British jazz

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

You have new messages (last change).
Music of the United Kingdom
History Nationalities
Early popular music England
1950s and 60s Scotland
1970s Wales
1980s Ireland
1990s to present Caribbean and Indian
Genres: (Samples) Classical - Folk - Hip hop - Opera - Popular - Rock - Jazz
Timeline: 1999 - 2000 - 2001 - 2002 - 2003 - 2004 - 2005 - 2006
Awards Mercury, Brit Awards
Charts UK Singles Chart, UK classical chart, UK Albums Chart
Festivals Glastonbury Festival, The Proms, Homelands, Creamfields, Cambridge Folk Festival, Eisteddfodd, Download Festival, Reading and Leeds Festivals , V Festival, T in the Park, Isle of Wight Festival
Media NME - Melody Maker
National anthem "God Save the Queen"
Regions and territories
Birmingham - Cornwall - Man - Manchester - Northumbria - Somerset

Anguilla - Bermuda - Cayman Islands - Gibraltar - Montserrat - Turks and Caicos - Virgin Islands

Jazz in Britain has been performed in the country since shortly after the music's first appearance on record in 1917. A number of British musicians have gained international reputations, although adherents of this music have often felt embattled within the UK itself.

Contents

[edit] History

Jazz in Britain is usually said to have begun with the British tour of the Original Dixieland Jass Band in 1919. That stated, the British in the 1920s generally preferred the terms "hot" or "straight" dance music to the term "jazz." Jazz in Britain also faced a similar difficulty to Brazilian jazz and French jazz, namely it was seen as a bad influence. Although in Britain the concern that jazz was from the United States appears to have been less important than in France or Brazil. Instead those British who objected to it did so more because they deemed it "riotous" or unnerving.

By the early 1930s music journalism in Britain, notably through the Melody Maker, had created an appreciation of the importance of the leading American jazz soloists. Louis Armstrong played residencies in London and Glasgow in 1932, followed in subsequent years by the Duke Ellington Orchestra and Coleman Hawkins. But local jazz culture was limited to London where: "jazz was played after hours in a couple of restaurants that encouraged musicians to come in and jam for drinks". [1] The groups of Nat Gonella and Spike Hughes became notable within Britain early in the decade; Hughes was even invited to New York to arrange, compose and lead what, in effect, was Benny Carter's Orchestra of the time. Carter himself worked in London for the BBC in 1936.

Jazz became more important, and more separate as its own genre, in Britain during World War II. The war led to an increase in bands to entertain the troops and these bands began to refer to themselves as "jazz" musicians more often. The period also saw an increased interest in American musicians who also toured in military bands. The future leading alto-saxophonist Art Pepper was among the visiting American musicians at this time. This all increased an interest in jazz which continued after the war.

British jazz giants Ronnie Scott (left) and Tubby Hayes.
British jazz giants Ronnie Scott (left) and Tubby Hayes.

By 1949 John Dankworth and, to a much greater extent, Ronnie Scott began a movement toward "modern jazz" or Bebop. A movement in an opposite direction was revivalism, which became popular in the 1950s and was represented by musicians like Ken Colyer and Humphrey Lyttelton, though Lyttelton gradually became more catholic in his approach. At this point both streams tended to emulate Americans, whether it be Charlie Parker for Beboppers or Joe "King" Oliver for traditionalists, rather than try to create a uniquely British form of jazz.

During the 1950s mass emigration into the UK, brought an influx of players from the Caribbean such as Joe Harriott and Harold McNair, though some, such as Dizzy Reece, found the shortage of genuine Jazz work frustrating - dance music remained popular - and migrated to the United States. British born players too, including George Shearing, active on the London scene since before the war, and Victor Feldman also chose to move across the Atlantic.

A domestic musician's union ban on visiting American jazz musicians, initiated in the mid-thirties (Fats Waller had to visit the UK as a 'variety' act in 1938) was gradually relaxed from the mid-fifties onwards. This benefitted the local scene as the often erratic availability of American records had meant that, unlike the rest of Europe, British jazz aficionados had long been unfamiliar with the most recent jazz developments in the music's country of origin. Ronnie Scott's Jazz Club in London, co-founded in 1959 by one of the earliest native proponents of bebop, was able to benefit from an exchange arrangement with the American Federation of Musicians (AFM), allowing regular visits from leading American players from 1961.

At around the same time, in the 1960s and 1970s British jazz began to have more varied influences. One important aspect being the South African jazz musicians that had left, or been expelled, from their home nation, including Chris McGregor, Dudu Pukwana and others.

