The Harp in Jazz and American Pop Music Megan A. Bledsoe A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Musical Arts University of Washington 2012 Reading Committee: Donna Shin, Chair Valerie Muzzolini Gordon Áine Heneghan Program Authorized to Offer Degree: Harp Performance Bledsoe - DMA Harp Performance ©Copyright 2012 Megan A. Bledsoe 2 Bledsoe - DMA Harp Performance University of Washington Abstract The Harp in Jazz and American Pop Music Megan A. Bledsoe Chair of the Supervisory Committee: Assistant Professor of Flute Donna Shin, Chair Instrumental Performance, School of Music The harp has endured a tenuous relationship with the genres of jazz and American popular music throughout history.
While a few harpists have enjoyed successful and significant careers in these fields, the harp is largely absent from mainstream jazz and American pop. The purpose of this dissertation is to ascertain a definitive cause for such exclusion and use this information to identify a feasible path toward further integration of the harp in jazz and American pop music. This paper examines the state of the harp in jazz and American pop from various angles, including historical perspective, analytical assessment, and a study which compares harpists’ improvisational abilities to those of their mainstream jazz instrumentalist counterparts. These evaluations yield an encompassing view of the harp’s specific advantages and detriments in the areas of jazz and American pop.
The result of this research points to a need for specialization among harpists, particularly in defining new styles. It is evident that harpists’ careers generally necessitate a working knowledge of various styles of music. However, this often sacrifices commitment toward refining any single individual area of expertise, including the development of jazz and American pop subgenres which are well-suited to the harp. For this reason, the findings of this dissertation not only elucidate the current and past roles of the harp in jazz and American pop, but also hold the potential to influence the future of these genres.
3 Bledsoe - DMA Harp Performance Table of Contents Introduction 7 Chapter 1: A Brief History of the Harp in Jazz and American Pop Music 8 Roots and Early Development 8 Influence of the Cinema 16 Divergence of Jazz and Pop 21 From Swing to Cool Jazz and Everything In Between 23 Pushing the Boundaries of Style 30 Perpetuating the Jazz Tradition 33 Rise of the Singer-Songwriter 38 Chapter 2: “Harp Jazz” vs. “Real Jazz” 41 Is There A Difference? 41 Study: Comparison of Improvised Jazz Solo Transcriptions 43 Possible Causes for Discrepancy 54 Chapter 3: The Current State of Affairs 56 Defying (or Perpetuating) the Stereotypes 56 The Increasing Role of the Harp in Today’s Pop Culture 60 Tradition, Innovation, and Ambiguity in Edmar Castañeda’s 64 “Cuatro De Colores” Joanna Newsom and Today’s Singer-Songwriter Harpist 76 Chapter 4: The Future of the Harp in Jazz and American Pop Music 85 What Does Today’s Musical Climate Mean for Tomorrow’s Performers? 85 Pedagogy 87 Technology 90 Where Do We Go From Here? 91 4 Bledsoe - DMA Harp Performance Appendix A: Table of Harpists Involved in Jazz and American Pop Music 92 Appendix B: Lead Sheets 119 “How High The Moon” 119 “Ornithology” 120 “Moonlight In Vermont” 121 Appendix C: Transcription of Dee Carstensen’s “First Time Around” 122 Appendix D: Comparison of Improvised Jazz Solo Transcriptions Study 125 “All Blues” Lead Sheet 125 “All Blues” Solo Transcriptions 126 “Alone Together” Lead Sheet 129 “Alone Together” Solo Transcriptions 130 Survey 133 Compilation of Data 139 Appendix E: Form Chart of Edmar Castañeda’s “Cuatro De Colores” 145 Appendix F: Joanna Newsom’s “Sprout and the Bean” 147 Lyrics 147 Transcription of Introduction through Interlude 148 Bibliography 152 5 Bledsoe - DMA Harp Performance List of Figures 1. 1-12 of Adele Girard’s “Harp Boogie” (Head) 14 1. 1-10 of Harpo Marx’s “Harpo Woogie” 18 1.
11-12 of Harpo Marx’s “Harpo Woogie” (Treble Strings + Xylophone) 20 1. Transcription of Dorothy Ashby’s Harp Solo from “Moonlight in Vermont” 26 (over “BA” sections of the form) 1. Variation 1 in Deborah Henson-Conant’s “New Blues” 35 1. Comparison of Henson-Conant’s “New Blues” Variation Melody 36 (transposed) to Girard’s “Harp Boogie” Melody 1.
1-4 of Dee Carstensen’s “This Time Around” 39 2. Table of Data Gathered from Question A (averages) 53 3. Chorus of “You’ve Got The Love” by Florence + The Machine 62 (Harp, Bass, Chords) 3. 1-6 of Edmar Castañeda’s “Cuatro De Colores” 67 3.
15-16 of Edmar Castañeda’s “Cuatro De Colores” 69 (“A” Section Accompaniment) 3. 17-22 Flugelhorn Melody of Edmar Castañeda’s 70 “Cuatro De Colores” (“A” Section Melody) 3. 24-31 Harp and Flugelhorn Melody from Edmar Castañeda’s 71 “Cuatro De Colores” (“B” Section Melody) 3. 1-4 of Edmar Castañeda’s Solo Over “B” Section of 74 “Cuarto De Colores” 3.
