BEBOP

1940S - MID 1950S

Bebop Characteristics
Performance aspects differing from swing
Small combos (3 - 6 members)
Faster tempos than swing band tempos
Clarinet and rhythm guitar rarely used in bebop
Higher instrumental proficiency
Bebop became the 1st style of jazz that was not used for dancing
Bebop musicians
Disassociated from their own audience, their own employers, non-jazz
musicians, and even from other jazz musicians
Trying to raise the level of jazz from dance music to a chamber art
form
Status of jazz performer - from entertainer to artist
Drugs effect on bebop musicians
 Bebop Characteristics
The shift to bebop
Mintons playhouse - the hippest jazz club in NY
The first jazz style that was not used for dancing
Bebop was not enthusiastically accepted by the jazz community at
the time of its emergence
The origins of bebop - hard to determine
The word "bebop" is usually stated to be nonsense syllables
Bebop did not have the same large audience enjoyed by the swing
bands
Jazz, in general, despite of its popularity was not viewed as an art
form by the general public
Bebop was the era from which the majority of our jazz giants
emerged
 Bebop Characteristics
Bebop Compositional Aspects
Complex melodies
Large melodic intervals
Abrupt changes in melodic direction
Highly syncopated, rhythmically quick and unpredictable
Original melodies commonly based on popular song chord progressions
Blues form used often
Bebop arranging
Melodies in unison (trumpet and sax together)
Usually improvised lines
Standard format
1 chorus melody, improvisations, and 1 chorus melody again for end
of the tune
Faster tempos not danceable
Charlie Parker
Alto saxophonist

Called Yardbird or simply

Bird

Credited as THE originator

of bebop

1943 - NY, central figure of

group of musicians including
Dizzy, Monk and Clark

Charlie Parker
Charlie Parker
Parker's sound - dry with slow vibrato, the opposite of all favorite that time

Improvising concept
constructed solos on upper structure chords
syncopated accents on particular notes
double time feel even in ballads
influenced all the great players from then on: Coltrane, Powell, Stitt
and Gillespie

Parker also became an icon for the hipster subculture and later the Beat
generation, personifying the conception of the jazz musician as an
uncompromising artist and intellectual, rather than just a popular
entertainer.

Suggested Viewing Bird

 Dizzy Gillespie
Trumpet player
Called Dizzy
Together with Charlie
Parker, he was a major
figure in the
development of bebop
and modern jazz.
He was instrumental in
founding Afro-Cuban
jazz
Manteca the Dizzy Gillespie
first Latin Jazz
tune
 Dizzy Gillespie
Gillespie was a trumpet virtuoso and gifted
improviser, building on the virtuoso style
of Roy Eldridge but adding layers of
harmonic complexity previously unknown
in jazz.

In addition to his instrumental skills,

Dizzy's beret and horn-rimmed spectacles,
his scat singing, his bent horn, pouched
cheeks and his light-hearted personality
were essential in popularizing bebop,
which was originally regarded as
threatening and frightening music by many
listeners raised on older styles of jazz.

He had an enormous impact on virtually

every subsequent trumpeter, both by the
example of his playing and as a mentor to
younger musicians. Dizzy Gillespie on The Muppet Show
Influenced: M. Davis, R. Rodney, F
Navarro, K. Dorham, T. Jones Dizzy Gillespie & Louis Armstrong - Umbrella Man
Bebop Pianists
Bud Powell
Classically trained pianist
Created the model of bebop piano
Approach derived from Tatum with bop phrasing of Parker and
Gillespie
Modern comping--two or three note chords
Thelonious Monk
Piano-composer, co-founder of bebop, approach derived from
Waller-stride piano playing and Ellington's percussive comping
Improvisation style: avoided the difficulties of finger dexterity
Technical virtuosity (rapid scales, arpeggios) was not characteristic
Compositions--difficult chords, symmetry, unique logic, shifting
accents
 Bebop Musicians
Kenny Clarke - drums
House-drummer at Mintons Playhouse w/ Gillespie,
Monk, C. Christian, B. Powell
4/4 pulse from bass drums to ride cymbal
Bass drum and snare--independent background accents

Oscar Pettiford - bass

Bass-cello-bandleader, first bassist to apply virtuosity of
Blanton within bebop context
Co-leader with Dizzy, worked with Ellington
 Bebop Musicians
Oscar Peterson piano
Style derived from Tatum and Powell
Extraordinary technique

