand – the moniker, Jelly Roll, was a common sexual term in the early twentieth century – and his actual last name is believed to have been either LaMothe, Lemott, or LaMenthe; Morton was an Anglicized derivative. In varying accounts, his year of birth is listed as 1885 or 1890. There is no debate that Morton’s New Orleans Creole family opposed his musical aspirations.

In an epic 1938 interview with Alan Lomax (Library of Congress), Morton explained, “We always had musicians in the family, but they played for their own pleasure and would not accept it seriously, and always considered a musician (with the exception of those who would appear at the French Opera House, which was always supported with their patronage) a scalawag, lazy, and trying to duck work.” Even in the face of such disapproval, Morton was drawn to the New Orleans neighborhood known as Storyville where gambling houses and brothels offered work for musicians who were developing the genre that came to be known as jazz. Morton roamed the South as a bandleader and solo performer, while supplementing his income as a pool hustler and a card shark. His original signature songs from this era include “The Animule Dance, “King Porter Stomp” and “Original Jelly Roll Blues.” Morton did not single-handedly “invent” jazz, as he frequently claimed; no musical genre can be created by one artist alone nor can it suddenly emerge from a single location, as is often alleged to have happened with New Orleans jazz.

Nonetheless, Morton can justly be considered a key-defining figure in jazz’s early evolution. His diverse oeuvre combined elements of ragtime, a wide range of popular songs, basic blues, and classical music, including opera. Morton did not perceive jazz as a radical departure from the mainstream music of his day, instead he viewed it in terms of a sensibility, “�a style that can be applied to any type of music” that demanded “plenty of finger work in the groove ability, great improvisations, accurate, exciting tempos with a kick.” When Alan Lomax aptly noted that Morton’s “epic self-praise antagonized even his admirers,” he was referring to such overblown statements as, “It was I, that’s the originator of jazz� It was in the year of 1902 that I conceived the idea� It was a style which I had that grabbed the world by the throat with a strangle hold.” Ironically, the seamy side of the music industry would put a stranglehold on Morton’s career. Morton’s synthesis of African/African-American ideas and European concepts – as exemplified by his blending blues and classical-music elements – were the pillars of his music.

He also drew on and introduced to the nascent jazz genre a variety of Afro-Cuban rhythms, including the tresillo, and the habanera that he collectively termed “the Spanish tinge” – as heard on such compositions as “New Orleans Blues” and “The Crave.” This musical mélange reinforces the notion of South Louisiana as the northern frontier of Caribbean culture. Morton picked it up via both the popular written work of… A nimble pianist, skilled composer and arranger, an evocative soulful singer and a classic New Orleans flamboyant character – Jelly Roll Morton embodied all these estimable traits. Morton (1885 – 1941) was a second-generation New Orleans jazz musician, and the genre’s first important composer/arranger, as heard on such intricate, infectious songs as “Black Bottom Stomp.” Despite his seminal contributions, Morton enjoyed little of the commercial success he deserved because of the dubious machinations of the recording and music publishing industries. Morton’s origins are shrouded in mystery.

His real first name was Ferdinand – the moniker, Jelly Roll, was a common sexual term in the early twentieth century – and his actual last name is believed to have been either LaMothe, Lemott, or LaMenthe; Morton was an Anglicized derivative. In varying accounts, his year of birth is listed as 1885 or 1890. There is no debate that Morton’s New Orleans Creole family opposed his musical aspirations. In an epic 1938 interview with Alan Lomax (Library of Congress), Morton explained, “We always had musicians in the family, but they played for their own pleasure and would not accept it seriously, and always considered a musician (with the exception of those who would appear at the French Opera House, which was always supported with their patronage) a scalawag, lazy, and trying to duck work.” Even in the face of such disapproval, Morton was drawn to the New Orleans neighborhood known as Storyville where gambling houses and brothels offered work for musicians who were developing the genre that came to be known as jazz.

Morton roamed the South as a bandleader and solo performer, while supplementing his income as a pool hustler and a card shark. His original signature songs from this era include “The Animule Dance, “King Porter Stomp” and “Original Jelly Roll Blues.” Morton did not single-handedly “invent” jazz, as he frequently claimed; no musical genre can be created by one artist alone nor can it suddenly emerge from a single location, as is often alleged to have happened with New Orleans jazz. Nonetheless, Morton can justly be considered a key-defining figure in jazz’s early evolution. His diverse oeuvre combined elements of ragtime, a wide range of popular songs, basic blues, and classical music, including opera.

Morton did not perceive jazz as a radical departure from the mainstream music of his day, instead he viewed it in terms of a sensibility, “�a style that can be applied to any type of music” that demanded “plenty of finger work in the groove ability, great improvisations, accurate, exciting tempos with a kick.” When Alan Lomax aptly noted that Morton’s “epic self-praise antagonized even his admirers,” he was referring to such overblown statements as, “It was I, that’s the originator of jazz� It was in the year of 1902 that I conceived the idea� It was a style which I had that grabbed the world by the throat with a strangle hold.” Ironically, the seamy side of the music industry would put a stranglehold on Morton’s career. Morton’s synthesis of African/African-American ideas and European concepts – as exemplified by his blending blues and classical-music elements – were the pillars of his music.

