From the Club to the Classroom: Jazz Education Through the Ages
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From the Club to the Classroom: Jazz Education Through the AgesStarting as a movement priding itself on improvisation and informal modes of teaching, in-line with the long-standing oral traditions of African American cultural heritage, Jazz has now reached a place in formal academia. An increasing number of Colleges and Universities in the US now offer courses and degrees in Jazz Studies, placing the genre that epitomized formless expression and aural training under the heavy lens of scholastic analysis. Our project explores how Jazz education has changed over the years and why. More specifically, why has there been a transition from a mentor-style mode of teaching to more formal avenues and what are the advantages and drawbacks of each? With this project, we will analyze the change and development in the art form and why the transition towards an education-based mode of teaching may not be advantageous for the growth of the medium. The Hamilton College Jazz Archive in particular provides us with unique primary sources to explore this change. We will use Scalar to augment our narrative. It is a complex, extensible tool that we can use to present our work in a non-linear, interwoven way. We plan on using paths, path visualizations, and other methods of generating progressions throughout the material that lend to the argument that we are making. |
Contributors: Nick Chkonia, Jack Hay, Jill Fu, Brett Mele, Seamus Glavin |