Jazz

Forged in the multicultural melting pot of early 20th-century New Orleans—a place where the blues of Deep South collided with European classical music and Caribbean rhythms—jazz began as a fundamentally African American expression and became America’s indigenous music. The music grew up in speakeasies and brothels, where singular geniuses like Louis Armstrong displayed a new improvisatory language, and it was transported to ballrooms and dancefloors with the sophisticated compositions and arrangements of Duke Ellington and Fletcher Henderson. The music was refined and popularised in the ‘30s as the swinging sounds of Benny Goodman and Count Basie entertained dancing masses in ballrooms and on the radio. At the same time, tunes from popular songwriters like George and Ira Gershwin, Cole Porter and Irving Berlin were reimagined by vocalists like Billie Holiday and Ella Fitzgerald. Early jazz styles spoke with regional accents—particularly in hotbeds like Harlem, Kansas City and Chicago—but as time passed, the language emerged in France, Japan, Brazil and beyond. This constantly evolving diaspora—connecting people, cities and countries across the globe—fuels the genre’s unique energy.

The ‘40s and ‘50s saw jazz take some of its most ambitious artistic leaps, placing improvisation and free expression at its centre. Smaller ensembles became nimble vehicles for fearless solos from the likes of bebop pioneer and alto saxophonist Charlie “Bird” Parker, trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie and pianist Bud Powell. While Dave Brubeck became a sensation on college campuses in the ‘50s, Miles Davis’ mid-century trajectory—from his cool-jazz landmark Kind of Blue to the rock fusion of Bitches Brew—encapsulated many of the changes happening within the music for the next 30 years. The restless experimentation of Ornette Coleman and John Coltrane in the ‘60s took jazz to new artistic heights and challenged audiences as it never had before. Straight-ahead jazz reemerged in the ‘80s thanks to traditionalists like Wynton Marsalis and others, while the genre mingled with ‘70s R&B-flavoured pop to create smooth jazz. Broadly appealing singers like Diana Krall and Harry Connick, Jr. kept the repertoire of standards alive at the end of the century, while other artists embraced a newly ascendent art form: hip-hop. Jazz in the new millennium continues to do what it has always done, by reflecting the complexity of our times in the work of musicians who know their history but aren’t bound by it.