Charlie Parker Research Paper

     The music called Jazz was born sometime around 1895 in New Orleans. It combined elements of Ragtime, marching band music and Blues. What made Jazz such a different perspective of traditional music was its act of improvising. There was a widespread use of improvisation often by more than one player at a time. Songwriters would write the music down on a piece of paper, and then the Jazz musicians would try their best to play the music. Usually in a Jazz piece, musicians would use the song as a starting point to improvise around. Jazz musicians would play a familiar song to the audience, and by the time they were done with the piece they would stir up a totally different feeling away from the

Ferdinand Joseph “Jelly Roll Morton” LaMenthe was born in New Orleans, Louisiana on October 20, 1890. As a child he began to learn how to play the piano at age 10 years old. He was taught by Tony Jackson; compose of songs like “Pretty Boy” and other hits. Tony Jackson is among the few musicians whom Morton admired and respected. Jackson was also known to him as the greatest single-handed entertainers in the world. After his mother’s passing, Morton began playing in gigs in the bordellos of the Storyville district of New Orleans. In New Orleans he became active as a gambler, pool shark, and many more things that made him get kicked out by his grandmother. With him doing all of this gambling she didn’t want his sisters to see that life that he was going down.

The person whom invented Jazz was born in uptown New Orleans on September 6, 1877 to Alice and Westmore Bolden. Charles “Buddy” Bolden grew up in one of the most musically rich cities in all of the United States during the time, and it would have great influence in his life. As a young man, Buddy made money as a barber, however his heart was truly in his music. The cornet was his instrument, and he could play like nobody else. He was famously known as “The King” because of how well he played the cornet, as well as his public demand and popularity.

in Kansas City and became one of the most famous jazz musicians of all time. He led us

Then by 1949 was when the real business started. Miles went solo. With the tremendous amount of experience he accumulated, the recordings he had made, the people he knew, and with the 'hook-ups' Miles developed, he should not find any difficulty finding success in the evolution of Jazz.

Jazz music can be likened to a progressive work of art. Throughout its history, Jazz music theory and techniques are continuously advancing and reforming as musicians pursue their interests by seeking new methods of expression. Jazz evolution is perpetual, and can take the form of incorporation of new techniques, adoption of more intricate harmonies and rhythms, or establishment of more elaborate melodies (Gioia). The early 1940s saw an increase in the number of Jazz modernists. As swing music declined in popularity due to various effects of the Second World War, Jazz branched into two very contrasting musical styles. The first of these new and unique styles of Jazz, called Bebop emerged in the 1940s, and was the product of numerous jam sessions in back rooms and after-hours clubs. The movement that unfolded in the later 1940’s and 50’s, called Cool (sometimes referred to as West Coast Jazz) came as a response to Bebop’s later demise. Even though Bebop and Cool stemmed from the big band music of the swing era, their differences are apparent. From its conception, to its musicians, to its audiences, Bebop and Cool came into the Jazz timeline for different reasons. Nevertheless the two musical movements ultimately left a long-lasting and distinctive influence on Jazz music, which is still manifested in Jazz music today.

People also called him Charlie Chan, Yardbird, Sparrow, Bird. Influence on music Charlie Parker’s big influence on jazz is that with Dizzy Gillespie they both invented the musical style called bop or bebop. He developed a new style of jazz called bebop. It was different from the dance, or swing, style that was popular for years.

Charlie Parker was a co-leader and then leader of a quintet and he became famous by mocking and perfecting the styles of others he observed while working in New York. He was not initially famous and had to work his way up to stardom, and he also suffered a drug and alcohol addiction that caused him to decline as a musician in his later years. Dizzy Gillespie started off in a good place in the music industry, playing in New York and becoming one of the fist soloists in the Cab Calloway Orchestra. Eventually, he got fired from his trumpeting position and started working with Parker and would have jam sessions in his home with many musicians discussing chord progressions and bebop in general. Later in life, he focused on big band and added cuban

Charlie Parker and other Bebop musicians played regularly at Minton’s Playhouse on 118th Street in Manhattan. They loved challenges. Kenny Clarke would drum with them. It is known that he changed the way he drummed in the 1930s because of how fast the tunes he played with the Teddy Hill band were. He couldn’t play quarter notes on the bass drum so he would keep the beat on the cymbal instead, which produced a lighter, more flexible way to play, and also allowed for the bass drum to be used for other rhythmic ideas. Hill was not fond of this new way of drumming so in 1940 he let Clarke go. Minton offered Clarke the job of running the music at Minton’s Playhouse. Clarke’s style was perfect for jam sessions and his combination of snare

Bebop is the first stylistic shift the represented the movement away from the current jazz, the Swing. In this style of music, the chord usage becomes lot more complex using extensions such as 9th, 11th, and 13ths but also the flatted 5ths. Improvisation has also been greatly developed. The improvers now used the underlying chords as their basis of improvisation with combination to virtuosic quick notes in a successful complex rhythm. Jam session is another important aspect in Bebop as this is where the young and old musicians informally gather together to play their own ideas of Jazz, not the standard way of the Swings.

Jazz songs in the Bebop style usually have a higher tempo relative to other styles. The reason is that Bebop jazz, emphasizing speed and agility, required unprecedented mastery of the instrument (lesson 7). Therefore, bop harmonies and melodies were more complex than any jazz style that

Charlie Parker, known for his musical genius and contributions to the bebop movement in post WWII America is a huge influence on Coleman’s music. The performance included the use of many characteristics developed within the bebop movement. The use of combo instrumentation between Coleman, Grand, and Finlayson; the utilization of the jam-session format which included the

Utilized almost exclusively for dancing, the music of the big bands borrowed heavily from the techniques introduced by Henderson. Among the most popular bands were those led by Goodman, Glenn Miller, Woody Herman, the Dorsey brothers, and Artie Shaw. As a counterpart of the highly arranged orchestrations of these New York-based bands, a Kansas City swing style developed under the influence of Count Basie and Bennie Moten that emphasized a blues

When I thought of jazz before I took this course, the Cool style Jazz is what would come to mind. I am a fan of the more relaxed way of playing personally, and I love the classical influence that is found in Cool. This new style could have been a rebellion against the more complex and ‘hot’ Bebop, or it could have simply been society swinging back like a pendulum the way it often does, and favoring something different.

Bebop is a style of jazz that was developed in the early to mid-1940s in the United States. Bebop was developed during the 1940’s and is one of the most artistic styles of jazz music. The word Bebop focused more of the freedom of creativity rather than rhythmic aspects. The word bebop is an onomatopoeic of a staccato two-tone phrase distinctive in this kind of music. Bebop also gave soloists more room for improvisation. Bebop differs from the composition of the swing era and is characterized by fast tempos, asymmetrical phrasing, intricate melodies, and rhythm sections that expand on their role as tempo-keepers. It appeared to sound racing, nervous, erratic, and fragmented. To jazz musicians and music lovers, bebop was a beautiful revolution in the art of jazz.