Word: musically
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...almost as if some anthropologist who had spent a lifetime studying cave drawings suddenly encountered a surviving Neanderthal. These men were playing the music which had developed out of 200 years of enslavement, out of a thousand years of African culture, out of Civil War marches, creole melodies, ragtime, blues. It had all meshed on the back streets of New Orleans around the turn of the century, and blossomed in the grand houses of Storyville, the city's legendary red-light district...
...discovery of the Bunk Johnson band, most jazz collectors assumed that New Orleans jazz had died when the red-light district was closed in 1917. They assumed that all the jazz musicians were out of work and either went north to Chicago or New York, or gave up music entirely. Many great musicians did go north--King Oliver, Johnny Dodds, Jelly Roll Morton, Louis Armstrong. The New Orleans music they took with them began its metamorphosis in the 20's and 30's, evolving into swing and big band dance music, and later into bop and progressive jazz. Most collectors...
...appearance of umbrellas at these parades is like some ancient ritual. In the beat of the music, a dance will sometimes throw his umbrella on the ground--handle pointing skywards--and writhe around it in a riotous, sensual dance. If you ask him where he learned to do that with his umbrella, he will say, "Man, they always done this at parades!" or "My daddy done that!" It is a remnant of some long-forgotten rite. An astute observer once described that scene as "some vanished ritual grandeur of humanity that has been lost in the stones, the jungle...
...foaming bottles held in one hand as they danced, head back, eyes closed. The dancing got looser and wilder and better. It went on like this for blocks and blocks, and the second line got bigger all the time. The musicians bounced along blasting out their roughest and raunchiest music, "Little Liza Jane," "Honky Tonk Town," "Shoutin' Blues." The numbers just kept coming. Battiste strutted sideways, holding his trumpet with one hand, a beer can in the other. Huge drops of sweat glistened on his face...
...caught up with the band by then. Sammy started to blow his trumpet again, and the music went on. Everybody was so cool about the whole thing. It really was an everyday occurrence. Run your tail out of the way of the man with the gun, make sure he's not coming after you, then go on about your business. Today, their business was music, dancing and good times, and they went rolling right on. The second line reformed. They shouted, they danced, they bumped and ground. The trumpets blared, the clarinet soared, the bass drum throbbed, the trombones moaned...