He also drew on and introduced to the nascent jazz genre a variety of Afro-Cuban rhythms, including the tresillo, and the habanera that he collectively termed “the Spanish tinge” – as heard on such compositions as “New Orleans Blues” and “The Crave.” This musical mélange reinforces the notion of South Louisiana as the northern frontier of Caribbean culture. Morton picked it up via both the popular written work of classical-music idol Louis Moreau Gottschalk and through the African-rooted street music that has flourished in New Orleans since the city’s inception and, in different forms, remains present today. In addition, the “Spanish tinge” and related forms of syncopation were and are vital elements in the New Orleans rhythms collectively known as “second-line” beats. In this sense, Morton’s work was an precursor to that of such mid-century blues and R&B artists as Professor Longhair. These attributes – combined with Morton’s dexterous playing and his ambitious-yet- fully realized composing/arranging – can be clearly heard on the recordings made from 1926 to 1930 with his Red Hot Peppers.

This material, plus some player-piano rolls from a few years earlier, are the cornerstone of Morton’s legacy. By the 1930s, his innovations went out of vogue as part of a broader waning interest in traditional New Orleans jazz. In addition to this career slump, Morton did not secure copyrights on all his original works. As a result, he did not receive adequate payment and recognition when other artists recorded and performed his material, in some instances he received nothing at all. In dire financial straits, failing health and somewhat embittered, Morton moved to Washington, D. C. in 1938. His prospects did not improve there, although the world at-large benefitted when Alan Lomax conducted an in-depth interview with him for the Library of Congress. The eight-plus hours that Lomax recorded represent a rich historical document and a landmark development in academia’s recognition of oral history as a legitimate field of study. Morton was never able to revive his career, dying on July 10, 1941, shortly before a revival of New Orleans jazz in which he surely would have been lionized.

In 2013, Morton is firmly ensconced in the pantheon of both all-time jazz greats and major New Orleans musicians. ———— Ben Sandmel is a New Orleans-based journalist, folklorist, drummer, and producer. Sandmel is the author of Ernie K-Doe: The R&B Emperor of New Orleans and Zydeco!, a collaborative book with photographer Rick Olivier. Sandmel has produced and played on albums including the Grammy-nominated “Deep Water” by the Cajun/country band The Hackberry Ramblers.

Suggested reading: Doctor Jazz, essay by John Szwed that accompanies Jelly Roll Morton: The Complete Library of Congress Recordings, Rounder Records 11661-1888 Focusing on music during the colonial and antebellum periods, we might expect that the city was most associated with the famed… 6 Music and Memory In the final unit of the course, we’ll revisit some scholarship on the situation of African Americans in the decades just… 8 Piano Professors Jelly Roll Morton (c.1890–1941) Musical notes for school children Jelly Roll Morton (c.1890–1941) Born: Possibly 20th October 1890, or 20th October 1885, or 20th September 1885…! In any case, he was born in New Orleans, Louisiana, USA. Jelly Roll Morton’s grave in Los Angeles Died: 10th July 1941 in Los Angeles, California, USA. Buried: King Porter Stomp. ( See below for a video.) Wolverine Blues.

Jelly Roll Morton & His Red Hot Peppers (1926–1928). Some great collections: Jelly Roll Morton Complete Recorded Works 1926-1930. Jelly Roll Morton Centennial: His Complete Victor Recording (1926–1939). The Complete Library of Congress Recordings (1938). Plus many more! Some interesting facts: He was one of the first great jazz artists! In fact, he wrote, “I myself, happened to be the creator of jazz in 1902.” This probably isn’t completely true (and certainly isn’t if he was born in 1890!). He did like showing off! He was a true composer . Many jazz artists do not actually write much music themselves. Jelly Roll Morton was different. He wrote loads of music himself! He was a piano player and led small bands. He was one of the great jazz artists of the 1920s and played in the New Orleans style (which is where he came from). His recordings with the Red Hot Peppers are some of the best jazz recordings of the 1920s. He was a bit of a rascal! He liked gambling.

He also liked hanging around places and people that weren’t very respectable. When he first started playing jazz he was living with his great-grandmother. She was very religious. When she found out that Jelly Roll Morton was playing jazz, she threw him out of her house! She said he had disgraced the family! He was called Ferdinand Joseph LaMothe when he was born, but changed his name later on. He was what is known as a ‘Creole’—a descendant of the French who once lived in New Orleans and Black Americans. His style of music went out of fashion when &#8216swing’ became popular in the 1930s. He found it hard to make money after that. Not only that, but one of the first swing artists, Benny Goodman became famous partly from a recording of Jelly Roll Morton’s ‘King Porter Stomp’! Jelly Roll Morton got no money from this whatsoever!! He died poor and almost unknown :-(. Here is a video of Jelly Roll Morton and his band playing Courthouse Bump. Jelly Roll Morton and his band playing ‘Courthouse Bump’ And here is a video of someone else playing Jelly Roll Morton’s King Porter Stomp.

