Listening for History: Using Jazz Music as a Primary Source

Social Education

134

Listening for History:

Using Jazz Music as a

Primary Source

Marcie Jergel Hutchinson and Lauren McArthur Harris

Picture this … It’s 8 o’clock on a Wednesday: “The regular crowd shuffles in” to an

interdisciplinary teacher workshop called “Everybody’s Got the Blues: Migration of

the Blues in Post-World War II United States and United Kingdom.” After explor-

ing the push/pull factors of the Second Great Migration, social studies, music, and

English teachers are on their feet clapping the shuffle rhythm, “stompin’ the stallion,”

and singing an improvised 12-bar Delta Blues song about their morning while the

workshop organizer accompanies them on double bass.

Now, picture students in an 8th grade

U.S. history class stomp clapping free-

dom songs of the civil rights movement,

high school students researching the

“Leadership and Legacy” of Muddy

Waters to align with the National History

Day theme, world history students writ-

ing a poem entitled “War Is” in reac-

tion to World War I poems and songs

they analyzed, and high school juniors

assuming the persona of a jazz musician

they have researched for a performance-

based learning assessment in a twentieth-

century U.S. history class. Imagine music

teachers seeking out social studies teach-

ers in a workshop to better understand

the historical context of Bessie Smith’s

performance of “Downhearted Blues,”

or teachers pouring over Martin Luther

King Jr.’s 1964 speech in Arizona—ana-

lyzing it for historical references, liter-

ary elements, and passages with musical

qualities.

These scenes highlight activities

from a ﬁve-year professional develop-

ment program focused on an interdis-

ciplinary approach to teaching U.S. and

world history using jazz and music often

linked to jazz: blues, gospel, and rag-

time. The program, called Jazz from A

to Z, represents collaboration between

Arizona State University and the Mesa

Arts Center in partnership with Jazz at

Lincoln Center.

Through an integrated

study of jazz music within the context of

historical study, teachers and students

can enrich both their historical and cul-

tural knowledge. Music is an effective

resource for teaching social studies, but

it is often left out of secondary social

studies classrooms.

Jazz music selec-

tions make for particularly compelling

primary sources since the music often

reﬂected the times. Additionally, music

is a source that adolescents can relate to

and enjoy. In what follows, we highlight

useful resources and discuss how any

teacher can incorporate jazz into their

history courses.

Jazz in the Social Studies

Classroom

“If ‘jazz’ means anything at all, which is

questionable, it means the same thing

it meant to musicians ﬁfty years ago—

freedom of expression. I used to have a

deﬁnition, but I don’t think I have one

anymore, unless it is that it is a music

with an African foundation which came

out of an American environment.’”

—Duke Ellington as quoted

by Stanley Dance

Jazz is America’s music. It has deep

roots in ragtime, blues, and the music

of the black church. It was shaped in

American cities such as New Orleans,

Chicago, New York, Kansas City,

Pittsburgh, Detroit and Los Angeles after

the mass migration of African Americans

and immigrants in the ﬁrst half of the

twentieth century. Musicians steeped in

these American urban cultures exercised

their freedom of expression and made

jazz their own.

Jazz musicians, deeply affected by

time and place, created a soundtrack

to America’s history. The jazz trumpet

of the great Louis Armstrong accompa-

nied the migrants of the Great Migration.

Americans and Europeans danced their

way through the Great Depression to the

swing music of Count Basie and Benny

Goodman. The importance of jazz music

emerges from its democratic roots and its

tendency toward improvisation; these

elements, along with technological

advancements of the twentieth century

and the prominence of the United States

on the world stage have enabled it to

cross political and cultural boundaries.

Jazz music is found in every era of twen-

Social Education 80(3), pp 134–140

May/June 2016

135

tieth-century history from the origins of

jazz to World War I, the 1920s, the Great

Depression, and the post-World War

II era. (See Table 1, a table of historical

eras and musical genres). Additionally,

jazz music connects well with literature,

art, and poetry. For example, in study-

ing the Great Migration in the ﬁrst part

of the twentieth century, students could

analyze and compare composer Duke

Ellington’s “Harlem Air Shaft,”(www.

youtube.com/watch?v=D4NN-lecNvw),

painter Jacob Lawrence’s Migration

Series, (

www.moma.org/interactives/

exhibitions/2015/onewayticket/

) and poet

Langston Hughes’s “The Weary Blues”

(

www.poets.org/poetsorg/poem/weary-

blues

) to examine aspects of the African

American experience during that time

period. Although there are many aspects

of jazz music that teachers can empha-

size in social studies instruction, we have

found that two of the most useful and

engaging are (a) focusing on multiple per-

spectives by examining jazz in the context

of U.S. and world history, and (b) analyz-

ing the compositional and performance

styles as well as the music lyrics.