Max Roach drums

House-band at Monroes Uptown House with Bird & Diz
Developed K. Clarke's style into bebop

Modern Jazz Quartet

John Lewis-piano-arranger-composer
Milt Jackson-vibraphone; warm bluesy melodic lines w/ slow vibrato
Bebop Musicians
J.J. Johnson - Trombonist-composer
Paved the path for trombonist in the bop style
Active composer, particularly for TV and movies in the 70s
Sonny Stitt - alto-tenor sax, "Lone Wolf
Recording over 100 records
The greatest disciple of Charlie Parker
Sonny Rollins - tenor sax
One of the last still living legends of jazz;
Still performs very actively throughout the world
Clifford Brown trumpet
An influential and highly rated musician
Considerable influence on later jazz trumpet players
Cool Jazz & Third Stream
 Cool Jazz
Cool Jazz markedly different from the complexities of
bebop
Relaxed tempos, subtle instrumental colors
Expanded ensembles
Chamber ensembles-performing in more intimate setting
Intricate arrangements and innovative forms
Little or no vibrato
New meters were added like 5/4, 9/4 (Odd, Irregular meters)
Typical symphonic instruments
String instruments -violin, viola, cello
Woodwinds - flute, oboe, French horn
Flugelhorn - like trumpet, a darker, more mellow sound
 Miles Davis
Trumpet player, Composer/arranger

Innovative band leader

Leading personality among the

giants of jazz

He was not destined to be known

only for his contribution to the
development of cool jazz but rather
he was an innovative force in the
evolution of jazz

Posthumously inducted into the Rock Miles Davis

and Roll Hall of Fame on March 13,
2006.
 Miles Davis
Widely considered one of the most influential musicians of the 20th century
Davis was at the forefront of almost every major development in jazz from
World War II to the 1990s.
He played on various early bebop records and recorded one of the first cool
jazz records.
He was partially responsible for the development of modal jazz, and jazz fusion
arose from his work with other musicians in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

Belongs to the great tradition of jazz trumpeters that started with Buddy Bolden
and ran through Joe "King" Oliver, Louis Armstrong, Roy Eldridge and Dizzy
Gillespie
He was never considered to have the highest level of technical ability.

His greatest achievement as a musician, however, was to move beyond being

regarded as a distinctive and influential stylist on his own instrument and to
shape whole styles and ways of making music through the work of his bands,
in which many of the most important jazz musicians of the second half of the
Twentieth Century made their names.
 Miles Davis
Important in the development of improvisational techniques incorporating modes
rather than the standard chord changes

Daviss tone is straight with very little vibrato, long tonesepitomized the cool
attitude

Many critics consider his album Birth of the Cool as the beginning of the
Cool Jazz

Always searching for new, fresh, exciting ways to play his music

Befriended Jimi Hendrix and were going to record an album together

Hendrix died

Of all the stylistic periods contributed to or initiated by Davis, it was the cool
period which he is most connected
Gil Evans
Arranger, composer, pianist, and
bandleader

His arrangements made use of string

instrument as as well as nontraditional
jazz instruments

Influenced by Duke Ellington

The music of Cool Jazz was much

associated with Gil Evans

His contribution to Cool Jazz was as

important as Davis's.
Gil Evans
Dave Brubeck & Paul Desmond
Dave Brubeck piano
Much of his music employs unusual time signatures (Odd meters).

His long-time musical partner, alto saxophonist Paul Desmond, wrote

the Dave Brubeck Quartet's most famous piece, "Take Five", which is
in 5/4 time and has endured as a jazz classic. Brubeck experimented
with time signatures through much of his career, recording "Pick Up
Sticks" in 6/4, "Unsquare Dance" in 7/4, and "Blue Rondo la Turk"
in 9/8.

In 1954 he was featured on the cover of Time Magazine, the second

jazz musician to be so honored (the first was Louis Armstrong).