‘King Porter Stomp’ by Jelly Roll Morton 'King Porter Stomp' : NPR 'King Porter Stomp' Embed Embed Embed Embed Recordings Used: LOC recording of Alan Lomax interviewing KPS - JRM in 1938 KPS - by JRM in 1923 at Starr Paino Company KPS - Benny Goodman band KPS - Gil Evans and Cannonball Adderly (1955) KPS - JRM in 1941 Ferdinand Joseph La Menthe, better known as Jelly Roll Morton. Hulton Archive/Getty Images hide caption toggle caption Ferdinand Joseph La Menthe, better known as Jelly Roll Morton. Hulton Archive/Getty Images The flamboyant pianist and composer Jelly Roll Morton notably performed his "King Porter Stomp" in 1923 at the Star Piano Company in Richmond, Indiana. Morton titled the song in honor of an admirer of his music, a piano-playing gentleman from Florida named Porter King. It was written around 1905 during Jelly Roll's tenure as a teen-age piano professor in the clubs and brothels of Storyville, the legal red-light district in his native New Orleans.

The city's wide range of cultural influences are all there in this composition—African, Mediterranean, Caribbean, and American, simmerings of blues, ragtime, classical, parlor and marching band music. Morton was born Ferdinand Lamothe in 1890, the son of a bricklayer. He was raised by his grandmother, but he left home at an early age and went off on his own, irresistibly drawn to bawdy houses and playing music. Morton's life was a topsy-turvy affair of recognition and obscurity, riches and poverty, first-class travel and freight hopping that took him to nearly every major city with a vibrant club life. An accomplished pool shark, Jelly Roll was known for flashy suits and hats, bandanas and spats. He sported a diamond in his toothy smile and had the smirking improvisatory wit of a master raconteur. In 1938, in what would be the twilight of his career, Jelly Roll Morton sat down at the piano and vamped, while he talked with Library of Congress folklorist Alan Lomax.

Article continues after sponsorship Lomax had found Morton running the Jungle Inn, a ramshackle jazz club on nearby U Street in Washington, DC. Morton began his now legendary narrative talking about his French Creole ancestors. "As I can understand, my folks were in the city of New Orleans long before the Louisiana Purchase, and all my folks came from France," Jelly Roll Morton said in the interview. "They just crossed the world. I remember so far back as my great grandmother and great grandfather. My great grandfather's name was Emile Peche. That's a French name. And my grandmother was Meme Peche. It seems to be all French. And as long as I can remember those folks, they never was able to speak a word in American or English." When he talked with Alan Lomax, Jelly Roll elaborated on the differences between his people, the educated French Catholic Creoles descended from antebellum free people, and the English-speaking African-Americans they often disdain socially, but whose musical prowess they emulated in creating a new sound for the 20th century: jazz. Lomax was especially interested in how jazz was constructed, and Morton expounded. "My theory is to never discard the melody.

Always have the melody going some kind of a way. And, of course, your background would always be with perfect harmony with what is known today as riffs, meaning figures, musically speaking as figures. That would be a riff against a melody. In essence, we'd say the melody was, that's what's called a riff." Jelly Roll was a commanding pianist and an endearing braggart who claimed to have single-handedly created jazz. And most jazz historians would agree. Dan Morgenstern, director of the Institute of Jazz Studies at Rutgers University, says that if Jelly Roll Morton was not the actual inventor of jazz, he was its first great composer and master architect. "When he talked about music, he said you don't start out with a full glass of water; you start out with half a glass, and then you gradually fill it up. He knew how to build to a climax. And that's what "King Porter Stomp" does so very well. At the climax, he actually starts building what we now call riffs, and it swings like the dickens, you know?

You have to stomp your feet to that." Perhaps because Morton had viewed the piano less as a solo instrument and more like a whole orchestra, "King Porter Stomp" was adapted and performed by many full bands in the 1920s. But it was Fletcher Henderson's 1928 version that put it indelibly on the map. With the onset of the Depression, Henderson's band fell on hard times, and he turned his talents toward arranging. When Henderson was hired by a young Benny Goodman to arrange "King Porter Stomp" for his touring big band, a new era in jazz was born. Throughout the '30s and into the war years, big band versions of "King Porter Stomp" came to define the new propulsive, streamlined style called swing. The tune was performed by black bands and white bands alike, from Cab Calloway and Count Basie to Glenn Miller and Tommy Dorsey. But by the late '30s, Morton was passe, or even unknown, to many of the big bands and their new young audiences.

