Walton Arts Center
HS Learning Guide
Lower Elementary | Performance Guide
Jazz Is What You Make It
Photo credit: Roland Godefroy
Ideas for Curriculum Connections
Arkansas Learning Standards: SL.9-10.D, SL.11-
Jazz Is What You Make It! is a concert experience which identifies jazz
as an American phenomena while visiting the various styles and eras of
jazz history. Performed by the Fayetteville Jazz Collective, the concert
mixes a healthy dose of performance with informative dialogue. Band
members demonstrate how jazz has influenced contemporary and
popular music while emphasizing the fundamental character of jazz as
self-expression, individualism and improvisation. Jazz is presented as
a uniquely American, democratic process and connected to the rich
legacy of jazz in the Natural State with a tip-of-the-hat to the music of
Louis Jordan.
12.D; SL.9-10.2, SL.11-12.2
Fine Arts Standards Music: P.6.5.3; CRA.SL.1;,
R.7.7.1, R.7.8.1; R.7.7.3, R.7.8.3; R.8.6.1, R.8.7.1,
R.8.8.1; CN.10.6.1, CN.10.7.1, CN.10.8.1; CN.11.6.1,
CN.11.7.1, CN.11.8.1, CN.11.6.2, CN.11.7.2,
CN.11.8.2.
Music Appreciation: P.4.MA.1; P.5.MA.1;
P.6.MA.2; R.7.MA.3; R.9.MA.1.
Jazz Band: P.6.JBI.4; R.7.JBI.1 and 2; R.8.JBIII.1
History: Era 5.5
Duke Ellington his band, 1937, Photo Credit: Frank Driggs—Frank Driggs Collection/Hulton Archve/Getty Images
The Art Form
Jazz is an American art form and an international
phenomenon! Born in America, jazz music can be seen as
a reflection of the diversity and individualism of this
country. Jazz is a product of cultural collaboration and a
universal language of tolerance and freedom. At its core
are openness to all influences and personal expression
through improvisation. Throughout its history, jazz has
straddled the worlds of popular music and art music, and
it has expanded to a point where its styles are so varied
that one may sound completely unrelated to another. Jazz
is partly planned and partly spontaneous; that is, as the
musicians perform a pre-determined tune, they have the
opportunity to create their own interpretations within that
tune in response to the other musicians’ performances
and whatever else may occur “in the moment” -- this is
called improvisation and is the defining element of jazz.
The Program
Jazz Is What You Make It! begins with a contemporary pop
song re-arranged as a jazz composition. Audiences
immediately recognize the song, and are drawn in to
discover that jazz is not a particular tune; rather it is a way
to express music through syncopation, harmonization and
improvisation. This opens the door to discovering how
jazz thrives on change & new influences, and how it is an
influence itself, helping to bring innovations in rock and
roll, funk, hip hop and rap. The program continues with
original compositions plus iconic standards that
demonstrate traditional forms of jazz like Swing, New
Orleans, Latin, and Fusion. The members of the
Fayetteville Jazz Collective ignite the stage with virtuosic
solos that demonstrate the art of improvisation as well as
tightly arranged ensemble playing.
Jazz Is What You Make It! / Learning Guide
The essence of jazz as a democratic process is revealed
in performance by individuals freely choosing their
improvisations, but in a manner which enhances the whole
group. Jazz musicians realize the music is better because
each player is different – it doesn’t matter what your
ethnicity, age or background is; what matters is who you
are inside and how you play.
The history of jazz in Arkansas is highlighted with the
music of Louis Jordan, a pioneering American musician,
songwriter and bandleader who was popular from the late
1930s to the early 1950s. Known as “The King of the
Jukebox”, he was popular with both black and white
audiences in the later years of the swing era.
The Musicians
The Fayetteville Jazz Collective was founded in 2009
as a professional jazz ensemble comprised entirely
of musicians and educators active in and around the
Northwest Arkansas area. The FJC seeks to preserve and
enhance the jazz tradition through education of young
audiences, aspiring musicians, and the general public.
