Jazz Italian Style 42 government to assist in the effi cient transport of American aid. In addition to 60 trucks, 30 cars, 360 ambulances and 30 motorcycles with side cars, the Americans arrived with enough musical instruments and sheet music to outfi t three ensembles: two pit bands linked to the Kernell-Fechheimer shows GoodBye Bill and Let's Go , and a smaller group referred to in military documents as the "American Jazz Band , " also nicknamed Hamp's Jazz Band, aft er their bandleader, Charles W. Hamp , who played both piano and saxophone. 7 Th e USAAS had been sent to assist the 332nd Regiment, the only US forces stationed in Italy during World War I. Th e regiment's principal mission was to build up Italian morale by showing that Americans had arrived and were fi nally engaged in protecting Italy's interests. Since the troops sent to Italy were far fewer in number than those delegated to France, they were advised to make themselves noticeable so that they might appear more numerous than they were. Th e USAAS bands, whose core duty was "propaganda and morale building, " played a key role in creating this impression. Travel was encouraged, and the American Jazz Band , in particular, moved up and down the peninsula, from one locale to the next, performing "distinct American music" in public venues open to soldiers and Italian citizens alike. 8 In his study of USAAS activities during World War I , military historian John R. Smucker, Jr. included detailed descriptions of the American Jazz Band's six months of active service. 9 Aft er the Armistice, the band's duties continued, and as one band member noted in a letter home, the YMCA took over management of the ensemble: Th e problem of fi nances arose-who was going to foot the bill? Th is was solved in Treviso where. .. we met a YMCA secretary named Pepin from Detroit. Pepin called his headquarters in Paris, France, and secured permission to spend 20,000 Lire for our expenses. 10
This chapter outlines the value of music as a humanities discipline and presents an overview of the structure and central themes of Music and Human Flourishing. Participating in music, either as a performer, listener, and/or composer has long been accepted as an activity that can contribute to human flourishing. This chapter describes a fourth musical activity, the act of music scholarship, and reveals how engagement with the cultural, social, and political practices surrounding music contributes to human flourishing in a way that listening, performing, and even composing alone cannot. Using the concepts of contemplation, critique, and communication, the author explores the various ways that music scholarship can serve as a tool for instilling a sense of social justice and cultural understanding. Music scholarship helps listeners understand and better communicate the emotional and psychological characteristics associated with music. It opens minds, which in turn can contribute to human flourishing.
This chapter looks at the connections between professional music performance and human flourishing, specifically the ways in which changes in technology have influenced the performers’ participation in “emotional labor” and the effects these changes have had on the complex nature of their connection with fans. The chapter begins in the nineteenth century, when virtuoso performers connected with listeners directly via extended, transcontinental concert tours. The discussion then moves to the rise of recording technology in the twentieth century and its impact on the performer/fan relationship. Finally, the appearance of social media and streaming services is considered. With each technological advance, the role of the performer has changed, especially with regard to his/her/their participation in emotional labor. The central question this chapter proposes to answer is: What happens to human flourishing when the performer/fan relationship is commodified?
In 1960 Duke Ellington and his Orchestra recorded an album for the Columbia label titled Swinging Suites by Edward E. and Edward G. 1 (See Figure 1.) This album paired two multi-movement compositions created collaboratively by Duke Ellington and Billy Strayhorn: The Peer Gynt Suites, which was an arrangement of five movements from Edvard Grieg's Peer Gynt Suites I & II, and Suite Thursday, a set of original compositions inspired by the similarly titled novel by John Steinbeck. 2 Until now, scholars interested in discussing "side one" of the Swingin' Suites album have focused on two topics: Who actually composed The Peer Gynt Suites: Ellington, Strayhorn or both? And how was the suite received by listeners when it was released in 1960? 3 With respect to the first topic, it appears that Ellington and Strayhorn composed their arrangement collaboratively, with Strayhorn serving as the lead creative force, a process that I will explain in more detail later in the article. As to the second topic-the work's reception-a straightforward assessment of this subject appears in an article by Mervyn Cooke titled "Jazz among the Classics, and the Case of Duke Ellington" in the Cambridge Companion to Jazz. 4 As Cooke explains, the Ellington/Strayhorn Peer Gynt Suites met with vehement protest from the Grieg Foundation in Norway and was consequently banned from public distribution via record sales, media broadcasts, and public concerts throughout Scandinavia for nearly a decade (figure 2). 5 The Grieg Foundation in Norway viewed the recording as an offensive attack on Grieg's musical reputation. In a debate published in the Oslo Aftenposten in 1964, the president of the Grieg Foundation called Ellington's Peer Gynt "ugly" and "uninspired," he even went so far as to say that "in Solveig's song" Ellington had made the Norwegian maiden "bray like a sow." 6 In the United States, the An earlier draft of this article was presented on 5 November 2010 as part of a session titled "Duke Ellington's Late, Extended Works: Some New Critical Perspectives" at the American Musicological Society's 76 th Annual Conference in Indianapolis, Indiana. As I noted at that time, this project could have never progressed without the groundbreaking work of David Hajdu and Walter van de Leur. I thank the latter, especially, for his descriptions of the manuscript sources currently held in the Billy Strayhorn Collection in Pittsburg, PA, since I was unable to gain access to these sources during my research on this project. 1 Columbia (Cl 1597). In England, the album was released as a Philips LP (BBL 7470
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