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HOW JAZZ DEVELOPED 15
Or; finally, with despair:
I'm gonna lay my head on some railroad
line, I'm gonna lay my haid on some lonesome
railroad line, An' let that 2.19 train jus' pacify my
min' . . .
After the emancipation of the negroes in 1865, their music stayed predominantly vocal for nearly 20 years—because the negro could not afford instruments of any sort. We shall see later how he gradually acquired primitive instruments and developed an instrumental music. In the build-up of the Blues, we can see how negro contact with the white man's hymns and folk tunes gave a primitive harmonic structure that could be used as a basis for improvisation.
Foundation of Improvisation
If you are going to improvise, you must have some agreed basis to improvise on. You can't have any sort of rewarding conversation unless there's some agreed topic—even if it's only gambling or drink or the weather.
'Form' in music, as we know it, is a product of rational educated thought. The negro had not had the luxury of an education (indeed, as we shall learn in the next chapter, it had been the deliberate policy of the white Master to deny all education to the |
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