History of Jazz: Part 7
Jazz fusion is a pretty big category, and we’ve lumped a lot of material together here. Basically, these are the granddaddies of the marriage of jazz with electronics, rock, funk, and technology.
Continue reading Jazz Fusion
Category Archives: History
Free Jazz and the Avant-Garde
History of Jazz: Part 6
Free jazz is perhaps one of the more misunderstood forms of music. Free jazz draws from other forms of improvisational music that are based on instrumentalists playing based on either a very loose thematic element or perhaps no specific starting point, and playing based on what they are hearing other musicians in the group playing at any given time. The element of playing and listening is a large part of any improvisational music, from primitive folk music to art music.
Continue reading Free Jazz and the Avant-Garde
The Dawn of Hip-Hop DJs
From Brooklyn Disco to the Bronx Playground
Continue reading The Dawn of Hip-Hop DJs“The idea of a d.j. making something new out of other people’s music might seem preposterous. But there’s no question that a real d.j. can shape a night of music with his personality, style, and spirit, magically turning a string of records into a spontaneous symphony.”
–Vince Aletti– The Disco Files 1973-1978 —
Hard Bop, Post Bop & Soul Jazz
History of Jazz: Part 6
The strains of blues, gospel, and R&B that figured in the music of many hard bop musicians led to the development of soul jazz, which eventually led to the development of fusion and electric experiments in jazz.
Continue reading Hard Bop, Post Bop & Soul Jazz
Cool Jazz
History of Jazz: Part 5
Ted Gioia, one of the writers who has given significant attention to cool jazz, writes “The cool aesthetic has always found a few lonely champions in the jazz arena–fascinating individuals who have provided an alternative to the dominant hot stylists. As such, they stand as double outsiders in the already counterculture world of jazz.”
Continue reading Cool Jazz
Give A Damn
Spanky & Our Gang, John V. Lindsay and the counterculture meet in the whirlwind of 1968
by Marshall Bowden
1968, the summer of the New York Urban Coalition’s ‘Give a Damn’ campaign was much different than that of 1967. The summer of love rose in a giant puffy cloud over the San Franciso Bay area and wafted out across the country. But now that cloud was turning darker.
For Spanky and Our Gang, a Chicago-based pop music group whose music helped spawn the sun-drenched subgenre ‘sunshine pop,’ as for many Americans, it turned into the year.
Continue reading Give A Damn