Foreword

When big band jazz and ballroom swing dancing faded in the year after World War II, the music began to change. A few years later, dozens of intimate jazz clubs died out, too. College jazz programs replaced the clubs as training grounds for jazz, further removing the music from everyday experience. Today, schoolchildren seldom hear or learn about it, let alone play it. And radio has all but abandoned the music it popularized during the 1930s and 1940s.

Yet jazz survives among hardcore fans who have the patience to find it in music stores and clubs. And because jazz is deeply emotional music, anyone can connect with it - without knowing everything about it. True! Many people do say that you have to know about jazz before listening to it otherwise you loose the essence of the music. But in this case when you get some listening experience then can you start understanding it. Many people perceive jazz to be restricted to dark schools or college rooms with shiny wooden floors and rows of chair and a black American teacher with huge horn-rimmed glasses, who had once played before the Black revolution in a certain club. But this is not the actual jazz or the essence of jazz. Trumpeter and bandleader can make you laugh, saxophonist Charlie Parker can shoot an electrical jolt up your spine and vocalist Billie Holiday can make you cry - even if you don't know what key they are playing in, whether or not they are improvising, or even what makes jazz jazz.

Jazz has a tough time of it in this modern, convenient world. People have grown used to getting everything fast and easy. Restaurant, gourmet food emporia offer speedy take out and drive through - or even delivery. Quickie tune - and - lube shops offer car service with 10 - minute fast - or - free guarantees. Vacation photos are back in an hour. And when people get sick, they want a doctor to prescribe rapid relief … preferably over the phone.

When it comes to music, many people don't want to work too hard there, either. Most listeners settle for what gets played on the radio. Trouble is, much FM radio music these days is programmed to attract the widest audience possible. Simple melodies and upbeat, brainless lyrics are signs of a potential hit song and bigger advertising dollars for the

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