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The Origins of Jazz
by Len Weinstock
Tracing the origins of Jazz in the formative years (1895-1917) is not an easy task. Recordings of Jazz did not begin until 1917, and even then the severe technical limitations of the primitive acoustical recording equipment distorted the true sound of the bands as they would have been heard in person. Ear-witness accounts of early Jazz bands of the turn of the century, like Buddy Bolden's band, vary widely. Nothing that they played was written and even if it was, it would be of little value. No musical notation has yet been devised that accurately describes the feel of an improvised performance.
Even the geographic location of the earliest Jazz experiments and the parties involved have been the subject much controversy. Many Jazz writers have pointed out that the non-Jazz elements from which Jazz was formed, the Blues, Ragtime, Brass Band Music, Hymns and Spirituals, Minstrel music and work songs were ubiquitous in the United States and known in dozens of cities. Why then, they reason, should New Orleans be singled out as the sole birthplace of Jazz? These writers are overlooking one important factor that existed only in New Orleans, namely, the black Creole subculture.
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