Blog Music

We may never really know when and where the flute tradition first began in North America. Whatever its origin, the native flute became an important part of the musical heritage of North America. Most of the ancient predecessors of the native flute were elaborate derivatives of the whistle. Usually lumped together with the simple whistles, perhaps a separate category should be created and called something like “whistle flutes. ” This would include the multiple holed “whistles” made of bone and stone found in a variety of ancient sites throughout the country. Another ancient flute-like instrument was the Hopewellian panpipes, made of varying lengths of bone pipes sheathed in a copper band. The Hopewell culture also had single bone whistles, some with multiple holes. One made of a human bone seems to have been used in a fertility ritual. As we trace the origin of the most common Native American flute, that being the two-chambered duct flute, we encounter mystery. We know for certain that a flute tradition did exist, but when it began is unknown. Chronicles of travelers and explorers make mention of the existence of flutes. A native flute is first mentioned as far back as the 1500s in the chronicles of explorers who rampaged through both the Southeast and Southwest. They unfortunately do not describe the flutes – what they were made of, what they looked like or how they sounded. A native flute is again mentioned in the writings of numerous individuals traveling during the 1700s, primarily in the Eastern part of the country. Although many describe them as being made of cane or reed, they again do not describe what they looked like or how they sounded. However, we do have a few examples from this period and all are single chamber designs. It must be recognized that both the legends and the chronicles are discussing the native flute as it existed in the historic period, which began in the early 1400s. We can surmise from the early descendents of the previous cultures that flutes existed in ancient times, but since no ancient North American culture established a written form of their language, we must turn to artifacts to establish existence and dates. The difficulty in the eastern part of the country is that no organic objects have been found in their natural state. According to Dr. Vernon James Knight, Associate Professor of Anthropology at the University of Alabama and Curator of Southeastern Archaeology at the Jones Archaeological Museum, especially in the southeast, no flute artifacts have been found at any of the known sites from this period. He suspects that these flutes were made from perishable materials and did not survive. In the southwest, with its drier climate, organic artifacts of many types have been found, including native flutes. In 1931, archeologist Earl H. Morris led an expedition to the Prayer Rock district of northeastern Arizona. Accounts of Morris’s expedition identify the area as Atahonez Canyon. The valley is on the Navajo Indian reservation in Arizona. Morris’s team excavated 15 caves. The largest cave contains 16 dwellings and was later named Broken Flute Cave. His team unearthed thousands of artifacts. Among them were four wooden flutes that have been dated between AD 620 and 670. In one dwelling, two almost completely intact flutes were discovered. The broken pieces of two other flutes were recovered from another dwelling. All four flutes are constructed of Box Elder and had six holes. According to Clint Goss, who personally examined these flutes, the playing style is similar in principle to the Japanese Shakuhachi. “The mouth hole is largely covered by the lips (maybe 70%) and the player blows across the portion of the rim of the mouth hole that has not been covered by the lips. ” This indicates a design different from what we now know as the contemporary native flute. We simply cannot find the origin of the contemporary native flute design in ancient times. Zadjik Productions. “Ancient Period History. ” Native American Flutes. 27 Aug. 2009 [http://www. zadjik. com/flutes/].

