African American Musicians in American Popular Culture

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African American Musicians in American Popular
Culture

• Presented by
• Ryan Tarjanyi
• Jasen Dodds

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Diversity/Black History Month

• Age Group High School

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Objective

• Teach students about African-Americans
  contribution to the first real American Music.
• Teach students about the rich cultural heritage
  of this art form.

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Materials Needed

• Attention Span
• Notebook/ writing implement

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Activity

• Ask students the question, what is jazz?
• Have students tell you the first thing that comes
  to their mind when you ask this question.

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Different Styles of Jazz

• Early Jazz (Dixieland)Time period Cir.
  1900-1928
• The Swing EraTime Period1920-1935 Beginning of
  swing bands
• 1935-1945 The Swing Era

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• BebopTime period 1940 - 1955

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• CoolTime Period 1950 - 1955

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• The Return to the Hot Hard Bop and Funky
  JazzTime period 1951-1958

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• Post Bebop Straight-Ahead
• Time Period 1959 to present
• Style characteristics and performance practices
• Complex harmony, melody, and rhythm
• Forms became increasingly complex, asymmetrical,
  and unpredictable
• Expanded use of different time signatures
• Expanded scale vocabulary
• Required great technical skill and facility
• A small group music
• Tune sources included the following
• blues
• I Got Rhythm tunes
• original tunes (contrafacts and others)
• modal tunes
• jazz tunes
• Important players in this style include Miles
  Davis, John Coltrane, Sonny Rollins, George
  Russell, Cannonball Adderley, and numerous
  others.

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• The Breakthrough Year into the Contemporary
  Period 1959
• 1959 was the year in which a number of major
  events in jazz history took place, among them the
  following
• The arrival of Ornette Coleman, one of the
  founding fathers of free jazz, on the East Coast
  at the Lenox School of Jazz also the year of his
  heralded and controversial opening at the Five
  Spot in New York City
• The release of Miles Davis' groundbreaking and
  influential album Kind of Blue
• The awakening of interest in Latin and
  Latin-derived music, primarily due to these 1959
  events
• The film Black Orpheus, with music by Antonio
  Carlos Jobim and Luis Bonfa, reached America
• The first major album in the bossa nova style,
  Chege de Saudade by Joao Gilberto, was recorded.
• The term "bossa nova" was first used, in the song
  "Desafinado"
• Sketches of Spain, a collaboration between Gil
  Evans and Miles Davis, was recorded. This was
  Miles' most popular album in the 1960s.
• This high level of interest in Latin music opened
  the door for explorations into other ethnic
  music, resulting in experimentation with the
  elements of the music of India and Africa (among
  others)

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• Ethnic Jazz
• Time Period 1959 to present Style
  characteristics and performance practices
• Draws heavily on the identifiable musical
  characteristics of other ethnic musics
• Utilizes the melodic, harmonic, and rhythmic
  characteristics of other ethnic musics
• Uses the compositions of other ethnic musics
• Makes use of the instruments, instrumental
  concepts, and often the musical philosophy of
  other ethnic musics

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Activity

• Have students listen to several different
  recordings spanning the different styles and
  decades of jazz.
• Have students verbalize what sounds different
  about each.

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Activity

• Have Students select a famous recording, listen
  to it and then write a few paragraphs describing
  what they heard.

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Activity

• Have students write a report on the life of a
  famous jazz musician.

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Activity

• For extra credit encourage a student to
  transcribe an improvised solo from one of the
  recordings we listened to. To do this, the
  student will listen to the performer and then
  write down note-for-note what the performer is
  playing.

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Five Websites

• http//www.monkinstitute.com/
• http//www.smithsonianjazz.org/
• http//www.iaje.org/
• http//www.kennedy-center.org/programs/jazz/
• http//www.apassion4jazz.net/

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