Which music qualifies as jazz has been a hot topic for over a hundred years. From the beginning there were attempts to both define and separate jazz from the popular music of the time as that popular music evolved from ragtime and waltz music to funk and rock. At some lost moment that effort to distinguish jazz flipped from it being the lesser endeavor to being the more creative and artistically worthy one, America’s art form, distinct, even if popular, from mere pop. This need to categorize, which would eventually invade all styles of music, began with swing gaining dominance in the 1930s which quickly inspired hot clubs, moldy figs, and revivalists to spring up to preserve a sound not yet a generation old. It soon took on a new urgency as in the ’40s swing diverged down at least two major paths into the future. One being bop, and the progression of artistically focused jazz that followed it. The other being what Tad Richards calls small group swing, but at the time became known as rhythm and blues—a style that lent itself to rock ’n’ roll, soul, and everything after. This was the audience focused path.
There was other jazz going on, revival, or otherwise, that did not follow either path, and older musicians who just kept playing how they had, or traveled between styles. The branches on the jazz tree are primarily a critic creation with the artists hopping between them as fluidly as squirrels. That is evident throughout Tad Richards’ new book, Jazz with a Beat: Small Group Swing 1940-1960. While he frequently returns to the theme that small group swing was classified somewhere outside of proper jazz, the musicians filling out the sessions he covers will largely be familiar to Syncopated Times readers. Many had been playing since the 1920s. Many were part of the boogie woogie craze that is intertwined with rhythm and blues. Many became elder statesmen at classic jazz parties in the decades following.
Many of the artists playing what was considered “not jazz” appeared on “proper” jazz albums of the ’50s that traditional jazz lovers still cherish. Some of that material is what comes to mind when I hear his neologism “small group swing.” When I read that in the subtitle I did not picture the big honking sax sound of 1948 or a boogie woogie beat. I expected something more along the line of Flip Phillips. What you might hear on 1950s jazz TV shows or Playboy Mansion parties—classy, and, much of the time, white. Or perhaps simply a catch all term for the smaller jazz band format in the postwar period regardless of style. His need for a new term is that to modern ears the term R&B refers to music of very little relation to the sound of the ’40s and ’50s. By coincidence the current usage has become a catch all for Black popular music that is not rap.
Why was this jazz with a beat Richards refers to, the popular rhythm and blues sound of postwar Black America, excluded from “serious” jazz? A few reasons are suggested. The most obvious is that it was showy and entertaining in a way that was no longer appreciated by critics. By the ’50s jazz was frequently celebrated on TV and radio, finding its way to Newport and civic venues, celebrated as an American art that may also entertain the well read mid-century man. With so much available that was very obviously and assertively jazz, music that was grittier, bluesier, than the current iteration, was easy to exclude. In retrospect the primary reason is that once rock ’n’ roll took over the white youth market, as an obvious close cousin of the rhythm and blues sound, the chance of these records being classified as jazz dropped to nil. The gate keepers of jazz hated rock, and as time went on the rock critics saw rhythm and blues as important only as proto-rock.
A more subtle point made is that this was music that thrived on the surge of small 78 RPM labels in the postwar period. Serious jazz would embrace the LP and extended live performance sessions, but rhythm and blues was meant for three minute plays on the jukebox. Had the same outfit been given seven minutes to flush out a jam there would be less reason to question the artistic value. LPs debut in 1948, and Charlie Parker was an early adopter, but I wouldn’t exaggerate this point. Richards recalls a scene from Kerouac’s On The Road where the young beatniks in Oakland go mad enjoying not Bird and Miles, but a player reminiscent of Big Jay McNeely, with a screaming tenor and wild drums. McNeely happens to be the man playing on his back for a room of ecstatic white kids in the famous photo often associated with that Kerouac passage. The honkers weren’t keeping to three minutes live, and their technicality, their jazz artistry, can be glimpsed even in three minutes.
The book traces the origin of jump blues, as the swing dancers of today refer to this music, to 1942. Illinois Jacquet and Louis Jordan kick off what would become the Black popular music of the next decade or more, a danceable alternative to Bop, rooted most directly in the territory bands of the South West, where many of the musicians had originated. He traces the music through the war, focusing on LA’s Central Avenue, and then on to New York City and elsewhere. Wynonie Harris and Ruth Brown are among scores of artists who get special focus along the way.