After I had received a general overview of the history of the Orlando area in the Orange County Regional History Center, I wanted to delve a little deeper into the social history of the Orlando area, and the Wells Built Museum of African American History and Culture was going to give me a more in-depth look into Orlando’s African American history. To this day this area west of I-4 is primarily inhabited by African Americans and the difference in housing and facilities between this area and the downtown area is quite notable. As a matter of fact, the very name “Division Street” points to a distinct historical line of demarcation between black and white residential areas. The origins of the Wells Built Museum date back to a prominent local African physician by the name of Dr. William Monroe Wells who started building the Well’s Built Hotel in 1926 to provide lodging to African Americans during an era of segregation when accommodations were not available to them in other areas of Central Florida. Next door to the Wells’ Built was once the South Street Casino, a performance hall, which featured musicians that traveled the ‘Chitlin Circuit’ performing for audiences all over the country. The hotel opened with three storefronts on the first floor and hotel rooms on the second floor. Dr. William Monroe Wells was one of Orlando’s first black physicians and came to the area in 1917. Born in Ft. Gaines, Georgia, in 1889, Dr. Wells completed his medical training at Meharry Medical College. During part of WWII, Dr. William Monroe Wells was the only African American physician in Orlando. During segregation, white physicians did not treat African American patients. African American doctors, therefore, earned their money from people of their own race. He worked very hard to serve the growing African American population in Orlando. With the help of his assistant, Mrs. Josie Belle Jackson, Dr. Wells is known to have delivered over 5,000 babies in Orlando. He treated patients who suffered from pneumonia, influenza, scarlet fever and other serious illnesses before drugs like penicillin were introduced. Many of Dr. Wells’ patients were extremely poor. He treated their illnesses though they many times could not afford to pay his fee. This allowed them to speak forcefully against poor conditions that existed in the African American community without fear of losing their livelihood. Although African Americans were taxpayers like other residents of Orlando, they did not have access to recreational facilities, good schools, police protection, health care and other services that were provided to white citizens. This led him to build the South Street Casino and the hotel next door. Dr. Wells booked bands and other big name entertainers to perform at the South Street Casino. Many famous performers that we know today played at South Street Casino within the Chitlin Circuit. A few examples of these performers are: - Ray Charles - B. B. King - Louis Armstrong - Guitar Slim - Bo Diddley African Americans came from all over the surrounding areas to Orlando to shop and take in performances of popular musicians at the South Street Casino. After the performances at the casino, the artists checked in at the historic Wells’ Built Hotel. In its heyday, the Wells’ Built provided lodging for clientele such as Pegleg Bates, Ella Fitzgerald, Roy Campenella, Thurgood Marshall, and Jackie Robinson. The entertainers and athletes who frequented this establishment made it one of the most popular venues for African Americans in the South. Today the museum features over 6,000 square feet of display space. It retains the original hotel facade, a guestroom featuring authentic furniture, beading and decorations of the 1930’s, and also bears an original interior wall reflecting important architectural elements and designs unique to the period. Exhibition material collected for display include: official hotel documents, an original Negro League baseball jersey, photographs, artifacts, books, multi-media exhibits, slave records and other items of historic significance. Dr. Well’s home has been moved to the site of the Casino and will be restored and opened to the public. The Well’s Built Museum of African American Culture and History is located just west of I-4 near Church Street at 511 West South Street, Orlando 32801, tel. (407) 245-7535. This entire article including photos is located at http://www. travelandtransitions. com/stories_photos/orlando_wells_built_museum. htm

Jazz became organized as a musical genre in the United States in the early 20th century, but its roots originated in the l9th century in the South. The Atlantic Slave Trade brought over half a million Africans to America and with them came musical influences from their native land. As African americans learned to play European instruments in the 19th century and developed their own styles of music, like the cakewalk. The Cakewalk is a combination of harmony and syncopation. It became very popular and caught on among white folk, and was played in minstrel shows. Toward the end of the 19th century, a new style of music emerged called ragtime. After the abolition of slavery, opportunities to learn opened up to many African americans. However, there were not many job openings. Many talented African americans took jobs as musicians in minstral shows, in bars and clubs. Ragtime was created in the red-light districts of New Orleans and was a modifcation of the march, characterized by polyrhythms and syncopation. It was very upbeat and perfect for dancing. Ernest Hogan was a black