Reflections

A big part of my impression of this class is the emphasis we placed on taking a more holistic approach to jazz history by thinking a lot about how jazz is a product of its total environment and also how communities and cultures were, in turn, created by jazz.  This process is a part of what Bahktin’s dialogic imagination seeks to describe.  My first encounter with the dialogic theory, however, was through its use as a counterpoint to Ken Burns’ theory that superlative individuals make jazz.  The dialogic theory instead claimed that the creation of jazz takes place as a dialogue between community and performer.

From the start, the idea of superlative individuals developing jazz appealed more to me, as this certainly seemed to be the means by which innovation takes place in classical music.  Particularly, coming into this class, I held the general notion that composers were the creators of new musical styles.  Certainly the now ubiquitous concept of the singer-songwriter shows a synthesis between composer and musician but it was in jazz that I first witnessed the spontaneous molding and creation of new styles that took place entirely through improvisation, without much conscious desire on the part of the musician to move in a particular direction.  Louie Armstrong is a prime example of a musician, who through his solo playing alone, had the power to alter the sound of a band and ultimately of the entire jazz soundscape (King Oliver, 48).

I think this was possible because of the dynamics of the jazz band and the extent to which this allowed individual musical “personalities” to emerge in the sound.  I underestimated how sensitive and adaptive these musicians were to each other on stage and consequently just how much the performance of a piece of jazz music depended on the style and idiosyncrasies of the musicians playing it.  Coltrane talks about what a dominating musical presence Thelonious Monk had on the piano and how Monk‘s leaving the piano for a few minutes completely altered the dynamic of the band and allowed for experimentation.  (Robin Kelley, 231)  Jazz is unique in allowing the essence of each musician to shine so transparently through the sound and I think this is a part of the reason why community and other non-musical aspects of the environment are so apparent in jazz.  In this respect, the evolution of jazz can sometimes be seen as the sum of disparate cultural and musical experiences different musician bring to the table.

The above describes the development of my ideas about how the dialogic theory shapes jazz music. The evolution of these ideas is paralleled by the changes, as we shifted our focus from city to city, in my understanding of how the theories of the creation of jazz through “genius” or through a community in dialogue, support and oppose each other.    From the beginning, Chicago provided one the strongest arguments for the creation of jazz primarily by superlative individuals.   The influence of the community was surely present there, for the sound drew heavily on that of their New Orleans predecessors, but, for example, individual genius seemed like the absolute prerequisite to the revolution Louie Armstrong began.  His authority as a soloist stood out glaringly in King Oliver’s band and this ‘hotness’ was not lost in translation as many young white musicians attempted their own imitations of jazz (Chicagoans, 159). 

On the other hand, I knew the fusion of ragtime and blues in New Orleans and also later the creation of New York stride piano and the Kansas city sound were all evidence of a new style emerging in the collision between two cultures, with no single musician apparently leading the charge and the music evolving naturally within a community.  So clearly it was not necessary, for a truly “superlative” individual, whose vision and talent were so beyond his contemporaries, ie. Armstrong, for jazz to grow up and assume a new sound. 

Modern jazz is rife with examples of both theories at work.  Bebop was developed amongst a small community of friends inspired by the visions of members Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie.  (Miles, chapter 3) Their music was at its ideological core, one espousing individualism and anti-conformism, a direct reaction to what had become a stale and formulaic swing scene.  (Gioia, 190) One of their contemporaries, Thelonious Monk, also developed a style around the bebop sound, but one that was also completely unique and idiosyncratic of Monk as an artist and person.  Although both of these styles developed in tandem and were very much related, these musicians were also “superlative” in their unique approach and so it seems as if their style was the result of collaboration amongst a small community of very talented individuals.

And so my rather ambivalent conclusion at the end of this is simply that both theories of the creation of jazz must coexist at some level.  There are certainly entire styles that could not have emerged without one or two key musicians but also instances when no single musician could be held largely responsible for a development and the results really were a collaborative effort.