Jazz on the border
jazz and dance bands in Chester and North Wales in the mid-twentieth century
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1558/jazz.v7i1.49Keywords:
dance music, hidden history, jazz history, jazz in Britain, music business, popular musicAbstract
There was a high degree of overlap between western popular music and jazz in the mid-twentieth century. However, histories of jazz and histories of popular music are often puzzlingly separate, as if divided by strict borders. This article looks at some of the reasons for this (including those proposed by Frith (2007) and Bennett (2013). The importance of musical pathways and hidden histories (Becker 2002, 2004; Finnegan 2007; Nott 2002; Rogers 2013) in the context of local music scenes is considered. The importance of taking live music scenes and provincial areas into account when discussing genre histories is discussed, in the context of examples from an oral history study of dance-band musicians and promoters in the Chester (UK) area. These examples help to demonstrate that boundaries between jazz and popular music are frequently less abrupt in practice than they are in theory.
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——(2002) Jazz Places. http://buffaloreport.com/020401beckerjazzplaces.html (accessed 20 March 2006).
——(2004) ‘Jazz Places’. In Music Scenes: Local, Translocal and Virtual, ed. A. Bennett and R. A. Peterson, 17–27. Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press.
Bennett, A. (2013) ‘Cheesy Listening: Popular Music and Ironic Listening Practices’. In Redefining Mainstream Popular Music, ed. S. Baker, A. Bennett and J. Taylor. London: Routledge.
Brocken, M. (2010) Other Voices: Hidden Histories of Liverpool’s Popular Music Scenes, 1930s–1970s. Farnham, Surrey: Ashgate.
du Gay, P., ed. (1997) Production of Culture/Cultures of Production. London: The Open University; New Delhi: Thousand Oaks.
During, S., ed. (2007) The Cultural Studies Reader, 3rd edn. London: Routledge.
Eggleton, P. (2010) ‘Termites “Unsung Heroes” of African Savannah’. Interview with Dr Paul Eggleton (termite expert at the Natural History Museum, London). First broadcast on 26 May 2010. http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/news/2010/05/100526_termites_nh_sl.shtml (accessed 17 June 2012).
Faulkner, A. W. (2007) ‘Biographical Stuff’. AWFUL MUSIC: the website of drummer, arranger, composer—Tony Faulkner. http://tonyfaulkner.net/about.html (accessed 21 December 2012).
Faulkner, R. R., and H. S. Becker (2009) Do You Know–?: The Jazz Repertoire in Action. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.7208/chicago/9780226239224.001.0001
Field, G. (2006) Personal interview with D. Owens.
Finnegan, R. H. (2007) The Hidden Musicians: Music-Making in an English Town. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press.
Frith, S. (1983) Sound Effects: Youth, Leisure, and the Politics of Rock. London: Constable.
——(1988) Music for Pleasure: Essays on the Sociology of Pop. Cambridge: Polity Press.
——(2007) ‘Is Jazz Popular Music?’ Jazz Research Journal 1/1: 7–22. http://dx.doi.org/10.1558/jazz.v1i1.7
Frith, S., M. Brennan, M. Cloonan and E. Webster (2013) The History of Live Music in Britain, Volume I: 1950–1967. From Dance Hall to the 100 Club. Farnham, Surrey: Ashgate.
Gibson, C. (2006) Personal interview with D. Owens. Harker, D. (1980) One for the Money: Politics and Popular Song. London: Hutchinson.
——(1992) ‘Still Crazy After All These Years: What Was Popular Music in the 1960s?’ In Cultural Revolution? The Challenge of the Arts in the 1960s, ed. B. Moore-Gilbert and J. Seed. London: Routledge.
Lloyd, S. (2006) Interview 3. Personal interview with D. Owens. McMahon, R. (n.d.) ‘Roy Mack—Musical History’. http://www.roymack.co.uk/musical_history.htm (accessed 28 December 2012).
Martin, J. N., and T. K. Nakayama (2004) ‘Intercultural Communication in Contexts’. Online Learning Center, 3rd edition. http://highered.mcgraw-hill.com/sites/0767430131/student_view0/glossary.html (accessed 12 July 2013).
Morris, K. (2008) Personal interview with D. Owens.
Negus, K. (2004) Popular Music in Theory—An Introduction. Cambridge: Polity Press; Oxford: Blackwell Publishing.
Nott, J. J. (2002) Music for the People: Popular Music and Dance in Interwar Britain. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Oxford English Dictionary online.
Rogers, I. (2013) ‘The Hobbyist Majority and the Mainstream Fringe: The Pathways of Independent Music-making in Brisbane, Australia’. In Redefining Mainstream Popular Music, ed. S. Baker, A. Bennett and J. Taylor. London: Routledge.
Rowe, B. (2006) Personal interview with D. Owens.
Taylor, L. (presenter) (2013) ‘Live Music—from Dance Hall to the 100 Club’. Thinking Allowed, BBC Radio 4, 22 May. http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/series/ta (accessed 22 May 2013).
Published
2014-10-07
Issue
Section
Articles
How to Cite
Southall, H. V. (2014). Jazz on the border: jazz and dance bands in Chester and North Wales in the mid-twentieth century. Jazz Research Journal, 7(1), 49-77. https://doi.org/10.1558/jazz.v7i1.49
