And All That Jazz

Jazz Poetry Florence Paisey MDC-West

Bob Dylan, at work

Jazz Poetry like jazz music grew out of discontent with mainstream, conventional art and society. African Americans kicked off the movement in New Orleans with sounds and rhythms that expressed their African origins and cultures. 1

Jazz Poetry Origins

Jazz Poetry like jazz music grew out of discontent with mainstream, conventional art and society. African Americans kicked off the movement in New Orleans with sounds and rhythms that expressed their African origins and cultures. 2

And All That Jazz.Counterculture & Themes

Jazz musicians poets broke with convention and invented their own rhythms based on African rhythm, gospel, slave songs, spirituals, and poetic techniques used in religious sermons. African Americans were seeking their identity as a people and struggling for their civil rights and individual destinies while also expressing their sense of loss and sadness out of this gloominess, blues poetry was born and a conversational dialogue call and response -- between musicians and poets emerged. Arts expressed their innermost feelings SOUL and this sense continues today in rap and hip-hop. This cultural ferment and African American sub-culture in New Orleans gave life to jazz music and some poetry early in the 20th century. Gradually, the popularity of jazz grew, affected all the arts, particularly literature. F. Scott Fitzgerald coined the term Jazz Age denoting the permissive, flamboyant arts and lifestyle of the 1920s. With jazz popularity and recognition as an artistic genre, the unconventional rhythms of music, poetry, and forms in art spread, finally finding its epicenter in Harlem, New York. 3

Jazz Poetry Movements

Do I Dare Disturb the Universe? T. S. Eliot

This cultural ferment and African American sub-culture in New Orleans gave life to jazz music and some poetry early in the 20th century. Gradually, the popularity of jazz grew, affected all the arts, particularly literature.

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Harlem RenaissancePioneer Poets: Hughes, McCay, Cullen

F. Scott Fitzgerald coined the term Jazz Age denoting flamboyant arts and lifestyle of the 1920s. With jazz popularity and recognition as an artistic genre, the unconventional rhythms of music, poetry, and forms in art spread, finally finding its epicenter in Harlem, New York. Langston Hughes, Claude McCay, James Weldon Johnson, Countee Cullen5

The Dream Keeper.Harlem RenaissanceLangston Hughes

Langston Hughes became Harlems pioneer in jazz poetry and one of the first poets to collaborate with jazz musicians. Dream Keeper is a well known poem; here Hughes talks about dreams and recites his short poem. We can still relate to Hughes feelings about dreams. 6

The Beats 1950s and 1960sBreaking the RulesProvocative, Permissive, Bohemian

Out of the Jazz Age especially the fissure Jazz launched with convention, a group of disenfranchised, restless, free-spirited poets, musicians, actors, and artists came together. Among them were Allan Ginsberg (poet), James Dean (actor), Bob Dylan, Woody Guthrie, and Jackson Pollack.

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The BeatsGinsberg, Kerouac, Ferlinghetti

Our of the Jazz Age and particularly the fissure Jazz launched with convention, a group of disenfranchised, restless, free-spirited poets rose. They were disillusioned with white, middle class, repressive, alienated, corporate culture that grew following WWII. During the War everyone understood the need for efficiency, but after the war, Americans, Europeans and Russian dissidents wanted freedom of expression and creative lifestyles. The movement begin in San Francisco with a small group of writers and musicians. Allan Ginsberg become the poet-leader; his poem Howl evokes the reckless, protests against the establishment of the 1950s. 8

Black Arts MovementAmiri Baraka and Black Power

The Black arts movement took off in the 60s and is associated with the civil rights movement, black power, and racial identity it reflects many of the same themes and concerns as artists in the Harlem Renaissance. 9

Black Arts MovementNoted Poets of the Black Arts Movement:

Gwendolyn BrooksNikki GiovanniLucille CliftonRita DoveWelton SmithDudley Randall

Political & Religious thinkers included:

Malcolm XMartin Luther King Jr.

The Black Arts concept related broadly to the Afrrican Americans desire for self-determination and nationhood. Jazz has taken on many forms, but underneath all is a sense of inner, personal expression; political dialogue, and the quest for self determination and identify. 10

Black Arts, Jazz Poetry, BeatsJazz BluesDixielandRagtimeSwingBebopBossa novaLatin JazzRock n RollRhythm & BluesRapHip-hop

The Evolution in Word and Tune

Some forms of jazz music and poetry.11

Jazz Age and the Harlem Renaissance

Harlem by Langston Hughes (rap) What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry uplike a raisin in the sun?Or fester like a soreAnd then run?Does it stink like rotten meat?Or crust and sugar overlike a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sagslike a heavy load.

Or does it explode?

Langston Hughes, Claude McCay, James Weldon Johnson, Countee Cullen12

And All That JazzRhythm & Blues TodayTurning Tables by Rudy Francisco

Rudy Francisco13

And All That JazzRap, Rhythm & Blues, Hip-hop

Did you hear about the rose that grew from a crack in the concrete? 2pac

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Make Life Your Song

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null59714.8null73952.055null87537.055The Rose That Grew From Concrete (Album Version)Nikki GiovanniThe Rose That Grew From Concrete, track 12/25, disc 1/12000Rap & Hip-Hop155488.17eng - Amazon.com Song ID: 208837631