Unfortunately, when he had needed money, Morton had sold the publishing rights to many of his works, including "King Porter Stomp." And in his 1938 recordings for the Library of Congress, Morton pointed out that "King Porter Stomp" was not just a part of nearly every big band's repertoire. It also provided the foundation, in its memorable riffs, for many other hits." "Now this tune become to be the outstanding favorite of every great, hot band throughout the world that had the accomplishments and qualifications of playing it. And until today, this tune has been the cause of many great bands to come to fame. It has caused the outstanding tunes today to use the backgrounds that belong to "King Porter" in order to make great tunes of themselves." "Jelly had so many people to borrow, take, steal a lot of his musical ideas and not give him credit," says Dr. Michael White, a jazz clarinetist from New Orleans who has long studied and played the music of Jelly Roll Morton. "He was credited, of course, for 'King Porter Stomp,' but because of his character and personality, he had no bones about letting everybody know that this was his music and that all of it was his music.

So I think he was proud, but at the same time, I think he felt like he was being cheated because he didn't reap as much of the financial benefits of the music. And then a lot of musicians did try to discredit him because he, you know, bragged so much about his playing and about his having created jazz and how everyone was stealing his music. But in truth, they were." A cool post-bebop version of "King Porter Stomp" was made by the Gil Evans orchestra with Cannonball Adderley in 1958. All kinds of interpretations have been recorded over the decades: avant-garde, jazz and pop. Jelly Roll himself recorded a couple of hot retakes, including this one from 1939. He was encouraged by the impact of the Library of Congress sessions and by the fact that traditional jazz was undergoing a revival. Morton was poised to regain the fame that he had had in the 1920s when he and his band, The Red Hot Peppers, were taking New Orleans-based ensemble jazz to a national audience.

But in July, 1941, before he was able to recapture that fame, Jelly Roll Morton passed away from a combination of asthma and heart failure. He was 50 years old. Jelly Roll Morton has a new popularity today. His ensemble music is played from New York City's Lincoln Center to New Orleans' French Quarter. His autobiography, "Mr. Jelly Roll," is now a classic in oral history. And the "King Porter Stomp" with Morton, the inventor of jazz at the piano, remains a fundamental element in the soundscape of the 20th century. Chapter 4: New Orleans | Jazz: W. W. Norton StudySpace Jazz: W. W. Norton StudySpace New Orleans Chapter Outline While the usual claim for New Orleans as the unique "birthplace" of jazz may be somewhat exaggerated, its distinctive cultural climate provides a microcosm for the social forces that created jazz-in particular, tensions within the nominally black community between "Creoles of color" and lower-class black populations, and the interactions between these musicians and "white" musicians of many ethnic backgrounds.

The nascent New Orleans jazz style is exemplified by the music of cornetist Buddy Bolden, whose work was never recorded. This was a music that simultaneously privileged oral musical techniques of lower-class origin while adapting them to the new demands of professional dance music, thus setting the direction for jazz for decades to come. We outline the basic elements of New Orleans style, discuss the Great Migration and its importance to the development of jazz, and look in detail at the music of the Original Dixieland Jazz Band, Jelly Roll Morton, Joe "King" Oliver, and Sidney Bechet. New Orleans Jazz comes from a mixture of African, European, and Caribbean experiences, but it started out as a local musical practice in New Orleans until 1917, when the rest of the country started to hear about it. New Orleans jazz transformed marching band and dance music into an improvised, playful-voiced, cyclic, polyphonic music over a steady dance beat. The demographics of New Orleans also contributed to the creation of jazz because it was a site characterized by the mingling of newly urbanized blacks with Europeanized Creoles.

New Orleans musicians eventually moved to other parts of the United States, such as Chicago, New York and California, as part of the Great Migration. At the same time, the burgeoning record industry made New Orleans jazz available in diverse geographical and sociocultural contexts. Early New Orleans New Orleans is a port city. It became a nineteenth-century commercial center focusing on the slave trade on the one hand, with a distinct, more relaxed Caribbean culture on the other. A brief history: 1718: founded by France 1803: reclaimed by the French 1803: almost immediately sold to the United States 1804: Haitian revolution. Many white masters and their slaves fled to New Orleans. New Orleans had French, Spanish, and English speakers and was the largest, most sophisticated city in the South. This included a very active cultural life from the eighteenth century, encompassing opera, Mardi Gras, dances, parades, and fancy balls. Race relations were different from those in other parts of the United States. Unlike Protestant North America, New Orleans was oriented to the Caribbean, and like racial practices there, slaves were allowed to retain much of their culture, including music.

