CHAPTER 12 | FOUR GIANTS OF EARLY JAZZ 291
drummer, recalled that Morton worked “on each
and every number” in rehearsal until he was satis-
fi ed. “You did what Jelly Roll wanted you to do, no
more and no less.”
Morton moved to New York in 1928. But in an
environment dominated by large dance orchestras,
his emphasis on the New Orleans style was consid-
ered old-fashioned. Work opportunities gradually
dried up, and Morton fell into obscurity, convinced
that he was the victim of a voodoo curse. He resur-
faced in 1938, opening a small jazz club in Wash-
ington, D.C. Morton also presented himself at the
Library of Congress, anxious that his role in the his-
tory of jazz—he claimed to have invented it—be docu-
mented. In a landmark encounter, he was interviewed at length by folklorist Alan
Lomax, illustrating his recollections at the piano. During a trip to California in
1940 he became ill and never recovered. His death in Los Angeles in July 1941 was
hardly noticed by the jazz community.
At a time when solo improvisation based on a composition’s harmonic struc-
ture was gaining importance in jazz, Jelly Roll Morton maintained composition as
the music’s vital force, with improvisation in a secondary role. “My theory,” Mor-
ton announced, “is to never discard the melody.” Thus spontaneity in his music
stemmed not only from improvising on harmonic changes but also on embellish-
ing the melody, and on the varied repetition of whole sections. Morton’s prefer-
ence for melodic variation and sectional construction refl ected his attachment to
ragtime, whose rhythm, melody, and multi-strain forms he absorbed growing up,
and which he continued to draw upon throughout his career.
Morton’s compositional prowess is on display in Black Bottom Stomp (LG 12.3),
the fi rst of his Red Hot Peppers recordings from 1926. The title refers to a then-
popular dance of African American origin, the Black Bottom, whose music
made use of what Morton called the “Spanish tinge”: a hint of Latin American or
Caribbean rhythm, which he considered an essential element of jazz. The Black
Bottom rhythm resembles both the habanera, audible in the ring shout “Jubilee”
(see LG 4.3), and the Charleston, another popular African American dance style
of the 1920s. But the Spanish tinge is only one rhythmic feature of Black Bottom
Stomp: Morton and his musicians vary the rhythmic sense by using stop-time; by
having the bass line alternate between two strong beats to the bar (on beats 1 and 3)
and four, the latter called a walking bass; and, in the last section, emphasizing
beats 2 and 4 in the drums, the so-called backbeat.
The structure of Black Bottom Stomp resembles the multi-strain format of
marches and ragtime, including a key change in the middle to suggest a trio. But
where rags and marches typically have four strains, Morton’s tune has only two,
labeled A and B in the listening guide, providing material for multiple variations.
The composed A section is followed by two variants showcasing solo cornet and
clarinet respectively, and the B section is heard in no fewer than seven contrast-
ing versions. Increasing and decreasing the number of instruments playing at
a given time and spotlighting different soloists, Morton creates variety not only
between sections but within them as well; a sixteen- or twenty-bar segment may
encompass several shifts in texture, volume, and rhythm. The result, for a close
listener, is akin to a constantly changing musical kaleidoscope.LG 12.3the “Spanish tinge”walking bassK Jelly Roll Morton and
His Red Hot Peppers, who
recorded New Orleans–
style jazz in Chicago in
1926 – 27.172028_12_280-304_r3_ko.indd 291 23/01/13 8:40 PM