Unit 8

Question 1

Jazz music

Answer 1

contains three main aspects: timeframe, musicians, inspiration

Question 2

Improvisation

Answer 2

the act of creating music in the moment by responding to aspects such as the music of others playing, the atmosphere, and the musician’s inner feelings. (key feature in jazz)

Question 3

Syncopation

Answer 3

Jazz music includes syncopated rhythms. a variety of rhythms played together to make a piece of music, making part or all of a tune or piece of music off-beat.

Question 4

Blues

Answer 4

to a genre of music that, unlike Western classical music, is not produced for performance but rather acts as an expression of anguish and suffering.

Question 5

The Jazz Age

Answer 5

1920s America, the decade in which jazz music arose.

Question 6

Buddy Bolden

Answer 6

an African American cornetist who was regarded by contemporaries as a key figure in the development of a New Orleans style of ragtime music, or “jass,” which later came to be known as jazz.

Question 7

Hot jazz

Answer 7

a form of jazz that emphasized improvisation. The term “hot” refers to the fact that the improvising instruments often built up to a crescendo around the melody, supported by the rhythm section of the band.

Question 8

Swing

Answer 8

a form of syncopation that features a jolty “groove.” Swing music features a strong rhythm section that is fronted by the lead brass section. With medium to fast tempos, swing music encouraged dancing. Just like classic jazz, swing music featured soloists who improvised over the melody line (played by the brass section).

Question 9

Big bands

Answer 9

a type of musical ensemble of jazz music that usually consists of ten or more musicians with four sections: saxophones, trumpets, trombones, and a rhythm section.

Question 10

Bebop

Answer 10

a style of jazz developed in the early to mid-1940s in the United States, which features compositions characterized by a fast tempo, complex chord progressions with rapid chord changes

Question 11

Cool jazz

Answer 11

a style of modern jazz music that arose in the United States after World War II. It is characterized by relaxed tempos and a lighter tone, in contrast to the fast and complex bebop style.

Question 12

Bossa nova

Answer 12

a mix of cool jazz, classical harmonies, and samba rhythms.

Question 13

Free jazz

Answer 13

free-form jazz music without formal arrangements or structures. In fact, the music is almost totally improvised and it can have a very random, chaotic sound. Musicians such as Ornette Colman and John Coltrane pioneered this type of jazz.

Question 14

Louis Armstrong

Answer 14

perhaps the best-known jazz musician of the early jazz periods, and his recordings made with his bands Hot Five and Hot Seven are widely regarded as jazz classics.

Question 15

Scat singing

Answer 15

vocal improvisation with wordless vocables, nonsense syllables or without words at all. In scat singing, the singer improvises melodies and rhythms using the voice as an instrument rather than a speaking medium.

Question 16

Duke Ellington

Answer 16

a prolific composer, musician, and bandleader. During his lifetime, he wrote over 1,000 songs and his music has sometimes been called “beyond category.” Ellington himself liked to call his music “American music” rather than strictly “jazz.”

Question 17

“Count” Basie

Answer 17

founder of a type of jazz known as “Kansas City Swing”

Question 18

“Kansas City Swing”

Answer 18

a subgenre of jazz that incorporated southern African-American elements and musical ideas from Native-American cultures.

Question 19

Billie Holiday

Answer 19

voice spoke of deep emotion and hardship. Despite a relatively short career, and leading what is generally considered by scholars quite a tragic life, Holiday introduced new timings and rhythms that would forever change the way jazz was sung.

Question 20

Ella Fitzgerald

Answer 20

the “First Lady of Song,” performed for over 60 years. Fitzgerald is most known for a vocal range of three octaves and her ability to improvise effortlessly. She is also regarded as one of the best scat singers in the history of jazz. Even today, we can hear the ways that she put her own artistic “stamp” on the music of her time in a way that no one else could match.

Question 21

Great American Songbook

Answer 21

a collection of influential jazz standards that together define American musical history for much of the twentieth century.

Question 22

Miles Davis

Answer 22

one of the most influential musicians of the twentieth century. He was at the front of a number of developments in the evolution of jazz, including bebop, modal jazz, and cool jazz. In fact, he might be the most innovative jazz musician of all time. The bands that Davis put together would also nurture and develop some of the best jazz musicians of the late twentieth century.