entertainer who first recorded ragtime on sheet music in 1895. It became very popular music and was even adopted by white musicians in America and in Europe. The ragtime is considered the first type of jazz music. The ragtime carried its popularity into the 20th century. Small jazz groups began to travel and eventually spread the music from coast to coast. Jazz even traveled across the seas. During World War I, the “Hellfighters” infantry band carried ragtime to Europe. By the 1920’s Jazz had become the dominant genre of music in America. Jazz was associated with parties, extravagent behavior and drinking. The peak of Jazz music in the first half of the century lasted from 1920 to 1933. Many believed it was the cause of moral decay in American society. This period was the dubbed “The Jazz Age. ” By the 1930’s ragtime had lost its novelty. A new grand and exaggerated form of jazz was introduced, the big band swing. Big band or swing jazz was composed of a very large section of brass and reed instruments and was headed by a bandleader or an arranger. Some of the most famous bandleaders were Duke Ellington and Glenn Miller. In the 1940’s Swing Jazz introduced a string section and vocals to the big band. Swing jazz was broadcasted over the radio and soon travled to other countries. During World War II, for example, a collection of dissenting german youth known as the “swing kids” adopted swing jazz and swing culture. They would dance and play swing music in defiance to Hitler. He had forbidden any Swing Jazz or swing dancing because of its ties with African-Americans and Jews. During the 1950’s a type of jazz called “cool jazz” was preferred. The 1950’s was a decade of conservatism and the jazz music of the period definitely reflected that. Cool jazz was a toned-down version of jazz, where the big band reduced in size and sound. The 1960’s and 1970’s saw a new forms of jazz with the introduction of Latin cultural influence rock and roll and soul. In the 1960’s Afro-cuban jazz became popular, but was soon replaced by Brazilian Jazz. Latin jazz combined traditional jazz with unconventional instruments like bongos, morracas and different types of flute. Into the 1970’s soul jazz was formed from a mixture of soul, blues and gospel music. The unique thing about soul jazz was that the solo instrument was typically an organ, which was very new to jazz music. Finally the 1970’s saw a rise in rock and roll. Jimmy Hendrix was famous for infusing jazz with rock and roll and established a form of jazz- jazz infusion. In the recent history jazz has been experimented with and a plethora of subgenres have emerged like, pop fusion or “smooth jazz”, jazz rap, nu jazz and even vocal jazz.

Jazz is an American art form whose roots date back to the mid-19th century slave songs and chants. The early 20th century saw the art form blossom as instrumental music in the southern United States, mainly along the Mississippi river and specifically New Orleans, Louisiana. Early instrumental jazz combos of New Orleans varied in instrumentation. More often than not, these early jazz groups generally consisted of trumpet, clarinet, trombone, tuba and drums. This instrumentation became what is known as the “dixieland” combo, making its way up the Mississippi river to Chicago where the music became popularized by jazz greats such as Louis Armstrong. Dixieland combos can be thought of as groups that play “polyphonic” improvisational music. Each instrument is independent of every other instrument, with each player creating separate musical improvisations based on known melodies, or “tunes” of the day. The players of these early jazz combos each had a separate role within the group. The trumpet player was depended upon to state the melody of the song, while the clarinet would improvise complex lines above him. The trombonists role was to improvise or “fill in” the middle register with lines and notes that were essential to the chord changes of the song itself. The tuba player (or bass player) generally laid down root notes (and 5ths) of each chord on beats 1 and 3 of each measure. The tuba served as the harmonic anchor for the group. Lastly, it was the drummers role to keep everyone together by keeping a steady beat throughout the entirety of the song. As jazz music developed throughout the 1940s and 1950s, jazz combo instrumentation began to become more standardized. The jazz “quintet” and “sextet” became very popular during this time. The quintet consisted of trumpet and alto (or tenor) sax as the main melodic instruments while the rhythm section (piano, bass and drums) took care of rhythm and harmony. The sextet added a trombone to form what essentially was a three horn front line, with rhythm section accompaniment. The extra melodic instrument of the sextet made it possible for the horns to add more harmonic depth to the sound of the group. Each instrument had a role not only as a melodic voice, but also as an integral component of the harmonic structure as well. Modern jazz combos consist of a variety of instrumentation – 4, 5 horn combos are common place. As the group grows in size however, the name “combo” is replaced by “band” or “little big band”. The jazz combo has provided a musical and creative outlet for countless musicians over the last 100 years. The jazz combo continues to provide jazz musicians the opportunity to work together to make music not only as a group but also to develop their own voice as individual jazz improvisers. It is, and probably always will be, the perfect vehicle for learning the art of jazz improvisation.