The Fayetteville Jazz Collective has been featured
around the 4-state region of Northwest Arkansas
with performances at the Walton Arts Center with the
Symphony of Northwest Arkansas, Crystal Bridges
Museum of American Art, University of Arkansas
Commencement Ceremonies, Bentonville Arts Festival,
University of Arkansas Summer Band Camp and Arend
Art Center with the Arkansas Philharmonic Orchestra.
What is Jazz?
Where Did Jazz Come From?
healing songs, fertility songs, etc. From
• Instruments - most of the instruments
used in jazz originated in Europe
African music, jazz got its:
(saxophone, trumpet, piano, etc.)
Jazz was born in New Orleans about 100
• Musical improvisation comes from both
years ago (early 20th century), but its roots
• Rhythm and “feel”
can be found in the musical traditions of both
• “Blues” quality
Africa and Europe. In fact, some people say
• Tradition of playing an instrument in your
traditions.
that jazz is a creative blending of traditions
own way, making it an “extension” of the
Both origins are essential to jazz. It is
from African and European music.
human voice
unquestionably art music; however, it
has been and continues to be utilized as
From 1619 to well into the 1800s, men,
Contrary to the basic concept of African
functional music as well (e.g., for dancing,
women and children wre brought to the
music as functional music, the basic
atmosphere background music, even funeral
Americas from Africa as slaves. Labor was
concept of European music was art and
music in the 1920s); it has been performed
forced upon them, and they were denied
entertainment. From European music, jazz
everywhere from the most prestigious
many basic rights. In their new communities,
got its:
concert halls (e.g., Carnegie Hall, Lincoln
music played a functional (not artistic) role.
• Harmony - that is, the chords that
Center, Los Angeles Music Center, The
African American, both enslaved and free,
accompany the tunes (the chords played
John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing
shared music in work songs, spiritual songs,
on the piano); jazz harmony is similar to
Arts, etc.) to the lowliest street corners and
classical music’s harmony
dancehalls.
Herbie Hancock, 2006
America’s Music
Born in the United States over 100 years ago, Jazz is America’s
music. It is the best music to represent America because:
• Jazz is an example of democracy in action. Each member of the
band has the individual freedom to express their musical ideas.
Along with that freedom comes responsibility to the group. In
other words, individual musicians have the freedom to express
themselves on their instrument as long as they maintain their
responsibility to the other musicians by adhering to the overall
framework and structure of the tune.
• Jazz music is a melting pot and it represents all the cultures and
races that participate.
• Jazz is partly planned and partly spontaneous; that is, as
the musicians perform a pre-determined tune, they have the
opportunity to create their own interpretations within that tune
in response to the other musicians’ performances and whatever
else may occur “in the moment” -- this is called improvisation
and is the defining element of jazz.
• People are constantly improvising. We all improvise daily
in conversation, walking down the street, choosing our
wardrobe and through countless choices we make on the spot.
Improvisation is the key element of jazz.
[email protected] / www.waltonartscenter.org
Photo Credit: Fayetteville Jazz Collective
A Timeline of Arkansas and Jazz History
1803
The land between the Mississippi River and Rocky
Mountains, including what would become Arkansas, is
sold to the United States.
1830
Storytelling and “Arkansas Traveler,” played on fiddle and
banjo are entertainments in the early settlements in
Arkansas Territory.
1836
The US Supreme Court rules “separate but equal
facilities” is constitutional in Plessy v. Ferguson.
1899
Scott Joplin’s Maple Leaf Rag becomes the most
successful piano rag for the era. Eugene Staples, known
as the King of Rhythm, and his orchestra play hot jazz.
1910
A new kind of jazz music started in New Orleans and
spread across Arkansas.
1920
Touring “territory bands” like the Synco Six of Helena and
Brady Bryant’s Salt and Pepper Shakers with Louis Jordan
emerged in Arkansas. Their music included the blues,
ragtime and boogie-woogie traditions that contributed to
the sound of Kansas City Jazz.
1925-1930
1942
Jazz vocalist, Al Hibbler, who studied at Arkansas School
for the Blind, began singing with Duke Ellington’s Band
and recording popular jazz records. The widespread use
of radio and phonograph records helped spread jazz
music in popular culture.