Paul Desmond alto sax

Known to have possessed an idiosyncratic wit, he was one of the most
popular musicians to come out of the West Coast's "cool jazz" scene.
Cool Jazz Performers
Modern Jazz Quartet
Piano, Vibraphone, Bass, Drums

Gerry Mulligan-baritone sax

Line For Lyons - Classic example in the Cool Jazz repertoire

Stan Getz sax

With Astrud Gilberto The Girl from Ipanema

Chet Baker trumpet/flugelhorn

Specializing in relaxed, even melancholy music`
West Coast Jazz
Late 1940s-cool style on the West Coast
Lighthouse at Hermosa Beach-center of activities
Competition between East Coast and West Cost Cool
Jazz
Most of West Coast musicians - white, associated with
Swing band tradition
Most of East Coast musicians - African American,
associated with the bebop style
West Coast musicians working in Hollywood studio
orchestras
Influences of Western European classical music
Third Stream
Combines elements of Jazz and 20 Century art
music
Extension of the cool compositional style

Gunther Schuller
One of the key figures in contemporary classical music.
Schuller coined the term third stream in a lecture
Thus describing a style that is a synthesis of classical
music and jazz
Third Stream
In 1981, Schuller offered a list of "What Third Stream is
not:
It is not jazz with strings.

It is not jazz played on classical instruments.

It is not classical music played by jazz players.

It is not inserting a bit of Ravel or Schoenberg between

be-bop changesnor the reverse.

It is not a fugue played by jazz players.

Third Stream
From Jazz:
Language, gestures, improvisation, and
rhythmic drive

From Classical:
Instrumentation (orchestra, string quartet, etc.),
forms (fugue, suite, concerto, etc.), and
compositional techniques

 Hard Bop 
(Funky, Gospel Jazz)
Characteristics
Hard (more driving)

Bop (return to the elements of the bop style)

Funky (rhythmic feeling)

Gospel Jazz (funky + elements of early Gospel

music)
Characteristics
The Hard Bop style was more improvisational and
emotionally based
Used highly rhythmical melodies and less complex
harmonies

Happy sound, lacked tension and frustration

Bop elements which were generally simplified

Borrowed elements from African American church

music
Cool jazz and Hard bop
Cool Jazz
European compositional techniques
Often called West Coast jazz - centered in California

Hard bop/Funky
Adopted the truly American, and oral idioms found in
gospel and blues
Centered in New York
 Art Blakey
One of the inventors of the
modern bebop style of
drumming.

Formed a group called the

Jazz Messengers

Blakeys name became

synonymous with hard drive
and pulsating excitement
Art Blakey
Art Blakey
Along with pianist Horace Silver formed a group called
the Jazz Messengers
Over more than 30 years his band the Jazz Messengers included
many young musicians who went on to become prominent names in
jazz.

Blakey's group is equivalent only to those of Miles Davis in

this regard.

His brand of bluesy, funky hard bop was, and remains,

profoundly influential on mainstream jazz.
Horace Silver
Pianist, composer

Known for his distinctive

humorous and funky playing
style and for his pioneering
contributions to hard bop.

His quintet served as a model for

small jazz groups during the
1950s 1960s

Trained many young players

Excellent composer and arranger

Horace Silver
 Charles Mingus
Bassist, pianist, composer, bandleader

Influenced by Ellington, Charlie

Parker, Thelonious Monk, Negro
gospel music, Mexican folk music

Had a strong approach to composition

and performance

Excellent bass soloist

Charlie Mingus
 Bill Evans
One of the most famous and influential American
jazz pianists of the 20th century
His use of impressionist harmony, his inventive
interpretation of traditional jazz repertoire, and his
syncopated and polyrhythmic melodic lines influenced
a generation of pianists
His works continue to influence pianists, guitarists,
composers, and interpreters of jazz music around the
world.
Moved to the head of the jazz community when
asked to join the Miles Davis group in Kind of
Blue album
Created a new sound for the piano that took the
traditional chords and reshaped them with his own
trademark voicings
During his lifetime, Evans was honored with seven
Grammy Awards and nominations.
In 1994, he was posthumously honored with the
Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award.
Bill Evans
 Free Form 
Avant-Garde
Free Jazz - Characteristics
There is no universally accepted definition of Free Jazz, and any proposed
definition is complicated by many musicians in other styles drawing on free jazz,
or free jazz sometimes blending with other genres.
Free Jazz uses jazz idioms but generally considerably less compositional material
than in most earlier styles
Typically this kind of music is played by small groups of musicians.
Free jazz normally retains a general pulsation and often swings but without regular meter, and often
with frequent accelerando (gradually speeding up the tempo) and ritardando (gradually slowing
down the tempo), giving an impression of the rhythm moving in waves.
Rhythm is more freely variable but has not disappeared entirely.
It is also fairly common for free jazz songs to use an "open vamp" of one chord
for solos
Consciously breaking away from the established tradition
Melody of the tune - often absent
Rhythm would not likely remain the same throughout the performance
Improvisations - not based on a harmony of a popular tune
The more freedom allowed, the more discipline necessary
Ornette Coleman
Saxophonist
One of the major innovators of the free jazz
movement of the 1950s and 1960s.
1st known leader of the jazz avant-garde
One of the most controversial free jazz players
He initiated a controversy of strong, opposing
opinions from many of the other established
jazz leaders, including Miles Davis &
Charles Mingus
1st player to move all the way into harmonic
freedom
Approached the harmonic freedom through
improvisation
Had an extensive background in blues bands
Ornette Coleman was honored with a Grammy
award for lifetime achievement (2007)
Pulitzer Prize for music (2007)

