Tin Pan Alley Flashcards
How does the rising popularity of Jazz relate to the centre periphery model?
> jazz emerged as one popular style during the 1920s. > Thinking about the centre-periphery model, jazz crossed the boundary between periphery music (African American folk tradition) to mainstream pop (as dance music, novelty music, and “deviant” youth culture).
Tin Pan Alley continued and wasn’t threatened by the new music (or its sales). Tin Pan Alley composers and publishers held most control. Unlike most jazz bands, Tin Pan Alley had the strength of ASCAP behind them.
How did Tin Pan Alley adapt to the rise of Jazz?
> Their music also thrived as romance songs (their pieces had singers, while a lot of jazz was instrumental music).
Tin Pan Alley composers absorbed new musical ideas from Ragtime and jazz as well (brining periphery music styles to the mainstream and changing them for wider appeal).
Tin Pan Alley tunes were also used by some early jazz bands to cross the boundary between jazz and pop (jazz players paying royalties to ASCAP).
By the 1930s, jazz changed into Swing, and most of that repertoire was based on Tin Pan Alley tunes. In other words, jazz and Tin Pan Alley coexisted with a relationship that was mutually beneficial.
Who was Irving Berlin?
> A Russian Born immigrant (Baline was name before change) whose family settled in New Yorks Lower East Side
he began working in music as a child, eventually becoming a song plugger and songwriter. By 1910 he (and other Tin Pan Alley composers) was using the idea of “Ragtime” successfully.
Post WW1 he founded a production company and theater.
He would become part of the bedrock of Broadway (and hit musical movies by the 1930s).
What was Tin Pan Alleys role in song standardization?
Tin Pan Alley of the 1920s and 30s was responsible for solidifying standard song forms.
> In Ragtime (“Maple Leaf Rag” and “Castle House Rag”) we saw how song forms were more complex. The ragtime form had more repeated sections (like AA, BB, CC, etc.) to create melodic interest. Musically speaking, we call this thematic development: taking a musical theme and altering in it subsequent sections.
> There generally isn’t thematic development in popular music
What were Tin Pan alley songs about?
The music was for entertainment only, and that anything difficult, troublesome or controversial was to be avoided: > the role of a song was to help the listener forget the real world and its problems.
What was Crooning? Who were some popular crooners?
crooning is linked between music and personal experience—the microphone allowed for a “private experience” rather than previously recorded (and performed) music that required vocalists to be loud (and sometime obnoxious
> instead it allowed vocalists to speak to the listener
> Al Jolson (though he didnt start as one) Bing Crosby, Gene Austin, Ruth Etting
What is a standard in terms of Tin Pan Alley? Example?
Tin Pan Alley songs, which are now considered part of the “Great American Songbook,” with wide appeal are the bulk of the repertoire for popular song until Rock and Roll (and even continue to be recorded today).
> “I Got Rhythm” is likely the best example. Not only is it recorded by many performers, jazz musicians from the 1930s to the 1950s wrote hundreds of pieces based on “I Got Rhythm.”
What is rhythm changes?
> Jazz musicians would take the chorus of “I Got Rhythm” and play that AABA form—the specific chord progression of the form—and play it over and over, excluding the verses.
Rhythm changes” specifically refers to the chord changes in the chorus of “I Got Rhythm.” So, jazz musicians would play “Rhythm changes” and compose new melodies and improvise new phrases over that chord progression.
In performance, the newly composed melody is played, then band repeats the AABA form (the chorus) multiple times and soloists take turns improvising over those chord changes.