Irish Americans number over forty-four million, twelve percent of the total American population, the only larger ethnic group are German-Americans. The largest Irish-American communities are in Chicago, Boston, New York City, Baltimore, Philadelphia, Kansas City and Savannah, Georgia. Irish people and been emigrating in considerable numbers to the States since the 1760s, however it was during and after the Great Famine of the 1840s that literally millions sailed west across the Atlantic. After 1860, Irish immigration into America continued with family reunification attracting people into the major cities where Irish ghettos were established. They were hired by Irish labour contractors to work in labour gangs on the railroads, streets and other construction projects, Irish men also found employment in the police departments, fire departments. Many departments maintain large ‘Emerald Societies’, bagpipe marching bands or other units demonstrating their Irish heritage. A large number of Irish Catholic women took jobs as maids in middle class households and hotels. Although they started very low on the social scale, by 1900 they had improved themselves and were on a par with the average wage. After 1945, they began to enter the higher ranks of the social hierarchy, this was especially a result of their high rate of college attendance. The annual celebration of St. Patrick’s Day is the most widely recognised symbol of the Irish in America when all things Irish are celebrated, the New York parade attracts upwards of two million people. According to the latest census, the Irish language ranks sixty-sixth out of the three hundred and twenty two languages spoken today in the U. S. , with over twenty-five thousand speakers.   Russell Shortt is a travel consultant with Exploring Ireland, the leading specialists in customised, private escorted tours, escorted coach tours and independent self drive tours of Ireland. Article source: http://www. exploringireland. net

As anyone who saw a campaign poster in 2008 could surely tell you, Barack Obama is all about change. Change in the White House, most profoundly in the simple, yet stunning, fact that we now have our first black president. Change in the tenor of politics, in an effort to step back from the ferocious partisanship of the past decade. And change in the direction of the country, in the form of a dramatic shift in the priorities and policies of the government. Yet change, Obama also knows, can be frightening. Too much change can seem radical, threatening, dangerous. During the campaign, Obama had to overcome the deep-seated fears of many Americans that his particular brand of change would only mean change for the worse. So Obama has always made a conscious effort to balance his calls for change with equal references to the timeless continuities of American history, seeking to cast his own political movement as nothing more than the culmination of the work of Lincoln, Roosevelt, Jefferson, Kennedy, and the other great leaders of our past. (Obama deliberately began his campaign, for example, in the same place that Lincoln began his own run for the White House, and ended it by taking the oath of office on Lincoln’s bible. )Obama’s best speeches have all been peppered with historical allusions and quotations. Over the course of the campaign, Obama breathed fresh life into some of the most moving phrases offered in the past by Lincoln (“a new birth of freedom”), Martin Luther King (“the fierce urgency of now”), and Cesar Chavez (“yes we can”). This morning’s inaugural was no exception to Obama’s tradition of using the past to frame the present, as the inaugural address was full of historical allusions—some obvious, some not so obvious. So what exactly was Obama referring to with each of his invocations of the past? Let Shmoop be your guide…Forty-four Americans have now taken the presidential oath. The words have been spoken during rising tides of prosperity and the still waters of peace. Yet, every so often the oath is taken amidst gathering clouds and raging storms. At these moments, America has carried on not simply because of the skill or vision of those in high office, but because We the People have remained faithful to the ideals of our forbearers, and true to our founding documents. Actually, only 43 presidents have taken the oath. (Grover Cleveland, who won the presidency in 1884, lost it in 1888, and won it back again in 1892, counts as both President #22 and President #24… so while there have been 44 distinct presidencies, there have only been 43 different presidents. ) Aside from that bit of random trivia, the new president’s point here is to emphasize the continuity of the presidential transfer of power, in times good and bad, as prescribed in the Constitution (that’s what Obama’s invoking in his references to “We The People” and “our founding documents”). Our journey has never been one of