LivinBlues- Jazz and the Blues

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Way Down Yonder In New Orleans - The standard legend is that Jazz was born in New Orleans and moved up the Mississippi River to Memphis, St. Louis, and Chicago. Although contemporary scholars point to the emergence of Jazz from a variety of places almost simultaneously, many consider New Orleans as the birthplace of Jazz. For much of the 19th century, black Creoles in Louisiana enjoyed a social status higher than that of other African-Americans in the South. Of particular significance was their access to European culture; most Creoles could read music, and had instrumental training. The end of the century, the music of the black Creoles and African-based folk music were gradually combined, and a synthesis of the two emerged. Jelly Roll Morton gives the "birth of Jazz" as 1902, and other factors suggest Jazz emerged from the music of its predecessors between 1900 -1905.

Some of the characteristics it borrowed from the Creole tradition were standard repertory of rags, marches, and dances. In addition to the European concept of musical form, early Jazz inherited from its Creole roots the "stride" style accompaniment from rags; the basic drumbeat from marches; and the sound of feet on the floor from dances. Musicians trained in the African-American Folk tradition introduced a distinctive type of melodic displacement, setting the melody at variance with the ground beat. Their musical heritage contributed work songs, Spirituals, and the Blues. Further, the tonality of their African heritage, when merged with that of the European tradition, produced "Blue notes," avoiding the major third and seventh characteristic of the major scale.