Congo Square By 1817 slaves and free blacks were permitted to dance and play music in a field behind the French Quarter called Congo Square. Whites were shocked to see choirs, drum ensembles, homemade instruments of all kinds, and dances ranging from slapping juba to the slow bamboula. This stopped around 1840. That it lasted this long is important because it gave the tradition an enduring role in New Orleans culture. Creoles of Color North American culture recognized two categories: white and black. Caribbean culture, including New Orleans, recognized a mulatto culture as well. This benefited free blacks with lighter skins. New Orleans mulattos were known as Creoles of Color. Because they were of mixed race, they had privileges and opportunities that blacks did not, including civic power, property ownership, French language skills, Catholic religious practice, decent education, and skilled trades. Creoles lost this status around 1894 with the enactment of Jim Crow laws and U.S. Supreme Court decisions in 1896.

A Meeting of Musical Styles Creoles and Uptown Negroes Creoles tried to remain geographically separate from blacks by keeping to an area of the city east of Canal Street including the French Quarter. Blacks lived "uptown," on the other side of Canal. But Jim Crow laws forced the two traditions to collide. Uneducated "Uptown Negroes" played raucous, beat-based, orally learned, bluesy, improvised music based on rags, folk music, and marches. Creoles saw this as unprofessional, but they started teaching Uptown blacks as well as young Creoles. At first Creoles got the better-paying jobs playing traditional European dances, but blacks offered a new way of playing. Manuel Perez (1878-1946) A Creole trumpeter, he learned the skill of cigar making, studied French at school, studied classical music, and played in various bands, which required reading music and no improvisation. For thirty years he led the Onward Brass Band and other ensembles, playing picnics, riverboats and dancehalls. He influenced many famous New Orleans jazz musicians.

By 1910 he realized that improvisation was becoming more important, so he hired Joe "King" Oliver for that purpose. By 1937 his style of music had lost its popularity, so he went back to cigar making. Buddy Bolden (1877-1931) and the Birth of Jazz Although there are many myths about cornetist Buddy Bolden, it is generally accepted that he was the first important jazz musician, had a large black and Creole following, and represents the triumph of African American culture. 1877: born in New Orleans 1895: started working in parades and other functions 1901-1902: went into music full time 1906: mental breakdown after years of depression and alcoholism; incarcerated in state hospital for the insane. 1931: died in the hospital Bolden's Style Known for loud and great blues playing. Unlike other New Orleans musicians, who were generally known for their musicianship and clarity, Bolden was known for his individual style. Combine this with his brief career, excessive life style, competitive spirit, and charisma, and we have the template for later jazz and popular music stars.

Bolden and Jazz Did Bolden invent jazz? He was known as an innovator of a new way of playing; no precursors or contemporary rivals are mentioned. He could play in every setting at a time when there was a huge demand for a wide range of music. November 1890, New Orleans Mascot, five years before any Bolden performance. Illustration of four musicians (three on brass instruments and one on bass drum) playing from a balcony advertising Robinson's Dime Museum. These are Uptown blacks playing without sheet music and provoking outrage and confusion among whites. Is it jazz? We don't know. But it added to the mix of music for minstrel and medicine shows, spirituals applied to secular music, parades, saloons, and dance halls. These different contexts required different skills, including reading, bluesy expressiveness, and ad-lib playing Bolden could do all of it-"legitimate" and "stink" music- and was well respected in both. He also played pieces that have remained part of the jazz repertory, sentimental pop, and dance music.

He led many bands, with the best known in 1905, consisting of cornet, trombone, two clarinetists, a guitarist, a bassist, and a drummer . Sometimes a second cornet was added, foreshadowing King Oliver's band with Louis Armstrong. New Orleans Style Between the time of Bolden and the first jazz recording in 1917, jazz continued to develop. Photos and interviews give us a picture of this stage. Instrumentation There were two sources. First, brass bands provided the "front line" of cornet or trumpet, trombone, and clarinet, as well as the drum set. Second, the string ensemble (violin, banjo, mandolin, etc.) provided guitar and bass. Ragtime players added piano later. At first, a violin played an unadorned melody against which the cornet "ragged" the melody, but by 1917, the violin had disappeared. Now the clarinet improvised a countermelody around the trumpet line (originally taken from published arrangements), using the underlying harmony. The trombone improvised a line lower than the trumpet and with fewer notes (and originally played cello or baritone horn parts).

It typically uses long glissandos called tailgate trombone. Improvisation By the time New Orleans jazz was first recorded, it had attained its own distinctive style of collective improvisation, with each wind instrument having its own musical space and rhythm: clarinet was the fastest and higher than the cornet; the cornet was in the middle; and trombone was the slowest and below the cornet. Occasionally there were other textures as well. The trio part of a performance often contained block chord texture or a single horn with accompaniment, breaks, and stop-time. The rhythm section played an even four, although this is difficult to hear due to recording technology of the time. Form Mostly the form was the same as ragtime. At the end, the last strain would be repeated many times. A new structure was the twelve-bar blues. This could be repeated indefinitely. Storyville "The District" in New Orleans, where prostitution was legal, lasted until 1917. Bordellos could be mansions or shacks. The purported link between jazz and Storyville is widespread but wrong. At most, there were a few pianists who worked the bordellos.