Like other primary sources, music

can be analyzed and interpreted. This

analysis provides multiple perspectives

that can help students understand the

National Council for the Social Studies

themes of

CULTURE; TIME, CONTINUITY

AND CHANGE; INDIVIDUALS, GROUPS AND

INSTITUTIONS; AND GLOBAL CONNECTIONS.

Using jazz music as a primary source

helps students understand the signiﬁ

cance of the past, comprehend diverse

cultures and shared humanity, assess

change over time, develop historical

empathy and recognize the importance

of individuals who have made a differ-

ence in music and in history. This type

of analysis also meets the Common Core

Standards for Literacy in History/Social

Studies, Science, & Technical Subjects

as well as the English Language Arts

Rodney Whitaker, one of the Jazz from A to Z workshop organizers, engages a high school student in singing the blues, January , .

Photographer: Marcie Jergel Hutchinson

Social Education

136

Historical Era Musical Genre/Artist/Song – Some Examples

Roots of Jazz; New

Orleans, Mississippi

and the South

Ragtime: Scott Joplin, “Maple Leaf Rag”

Blues: Leadbelly, “Good Morning Blues”

Jazz: Jelly Roll Morton, “Black Bottom Stomp”; King Oliver, “Snake Rag,” “Chimes Blues”; Louis Armstrong, “St.

Louis Blues,” “Sugar Foot Stomp”; Sidney Bechet, “Maple Leaf Rag”

World War I,

1914–1918

Ragtime/Early Jazz: James Reese Europe, “On Patrol in No Man’s Land”; Eubie Blake and Nobel Sissle,

“Charleston Rag” and “Shuﬄe Along”; Lucky Roberts, “Junk Man Rag”

The 1st Great

Migration, 1915–40s

Women in Jazz: Mary Lou Williams, “Jitterbug Waltz,” “Zodiac Suite”; Ella Fitzgerald, “How High the Moon,”

“Cotton Tail”; Dinah Washington, “What a Diﬀerence a Day Makes,” “Lover Come Back to Me”; Sarah Vaughn,

“Lullaby of Birdland,” “Embraceable You.”

The Culture Wars,

1920s

Jazz: “The Whoopin’ Blues”; Louis Armstrong, “West End Blues,” “Potato Head Blues,” “Heebie Jeebies”

The “New Woman,”

1920s

Blues: Bessie Smith, “Preachin’ the Blues,” “Safety Mama,” “Yes, Indeed He Do,” “Downhearted Blues”

The Great Depression,

Keeping Spirits Up,

1930s

Swing Music: Count Basie, “Swingin’ the Blues,” “Jumpin’ at the Woodside”; Duke Ellington, “The Mooche,” “Take

the ‘A’ Train”; Benny Goodman, “Sing, Sing, Sing”

Vocal Jazz: Ella Fitzgerald, “Tisket-a-Tasket,” “Cotton Tail”

Civil Rights and the

New Deal, 1930–40s

Blues/Folk: Leadbelly, “Bourgeois Blues,” “Scottsboro Boys”; Josh White, “Jim Crow Train,” “Uncle Sam Blues”

Jazz: Billie Holiday: “Strange Fruit”

World War II, 1940s Bebop: Charlie Parker, “Ko-Ko,” “Cherokee”; Dizzy Gillespie, “Salt Peanuts”

1950s: Conformity &

Dissent

Hard Bop: Charles Mingus, “Fables of Faubus”; Sonny Rollins: Freedom Suite

Beginnings of

Nonviolent Resistance

Gospel Music: Mahalia Jackson, “Come Sunday” / Freedom Songs (Congregational Singing): “Wade in the Water,”

“I Shall Not Be Moved,” “O Freedom”

Jazz: Max Roach: We Insist: Max Roach's Freedom Now Suite; Vocal Jazz: Nina Simone, “I Wish I Knew”

1963 Civil Rights

Movement

Gospel Music: Mahalia Jackson, “I Been ‘Buked and I Been Scorned”

