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"JASS"

Deborah Jeter

Tom Morgan's Jazz and Blues site is the cat's meow of Jazz sites on the internet, in my opinion.

Not only does he has extensive coverage of many jazz and blues musicians, but he has written a book about the history of how it all began. This article will feature excerpts from his book as well as spotlight various pages at his fantastic site.

OK... get ready for some Jazz Education, teachers.

Let's begin with the term, "JASS" as the title of Tom's domain and this article. No, it's not misspelled. Originally, when jazz was played in Chicago, Illinois, the name for this "new" style of music was called "JASS". Later on, after it became more common, people just began pronouncing it as Jazz. There are several versions as to how the term "Jass" was first started. In the book, "The Guinness Book of Jazz A-Z", this particular excerpt tells it another way.

"It is substantially reported that the term "jass" was first used first used in reference to "Jazz" when during a performance by the Original Dixieland Jazz Band, an inebriated 'retired vaudeville entertainer' leapt to his feet in excitement and yelled out: 'Jass it up, boys!' The word "Jass", up until then, had been a Negro word brought from the South and fashionably current in the Chicago underworld, with the specific connections known only to the black man. Nobody up until then had thought to apply it to the newly-emerging music, Jazz. It was reported that this useful customer was hired every night to be there and cry out 'Jass it up, boys!' and thus the band became later known as Stein's Dixie Jass Band. Later, at Reisenweber's in New York, it was billed as the Original Dixieland Jasz Band, perhaps as a result of a printer's error; then it appeared as jaz and finally jazz."

Tom Morgan's book has another version of the original use of the term, "Jass".

Clarence Williams says that he was the first person to use the term jass on a piece of sheet music which was a couple of years prior to the appearance of the jass band in Chicago.

So I guess, one version is as good as the next. Take your pick.

Take a look at this page entitled, Jazz Roots. It is the front page to Jazz, the first thirty years. For music teachers that are looking for some good ways to present jazz history to your students, this will be invaluable. The wording is clear and the musicians that he mentions in the overview, have some great links to details about their personal lives and the influence they had in this style of music.