Racial Discourse of the 1930s Swing Era

The 1930s decade all throughout the United States, but especially in industrial, heavily commercialized cities such as New York and Chicago, was marked by the Great Depression. This mass financial downturn prompted a surge of financial competition in all industries- especially in the music entertainment jazz business. These changes thus led to race becoming more explicit in the 1930s, giving birth to the “Swing Era”, defined loosely as the time period in which swing and jazz music began to become commercialized and commoditized. The discourse about race had always been present; however, with financial and commercial changes occurring, the topic of race appeared at the forefront of jazz.

David Stowe’s book “Swing Changes: Big-Band Jazz in New Deal America” helps highlight keep points of the Swing Era and its relation to race. Stowe writes: “Racially, jazz was perceived as uncouth and primitive, a variety of music associated with African-Americans… [I]t stood for… elements associated with Prohibition speakeasies and brothels… this reaction was not limited to whites, but was felt among the black middle class as well” (Stowe, 53). The pre-existing socially and culturally influenced set of values were challenged, with each race challenging one another and bringing race into the equation.

In a time of continuous segregation between Blacks and Whites, jazz musicians, both White and Black, struggled for competition in respective opposing worlds. Blacks were forced to find means within a segregated Black entertainment world, or succumbed to performing at the mob-run, popular but racially disputed all-White nightclub, The Cotton Club.

Although night club and other live performances were color-transparent, the only place in which race was hidden was the radio. The radio was the only place in which music can be heard colorlessly- listeners would not know the race of the musician that authored the music, and thus Black musicians were able to earn extra income through the radio. Duke Ellington was an example of a musician that took the radio to his advantage, as well as collaborated with a white Jewish entrepreneur, Irving Mills, to bypass the financial and commercial hardships of a racially segregated jazz industry for Blacks. Duke Ellington was faced with a challenge of staying within his limits whilst pushing against them to become as omnipresent and powerful in the music industry. Racial dissonance and racial residue was outlined not so subtly in many song titles: such as the musical numbers “Black Beauty” and “Black and Tan Fantasy” of Duke Ellington.

John Hammond, a wealthy White man, had a significant role in race discussions. He actively sought after “The Next Big Thing”, and was cited for discovering talent such as Benny Goodman, Fletcher Henderson, Count Basie, and Bennie Moten. Hammond came in conflict with Ellington and other reputable players in the industry for his outlandish, zealous, and politically motivated beliefs and publishings, such as his quote: “[t]he best of the white folk cannot compare to the really good Negroes in relaxed, unpretentious dance music” (Stowe, 60). Ellington criticized Hammond for “’freely condemning and condoning’ bands in which he had no financial stake, a ‘right’ Ellington believed he had ‘forfeited’ as a result of his activities as a producer and talent scout” (Stowe, 59). The de-segregation as well as integration of “Black and White economies”, alongside growing tensions and competition for financial security and fame and influence in the music industry led to race becoming more explicit in the 1930s “Swing Era”.

Chicago Jazz Era

            Although New Orleans is often cited as the original birth place of jazz, Chicago played a significantly more crucial role than New York in advancing and shaping the art of jazz in the 1920s. According to Liz Cohen, “Chicago was the jazz capital of the nation for much of the 1920s”. A particular style of jazz emerged out of Chicago, for reasons influenced by the social, racial, and economic conditions present at the time.

Chicago as well as much of the United States in the 1920s was in the beginning stages of the Great Depression. Regardless, people still needed entertainment in order to emotionally survive financial struggles, and so they turned to commercial jazz clubs to dance and sing the troubles away. This allowed for a more commercial stage for jazz to occur in Chicago. The Chicago Race Riots in 1919, in which a white man stoned a black man to death at a beach, set the stage for racial segregation of Blacks and Whites in the 1920s. This situation taught the Black community to rely on those within their community, thus a distinct Black culture emerges in Chicago. A sort of discrepancy occurred within the jazz audience- Whites were allowed to freely enter predominantly Black neighborhoods, whereas Blacks could not enter predominantly White neighborhoods. Black musicians’ innovations colonized American culture, and was commercialized in order to satisfy the White community.

A new kind of aggressive, upbeat style was rising in Chicago, predominantly introduced by King Oliver in his band, King Oliver’s Creole Jazz Band. This new sound was distinct from the New Orleans style- “the Chicago horns often join together for brief written introductions and interludes, a technique closer to the big band idiom” (Gioia, 75). An authentic sound of brash, sparkling, upbeat trumpet playing formed, alongside a bluesy swinging rhythmic portion of the composition. Chicago-style music heavily involved and necessitated a feeling of dance, rhythm, and motion- in alignment with Thompson’s African art elements of motion, attack, and vital aliveness. Louis Armstrong is perhaps the most influential Chicago musician who left the biggest footprint in jazz history- all musicians that followed him merely attempted to emulate his style, thus leading to a new sound of jazz.

Chicago’s main contribution was the commercialization, or the commodification of jazz music into American society- which in turn affected the actual style of music that was produced. The Chicago jazz scene was controlled mainly by gangsters, under whom legends like King Oliver, Louis Armstrong, and Duke Ellington, and the Austin High Gang all worked for. These gangsters assumed their natural roles as bosses, thus putting a damper in the artistic, creative freedoms of the musicians themselves. The gangsters were solely interested in the profit nature of the jazz industry, and thus were responding to consumer tastes and preferences- squashing the musicians’ autonomy and say in what they were to play, when, and how.

Mikhail M. Bakhtin states that “each dialogue takes place as if against a background of the responsive understanding of an invisibly present third party who stands above all the participants in the dialogue... The aforementioned third party is not any mystical or metaphysical being - he is a constitutive aspect of the whole utterance, who, under deeper analysis, can be revealed in it” (126-127). Bakhtin makes the reference that art is a dialogue between the audience and the creator of the art; it is a relationship. He believes that art is “intrinsic connectedness of temporal and spatial relationship that is artistically expressed”. This concept is crucial in understanding how jazz, or any art form is shaped and altered. The identity of jazz is the culmination of the consumer’s desires as well as the musician’s credentials, with the addition of racial, societal, and economic conditions that prevail. Chicago led the way in innovation and reigned tremendous influence that led to the Jazz Age in the 1920s, due to its characteristic living conditions and main artistic figures that changed jazz indefinitely.