Jazz: John Coltrane, “Alabama,” Donald Byrd, “Amen,” “Cristo Redentor”

Popular Music: Bob Dylan, “Blowin’ in the Wind”; Sam Cooke, “A Change is Gonna Come”; Curtis Mayﬁeld,

“People Get Ready”; Staple Singers, “Long Walk to DC”

Jazz Diplomacy during

the Cold War

Jazz: Dizzy Gillespie, “Night in Tunisia,” Louis Armstrong, “What Did I Do To Be So Black and Blue,” Duke

Ellington, “Far East Suite,” “Blue Bird of Delhi”; Dave Brubeck, “Blue Rondo a la Turk,” “Calcutta Blues”; Iola

and Dave Brubeck, The Real Ambassadors

Post-World War II; 2

Great Migration; Civil

Rights in the Urban

North and West

Delta Blues: Son House, “Walkin’ Blues”; Robert Johnson, “Crossroad Blues”; Muddy Waters, “I Be’s Troubled”

Urban Blues: Muddy Waters, “Mannish Boy”; Memphis Slim and Willie Dixon, “Chicago House Rent Party,”

Johnny Young, “Stockyard Blues”; Big Bill Broonzy, “Black, Brown, and White”; Willie Dixon, “It Don’t Make

Sense”; Marvin Gaye, “Inner City Blues”; Stevie Wonder, “Living for the City”

Jazz: Nina Simone, “Backlash Blues,” “To Be Young Gifted and Black”

Table . 20th Century Historical Eras and Related Music

Please see “Jazz from A to Z” at www.mesaartscenter.com/index.php/engagement/jazz-a-to-z/resources for information on each era

and links to songs, past workshop topics, and teaching materials. See also “Smithsonian Jazz” at americanhistory.si.edu/smithsonian-jazz/

education; “Folk Music and Song” at www.loc.gov/folklife/guide/folkmusicand song.html; and “Music that Scared America” at www.

humanities.uci.edu/history/ucihp/resources. Lyrics are often found with an Internet search; enter the song title and author. Free perfor-

mances of most songs can be seen (or heard) on YouTube (www.youtube.com) or Spotify (www.spotify.com/us).

May/June 2016

137

Using Music as a Primary

Source (An Analysis Tool)

Read this handout in its entirety before listening to the music.

1. Describing the Music using Historical Context:

Title: _____________________________________________________________________________________

Composer: ________________________________________________________________________________

Date Recorded: ____________________ Recording Company & Location: _____________________________

Events Happening in the World/Country/Region at the Time: _______________________________________

Background of the Composer: (position, nationality, gender, occupation, social class, religion, ethnicity, etc.)

__________________________________________________________________________________________

2. What did you hear? (First time played) Type of Music (folk, classical, blues, jazz, rock, etc.):

__________________________________________________________________________________________

Instruments (brass, woodwinds, strings, percussion): ______________________________________________

Vocals: Is there a vocalist in the piece? _________________________________________________________

What language/dialect is being sung? __________________________________________________________

3. Analyzing the Music: (Second time played) Compositional and Performance Style: Use musical terms to

analyze the music you just described (e.g., beat, call and response, dynamics). See the “Jazz Glossary”

for deﬁnitions: http://ccnmtl.columbia.edu/projects/jazzglossary/archives.html.

Musical Term Analysis (How is it used in the music? Why?)

HANDOUT

Social Education

138

Song Lyrics: Write down the most important words of the song. How do they

help tell the song’s story?

Words/Phrase Analysis (What does the word mean? Why is it used?)

Note anything the music informs about life in the world/nation/region at the time it was created.

__________________________________________________________________________________________

Video Performance (if available): Describe the performance (wardrobe, location, choreography, staging, inter-

action between the performers and the audience, depiction of the music, etc.) of the piece. How does the

performance of the piece help to further the message of the song?

4. Interpreting the Music: (Based on the description and the analysis of the piece.)

Motivation/Purpose: What is the message of the piece? What is the composer trying to do? Explain (using

speciﬁc references from the music).

__________________________________________________________________________________________

Audience: Based on your description and analysis of the piece, who was the intended audience for the music?

Explain.

__________________________________________________________________________________________

Impact/Eﬀectiveness: Is the composer’s message eﬀectively presented in the music? What impact would it

have on the intended audience? How did it make you feel? Explain with speciﬁc references to the music and

its historic context.