There was also a growth in free jazz inspired by European models as much or more than from American music. South African and free jazz influences came together in projects like Brotherhood of Breath, nominally led by McGregor. Added to this more musicians had been raised on rhythm and blues or English forms of rock and roll, which became increasingly significant to the genre. These influences mixed in a way that led to British jazz arguably going beyond traditional definitions of jazz. The local scene was not unaffected by, what elsewhere came to be known as, the British Invasion; the jazz audience was in numerical decline at this time. One branch of this development was the forthcoming of various British jazz fusion bands like Soft Machine, Nucleus, Colosseum, If, Henry Cow, Centipede, National Health, Ginger Baker's Air Force, to name a few. Some of the most significant musicians to emerge during this period include John McLaughlin and Dave Holland (both of whom joined Miles Davis's group), Keith Tippett, John Taylor, Evan Parker, and Kenny Wheeler.

The 1980s would see something of a revival in the music's fortunes. There was a new generation of Black British musicians entering jazz with Courtney Pine and Julian Joseph being noteworthy examples. Loose Tubes was a very imporant group in re-energising the British scene. Many musicians from this band such as Django Bates, Iain Ballamy and Julian Argüelles have become very important artists with highly developed individual musical voices.

This renaissance led to the establishment of the National Jazz Centre which raised money and purchased a venue in Covent Garden, London, which would be the intended home of British Jazz, but faced serious financial problems and had to be wound-up. Funk and hip hop became more of an influence on Britain's jazz scene. The expansion of jazz in this period was also marked by the launch of Jazz FM and the opening of the Jazz Cafe, Camden. The radio station soon faced financial problems, and after a long period where it had something of an 'identity crisis', was finally renamed Smooth FM in 2005.

[edit] References

  1. ^ Collier, James Lincoln (1984). Louis Armstrong. Pan. ISBN 0-330-28607-2. , p250

[edit] Bibliography

  • George McKay (2005) Circular Breathing: The Cultural Politics of Jazz in Britain. Durham NC: Duke University Press. ISBN 0-8223-3573-5
  • Catherine Parsonage (2005) The Evolution of Jazz in Britain, 1880 - 1935. Aldershot, Hampshire: Ashgate. ISBN 0-7546-5076-6

[edit] Jazz publications

Jazz publications in the UK have had a chequered history.

  • Jazz Journal (more recently Jazz Journal International) was founded in 1947 and edited for many years by Sinclair Traill. It tags itself "the greatest jazz magazine in the world".
  • Jazz Monthly (1955-71) had a particularly high reputation during its run and numbered Max Harrison among its contributors.
  • Melody Maker, originally founded as a jazz magazine, had a notable proselytiser for the music in Max Jones on its staff, but it had abandoned its coverage of jazz by the late 1970s.
  • The Wire founded in 1982 originally as a jazz magazine with contributions from Max Harrison and Richard Cook among others, but subsequently broadening its focus.
  • Jazz Review founded in 1998 and published by the music promoter Direct Music is a bi-monthly edited by Richard Cook.
  • Jazzwise was founded in 1997.

[edit] British jazz musicians

[edit] British Jazz Record Labels

[edit] External links

[edit] Television Documentary

  • "Celebration: Loose Tubes". Documentary. The 21-piece jazz orchestra its first national tour. The musicians are shown conducting a jazz 'workshop' in Sheffield, as well as performing. Directed by Christopher Swann. Produced by Granada Television. Channel Four, January 1987.
  • "Sounds Different: Music Out of Time". Ian Carr & his band "Nucleus" are seen during a two day workshop with young musicians. Participants are Guy Barker, Django Bates, Steve Berry, Neil Sitwell, Steve Sitwell, David Trigwell, Glen Vallint & Chris White. BBC TWO, 28th November 1980.

[edit] See also

World jazz
Argentina - Armenia - Australia - Austria - Belarus - Belgium - Bosnia and Herzegovina - Brazil - Cambodia - Canada - Chile - China - Colombia - Croatia - Cuba - Czech Republic - Denmark - Dominican Republic - Estonia - Finland - France - Greece - Germany - Hungary - Iceland - India - Indonesia - Iran - Ireland - Israel - Italy - Japan - Korea - Latvia - Lithuania - Malaysian - Mexico - Nepal - Netherlands - New Zealand - Norway - Peru - Philippines - Poland - Portugal - Romania - Russia - Serbia - Slovenia - South Africa - Spain - Sweden - Switzerland - Tatar - Thailand - Turkey - Ukraine - United Kingdom - United States - Uruguay - Vietnam - Zambia
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org../../../b/r/i/British_jazz.html"