The Counterculture

American music continued to evolve as an expression of cultural change. The phonograph became commonplace and the mass appeal of music further commoditized its expanding genres. In the 1920s and 1930s, music was a significant contributor to the arts scene of the Harlem Renaissance, a social revolt against racism that began as a literary movement led my Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston. The 1930s and 1940s brought swing music into the mix. The expertly arranged music of Fletcher Henderson, Benny Goodman, Glenn Miller and Duke Ellington appealed to romantics and dancers during World War II and allowed the big bands’ soloist to show off their chops. Some of these soloists rebelled against swing’s conventions and standardized charts and invented bebop. Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Max Roach, and Curly Russell emerged as fiery soloist in “cutting” sessions downtown after the big bands and their dull fans went home for the evening. In kind, some critics lambasted them, disputing bebop’s musicality. After all, you couldn’t dance to it.

My essay is up for the weekend at CounterPunch.


TS