Many jazz musicians worked in Storyville cabarets, but they also worked in parks, parades, excursions, advertising wagons, and riverboats and for dances throughout the city. But Storyville did play a role. It was a rough area where white values of taste were absent. This made it easier for musicians to develop expressive techniques, slow tempos (for sexy, slow dances), and timbre variation. The Great Migration In the late nineteenth century, slaves started to move into cities like New Orleans. With the onset of World War I, they moved north to places like Chicago and New York. They were socially motivated by their powerlessness, the discriminatory practices of sharecropping, widespread racial segregation touching practically all areas of life in the South, and thousands of lynchings for which nobody was arrested. Economically, the draft during World War I opened up the labor market in northern cities for blacks. Freddie Keppard (1890-1933) Southern entertainers led the charge north. Trumpeter Keppard played all over the United States with his band, the Creole Jazz Band, before 1917. By doing so, he brought New Orleans jazz to the rest of the country.

By the time he recorded in the 1920s, he had lost much of his technique, which, in his heyday, had been compared to Bolden's. He was offered an opportunity to record in 1916 but declined. Original Dixieland Jazz Band (ODJB) The white ODJB came to New York to play at Riesenweber's Restaurant in 1917. They were a sensation. Columbia had them record two pop songs but rejected them as cacophony and refused to release them. Victor signed them to record two pieces, "Livery Stable Blues" and "Dixie Jazz Band One Step," which turned out to be blockbusters. Although previous ragtime records had hinted at some jazz elements, to most listeners, ODJB's music was unprecedented. They were so popular that they brought the word "jazz" into common parlance. Origins Many New Orleans neighborhoods were integrated, and thus white players became familiar with ragtime and jazz in New Orleans and probably influenced black players in terms of repertory, harmony, and instrumental technique. The five-piece format of the ODJB comes from the Keppard band.

There is a significant white tradition centered around "Papa Jack" Lane, who led the Reliance Band. He discouraged improvisation but trained many important white players including members of the ODJB. Influence The ODJB has been accused of hiring mediocre musicians and being too vaudevillian. But they played a spirited, unpretentious music that established many Dixieland standards, broke with ragtime, and by visiting Europe in 1919, made jazz international. They broke up in 1922. "Dixie Jazz Band One-Step" This is a very well organized piece in ragtime form and highly embellished in its presentation. The famous 32-bar trio section is played three times, each one divided into two 16-bar sections with almost the same melody. Each repeat increases the energy level. This number of repetitions and the way they were handled were unprecedented. The song was also very well recorded. Jelly Roll Morton (1890-1941) Jazz history can be seen as a mutually influencing relationship between composers and improvisers, as is the relationship between Creoles and blacks in the creation of jazz.

Morton fits right in as a Creole composer who learned from and worked with black New Orleans musicians. Morton had many jobs and claimed to be the inventor of jazz. He was proud of his French Haitian heritage but Anglicized his name from LaMothe to Morton. His boasting alienated many in the jazz world including Duke Ellington. He may not have invented jazz, but he did propel it forward. He traveled widely, assimilating new musical approaches. He settled in Chicago in 1922 and started recording in 1923 with a white New Orleans band called the New Orleans Rhythm Kings (NORK) for Gennett Records in Richmond, Indiana; this was the first important integrated recording. He introduced some of his originals, including future standards such as "King Porter Stomp." The Red Hot Peppers Morton became a successful songwriter. To help increase interest in his work, Victor started recording his studio band of seven or eight players (The Red Hot Peppers) in 1926, when recording was switching from acoustic to electric recording. For many they represent a perfect balance of improvisation and composition in the New Orleans style.

"Dead Man Blues" A number of blues choruses in collective New Orleans style, this is Morton's take on the New Orleans burial ritual. This is highly organized with even the bass lines written out. There is also an overlay of ragtime structure with various sets of choruses as ragtime strains. "Doctor Jazz" Raucous rendition of a piece by Joe "King" Oliver. Morton uses stop-time, breaks, a long-held note in the second chorus, and his own sophisticated vocal phrasing to heighten the drama. Last Years Morton harnessed the energy of collective improvisation in the face of racial and critical disdain. By 1930, he was considered outdated, but in 1938 he made some very important recorded interviews with Alan Lomax for the Library of Congress (see bibliography and discography in the text). King Oliver (1885-1938) By 1922 jazz musicians had matured, writing many new pieces and demonstrating increased instrumental technique. But jazz had also become associated with gimmickry and comedy. King Oliver resisted this last turn.

