British Jazz - The Early Twentieth Century

The Early Twentieth Century

Jazz in Britain is usually said to have begun with the British tour of the Original Dixieland Jazz Band in 1919. That stated, British popular music aficionados in the 1920s generally preferred the terms "hot" or "straight" dance music to the term "jazz". Jazz in Britain also faced a similar difficulty to Brazilian jazz and French jazz, namely it tended to be seen by figures of authority as a bad influence, but in Britain the concern that jazz was from the United States appears to have been less important than in France or Brazil. Instead those who objected to it did so more because they deemed it "riotous" or unnerving. One of the earliest popular jazz dance bands was that of Fred Elizalde, who broadcast on the BBC from 1926 to 1929.

By the early 1930s music journalism in Britain, notably through the Melody Maker, had created an appreciation of the importance of the leading American jazz soloists and was beginning to recognise the improvising talents of some local musicians. Louis Armstrong played residencies in London and Glasgow in 1932, followed in subsequent years by the Duke Ellington Orchestra and Coleman Hawkins. But local jazz culture was limited to London where: "jazz was played after hours in a couple of restaurants that encouraged musicians to come in and jam for drinks". The groups of Nat Gonella and Spike Hughes became notable within Britain early in the decade; Hughes was even invited to New York to arrange, compose and lead what, in effect, was Benny Carter's Orchestra of the time. Carter himself worked in London for the BBC in 1936. During the 1930s most British jazz musicians made their living in dance bands of various kinds. Jazz became more important, and more separate as its own genre.