Lecture:
Comparison of colonization and slavery practice in British North America Vs. Latin
America
British North America: Latin America:
Slavery Started later 1600s Slavery started earlier 1500s
Early slave owners were religiously Early slave owners were single men
conservative families
Stripped slaves of culture Did not strip slaves of culture
Treated slaves as business asset Often treated slaves irresponsibly
Longer life expectancy Shorter life expectancy
The result of this chart leads to the conclusion that Latin American music has more
African percussion influence.
Negro spirituals were religious songs that slaves composed
The blues came about in the 19th century that started out as field hollers
o Originally came out of Mississippi but quickly spread around
o After if became popular, for African Americans, the blues was the real life
in contrast to BS Minstrel shows
First popular form of entertainment was minstrel shows beginning in the 1840s.
o The minstrel show, or minstrelsy, was an American form of racially
charged entertainment developed in the early 19th century.
Steven Foster was the first major popular songwriter in America in the mid
1800s
o He wrote for popular minstrel shows
Louis M. Gottschalk was a New Orleans raised pianist and composer.
o He is attributed as combining African rhythms and influences into
classical music (such as the banjo)
o He traveled all over south America playing concerts
o Scott Joplin was a big fan of Gottschalk
o His music was a precursor to ragtime
Ragtime was music characterized by a syncopated melodic line and regularly
accented accompaniment, evolved by black American musicians in the 1890s and
played especially on the piano.
o Theoretically, the syncopated form comes from how slaves were playing
flute and banjo
o The music was very controversial when it came out. Teenagers loved it
and older people deplored it.
o Rondo form was the standard style of popular music in the late 18th early
19th century. (ABACA)
o Scott Joplin was a native Missourian and one of the most prolific Ragtime
composers
Forms of black music that arose in the 19th century
Spirituals- early ones almost strictly used pentatonic scales
Blues- grew from the field hollers.
Louisiana Purchase (1803)
Napoleon was concerned for several reasons during this time. One reason was there was a
huge slave revolt in Haiti. Napoleon obtained the Louisiana land from Spain and he
decided to get rid of it- this was basically 15 states worth of land. Most important to Jazz
music was New Orleans. The culture of this city was vastly different than any other city
in America. This was very much a Caribbean city. Slaves could purchase freedom and
they could also do things like selling their crafts. There was a large population of the city
that was free blacks. They began merging with the other cultures such as the Spanish and
French. This is what led to what was called the Creole People. Creole people were
basically just mixed race people. Most of the Creole people and other free blacks were
very educated compared to other blacks. Both free black and the creole people
represented a significant portion of the New Orleans economy.
One of the epicenters of the black and creole people was the neighborhood of Trem.
This is where jazz was created. Congo square is a place where blacks would come and
play music.
Civil War (1861-1865)
Something that was really important that led to jazz was the rise of brass bands in New
Orleans. There were military bands and instruments that were left over from the civil war.
These basically transferred over to create Brass bands.
Reconstruction after the civil war was a fine time in New Orleans but in 1877 this all
ended. Plessey vs. Ferguson (1879), when Plessey refused to sit in the back of a trolley,
created legal discrimination. The Supreme Court ruled that separate but equal was
legal. Basically this forced the creole to merge with all other blacks.
Buddy Bolden
Buddy Bolden is generally considered to be the first bandleader to play the improvised
music which later became know as Jazz. He was the first "King" of cornet in New
Orleans, and is remembered by the musicians of that time period as one of the finest horn
players they had ever heard. He is remembered for his loud, clear tone. His band starting
playing around 1895, in New Orleans parades and dances, and eventually rose to
become one of the most popular bands in the city. In 1907 his health deteriorated and he
was committed to a mental institution where he spent the remainder of his life.
Trombonist Frankie Dusen took over the Bolden Band and renamed it the Eagle
Band and they continued to be very popular in New Orleans until around 1917. Bolden
made no recordings, but was immortalized in the Jazz standard "Buddy Bolden's Blues"
(I Thought I Heard Buddy Bolden Say) which is based on Bolden's theme song "Funky
Butt". Several early Jazz musicians, like Sidney Bechet (as a child musician) and Bunk
Johnson, apparently played in Bolden's bands occasionally.
(http://www.redhotjazz.com/buddy.html)
W.C. Handy (1873-1958)
W.C. Handy, in full William Christopher Handy (born November 16, 1873, Florence,
Alabama, U.S.died March 28, 1958, New York, New York), African American
composer who changed the course of popular music by integrating the blues idiom into
then-fashionable ragtime music. Among his best-known works is the classic St. Louis
Blues.
Handy worked during the period of transition from ragtime to jazz. Drawing on the vocal
blues melodies of African American folklore, he added harmonizations to his orchestral
arrangements. His work helped develop the conception of the blues as a harmonic
framework within which to improvise. With his Memphis Blues (published 1912) and
especially his St. Louis Blues (1914), he introduced a melancholic element, achieved
chiefly by use of the blue or slightly flattened seventh tone of the scale, which was
characteristic of African American folk music. Later he wrote other blues pieces (Beale
Street Blues, 1916; Loveless Love) and several marches and symphonic
compositions. (https://www.britannica.com/biography/W-C-Handy)
James Reese Europe (1881-1919)
He was a bandleader from Mobile Alabama that was one of the first African Americans
to record. He was very popular for recording several of W.C. Handys tunes. He joined
the National Guard during WW1 and he led the band known as the 396th U.S. Infantry
Hell Fighters.