In 1905 Oliver started playing cornet in brass bands and saloon groups, before joining trombonist Kid Ory's band in 1917. Oliver was known for his use of various mutes, a practice that was very influential. King Oliver's Creole Jazz Band Oliver organized many different kinds of bands depending on the specific job. In 1918 he moved to Chicago and spent several years on the road until 1922 to play at a high-end, black-owned nightclub, the Lincoln Gardens. His band was made up of New Orleans musicians except for the pianist, Lil Hardin. Oliver had gum disease, which meant he required a second cornetist to spell him off, so he sent for his old student, Louis Armstrong. They were a great success. Black and white musicians came to hear the Uptown style of this band. The band's recordings from this period exhibit a mature New Orleans collective style.

In 1923 they recorded for Gennett in Richmond, Indiana, using stop-time, breaks, and an improvised, polyphonic "first line." "Dippermouth Blues" also includes solos by clarinetist Johnny Dodds and Louis Armstrong and a widely imitated one by King Oliver using mutes. Gennett Records Gennett was owned by a piano-manufacturing company. The studio was made of wood planks with one megaphone that recorded acoustically, so the musicians had to position themselves in the room to create a musical balance. "Snake Rag" As per the title, this has a ragtime structure but also includes bluesy breaks, chromatic melodies (or "snakes"), a repeated trio section (which is used to build excitement), and the signature Armstrong-Oliver "improvised" duo breaks. Sydney Bechet (1897-1959) Clarinetist and soprano saxophonist Bechet may have been the first great jazz soloist and he made the saxophone central to jazz; he also traveled abroad early on spreading the word about this new music and wrote his autobiography.

Born a Creole, he was mostly self-taught but did take some lessons; he ended up playing in many of the important marching bands. In 1916 he started touring, which took him to Chicago in 1919. There he attracted the attention of composer, songwriter, classical violinist, and bandleader Will Marion Cook, who recruited Bechet for his band, the Southern Syncopated Orchestra, for their European tour. There were some important results from this tour: Bechet bought his first soprano saxophone in London. The band inspired the first serious jazz essay, which was penned by conductor Ernest Ansermet and praised Bechet's playing. This tour popularized jazz in Europe, and Bechet decided to stay but was deported. Bechet and Soprano Saxophone In 1921 he returned to New York and joined Duke Ellington. By this time Bechet was thinking of himself as virtuoso soloist, a new category in jazz. He left Ellington and teamed up with New Orleans pianist, composer, song-publisher, and record producer Clarence Williams and recorded with Clarence Williams's Blue Five.

In 1924, the now in-demand Louis Armstrong joined the band, making an even match for Bechet. "Cake Walking Babies (from Home)" A combination of New Orleans style and pop music, records such as these were seen as boosting sheet music sales so vocal choruses were included, here sung by Alberta Hunter. The performance contains bravura performances by Armstrong and Bechet. Last Years In 1925, Bechet returned to Europe with the Revue Negre starring Josephine Baker, which traveled to many major European cities. He returned to New York in the early 1930s to form the New Orleans Feetwarmers with fellow New Orleans musician and trumpeter Tommy Ladnier. He continued to record for many years, including the first piece with rhythm changes ("Shag" 1932) and an early use of overdubbing ("The Sheik of Araby" 1941). He settled in France in 1951, where he was very popular. New Orleans Style Today The New Orleans style is still alive at New Orleans's Preservation Hall bands in New Orleans and in bands all over the world devoted to Dixieland jazz.

Usually played by amateurs, has kept most of its style characteristics. Jelly Roll Morton | Biography & History | AllMusic google+ Artist Biography by Scott Yanow One of the very first giants of jazz, Jelly Roll Morton did himself a lot of harm posthumously by exaggerating his worth, claiming to have invented jazz in 1902. Morton 's accomplishments as an early innovator are so vast that he did not really need to stretch the truth. Morton was jazz's first great composer, writing such songs as "King Porter Stomp," "Grandpa's Spells," "Wolverine Blues," "The Pearls," "Mr. Jelly Roll," "Shreveport Stomp," "Milenburg Joys," "Black Bottom Stomp," "The Chant," "Original Jelly Roll Blues," "Doctor Jazz," "Wild Man Blues," "Winin' Boy Blues," "I Thought I Heard Buddy Bolden Say," "Don't You Leave Me Here," and "Sweet Substitute." He was a talented arranger (1926's "Black Bottom Stomp" is remarkable), getting the most out of the three-minute limitations of the 78 record by emphasizing changing instrumentation, concise solos and dynamics.

He was a greatly underrated pianist who had his own individual style. Although he only took one vocal on records in the 1920s ("Doctor Jazz"), Morton in his late-'30s recordings proved to be an effective vocalist. And he was a true character. Jelly Roll Morton 's pre-1923 activities are shrouded in legend. He started playing piano when he was ten, worked in the bordellos of Storyville while a teenager (for which some of his relatives disowned him) and by 1904 was traveling throughout the South. He spent time in other professions (as a gambler, pool player, vaudeville comedian and even a pimp) but always returned to music. The chances are good that in 1915 Morton had few competitors among pianists and he was an important transition figure between ragtime and early jazz. He played in Los Angeles from 1917-1922 and then moved to Chicago where, for the next six years, he was at his peak. Morton 's 1923-24 recordings of piano solos introduced his style, repertoire and brilliance.

