The Beats were very much influenced by jazz music and musicians. Kerouac would emulate bebop and cool jazz, and like other Beats, wanted his poetry and prose to have a similar musical language, rhythmic feeling, and flow to what he heard in modern jazz.
What style of jazz music most influenced the Beat poets?
The Beats were a group of American writers who came to prominence in the 1950s. They included Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac, William S. Burroughs, and Lawrence Ferlinghetti.
The Beats were heavily influenced by jazz music, particularly the bebop movement, which was pioneered by Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker in the 1940s. The Beats adopted many of the themes and styles of bebop into their own work.
So, What is bebop jazz?
Bebop, as the revolutionary new style and sound eventually came to be known (the origin of the word “bebop” partly stems from a nonsensical word used in improvised scat singing) grew as both an offshoot of and reaction to big band swing music, which was dominated by propulsive dance rhythms. In bebop, though, the rhythmic emphasis was switched from the bass drum to the more subtle hi-hat and ride cymbal, which allowed greater rhythmic fluidity (drummers Kenny Clarke and Max Roach were the chief instigators of this new approach). In the hands of bebop musicians, jazz became more blues-oriented and riff-based too; and because Parker and Gillespie were able to marry their supreme technical ability with their knowledge of advanced music theory, what resulted was a new type of jazz defined by extended solos and whose harmonic language was denser and richer than ever before.
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Who created bebop jazz music?
The movement originated during the early 1940s in the playing of trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie, guitarist Charlie Christian, pianist Thelonious Monk, drummer Kenny Clarke, and the most richly endowed of all, alto saxophonist Charlie “Bird” Parker.
A later style, known as hard bop, or funky, evolved from and incorporated elements of gospel music and rhythm and blues. Horace Silver was the most prominent pianist, composer, and bandleader in this period. Cannonball Adderley and Art Blakey led other hard bop combos.
What are some characteristics of bebop jazz?
Bop is a style of jazz developed in the early to mid-1940s in the United States, which features melodies and improvisations based on the melodic minor scale and chords built on the seventh chord (dominant seventh).
The bebop language evolved out of a mix of styles—including dixieland, swing, and bop—and was a departure from earlier jazz styles. Bebop musicians adopted a more modern approach to melody and harmony that included dissonant harmonies, fast tempos, counterpoint lines, extended chord progressions (often built by playing chords in upper registers) and complex harmonies.
Bebop musicians often played more tightly organized ensembles with greater use of written arrangements than was common for earlier jazz styles. The music typically has fast tempos, ostinatos that often include rapid chord changes with syncopated snare drum accents (known as “vamps”) at every beat or every second beat.
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Who was the biggest musician in bebop?
The bebop movement was a musical revolution that started in the 1940s and lasted until the early 1950s. The movement was mostly centered on New York City, but it spread across the country and even internationally. The bebop artists were known for their complex compositions, improvisations and fast tempos.
The biggest musicians of this movement include:
Charlie Parker
Charlie “Bird” Parker was the biggest jazz musician in bebop. Bebop was a branch of jazz that was popular in the 1940s and 1950s.
Known for his technical proficiency on the saxophone and his innovative approach to improvisation, Charlie Parker was a pioneer of bebop.
Dizzy Gillespie
American jazz trumpeter, bandleader, composer, educator, and singer. In the 1940s, Gillespie, with Charlie Parker, became a major figure in the development of bebop and modern jazz. Charlie Parker Gillespie was one of the creators of bebop, and together, they helped redefine jazz and push the boundaries of the genre.
Miles Davis
A master of bebop and cool jazz that helped to bring both styles to the mainstream, Miles Davis is one of the most legendary figures in jazz history.
He effortlessly transitioned between many styles throughout his career and was a pioneer in using electric instruments in jazz, and his music continues to influence artists today.
Davis is one of the most idolized and influential musicians of the last century who inspired many other great jazz musicians, including John Coltrane, Herbie Hancock, and Chick Corea.
Thelonious Monk
Thelonious Monk was an American jazz pianist and composer. He was a major influence in the development of bebop and modern jazz, and one of the most acclaimed musicians in jazz. His music is known for its “inventive melodies and rhythms” and his “originality that changed the course of jazz.”
John Coltrane
American jazz saxophonist and composer. Working in the bebop and hard bop idioms early in his career, Coltrane helped pioneer the use of modes in jazz and later was at the forefront of free jazz.
Coltrane influenced many musicians who would go on to develop diverse musical ideas of their own. He’s regarded as one of the most influential saxophonists of all time, along with Sonny Rollins, Charlie Parker, and Wayne Shorter.
Bud Powell
He was a jazz pianist and composer. He was one of the leading figures in the development of modern jazz. His virtuosity led many to call him the Charlie Parker of the piano. Powell was also a composer, and many jazz critics describe his work and performance as greatly expanding the scope of jazz harmony.
Mary Lou Williams
Mary Lou Williams was a jazz pianist, composer, and arranger.Mary Lou Williams is one of the most important figures in jazz history. She was a pianist and composer who worked with virtually every major musician in America during her career. She was also one of the first women to break into the male-dominated world of jazz.
Ray Brown
Ray Brown was an American jazz double bassist. He is generally regarded as the most influential jazz bassist of all time, having changed the role of the instrument in jazz.
Who were the famous Beat Poets?
In the 1940s and 50s, a new generation of poets rebelled against the conventions of mainstream American life and writing. They became known as the Beat Poets, a name that evokes weariness, down-and-outness, the beat under a piece of music, and beatific spirituality.
Allen Ginsberg
Allen Ginsberg was an American poet, writer, and activist. He is best known for his poem Howl, in which he denounced what he saw as the destructive forces of capitalism and conformity in the United States.
Ginsberg is considered to be one of the most influential figures in the Beat Generation and wrote about many taboo topics, including politics, sexuality, and drugs.
Lawrence Ferlinghetti
Lawrence Ferlinghetti was a poet, playwright, painter, activist and publisher who founded City Lights Booksellers and Publishers in San Francisco. City Lights remains a cultural landmark that published and hailed the Beat poets and other free speech poetry movements around the world. Ferlinghetti’s publication of Ginsberg’s first book of poems brought the bookstore/publisher to international attention.
Although perhaps best remembered as a publisher, Ferlinghetti is one of the best Beat poets in his own right and deserves more recognition and readership as a writer/poet.
Gregory Corso
Gregory Corso was a key member of the Beat movement, a group of convention-breaking writers who were credited with sparking much of the social and political change that transformed the United States in the 1960s. Corso’s spontaneous, insightful, and inspirational verse once prompted fellow Beat poet Allen Ginsberg to describe him as an “awakener of youth.” Although Corso enjoyed his greatest level of popularity during the 1960s and 1970s, he continued to influence contemporary readers and critics late into the twentieth century.
Gary Snyder
The Zen master, poet, environmentalist, essayist, lecturer, Gary Sherman Snyder is called the ‘poet laureate of Deep Ecology.’ He has traveled across Asia, specifically spending much time in Japan practicing Zen Buddhism. He also traveled extensively in India and went across the Himalayas with Allen Ginsberg and his long-time partner Joanne Kyger, an experience that birthed his book Passage Through India.
