Understanding Jazz: Swing and Bebop

Swing and Bebop
SWING

There has never been a more popular style of jazz than swing, and today there is a tremendous ressurgence of interest in this style. Today just as in the 40’s, it is centered around dancing. The Swing Era has also been dubbed the BigBand Era. It was during this time that literally hundreds of bands were playing for thousands of dancers in every city, town and hamlet. The "name" bands had very individual sounds that could be heard on the radio every night into the wee small hours of the morning. Their leaders became as famous as movie stars and had fiercely loyal followers.

GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS

1. Larger groups. Sections of instruments. Saxes, trumpets, trombones and rhythm.
2. Use of written arrangements with less space for improvisation.
3. No collective improvisation due to the number of players.
4. Most bands usually had a featured vocalist. (Frank Sinatra)
5. Each "name" band had an identifying feature.
6. The total package was important: dress, music stands, risers, backup vocal group, etc.

There were two very distinct "classifications" of big bands. White and black. Each one had different characteristics and styles of playing. The white bands, Benny Goodman, Tommy Dorsey, Artie Shaw, Glenn Miller received the bulk of the publicity, air time and movie footage. These bands were made up of very accomplished players who were excellent readers. The emphasis was on the ensemble rather than on the individual soloist. These bands had a national reputation and toured extensively. One of the most important people in these organizations was the arranger.

He was the person responsible for the sound of the band by how he would arrange the music for the individual players. Of course he had to satisty the leader of the band who may or may not have given him guidelines to work within. With a band of good readers the arranger could experiment with various techniques and provide a steady stream of new music. This was an important factor in maintaining a band’s popularity.

The black bands came from a different background that was largely more rural than urban. These bands, Count Basie, Andy Kirk, Benny Moten, etc. began as territorial bands. Bands that played and stayed in one certain locale. Oklahoma City, Dallas, Kansas City, which at that time were much more rural than today, were centers for territorial bands. The musicians in these bands were not good readers if they could read at all. They did not have the benefit of teachers, concert halls and the like. They were much more connected to the black vocal tradition of the blues and gospel music. The music of these bands was based largely on the blues and "riffs" and were also known as "riff" bands. (A riff is a short melodic statement that began life as a background for players waiting their turn in jam sessions and would be played just to keep their "chops" fresh and harkens back to the call and response pattern found in African music.) The black territorial bands put a greater emphasis on swinging and soloing than their white counterparts. There were however, several black bands that were quite polished and in a different category than the territorial bands. The bands of Fletcher Henderson and Jimmie Lunceford are two such bands.

One of the seeming paradoxes of the big band era was the fact that a number of really excellent soloists emerged from it. Coleman Hawkins, Benny Goodman, Lionel Hampton, Roy Eldridge, Gene Krupa, Benny Carter and Johnny Hodges to mention a few. The big band set-up of written arrangements and less solo space would seem to indicate the opposite.

The importance of radio to the swing era cannot be over-emphasized. It was through nightly broadcasts that the bands would develop an audience so that on their tours their concerts and dances would be jam packed. It was not an uncommon sight for a dance hall in the middle of nowhere to have 4 or 5 thousand people in it on a Saturday night to dance to one of the "name" bands.

BEBOP

Bebop was the first style to be classified as "modern" jazz. Like other styles it did not suddenly burst on the scene but developed gradually from the swing era. It was not as popular as swing and at the time caused great disagreement among fans and players alike. In the study of jazz, styles that follow one another are often the excact opposite of the preceeding style. Such is the case with bebop.

Bebop differed from swing in many ways that fall under the broad categories of performance practices and aspects of style.

The following fall under performance practices.

1. The preferred size and instrumentation of the bebop group was the small combo and not the big band.
2. The clarinet and rhythm guitar did not make the transition to bebop and were rarely seen or heard.
3. Bebop tempos were much faster which led to a greater display of technical virtuosity on the part of the players.
4. Where the big bands had elaborate arrangements, the bop quintet usually played the heads (melody) in unison.
5. Where the big bands were for dancing and catered to the dancers, bebop was almost strictly for listening and had none of the trappings of the big band.

In the area of stylistic changes there were many.

1. Bebop melodies were extremely complicated, full of notes that seemed to leap wildly and were unsingable.
2. Harmonies were also much more intense and varied than in the swing era.
3. Improvising took on a new importance and led to very long solos.
4. The general feeling of bebop was frantic to say the least.
5. The rhythm section became more responsive to the soloists and was not concerned with keeping time for a bunch of dancers. They supported the soloist and freely used accents called "bombs."

The main innovators of the new music were "Dizzy" Gillespie, trumpet; Charlie "Bird" Parker, Alto Sax; Thelonius Monk, piano: Bud Powell, piano; Charlie Christian, Guitar: Kenny Clarke on drums. Bebop began to crystallize in the 40’s at a place in New York Citry called Minton’s Playhouse. It was at after hours jam sessions at Minton’s that these players experimented with the new music. There was also a dark side that involved the heavy use of drugs by many of the players. This resulted in a lot of bad press, especially when its greatest practitioner, Charlie Parker, died at the age of 34 from a lifetime of drug use.

Bebop is still a viable style and can be heard on many Cds and in live performance. It is a special kind of jazz that not eveyone can play because of the high demands on creativity and execution. We say it generally separates the men from the boys and the sheep from the goats. There are several excellent videos and books on each of the "inventors" and I would highly reccommend that you check them out.