Although his earliest band sides were quite primitive, his 1926-27 recordings for Victor with his Red Hot Peppers are among the most exciting of his career. With such sidemen as cornetist George Mitchell , Kid Ory or Gerald Reeves on trombone, clarinetists Omer Simeon , Barney Bigard , Darnell Howard or Johnny Dodds , occasionally Stomp Evans on C-melody, Johnny St. Cyr or Bud Scott on banjo, bassist John Lindsay and either Andrew Hilaire or Baby Dodds on drums, Morton had the perfect ensembles for his ideas. He also recorded some exciting trios with Johnny and Baby Dodds . With the center of jazz shifting to New York by 1928, Morton relocated. His bragging ways unfortunately hurt his career and he was not able to always get the sidemen he wanted. His Victor recordings continued through 1930 and, although some of the performances are sloppy or erratic, there were also a few more classics. Among the musicians Morton was able to use on his New York records were trumpeters Ward Pinkett , Red Allen and Bubber Miley , trombonists Geechie Fields , Charles Irvis and J.C.

Higginbotham , clarinetists Omer Simeon , Albert Nicholas and Barney Bigard , banjoist Lee Blair , guitarist Bernard Addison , Bill Benford on tuba, bassist Pops Foster and drummers Tommy Benford , Paul Barbarin and Zutty Singleton . But with the rise of the Depression, Jelly Roll Morton drifted into obscurity. He had made few friends in New York, his music was considered old-fashioned and he did not have the temperament to work as a sideman. During 1931-37 his only appearance on records was on a little-known Wingy Manone date. He ended up playing in a Washington D.C. dive for patrons who had little idea of his contributions. Ironically Morton 's "King Porter Stomp" became one of the most popular songs of the swing era, but few knew that he wrote it. However in 1938 Alan Lomax recorded him in an extensive and fascinating series of musical interviews for the Library of Congress. Morton 's storytelling was colorful and his piano playing in generally fine form as he reminisced about old New Orleans and demonstrated the other piano styles of the era. A decade later the results would finally be released on albums.

Morton arrived in New York in 1939 determined to make a comeback. He did lead a few band sessions with such sidemen as Sidney Bechet , Red Allen and Albert Nicholas and recorded some wonderful solo sides but none of those were big sellers. In late 1940, an ailing Morton decided to head out to Los Angeles but, when he died at the age of 50, he seemed like an old man. Ironically his music soon became popular again as the New Orleans jazz revivalist movement caught fire and, if he had lived just a few more years, the chances are good that he would have been restored to his former prominence (as was Kid Ory ). Jelly Roll Morton 's early piano solos and classic Victor recordings (along with nearly every record he made) have been reissued on CD. Jelly Roll Morton Jelly Roll Morton was the first great composer and piano player of Jazz. He was a talented arranger who wrote special scores that took advantage of the three-minute limitations of the 78 rpm records. But more than all these things, he was a real character whose spirit shines brightly through history, like his diamond studded smile.

As a teenager Jelly Roll Morton worked in the whorehouses of Storyville as a piano player. From 1904 to 1917 Jelly Roll rambled around the South. He worked as a gambler, pool shark, pimp, vaudeville comedian and as a pianist. He was an important transitional figure between ragtime and jazz piano styles. He played on the West Coast from 1917 to 1922 and then moved to Chicago and where he hit his stride. Morton's 1923 and 1924 recordings of piano solos for the Gennett label were very popular and influential. He formed the band the Red Hot Peppers and made a series of classic records for Victor. The recordings he made in Chicago featured some of the best New Orleans sidemen like Kid Ory , Barney Bigard , Johnny Dodds , Johnny St. Cyr and Baby Dodds . Morton relocated to New York in 1928 and continued to record for Victor until 1930. His New York version of The Red Hot Peppers featured sidemen like Bubber Miley , Pops Foster and Zutty Singleton .

Like so many of the Hot Jazz musicians, the Depression was hard on Jelly Roll. Hot Jazz was out of style. The public preferred the smoother sounds of the big bands. He fell upon hard times after 1930 and even lost the diamond he had in his front tooth, but ended up playing piano in a dive bar in Washington D.C. In 1938 Alan Lomax recorded him in for series of interviews about early Jazz for the Library of Congress, but it wasn't until a decade later that these interviews were released to the public. Jelly Roll died just before the Dixieland revival rescued so many of his peers from musical obscurity. He blamed his declining health on a voodoo spell. For more information about Jelly Roll Morton's life and music you are encouraged to visit Monrovia Sound Studio's Jelly Roll Morton Page

Question: Which musical instrument was played by Jelly Roll Morton?
Answer: Piano