In a late chapter he visits New Orleans, which had a unique path through the period, as it often does, with Dave Bartholomew being a driving force. As popular music progressed this music was eventually reabsorbed into the jazz fold as the organ sound of soul jazz and popular artists like Ray Charles. Soon jazz had a wide enough definition to embrace jazz fusion, free jazz, soft jazz, and everything else. In that context, and given the musicians involved, it is odd this music of the ’40s and ’50s was ever considered not jazz, even if, even now, when I listen to the recordings referenced throughout the book, jazz is not the first thing I think of. The rock precursor effect, the blues festival effect, is too strong. I’ve been programmed to hear this music as other than jazz, as much as I enjoy it.
Artists who get mentioned as leaders or sidemen include, Jay McShann, Lionel Hampton, Les Hite, Freddie Slack, Joe Liggins, Lucky Millinder, Wynonie Harris, Eddie “Lockjaw” Davis, Panama Francis, Arnett Cobb, Milt Buckner, Hot Lips Page, Lonnie Johnson, Tiny Bradshaw, Charles Brown, Sid Catlett, Bill Hadnot, Nat King Cole, Charlie Barnet, Red Prysock, Tiny Grimes, Joe Morris, Frank Culley, Ruth Brown, Cootie Williams, Bill Doggett, Jack McVea, Slim Gaillard, Zutty Singleton, Champion Jack Dupree, Sir Charles Thompson, Earl Bostic, Hal Singer, Paul Williams, Milt Hinton, and Norman Granz’ Jazz at the Philharmonic concerts.
I include that list, which could easily be twice as long, to make a point. This was music made by many who already had long jazz resumes going into the late ’40s, and many more who could still be heard at jazz events in the 1990s. Even if the rhythm and blues of the ’40s and ’50s isn’t your favorite music of the time, reading this book fleshes out the musical story of many artists you already know. At 140 pages the book can be read in a day, but is better enjoyed over several with frequent YouTube breaks. A chapter by chapter discography is helpful in this regard. A more concise discography recommends full albums from many of the artists that can be found on CD or streaming.
For a 78 RPM record collector, the exploration of small labels is a highlight of the book. If you have ever wondered why King Records includes both sanctified country string bands and postwar jazz from LA, you will find your answer. The early days of several labels, notably Atlantic, are explored.
Another reward of the book is learning small amounts about a number of artists that were hit makers in their day but are all but unknown now because they don’t fall easily into any established narrative of musical history. Nellie Lutcher was the one of these I found most interesting. After buying a collection of 78 RPM records I befriended the 85 year old man selling it. On a later visit, he asked if I could gather the Nellie Lutcher records I’d taken and trade them for some 1940s Fats Waller 78 RPM albums he had held back. The Lutcher sides were what he wanted to hold onto until the end. That made me give them a good listen before returning them; they are timeless, though no great addition to the jazz canon, but they still moved him almost 70 years on. The book helped me place her within the time period.
Tad Richards is a writer of fiction, non fiction, poetry, and a few songs that have been recorded by others. In an interview about this book on www.jerryjazzmusician.com, he says he pitched the publisher with a discographical work covering the Prestige label, but was wisely redirected to try something less cumbersome. Instead, he decided to give this unrecognized genre of jazz its due. He is convincing in his assertion that though it is thought of today as a precursor to rock ’n’ roll, “jazz with a beat” is valuable in its own right. The sound of a transition period for many musicians. Some would become leaders in modern jazz, others would return to the roots playing Dixieland or vintage swing. Many had their own jazz groups right along but did time as sidemen playing rhythm and blues. Some would evolve with this style into the 60s as it leaned into the organ sound and became accepted as soul jazz.
To me this is the jazz that continued to be played for entertainment, a more fluid development than bop, a more roots and blues orientation than the main stream jazz on TV. The jazz feeling that had them dancing in Harlem and Kansas City kept them dancing to the big fun sound of rhythm and blues. One of the things we appreciate as fans of traditional jazz is the focus on making music with the audience in mind. This music is worth considering as an inheritor of that tradition, and Tad Richards’ book is a wonderful introduction for those who may have dismissed it.
Jazz with a Beat
Small Group Swing, 1940–1960
By Tad Richards
SUNY Press (Excelsior Editions)
sunypress.edu
ISBN (Paperback): 9781438496009; $29.95
ISBN (Hardcover): 9781438496016; $99
