New Orleans is the birthplace of many great American innovations, but I am only going to talk about one of them: jazz. Jazz was able to develop and flourish in New Orleans for many reasons, but the most important reason for jazz’s success specifically in New Orleans was the racial diversity. Specifically, it was the tolerance that came from this diversity. Sure, people in New Orleans still had slaves, and they defiantly were not going to give people of color equal rights, but they gave them a little bit more freedom and respect, which is all that was needed. In most of the country, if a white man had a half-black child, social stigma would force him to deny all claims to the child, but in New Orleans this was not the case. In New Orleans creoles were given a much higher social standing. In New Orleans they understood that even slaves needed to enjoy themselves once in a while, and they were given access to Congo Square.
It is great that New Orleans had more ethnic diversity, and that this let them appreciate other races more, but what does this have to do with jazz? Couldn’t jazz have developed even without the help of Caucasian slave owners? No, it couldn’t. This is because jazz is not a purely African form of music. Jazz started as both blues and ragtime, and evolved and merged into what it is today. Ragtime in particular is strongly based off of more traditional European music. Jazz could never have formed without European influences on African music. This, combined with American innovation, is jazz.
This still does not fully explain how European and African musical traditions were able to mix in New Orleans. It actually happened due to the raising in status of the black man when slavery was abolished, and the corresponding fall from grace of the Creole. Creoles used to consider themselves as superior to their full-African counter parts, but by the end of the 19th century the rest of the city did not seem them this way. They had maintained strong European roots and traditions, and they were now on the same level as the recently freed slaves. This forced interaction between the two groups, and lead to the European culture/music of the creoles and the African culture/music from the slaves to mix, and influence each other. If it was not for this forced mixing of cultures, and for the comparative freedom that slaves had in New Orleans before this (Congo Square), jazz would not have developed in the way that it did. This is why the melting-pot of cultures that is New Orleans is the mother of jazz.
I find it interesting that you talked about how Jazz is very much a combination of western and african musics. I discussed the same concept myself in my own post, where I talked about the importance of parades in New Orleans and how this western style really was the birth of the structure of Jazz music.
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, I disagree that Jazz would not have started without European instruments. The most important European influences were the structure of the music, and the instruments (clarinet, trumpet, etc). Today though, Jazz has already lost a lot of that structure, and the typical jazz band consists of drums, bass, and maybe one or two western instruments, if that. I feel that it could very much be possible for Jazz to have made the direct jump to a similar, albeit definitely different art form without much influence from the west. Otherwise, I liked your article Kyle.
P.S. when are you getting back from the lab? And have you started the physics homework yet?
I agree with the point you made about the influence of European music on African music. Ragtime especially shows a much tamer, formal and documented form of music, though it had the same passion and untraditional style of African music, at least to white standards.
ReplyDeleteI also want to point out that conditions weren't really much better for some of the ex-slaves after the Civil War. Jim Crow laws prevented freedmen from the freedom they were promised, but these laws applied to poor whites as well.
Eric, I was making the point that it was the European influence, not the instruments, that were required for jazz. I am sorry that you misinterpreted my post, and I will try to be more clear in the future. No, I have not started physics homework yet, no plans to sleep for the next few days. :)
ReplyDeleteKim, I know that the conditions were not much better, but there was some improvement, and it was more the fall of the creole that was important. It was just hard to fit everything into 600 words.