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franz kerschbaumer 1 / THE INFLUENCE OF CELTIC MUSIC ON THE EVOLUTION OF JAZZ T he aim of this chapter is to add to the body of research into the development of jazz (and of traditional American popular music) by focusing on musical roots originating in northwestern Europe, an aspect that the literature has until now largely passed over. The intention is not to diminish the significance of African American contributions to the birth and development of jazz. Rather, it is to complement these contributions by examining roots and a≈nities in European, Celtic music. The author has undertaken structured listening to numerous recordings, primarily of traditional Scottish and Irish music but also including Swedish folk music, to explore the European origins of jazz and early North American folk music. This process, together with often untapped evidence from the literature, has led to the following conclusions. Irish-Scottish Music Irish and Scottish music, as a part of the Celtic culture that spans Ireland, Wales, parts of Scotland and England, Brittany (Bretagne) in France, and Galicia and Asturias in Spain, was one of the seedbeds for American and British popular music and early jazz. The music of Scotland and Ireland in particular has a shared history and development, to the extent that individual musical forms cannot always be isolated from one another. In general, Irish melodies and harmonic structures exerted a strong influence on British and ‘‘imparted’’ American popular music. Scottish fiddle music, through the medium of ‘‘hillbilly music,’’ made a decisive mark on American country and country-and-western music as well as the cakewalk, ragtime, Cajun, and small American string bands so central to the birth of jazz. In addition to their African influences, the origins of jazz and North American folk, dance, and popular music can be understood in relation to migration from Northern Europe:∞ the majority of immigrants to the United States in the nineteenth century, a decisive period for this phase of musical development, came from Ireland, Scotland, Great Britain, Germany, and Scandinavia. Before 1820, these U.S. immigrants—largely Scottish-Irish—settled mainly in the southern Appalachians , bringing their Anglo-Scottish traditions with them and living in relative seclusion as so-called hillbillies. 4 f r a n z k e r s c h b a u m e r As has been documented on numerous recordings, traditional Irish-Scottish music≤ of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries (two of the primary forms of which are jigs and reels) evinces the following ‘‘jazz-intrinsic’’ characteristics: 1. The ‘‘Scotch snap,’’ typical of this music’s melodic rhythm, is fundamental to a) fiddle music, for example ‘‘To Answer the Peacock’’ (cd: To Answer the Peacock , Music for the Scottish Fiddle; Brian McNeil. fms Records 2084, p & c 1998, le 1 as well as b) vocal music, as in ‘‘Comin’ thro’ the Rye’’ (cd: Songs of Scotland; Marie McLaughlin, Malcolm Martineau, with Isobel Frayling-Cork. Hyperion cdA67106, c 1999, le 2). In the United States it led during the nineteenth century, as syncopation developed in the cakewalk, ragtime, and other styles, to o√beat phrasing in jazz. 2. Eighth notes, as later featured in jazz improvisation, appear as the rhythmic (or ‘‘motoric’’) normal value; phrasing (articulation) is ternary or in triplets, often with a two-beat feeling (accents on the second and fourth quarter notes) and with a latent o√beat articulation. A significant example is ‘‘The Fairy Reel’’ (cd: Shetland Fiddle Music; Scottish Tradition Series, vol. 4, School of Scottish Studies: University of Edinburgh; Greentrax Recordings 9004, c & p 1993, le 3). 3. A strong a≈nity with the blues genre can also be discerned insofar as particular Scottish-Gaelic songs, besides featuring blueslike agogics, already exhibit a blues tonality, with minor sevenths and approximate minor thirds (the blues scale, C–D–E®–F–G–B®–C) as well as the downward singing of the tetrachord that is also characteristic of the blues—for example in ‘‘It’s Time for Me to Rise Up’’ (cd: Music from the Western Isles; Scottish Tradition Series, vol. 2, Greentrax Records cdtrax 9002, recorded in the Hebrides, c 1992, le 4). In his 1992 book Origins of the Popular Style: The Antecedents of Twentieth-Century Popular Music, Peter van der Merve examines these same wide-ranging genotypical connections between Irish-Scottish folk music and popular music (blues, ragtime, etc.), o√ering various musical/structural analyses.≥ 4. ‘‘Diddling,’’ a traditional solo vocal form originating in northeast Scotland, has a phrasing and...

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