1955
Two innovative jazz musicians, Bob Dorough and Louis
Thomas Hardin advance the art of jazz through their
compositions and performances.
1957
Nine African American students struggle to attend Little
Rock Central High School. Civil rights struggle gains
national attention. Arkansas Gov. Faubus opposes
President Eisenhower. Jazz artist Charles Mingus records
Fables for Faubus including lyrics like: “Oh Lord, don’t let
them shoot us. Oh Lord, don’t let them stab us...”
1960
Jazz musicians witness racial prejudice in America and
are active in integrating orchestras, and performance
venues. Musicians and audiences helped bring cultural
and political changes including advancement in civil rights
that led to integration in the United States.
1970
Jazz artists fuse the improvisational style of jazz with
classical music, Latin music, swing, funk and ballad.
Arkansas musicians like Lawrence Leo “Snub” Mosley
and Hayes Pillars were among the first black artists to
perform jazz on the radio
1980
1936
1990
Little Rock, Arkansas hosts the biggest jazz artists touring
in the United States and became frequent stops for
leading jazz artists.
Arkansas celebrates 100 years of statehood.
Jazz Is What You Make It! / Learning Guide
Robert Ginsburg began producing Shades of Jazz, on
KUAF-FM in NW Arkansas.
The Arkansas Jazz Heritage Foundation is established.
2015
The Jazz Initiative at Walton Arts is created.
Jazz in the Natural State
With New Orleans, Louisiana, and Kansas
major jazz musician, pianist Alphonso E.
Jimmy Pryor’s Imperial Serenaders, one of
City, Missouri, emerging as the booming
“Phonnie” Trent led one of these bands,
a number of El Dorado bands whose short
urban epicenters of jazz music and
The Alphonso Trent Orchestra, which
tenures were a result of the city police’s
inevitably spilling this music and culture
became “the most idolized and advanced
crackdown on Prohibition-era nightclubs.
across interstate lines, Arkansas began to
band of the Southwest.” Another ground-
Ultimately, Louis Thomas Jordan—vocalist,
see a number of touring “territory bands”
breaking Arkansas musician was Louis
bandleader, and saxophonist—ruled the
sprout up around the state in the late 1910s
Jordan. In 1925, future icon Louis Jordan
charts, stage, screen, and airwaves of
and early 1920s. Territory bands were
began making a name for himself playing
the 1940s and profoundly influenced the
dance bands that crisscrossed specific
alto saxophone in Brady Bryant’s Salt
creators of rhythm and blues (R&B), rock n’
regions of the United States from the
and Pepper Shakers out of Brinkley
roll, and post–World War II blues.
1920s through the 1960s, disseminating
Arkansas. The mid-to-late 1920s also saw
popular music including swing, jazz, and
an emergence of jazz in El Dorado (Union
dance music, to remote gin mills and
County), driven by the number of dance
dance halls that were otherwise ignored by
halls popping up in the wake of the city’s
national booking agents. Arkansas’s first
oil boom. There, Jordan played briefly in
Louis Jordan, Photo Credit: William P. Gottlieb
Top 20 Jazz Recordings Everyone Should
Hear:
• The Original Dixieland Jazz Band – The Creators of Jazz
• Fats Waller – Handful of Keys
• Louis Armstrong – The Complete Hot 5 and Hot 7
Recordings
• Louis Jordan – Choo Choo Ch’Boogie
• Coleman Hawkins – The Essential Sides Remastered
• Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker – Town Hall, New York
City, June 22, 1945
• Duke Ellington - The Complete Ellington – Indigos
• Thelonious Monk – Genius of Modern Music, Vol. 1
• Dinah Washington – First Issue: The Dinah Washington
Story
• Wes Montgomery – The Incredible Jazz Guitar of Wes
Montgomery
• Modern Jazz Quartet – Django
• Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers – Moanin’
• Horace Silver – Song for My Father
• Miles Davis – Kind Of Blue
• Ornette Coleman – The Shape of Jazz to Come
• Mario Bauza – The Tanga Suite
• Dave Brubeck – Time Out
• John Coltrane – Giant Steps
• Sonny Rollins – Saxophone Colossus
• Keith Jarrett – The Köln Concert, 1975
• Wynton Marsalis Septet – Live at the Village Vanguard
[email protected] / www.waltonartscenter.org
Learning Activity
Music has the unique characteristic of communicating
emotions to every human being, regardless of language,
culture, or nationality. That is why music is found in every
culture, is a multi-billion dollar industry and many listeners
would agree that they are emotionally affected far more by
music than even the most beautifully expressed words.
