Jazz and Race in the 1930s

Jazz and Race in the 1930s

     In the 1930s, jazz was no longer simply a creative art form headed by the most talented musicians, but also an economic game in which a thorough knowledge of business was also necessary to be successful. Due to the Great Depression, the general public no longer had the disposable income they had in the 1920s to spend on entertainment. As such, jazz artists had to find ways to distribute their music and thus keep their status in the jazz world. The main way of doing this was through radio. “It became the main marketing tool for an entertainment industry in the Great Depression, and also the main source of advertising for a band” Professor Stewart said in lecture. Most importantly, it allowed a black artist to pass through a segregated barrier; a song on the radio was not so easily identified as black like it would be played live in a segregated club. Duke Ellington’s transition to the radio kept him alive as an artist, unlike his contemporaries Fletcher Henderson, King Oliver, and Bix Beiderbecke.

     It was not only Ellington’s smooth transition to radio that kept him relevant, but also his practical knowledge of the industry’s economics. First, he had a more aggressive personality in confronting this shift to better technology in music. He worked with his agent Mills to get the best bookings, venues, recordings, and radio outlets, even if it meant sharing profits with Mills.

     Because Ellington became business savvy, he could now compete for the top spot in jazz culture with white artists who did not have to endure the disadvantages of the times. According to Swing Changes, segregation made sure that “of the five major sources of big-band receipts−record sales, one-night engagements, theater shows, hotel location jobs, and commercially sponsored programs−black bands were essentially restricted to the first three.”  Even worse, swing was becoming so popular that a growing number of white bands actually became more popular than the black bands led by Ellington, Calloway, and Moten, so much so that the latter were pushed out.

     Why had swing become so popular among whites? Both black and white jazz musicians lacked high culture respect−black jazz musicians were not included in the intellectual Harlem Renaissance, and white jazz musicians were also not accepted by the rest of white culture because of jazz’s black origins. However, this all changed when Benny Goodman, a white orchestra leader, performed at Carnegie Hall in 1938. The concert made jazz a high culture art form; but it was only accepted as such because Goodman was white, and therefore only white jazz was high class.

     Another racial divide in jazz was the relationship between musician and critic. John Hammond, a critic from a white privileged background, condemned Ellington’s catering to white audiences and overlooking the injustices of his race. He had formed his music in response to white tastes, and he also knew and accepted the fact that he could not be successful (like headlining at the Cotton Club, for example) if he disregarded white influence. Hammond wrote, "Ellington's tact and suave manner disguised a willingness to tolerate racial indignities for the sake of commercial success." Ellington dismissed this, asking how a white critic (and in Hammond’s case, an upper class citizen too) could have any insight into the sacrifices a black artist made in order to be successful.

     In terms of jazz, race became explicit in the 1930s because perhaps for the first time, white musicians shared the same caliber of respect and popularity as blacks (as seen by Goodman’s Carnegie Hall performance), the advances in technology such as the radio, and the Great Depression’s impact on the entertainment industry. Blacks had to adapt to the economic game of jazz, whereas previously they needed only their talent to be successful.