__________________________________________________________________________________________

5. Lasting Impression: What is the most memorable or powerful aspect of this piece? Explain.

__________________________________________________________________________________________

HANDOUT (cont.)

Standards for Speaking & Listening

(e.g., interpreting a song’s “word choice,

points of emphasis, and tone used” www.

corestandards.org/ELA-Literacy/SL/11-12/).

Multiple Perspectives: Giving

Voice to the Voiceless

“Jazz music is America’s past and its

potential, summed up and sanctiﬁed

and accessible to anybody who learns

to listen to, feel, and understand it. The

music can connect us to our earlier

selves and to our better selves-to-come.”

—Wynton Marsalis, managing

and artistic director of Jazz at

Lincoln Center

Music opens a window to the past,

allowing us to hear the sounds and emo-

tions of a particular place and time. As

a primary source, music awakens the

listener to personal perspectives on past

events and beliefs. Like other art forms,

music reﬂects society and can be a force-

ful agent for change. Songs throughout

history have given a voice to the voiceless.

James Reese Europe conveyed the hor-

rors endured by the Harlem Hellﬁghters

May/June 2016

139

during World War I when he composed

and performed “On Patrol in No Man’s

Land.” Bessie Smith sang of issues that

still face women: domestic violence,

male supremacy, and working-class reali-

ties. Leadbelly sang the blues of African

American migrants who experienced

alienation, loneliness, and discrimina-

tion during the Great Migration. Josh

White’s songs of social protest attacked

segregation during World War II. Dave

and Iola Brubeck parodied U.S. diplo-

matic efforts in Asia and Africa during

the Cold War with their musical produc-

tion, The Real Ambassadors. By examin

ing these historical eras through the lens

of music and the people who created the

music, students can engage in historical

empathy for people and events typically

not included in social studies curricula.

Teachers can integrate these perspectives

into the units that they currently teach

(see “Jazz from A to Z” for sample les-

sons and resources:

www.mesaartscenter.

com/engagement/jazz-a-to-z/resources).

Analysis Beyond Lyrics

Social studies teachers sometimes have

students analyze music lyrics as part

of primary source analysis activities.

However, it is less common for students

to analyze the genre, vocals, and com-

positional and performance style of a

piece of music. The Jazz from A to Z pro-

gram has developed an analysis tool (See

handout/worksheet) to assist teachers in

using any piece of music more fully as a

primary source. The ﬁrst author, Marcie

Hutchinson, created the Music Analysis

Tool for teachers in consultation with

Jazz at Lincoln Center’s teaching profes-

sionals;

however, the analysis tool can

be used with any genre of music from

folk to country or rock and hip-hop. Like

any other primary source, music must

be put in its historical context. Students

using the Music Analysis Tool rely on

historical thinking skills to consider the

historical perspectives and context of a

particular piece of music. Students are

guided through ﬁve steps of analysis that

include examining the historical context,

examining the compositional and perfor-

mance style, and assessing the impact of

the piece in history. After students com-

plete the Music Analysis Tool, teachers

can use the additional questions (See p.

137) for a whole class discussion.

Recently, a group of eighth grad-

ers in a team-taught Language Arts

and Social Studies class analyzed a

recording of “Downhearted Blues”

by Bessie Smith (

www.youtube.com/

watch?v=go6TiLIeVZA) as part of a unit

on the 1920s. The students worked in

pairs to describe the music in its histori-

cal context by discussing traditional and

more modern views of women in the

1920s, and determining signiﬁcant bio-

graphical aspects of the lives of Bessie

Smith and the composers of the piece:

Alberta Hunter and Lovie Austin. After

the ﬁrst play of “Downhearted Blues”

many students, including those who had

not studied music before, could deter-

mine the type of music, name the instru-

ment used, and comment on the use of

language in the lyrics. In checking for

their understanding, it was easy to iden-

tify students who played an instrument

or sang in a choir. Using a jazz glossary

(ccnmtl.columbia.edu/projects/jazzglos-

sary/archives.html) and their own expe-

riences, these students served as “experts”

by explaining the musical terms to their

classmates and helping them identify

them in the performance. For example,

the music students pointed out how the

piano player established the tempo by

accenting the beat or pulse of the song.