•
With jazz, because of its improvisational aspect, the
musicians are communicating the “emotion of the
moment;” that is, the emotion they are feeling while they
are performing (remember, when improvising they are
deciding what notes to play as they respond to the music
of the moment and of the other musicians).
• In this way, jazz is different from classical music which
is written down (composed) ahead of time, transcribed
and played to express the emotion of the composer.
• In jazz, most of the music heard during a solo
is “spontaneously composed” by the musicians
themselves and played the way the musicians feel at
that given moment.
• The spontaneity heard (or “felt”) in jazz requires the
requires the audience to be actively listening to the
ever-changing aspects of a given interpretation of a
tune.
Every time you have a conversation you are improvising.
What you are going to say is not planned ahead of time;
it depends on what is discussed during the conversation;
what you say, then what your friend says, and so on. Jazz
musicians do the same with their instruments, but rather
than using words to communicate, they use they use
musical instruments and musical conventions; it’s literally
a musical conversation.
Dizzy Gillespie
A helpful analogy: classical music is to jazz as reading
a good book aloud is to having a good conversation;
while a printed book never changes, a conversation
changes according to the a conversation changes
according to the situation, moment or partner.
What Is Improvisation?
Improvisation is inventing something on the spur of the
moment and in response to a certain situation; in jazz, it
is when musicians perform a different interpretation each
time they play the same tune, i.e., a tune is never played
the exact same way twice; the improvisation becomes its
own musical dialogue between band members without
any preconceived notion of what the final outcome will be.
In the late 1930s Gillespie worked his
jazz music in the 1940s, helping to create
Trumpet (1917-1993)
way through a succession of big bands,
another jazz genre of enormous popularity
Biography: www.dizzygillespie.com/
earning a reputation as a talented performer
and importance.
and en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dizzy_Gillespie
and free spirit worth of the nickname,
“Dizzy.”During this period great connections
Consider the following questions as you
John Birks Gillespie, better known as
were made with fellow musicians, including
read the biography of Dizzy Gillespie:
“Dizzy,” was born in 1917 in Cheraw, South
the great saxophonist Charlie “Bird” Parker
• How did Dizzy Gillespie become
Carolina. He began playing piano at the
and the pianist Thelonious Monk. During
age of four and took up the trombone and
their jam sessions at New York Clubs,
trumpet at 12. Even though he earned
Gillespie, Parker and Monk established
a music scholarship to North Carolina’s
an entirely new sound in jazz: bepop. This
Laurinburg Institute at the age of 15,
new style took the jazz world by storm
throughout his high school years he was
and established Gillespie’s international
essentially self-taught.
reputation. Dizzy Gillespie also pioneered
the fusion of Afro-Cuban rhythms with
Jazz Is What You Make It! / Learning Guide
interested in music?
• What influence did he have on other
famous jazz musicians?
• What are Gillespie’s most famous
contributions to Afro-Cuban music?
• Why did he play on a trumpet with a
special, raised bell?
Focus Questions
When students respond to a performance from the point
of view of an actively involved listener in a live, theatrical
setting, they understand our world by interpreting what
they experience. Students learn through live performances.
Questions teachers ask before and after the performance
help students discover more. For students, the learning
process of seeing and responding prompts future inquiry.
Before the Performance
Interpret the Work
• Synthesize your thoughts. How does everything you
notice fit together to make meaning?
• Using your descriptions and analysis, develop your
interpretation of a song or the performance.
• What ideas might the artist have tried to convey?
• What issue was the artist concerned with?
• Can you connect your own experience with any
moments in the song?
• Have you heard jazz music?
• Can you think of the name of a jazz musician?
• Compare a jazz song to storytelling. How are they alike?
