Adrian Z Music: February 2013

How Jazz Impacted The Society

“Jazz is played from the heart. You can even live by it. Always love it.” Quoted from Louis Armstrong[1]. What is jazz? How does jazz play a role in our society and development? At the begining of the 20th century, jazz music was found by Afro-American people in New Orleans and other cities in the South East of America. Its unique style of music and beat really stole people interest and fastly spread around the world. At that time jazz was not only presented as entertainment, but instantly became a developing movement to other parts of the world. At the 20s and 30s era, jazz became the most influental music around the world as it awaken people spirit due to the world war and great depression. This essay will explain slightly about how jazz impacted society.

At first, jazz was only played by Afro-American people by combining African beat with elements from European classical music. It became a tremendous musical genre with synchopated rythms; which is unique and completely different from classical music. It appeared at the early 1910s in the South East of America like Kansas City, Chicago , and mainly in New Orleans. Jazz then rapidly gained popularity and evolve into one of the biggest musical genre in the world. Several of jazz musician like Glenn Miller, Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong, Benny Goodman, Charlie Parker and Count Basie inspired people by their records and entertain people. There were also a lot of styles and subgenres of jazz music; such as Swing, Bebop, Ragtime, and blues that werer really popular at that time. Then at 1930s, several jazz artists conducted tremendous contributions of development to their society by initiating to record their compositions rather than just playing them live on pubs or jazz clubs. Jazz records were the main assets to gain popularity, as the records awoke people’s spirit by the poetic and soulful lyrics; helping them to forget all the sadness and despair caused by the Great Depression era and the World War 2 which started to spread around the world..The Great Depression was the era of economic depression that took place at the early of 1930s followed the World War 2. The era was the biggest, longest and the most devastating of the 20th century. It caused by several things, but the main highlight was an unstable economic condition in America which started to spread around the world. Then the second World War also took place to make the condition more devastating, where many factories were shut and a lot of people lost jobs.

At that time in America was in bad condition caused by war, racism, and chaos which tortured the society. At the early 1930s, as the US government tried to abolished the racism, jazz became the voice of minority or the coloured people especially the black. Before the anti-racism policy was applied, black people are often treated unequally ; where they were separated from the white in schools, public transports, and even clubs or restaurants. During this era, jazz has proved that coloured people in America can too contribute to enrich the nation’s culture; and played a big role in building relations between black and white people as well as to cintribute to the American cultural history. In the next decades after the 40s until 80s, the popularity of jazz faded away because the rise of other musical genre like pop, rock, and hip hop. Those genres stole the spotlight and became the mainstream in the world. After the downfall, jazz also tried to survived by being established in various international festival such as the annuals in Montraeux, Blue Note, New Orleans, and Montreal Jazz festivals. Those international festivals had promoted new stars and rising talents such as Miles Davids, George Benson, and many more. Jazz festivals became medium that connected people around the world to communicate, relate, and express their passion and intention.

Jazz also started to be formally introduced into school curriculums to help build children personality, because jazz materials contain freedom in musical expressions which enable children to appreciate differences in life. Jazz education was founded in America in 1947, but not without controversies since the beginning before being formalized. Besides in formal schools and musical courses, several independent communities have also been developing various programs and activities to further introduce and uplift the genre again. In the Indonesian capital of Jakarta, Komunitas Jazz Kemayoran provides classes and jam sessions free of charge to anybody who wants to learn and develop their musical passion in jazz. The similar spirit can also be found in many other cities in Indonesia, which reflects the role of jazz as a new source of knowledge and lifestyle for many people. These ‘underground’ movements have gained high appreciation from respected clubs and cafes which regularly invite them to play or hold joint events. Furthermore, just quite recently Indra Lesmana (son of the late Jack Lesmana) released a full album in an Apple application format. The album includes songs which were mainly recorded and played with iPads, artworks, and even various interactive games. This ^phenomenon proves that jazz has escalated its role in our society as part of technology revolution; which can currently be accessed, played, distributed and enjoyed by unlimited number of people in the world at the same time.

Jazz is a considerably important element of our civilization, because the very genre has proved itself through the tests of time and societal changes as an influencial universe of music. Despite the impressions of being ‘complicated’ or even ‘scientific’ to play as well to enjoy; jazz serves strong foundations to our society in its roles as an intelligent product of culture, a medium to various different people in the world, a tool of education for young generation, as a modern element of lifestyle, and lastly as a part of the future development in technology.

Adrian Zandri Hendro

10F

Resources

1. “An Introduction To Jazz’s Influence On Society: The 4th of a 4-part Series on the Essentials of Jazz” AllYourJazz, 27 July 2008, Mike, 26 January 2013,

< http://www.allyourjazz.com/2008/07/an-introduction-to-jazzs-influene-on-society-the-4th-of-a-4-part-series-on-the-essentials-of-jazz/>

2. “Jazz and the Civil Rights Movement How Jazz Musicians Spoke Out for Racial Equality” JazzAbout, Jacob Teichreouw, 26 January 2013,

< http://jazz.about.com/od/historyjazztimeline/a/JazzCivilRights.htm>

3. “Jazz and World War II: A Rally to Resistance, A Catalyst for Victory”, National Government Humanities, 29 September 2010, 26 January 2013,

http://edsitement.neh.gov/lesson-plan/jazz-and-world-war-ii-rally-resistance-catalyst-victory#sect-thelesson

4. “Jazz Education” Jazz In America, Ryan, 26 January 2013,

< http://www.jazzinamerica.org/JazzResources/JazzEducation/Page>

5. “Great Depression” Britannica, 7 Juny 2008, 27 January 2013,

< http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/243118/Great-Depression>

6. “Top Ten Jazz Festival” Trip Advisor, Frank Lombardo, 27 January 2013,

<http://www.tripadvisor.com/GoListDetail-i212-Top_10_best_Jazz_festivals.html>

7. “Jazz By Decade: 1930-1940” Jazz About, Jacob Teichreouw, 27 January 2013,