short-cuts or settling for less. It has not been the path for the faint-hearted—for those who prefer leisure over work, or seek only the pleasures of riches and fame. Rather, it has been the risk-takers, the doers, the makers of things—some celebrated but more often men and women obscure in their labor, who have carried us up the long, rugged path towards prosperity and freedom. For us, they packed up their few worldly possessions and traveled across oceans in search of a new life. For us, they toiled in sweatshops and settled the West; endured the lash of the whip and plowed the hard earth. For us, they fought and died, in places like Concord and Gettysburg; Normandy and Khe Sahn. Time and again these men and women struggled and sacrificed and worked till their hands were raw so that we might live a better life. They saw America as bigger than the sum of our individual ambitions; greater than all the differences of birth or wealth or faction. Here Obama invokes the experiences of a wide variety of Americans, from all walks of life, in triumphing over adversity. Those who “packed up their few worldly possessions and traveled across oceans in search of a new life” would include both the first European settlers of America—the rugged colonists of Jamestown and the Puritan refugees of Plymouth Rock—but also the later generations of immigrants who poured into the country through most of the 19th and 20th centuries. Those who “toiled in sweatshops and settled the West” were the factory workers of America’s industrial revolution and the pioneers of Manifest Destiny. The “the lash of the whip” is both an obvious reference to slavery and, perhaps, a sly reference to a line in Abraham Lincoln’s second inaugural (“every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword”). Concord and Gettysburg and Normandy and Khe Sanh were momentous battles of the Revolutionary War, The Civil War, World War II , and Vietnam War, respectively. …As for our common defense, we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals. Our Founding Fathers, faced with perils we can scarcely imagine, drafted a charter to assure the rule of law and the rights of man, a charter expanded by the blood of generations. Obama’s reference to a false “choice between our safety and our ideals” is almost certainly meant to echo Benjamin Franklin’s famous dictum that those who “give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. ” The main peril faced by our Founding Fathers—Franklin among them, of course—was defeat and punishment at the hands of the British. The “charter” they drafted, the “charter expanded by the blood of generations” throughout American history, is the Constitution of the United States. …Recall that earlier generations faced down fascism and communism not just with missiles and tanks, but with sturdy alliances and enduring convictions. They understood that our power alone cannot protect us, nor does it entitle us to do as we please. Here Obama refers to American victories in World War 2 (over fascism) and the Cold War (over communism), both of which were achieved not only through force of arms but also through effective diplomacy—the Grand Alliance with Britain, the Soviet Union, China and France in World War 2, and the NATO alliance of Western powers against the Soviet bloc in the Cold War. …This is the meaning of our liberty and our creed—why men and women and children of every race and every faith can join in celebration across this magnificent mall, and why a man whose father less than sixty years ago might not have been served at a local restaurant can now stand before you to take a most sacred oath. These words were perhaps Obama’s most direct (yet still fairly subtle) reference to the profound racial significance of his election as President of the United States. Throughout the Jim Crow era, Washington, DC was essentially a Southern city—which is to say a segregated city. As late as the early 1960s, when Martin Luther King came to the city leading the March on Washington, the most admired black man in America was still only able to stay and eat in certain establishments inside the city’s African-American districts. …So let us mark this day with remembrance, of who we are and how far we have traveled. In the year of America’s birth, in the coldest of months, a small band of patriots huddled by dying campfires on the shores of an icy river. The capital was abandoned. The enemy was advancing. The snow was stained with blood. At a moment when the outcome of our revolution was most in doubt, the father of our nation ordered these words be read to the people:“Let it be told to the future world…that in the depth of winter, when nothing but hope and virtue could survive…that the city and the country, alarmed at one common danger, came forth to meet [it]. ”America. In the face of our common dangers, in this winter of our hardship, let us remember these timeless