The Origins of Jazz

A winner of multiple safety awards, Barry Baldwin served for 27 years as a bus driver in New York City. In his free time, Barry Baldwin enjoys listening to jazz. Although the term encompasses many styles, jazz is often characterized by improvisation on a familiar melody and a call-and-response pattern of one instrument responding to another.

Jazz emerged in the early 20th century in the cosmopolitan atmosphere of New Orleans, Louisiana, where immigrants from many nations brought along their musical heritage. Drawing on rhythms from African music and harmonies from the classical world, jazz also incorporated elements of the blues, marches, and ragtime.

Musicians such as Buddy Bolden and Jelly Roll Morton popularized jazz early on. A key moment in jazz history was its first recording, “Livery Blues,” by Nick LaRocca and his Original Dixieland Jazz Band (1917). However, the genre did not gain widespread acclaim until the appearance of legendary trumpeter Louis Armstrong, the first person to play solos on his recordings.

Jazz attracted European fans and eventually won over the entire world as an impressive body of work emerged from the likes of Duke Ellington, Charlie Parker, and Miles Davis. It even took hold in the former Soviet Union, where devotees secretly tuned in to the Voice of America’s radio signal to hear jazz greats during the Cold War.