Blog #4: The Harmony and Voice of Jazz Communities

Evident from its transitions throughout America’s history, jazz is more than simply sound coming from instruments. It evolves, refines, and ameliorates itself as a result of its founders’ interpretations of their community, and possibly American society as a whole. Thelonius Monk did not become a pioneer of the intellectual aspect of jazz without his unique circumstances, and although one can draw multiple parallels between his environment in New York as a young child and other multiracial communities, such as that of Leimert Park, it is evident that New York was spatially distinct. This distinction is what made Monk inherently talented at his profession, and cannot be exactly found in any other city in America. Although Leimert Park and other communities share similar traits of hidden artistic expression not recognized by mainstream society, it is apparent that San Juan Hill shaped Monk in a way that ultimately created an intellectual and imposing dialogue on the jazz community.

By no means was Leimert Park a community disconnected from modern jazz. With multiple global influences, the area brought all members of the community into a variety of cultural influences. Jazz was no exception, and as one resident states, “Jazz is the heartbeat of the community that brings all of us together.” (Leimert Park). With a primarily black population, jazz could reach even the farthest corner of the United States in Los Angeles, and ultimately created a positive dialogue within the community that fostered virtue. The relationship to jazz was that of a communal avenue to interpret events, such as the Rodney King verdict, and was not a competitive or contentious form of art in the area. Even when riots nearly destroyed many of the most important cultural establishments, the majority of the community demonstrated a sense of caring and trust that is often overlooked by the media in favor of examining violence. The dialogue between the residents of Leimert Park and jazz was to express a response to the rest of the world, and an attempt to prove that artistic expression and communal values were not absent in the ethnically diverse region of Los Angeles.

New York’s San Juan Hill appeared similar to the Los Angeles suburb in more traits than its association with jazz. It was a global community where people from Eastern Europe, the Caribbean Islands, and southern United States shared a common spatial dimension that inevitably incorporated jazz into its region. However, Thelonius Monk and musicians did not use jazz as a relationship to the community in a similar way that citizens of Leimert Park did. In Thelonious Monk: The Life and Times of an American Original, Robin Kelley notes, “Battles were not only limited to black and white, or between Caribbean and Southern blacks.” (Kelley 20). With such a large influx of immigrants from various countries, there was ultimately a lack of communal identity and sense of values that allowed jazz in Leimert Park to represent positivity. Monk, growing up in neighborhoods where he saw more than simply white versus black, saw jazz as an outlet for himself as an individual, rather than for his fellow San Juan Hill residents. Along with a rapid rate of people leaving San Juan Hill for Harlem, it is evident that the community would never become as unified or solidified as Leimert, and as a result, Monk’s style of jazz represents a break from the global influences due to his past conflicts with his international neighbors. Thelonius Monk’s style of Bebop was able to transcend the conformity of society simply because the musician was raised to fight against external influences as a whole, entirely in contrast to Leimert Park’s encouragement of a unified “heartbeat”. Jazz was in effect, a dialogue for Thelonius Monk alone, and did not aim to provide for entertainers but to better express the experiences he faced in a racially charged environment growing up.

While both areas of Leimert Park and San Juan Hill share traits of being neglected by mainstream society, San Juan Hill could not promote a homogeneity of beliefs that fostered positive community values in Leimert Park. It instead taught its residents, one of whom was Thelonius Monk, a more individualist worldview that cannot be shaped by mass media nor one’s own neighbors. Monk evolved jazz by adding his harsh experience as a child to demonstrate that a dialogue often speaks the loudest if there is only one speaker, and rather than blending global influences further, jazz can evolve by refining itself in an intellectual realm. San Juan Hill in New York brought a harsher, self-centered jazz into the American music community, but through Monk’s contributions, demonstrated its worth as an art form by relentlessly transcending conformity always present in our society.

Commented on Anna Bontrager's Blog