words. With hope and virtue, let us brave once more the icy currents, and endure what storms may come. Let it be said by our children’s children that when we were tested we refused to let this journey end, that we did not turn back nor did we falter; and with eyes fixed on the horizon and God’s grace upon us, we carried forth that great gift of freedom and delivered it safely to future generations. Obama closed his speech by invoking the bitter winter of 1776, which George Washington and his soldiers spent in camp at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania. American prospects in the Revolutionary War at the time looked bleak, as Washington’s men shivered and starved through the long winter knowing that they would soon have to go into battle against a fearsome British Army that regarded each and every one of them as a traitor to the crown. The most famous quotation to emerge from the ordeal at Valley Forge was, interestingly, one that Obama chose not to use—Thomas Paine’s declaration that “These are the times that try men’s souls: The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of his country; but he that stands it NOW, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. ” While our own predicament as Americans facing difficult circumstances in early 2009 can hardly compare to the hardships endured at Valley Forge, Obama’s choice to end his inauguration by invoking the nation-making struggles of our forebears was almost certainly offered in the hopes of restoring a sense of national unity and purpose similar to that fostered by George Washington two centuries ago. If Obama succeeds in that, he will surely join Washington in the pantheon of great American presidents.

The 20th century music world has seen the entry of light and easy listening music with African-American jazz music. Originating in southern USA, jazz music is a combination of African and European music traditions. It puts together the use of blue notes, improvisation, syncopation and swing notes.
Jazz music was first used in reference to music from Chicago early in the 20th century. It has evolved in several other subgenres such as New Orleans Dixieland, big band-style swing, bebop, Afro-Cuban jazz, Brazilian jazz, jazz-rock fusion, and the more recent acid jazz.
The realm of jazz music was and still is predominantly associated with the American black community. These black musicians transitioning from banjos and tambourines learned to play European instruments such as the violin. Black slaves from early America used to sing and play music as a form of spiritual or ritualistic hymns.
After emancipation, employment opportunities for black slaves were very limited as segregation laws were still in force. Most of these black slaves found themselves in the entertainment industry as piano players and instrumentalists. They became low-cost entertainers as minstrels, vaudeville players, piano bar players, and marching band members. Soon, this kind of jazz music called Ragtime Jazz spread from the southern USA to other areas in the western and northern cities in USA.
Ragtime jazz became very popular in the early part of the century. Musician Jelly Roll Morton published the first ever jazz arrangement in print in 1915 with the title Jelly Roll Blues. This printed arrangement brought forth a new breed of musicians playing ragtime. Ragtime music moved on from red-light district bars and vaudeville shows to major concert locations such as the Carnegie Hall.
The first jazz record was recorded in 1913 by Society Orchestra, the first black group to come out with a record. Another group that came up with their very own jazz music recording is the “Original Dixieland Jazz Band”. Other bands followed suit, releasing jazz music recordings starting in 1917. In 1922, the most famous blues singer of the decade, Bessie Smith, also released her first recording. Also in the 1920s, Jelly Roll Morton played with the New Orleans Rhythm Kings and made history as the first mixed-race recording collaboration. Big bands like those of Fletcher Henderson, Duke Ellington and Earl Hines played the more prominent venues and paved the way for the development of big-band-style swing jazz.
Louis Armstrong, a trumpeter, band leader and singer, came to be known as the Ambassador of Jazz, what with his early innovations in jazz music. Swing music is considered to be popular dance music and is played from printed musical arrangements. Then came the bebop which focuses more on small groups and simple arrangements.
Throughout the years jazz music has always been preferred music genre among those who enjoy light and easy listening. There are radio stations that play only jazz music. Jazz music can be heard most everywhere hotel lounges, salons, concert halls, wedding receptions, Jazz music is perhaps also the most unique form of music as there are no two jazz music performances are ever the same.