• Research two important artists in jazz history (Great
examples on page 3) How did they contribute to the style of
music we call jazz?
• Do you think people feel better when they express
themselves in music?
• What are instruments that make the sound of jazz?
• Does the song mean something to you personally?
• What other meanings might it have?
• Did the artist express a universal feeling or idea?
Analyze Artist Choices
• Notice the elements that made the performance.
• How did the musicians in the Fayetteville Jazz
Collective relate to each other?
Help your students listen to, analyze, describe and evaluate
the performance, Jazz Is What You Make It! Use some of
the questions on this page to guide your students. The
questions help students develop and expand their responses.
Practicing the reflective process helps students be more
specific in describing what they experience.
Describe the performance of one song in
as much detail as possible.
• What instruments were used?
• Describe the quality of voice.
• Describe the rhythm.
• Performances are made of several elements including:
what you see, what you hear and what you feel. How do the
genres of music, storytelling and the performing arts work
together?
• Performances share visual aural and emotional
experiences.
• What did you see, hear and feel?
• What choices did the artist make that you noticed?
• How did the musical elements of tempo, pitch, and
dynamics convey mood?
• What instruments did you notice? How did the choice
of instruments shape the musical idea?
• When and how did the artist choose to use his voice
to convey the story or feeling?
• Did text relate to the music?
Performances are made of several elements
including what you see, what you hear and what you
feel. How do the genres of music, storytelling and the
performing arts work together?
Performances share visual and emotional
experiences. What did you see, hear and feel?
[email protected] / www.waltonartscenter.org
Volume 14 Number 3
Colgate Classroom Series performances
help students meet Arkansas Learning
Standards.
Duke Ellington and his band
Learn more at:
www.waltonartscenter.org
Learn More Online
• History of Jazz In Arkansas
www.encyclopediaofarkansas.net/encyclopedia/entry-detail.aspx?entryID=5037
Walton Arts Center
• The Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz: jazz lesson plans and jazz resources
Learning & Engagement
Laura Goodwin, Vice President
www.jazzinamerica.org/Home
Dr. Patricia Relph, Arts Learning Specialist
• Jazz At Lincoln Center
Mallory Barker, School Services Specialist
www.jazz.org/
Meghan Foehl, Engagement Coordinator
As a part of Lincoln Center’s page, view live webcasts, explore their video library and
Sallie Zazal, Learning Coordinator
browse image galleries
www.jazz.org/media/
For more information about Jazz at Walton
Arts Center:
• Connect to the Northwest Arkansas Jazz Society whose mission is to present,
Robert Ginsburg, Jazz Curator
preserve, promote, and celebrate the great American art form known as jazz through
479.571.2751
education, concert presentation and artist promotion.
[email protected]
www.digjazz.com
• Arkansas Jazz Heritage Foundation: dedicated to educating the general public
Find us on Facebook!
about the historical significance of jazz in Arkansas
Walton Arts Center
www.arjazz.org/
Learning & Engagement
Walton Arts Center 2016/17 Learning programming is generously
supported by these funders, sponsors and benefactors:
Education Sponsors:
Colgate-Palmolive
JB Hunt Transport Services, Inc.
Octagon
Prairie Grove Telephone Co.
Tyson Foods, Inc.
Unilever
Education Partners:
Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art
Northwest Arkansas Education Service Cooperative
UA Center for Children & Youth
Education Grantors:
Arkansas Arts Council
Bank of America
Baum Charitable Foundation
The John F. Kennedy Center
for the Performing Arts
Murphy Foundation
Walmart Foundation
The Walton Family Foundation
Windgate Charitable Foundation
Become a Friend!
Close to 800 Friends of Walton Arts Center support learning programming with their annual support.
Become a Friend today and help Walton Arts Center continue to serve 45,000 students over the next year.
Name of Performance/ Performance Guide
Additional support for arts education programs comes from Candace and David Starling and all Friends of
Walton Arts Center.
For more information on the Friends of Walton Arts Center program, please call 479.571.2759 or
visit www.waltonartscenter.org/support
Special Program Support for Jazz Is What You Make It!:
Northwest Arkansas Jazz Society