That tempo helped the listeners to

focus attention on the lyrics sung by the

“Empress of the Blues.” Then it was time

for the class poets to shine. They could

help analyze the lyrics by determining

important words and discussing how the

word choice and Smith’s phrasing of the

melody drove the message of the song.

After a few minutes of quiet time to

interpret the music using their descrip-

tions and analysis of the piece, students

then engaged in “think, pair, share” in

their groups and came up with some

amazing interpretations. All the students

recognized the song as a modern depic-

tion of women by linking evidence from

the song with the issues facing women in

the 1920s. Many students thought that

the music and the lyrics were powerful

and would have attracted young women

who were ready to challenge traditional

views. One usually quiet young woman

eagerly described Bessie Smith’s perfor-

mance as bold, conﬁdent, and deliber-

ate, basing her opinion on evidence from

the instrumentation, the historical con-

text, and Smith’s approach to the music.

Students were eager to share their lasting

impressions of the piece using evidence

from the music and the historical context.

Discussion Questions

. What does the title of the piece tell you about the message of the

song? Who was the composer? Provide some information on his/her

background.

. What historical events were occurring at the time the piece was written?

What was the motivation of the composer to write the piece? Does the

music eﬀectively support the composer’s message? (Include relevant

and speciﬁc detail from the historical context in your answer.)

. What questions would you ask of this composer in an interview?

. Do you agree with the message of the piece? Cite speciﬁc information

to support your view.

. Imagine yourself to be a music critic at the time the piece was ﬁrst

performed. How would you rate the piece? Why?

. How will you remember this piece so you can identify it when you hear

it again?

Social Education

140

Students left the class talking about how

women still face some of the same issues

that Bessie Smith sang about in the 1920s.

Conclusion

“In music and in life, serious listening

forces you to recognize others.”

—Wynton Marsalis

By teaching our students how to use

music as a primary source, we not only

engage them in historical thinking, we

also teach them how to be active listen-

ers. The Jazz from A to Z workshops we

have run and the Music Analysis Tool

we have developed have allowed teach-

ers and students to practice listening

and hear the voices of past musicians

whose music reﬂected the times and also

advanced social change. By practicing

listening, students are better equipped to

recognize others’ voices on current issues

and then express their own ideas in an

informed, deliberate and civil manner.

Notes

1. The professional development program was par-

tially funded by a grant from the National

Endowment for the Arts.

2. Jeffery A. Mangram and Rachel L. Weber,

“Incorporating Music into the Social Studies

Classroom: A Qualitative Study of Secondary

Social Studies Teachers,” Journal of Social Studies

Research 36, no. 1 (2012): 3-21.

3. Stanley Dance, The Jazz Cadence of American

Culture (New York: Columbia University Press,

1998), p. 5.

4. Wynton Marsalis with Geoffrey C. Ward, Moving

to Higher Ground: How Jazz Can Change Your Life

(New York: Random House, 2008), 13

5. The music analysis tool was developed by Marcie

Hutchinson in collaboration with Jazz at Lincoln

Center’s teaching professionals Rodney Whitaker

and Eli Yamin. The collaboration was inﬂuenced

in part by analysis tools from Frederick D. Drake

and Lynn R. Nelson, Engagement in Teaching

History: Theory and Practice for Middle and

Secondary Teachers, 2nd ed. (Upper Saddle River,

N.J.: Pearson, 2008), 67-77; and National Archives,

“Document Analysis Worksheets,” www.archives.

gov/education/lessons/worksheets.

6. Marsalis with Ward, 66.

We would like to thank Rachel Collay, Brian Girard,

Kathy Hays, Nancie Lindblom, and Mary Roberts for

their helpful feedback on an earlier draft. We would also

like to thank all the Jazz from A to Z teachers, including

Misty Willis and Brian Buck, who have shared lessons

and projects they developed after attending workshops.

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Marcie Jergel Hutchinson

has 31 years expe-

rience teaching high school American and European

history. Hutchinson is currently the Director for K-12

Initiatives for the history faculty at Arizona State Uni-

versity in Tempe, Arizona, and coordinator, curriculum

designer and presenter for the Jazz from A to Z project.

Lauren McArthur Harris is an Assistant Pro-

fessor in the Mary Lou Fulton Teachers College and

the School of Historical, Philosophical, and Religious

Studies at Arizona State University in Tempe, Arizona.

She is a former ninth grade World History teacher.