| |
How Jazz Musicians Change the Race Relations in America
According to Dave Brubeck, “race has no place in jazz.
The one thing every person in the world has in common is the love of music.
Music is a sound that creates a bond between people, even if they despise
each other. While the rest of the world discriminated, jazz musicians of all
colors came together to create a sound that was loved by all Americans as
well as other countries.
Jazz started out in a diverse city, New Orleans. There were people of
Spanish, African, English and Caribbean origin. Musicians respected each
other but not at all times. At one point Duke Ellington said to one of his
band members that “I don’t want any ofay in the band,” and Tom Brown, a
white clarinetist, said “niggers aint no good on clarinet.”
By 1910, when leisure became a public activity, many white people were going
to see black musicians perform. They would have to leave their differences
outside the door of nightclubs and cabarets in order to enjoy the music and
in the 1920’s when many people, including jazz musicians, moved north of the
Mason Dixie Line to reside in Chicago and New York, the listening and
dancing audience grew and became integrated. In Chicago, the musicians were
segregated into transplanted blacks from New Orleans, whites from New
Orleans and white Chicagoans. After a while they became integrated with
musicians from New York.
In 1938 Benny Goodman became the first bandleader to tour with an integrated
band and paved the way for many other integrated bands such as Gene Krupa,
Duke Ellington who featured a white drummer, Artie Shaw, the Dave Bubeck
Quartet (later in the 50’s) and many others. When on tours, Benny Goodman
and Artie Shaw “regularly stood up to the segregationist policies of clubs
and hotels they visited on behalf of their members, demanding that they be
allowed equal access.” Even though it was looked down upon, many had
integrated relationships including Jazz musician Lester ‘Pres’ Young who had
a white girlfriend.
Nat King Cole became the first African-American to have his own show on NBC
in 1956. Since many whites didn’t want to associate themselves with blacks,
especially on television, Nat King Cole had only a few guests. His first
guest was close friend Frank Sinatra, they also recorded for the same label.
Since the 20’s until now, Jazz musicians have been in integrated bands and
have forced Americans to put away their differences and improve
relationships with people of different race. Even though the racial issues
are not non-existent, they have been decreased to a small community or
thoughts than people keep to themselves.
|
|
