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THE JAZZ AGE – ENGLISH TASK During the period between 1920 and 1930 in American history, a piece of popular music became the symbol in the United States of America: Jazz. It was a historical moment named the Jazz Age, not only because of the music but also the prosperity and the growth of the liberal side of social activities. At those times, the Americans were living in the city and left the rural areas, due to the major economic growth. It enhanced the freedom of the population, they had the autonomy to travel, have fun, and have a significant income. The conservative Americans didn't like this new lifestyle arranged in the cities, so as a way to deal with the bother they prohibited the selling and importation of alcohol, sadly for them, it did not stop the new way of living, just gave a welcome to gangsters and organized crime. There were illegal saloons where people reunited to drink and listen mainly to jazz music, big jazz stars such as Louis Armstrong used to play in those places, they were called Speakeasies. The young women who just left the war were a new symbol as well, they were free and empowered and had already shown their power when working in the war same as men, smoking cigarettes and cutting their hair short would bother the conservative older women, as well a great impact that has happened was the approval in the 19th Amendment giving the right to women to vote. All the youth was feeling rebellious, their way of dance was different, as well as their clothes and gestures. Talking about sex freely in the streets and on the radio was becoming common for this new American youth, which was a shock for conservative elders. With the right to vote women had now new importance in the culture and society, becoming more and more evidence, talking about equality of the genders and being open about their sexuality was their way to show that they were not going to accept be treated as before, they had become stronger and even female singers were becoming famous in the country. Bessie Smith became a great and famous musician and the fact that she was also African American made her shine way more, in a racist society, having black people famous is way harder than making other female artists famous, other than just equality of the genders, they had to fight racism as well. In the port cities, you could feel the mix of the cultures, Frenchs, African Americans, Cajuns, and creoles were blended to create music, food, and art in general. By the combination of African rhythms and European harmonies, African Americans created jazz, known for its deep freedom of expression. Jazz has its roots in slavery making it very emotional and sometimes painful for the singers, always showing it with passion, but jazz had a very important cultural and political meaning in American history which was widely accepted by the public. However, later, jazz became a genre where the race was really diverse, embracing all cultures. The radio was also a way of popularizing jazz, beginning to be described as a sound factory it has made it possible for many people to listen to music for free while being far away from the cities districts and also being a fan of the main artists, even people who could never afford attending into the big expensive clubs held in the cities. They were live concerts played on the radio, usually when the bands and artists would have a presentation in the leading centers such as New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Kansas City. Louis Armstrong known as the most famous jazz musician played very little on the radio, they used to prefer playing white artists, the musicologists said that jazz at the time was divided into three, black artists playing for black people, black artists playing for white people and white artists playing for white people. Usually, in the suburbs of big cities, black artists' jazz music was played way more. Jazz was heavily criticized as being an immoral movement, the older part of society together with the conservators made everything they could to end this style, because for them it was ending with the old cultural values of the society and promoting new values that weren't as good, giving women more freedom and making youth lose themselves while drinking and dancing to jazz music. The media also bought their fight and started to make bad articles about the music and artists, saying how jazz was just noise and would threaten people's ears. The reality is that society was changing because of the big popularization of the cities, the increase in the income of the classes and also the right to vote giving to women. Nowadays, we can think that jazz is just elevator music or a song to relax while listening, but it is in fact way more, the big movement caused during the jazz era was life-changing for many people, and many black musicians could increase their class status. For women, they could feel their freedom for the first time, going to the salons and dancing with their long bobs and smoking cigarettes, having their rights guaranteed. A heavily artistic era, where the mix between African American music and European would give freedom and improvisation would make beautiful songs.
