It’s unlikely that anyone will endeavor to explain what is jazz. Even the greatest man in jazz history, Louis Armstrong, did not do it, stating only that you just have to understand it. In fact, jazz, its history, its origin, its modifications and styles are way too diverse and multifaceted to give a simple and comprehensive explanation. However, some facts may help explaining the nature of this musical phenomenon.
Jazz emerged as an amalgamation of several musical cultures and national traditions. It arrived in its primitive embryonic form from Africa, and under the influence of highly developed Western music and its different styles (blues, ragtime) and by combining it with African folklore it crystallized into the style that is still very well alive today – the jazz.
Jazz is all about rhythm, misalignment, intersection and incompliance with keys and pitches. The music is built around confrontation and contradiction, however, within one musical work all of this is harmoniously combined and strikingly melodious, which creates the special appeal of jazz music.
The first jazzmen, with a few exceptions, established jazz orchestra tradition, which involves improvising with sound, pace and tempo, allows for changing the number of instruments and performers, and includes some symphony orchestra traditions. Many jazzmen contributed their art to developing the tradition of jazz band art.
After Louis Armstrong, a jazz genius who lived his entire life in jazz rhythms and still remains a legend, appeared on jazz scene, jazz performance art saw new extraordinary horizons: vocal or instrumental solo performances came center-stage, changing entirely the jazz concept.
This gives us a chance of explaining one more specific feature of jazz style: it is the unique individual performance of a virtuoso jazzman, a musician’s performance and the audience’s delight here and now. And the guarantee of jazz style’s evergreen youth is improvisation. Jazz has a lot of spirit, but has no skeleton to hold it. You can exchange a sax for a piano, or you can put your instrument aside a take a mike, and if this doesn’t work, you can go back to the trumpet and try to play something that hasn’t been yet performed by Armstrong or Bechet.
Jazz is not just a specific style of musical performance. It is, beside all, a whole unique and happy epoque.
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