Ornette Coleman
Cecil Taylor
Pianist

Extremely controversial, Taylor is generally

acknowledged as one of the inventors of free jazz.

Attended the New England Conservatory of Music

His music is a fusion of classical compositional

practices and jazz improvisations and can be heard as
either classical or jazz

His music is some of the most challenging in jazz,

characterized by an extremely energetic, physical
approach, producing exceedingly complex improvised
sounds, frequently involving tone clusters and intricate
polyrhythms. At first listen, his dense and percussive
music can be difficult to absorb. His piano technique
has often been likened to drums and percussion rather
than to any other pianists.
Cecil Taylor
 John Coltrane
Saxophonist (tenor/soprano)
Massive influence on jazz, both mainstream and
avant-garde One of the most dominant influences
on post-1960 jazz saxophonists and has inspired an
entire generation of jazz musicians.
Played with Miles Davis
Produced a large, dark, lush sound from his
instrument
Known for his long improvisations (sometimes 40
minutes in length)
Throughout his career Coltrane's music took on an
increasingly spiritual dimension that would color
his legacy. His conception of expression in jazz
became increasingly mystical, Gnostic and
cathartic.
Awards
Coltrane received a posthumous Special Citation from the
Pulitzer Prize Board (2007) for his "masterful
improvisation, supreme musicianship and iconic centrality to
the history of jazz. John Coltrane
Posthumously awarded the Grammy Lifetime
Achievement Award (1992) Saint John Coltrane
 Chicago Style of Free Jazz
Art Ensemble of Chicago
An avant-garde jazz ensemble that grew out of Chicago's AACM in the late 1960s

AEC explore world-based modern jazz music.

Notable for its integration of musical styles spanning jazz's entire history and for
their multi-instrumentalism, especially the use of what they termed "little
instruments" in addition to the traditional jazz lineup
Little instruments" can include bicycle horns, bells, birthday party noisemakers, wind chimes, and
a vast array of percussion instruments (including found objects).

The group also uses costumes and face paint in performance. These
characteristics combine to make the ensemble's performances as much a visual
spectacle as an aural one, with each musician playing from behind a large array of
drums, bells, gongs, and other instruments. When playing in Europe in 1969, the
group were using more than 500 instruments.
 Chicago Style of Free Jazz
Sun Ra & Sun Ra Arkestra (a deliberate re-spelling of "orchestra")
Pianist, composer, arranger, synthesizer player, poet and philosopher known for his "cosmic
philosophy", musical compositions and performances
Quite a controversial jazz figure
Known by several names throughout his career, including Le Sonra and Sonny Lee
Denied his connection with birth name, saying "That's an imaginary person, never existed Any
name that I use other than Ra is a pseudonym.
He abandoned his birth name and took on the name and persona of Sun Ra (Ra being the ancient
Egyptian god of the sun). Claiming that he was of the "Angel Race" and not from Earth, but from
Saturn, Sun Ra developed a complex persona of "cosmic" philosophies and lyrical poetry that made
him a pioneer of afro-futurism as he preached "awareness" and peace above all.
He experimented with electronic instruments
1st composer in Chicago to employ techniques of collective improvisation in big-band
compositions

His music touched on virtually the entire history of jazz, from ragtime to swing music, from
bebop to free jazz
He was also a pioneer of electronic music, space music, and free improvisation, and was one
of the first musicians, regardless of genre, to make extensive use of electronic keyboards.
Free Jazz Controversy

Free jazz performers - considered the most

radical musicians since the bebop era

It remains less commercially popular than

most other forms of jazz.