Here are the two main features of jazz.

1) Unlike Western classical music, jazz does not faithfully trace established scores. The performer plays a variation of the melody within the framework of the given harmony. Therefore, it can be said that the performer itself is a composer in a sense. In other words, there is no clear barrier between the composer and the person who interprets it and plays it.

2) The individuality of jazz depends largely on the delicate technique of playing. The essence of jazz is the expression of various performers, including attack, rhythmic strength, intonation, and vibrato.

And the history of jazz cannot be missed without the process of exploring endless harmony. The harmony is built on the tonality framework of major and minor, which was established in the Baroque era (1600-1750). Therefore, any musician must learn the origins of its traditional harmony.

Only then will you be able to sing, accompaniment to performers other than yourself, add harmonies to the melody, and improvise.

　music: Richard Rodgers words: Lorenz Hart

Once there was a thing called spring
When the world was writing verses like yours and mine

All the lads and girls would sing
When we sat at little tables and drank May wine

Now April, May and June
Are sadly out of tune

Life has stuck a pin in the boat

Spring is here
Why doesn’t my heart go dancing?

Spring is here
Why isn’t the waltz entrancing?

No desire
No ambition leads me
Maybe it’s because nobody needs me

Spring is here
Why doesn’t the breeze delight me?
Stars appear
Why doesn’t the night invite me?

Maybe it’s because nobody loves me
Spring is here, I hear

music Erroll Garner  words Johnny Burke

Look at me,
I’m as helpless as a kitten up a tree;
And I feel like I’m clingin’ to a cloud
I can’t understand
I get misty, just holding your hand

Walk my way
And a thousand violins begin to play
Or it might be the sound of your hello
That music I hear
I get misty, the moment you’re near

Can’t you see that you’re leading me on?
And it’s just what I want you to do
Don’t you notice how hopelessly I’m lost
That’s why I’m following you

On my own
Would I wander through this wonderland alone

Never knowing my right foot from my left
My hat from my glove
I’m too misty, and too much in love

Too misty
And too much in love

 

 

Jazz is music created by blacks released from American slavery in the early 1900s. It features a pleasant 4-beat groove and brass entanglement.

It is said that jazz was born shortly after the Civil War. Buying cheap instruments that were no longer needed by the army, the liberated blacks began playing blues and spiritual instead of singing. The black guys who knew the instruments knew they would make good money playing at the tavern in the Story Building in New Orleans.

The opening of World War I and New Orleans became a naval port, the prostitute was closed (1917), and the band-man who lost his job moved to Chicago throbbingly.

In Chicago, countless white jazz bands that imitated blacks were born, and as the Chicago style grew, jazz spread from southern blacks to all Americans. Chicago’s young Caucasian representative, Bix Beiderbecke, ushered in the height of Dixie style, but with the advent of Benny Goodman, jazz has undergone a major transformation, entering the so-called swing era of the 1930s.

Benny Goodman, Tommy Dorsey, and Harry James are three representatives of this era. Their performance was greeted by a fuss.

The outbreak of rag lime has signaled the beginning of the 20th century, paving the way for the heyday of jazz with a focus on World War I. And the golden age of swings came in the ’30s.