Excerpt from Edmar Castañeda’s Solo Over “B” Section of 75 “Cuarto De Colores” 3. Form Chart of Joanna Newsom’s “The Sprout and the Bean” 79 3. Rhythmic Phrase Model in mm. 8-16 of Joanna Newsom’s 82 “The Sprout and the Bean” 6 Bledsoe - DMA Harp Performance Introduction Virtually every discussion of the harp in jazz or American popular music begins with a statement acknowledging the rarity of this combination of instrument and genres.
This is as true for articles published in the 1950s as it is for podcasts and essays published in the current millennium. However, harpists have continued to immerse themselves in these musical worlds since the 1930s. This begs the questions: why hasn’t the public’s view of harps and harpists evolved with the music itself to accommodate the diverse and complex roles of harp music? Is the perceptive barrier a product of society’s inflexibility or the harp’s (or harpist’s) inability to fully engage in such genres? The purpose of this tome is to explore the involvement of the harp in jazz and American popular music. Subsequently, this document will draw conclusions regarding the extent to which such involvement has bolstered (or hindered) the musical diversification of the model harpist.
This document will view the history of the harp in jazz and American pop music with the purpose of identifying significant contributions and detriments to these genres. Answers to the aforementioned questions will become manifest through the examination of both historical and current practices, including analyses and comparisons to mainstream artists. Finally, these conclusions will inform speculation about future roles of the harp in jazz and American pop. These conclusions will also provide guidance to further the advancement of the instrument in jazz and American popular music.
7 Bledsoe - DMA Harp Performance Chapter 1: A Brief History of the Harp in Jazz and American Pop Music Roots and Early Development The beginnings of the jazz genre developed around the turn of the 20th century with the amalgamation of African and European musical traditions. Just as communities in the southern United States combined African rhythmic and melodic tendencies with Western sonorities, one naturally assumes that instrumentation in early jazz was also product of the coalescence of these two musical cultures. This proves to be true with consideration of such instruments as the banjo, percussion instruments like the gourd and jew’s harp, and vocal styles. These instruments combined with post-Civil War brass instruments to generate typical early jazz ensembles.1 There is little evidence, however, for the development of the harp in early jazz as influenced by the transplantation of the West African kora, a 21-stringed relative of the Western harp.2 Rather, the shape and structure of the kora likely contributed to the 19th century’s evolution of the banjo, specifically in its use of a stabilizing neck and resonant body created by an animal skin covering.3 This development aligns with the necessity for increased volume production in ensembles which mixed string and brass instruments.
1 Gunther Schuller, Early Jazz: Its Roots and Musical Development (New York: Oxford University Press, 1968), 54-57. 2 Ted Gioia, The History of Jazz (New York: Oxford University Press, 1997), 3-52. Gura and James F. Bollman, America’s Instrument: The Banjo in the Nineteenth Century (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1999), 2-5.
8 Bledsoe - DMA Harp Performance The structure of the kora also bears a resemblance to the harp guitar. Though invented in Italy in the Baroque era, this instrument saw a rise in popularity in Europe in the 19th and 20th centuries. There is evidence of the harp guitar’s presence in early jazz ensembles, as Roth notes,4 and is listed in programs of James Reese Europe’s Clef Club Orchestra5 beginning in 1910. The “harp” adjective in the instrument’s name refers to a set of two or more open strings which run parallel to the guitar’s neck.
These strings are used as drones which add to the instrument’s resonance. In terms of performance technique and chromatic capability, the harp guitar is analogous to a traditional guitar and has no relation to either the kora or the European harp. There are several possible reasons for the harp’s omission in early jazz, the first being its relative lack of sound production. By the early 1900s, harp makers had not only developed the cross-strung chromatic harp and the double-action pedal harp,6 but also expanded the soundboard to create more volume in addition to increased chromatic capability.
Despite these vast improvements, the harp still produced less sound than its brass, banjo, percussion, and keyboard counterparts. This impairment proves detrimental, particularly when coupled with budding yet primitive recording technology which required inordinately loud volumes in order for sounds to be documented on wax cylinders.7 In addition to volume discrepancies among instruments, the harp presents two logistical difficulties which likely prevented its immersion in early jazz: size and cost. Since there was no 4 Russell Roth, “On the Instrumental Origins of Jazz.” American Quarterly, Vol. Badger, “James Reese Europe and the Prehistory of Jazz.” American Music, Vol.
1, Special Jazz Issue (Spring, 1989): 50. 6 Roslyn Rensch, Harps and Harpists (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2007), 175-182. 7 Andre Millard, America on Record: A History of Recorded Sound (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 17-36, 80-114. 9 Bledsoe - DMA Harp Performance development of simple-structured harps from West Africa in the United States in the 1900s, early jazz bands would have needed to utilize the European style of harp.
There are two broad categories which define European harps, mainly characterized by their size.8 The first category is comprised of the previously discussed pedal and cross-strung harps, generally containing 40-47 strings. The second category consists of smaller harps and mostly contain less than 40 strings. These instruments often utilize levers on some or all of the strings to raise the pitch a half step. Smaller harps are emblematic of Celtic music and are frequently used for diatonic and modal musical genres.
Predictably, smaller harps produce less volume, thus essentially negating their potential usefulness in early jazz ensembles. Harps that provide greater volume and chromatic capability, by consequence, are large and heavy instruments that would have been difficult to transport. They are nearly impossible to perform while marching, as was common in New Orleans with funeral processions and street parties.9 Though this style of instrument began production in the United States in 1880s, the cost of purchasing a harp would have been prohibitive to the groups of people who were developing the genre of jazz. Early jazz musicians often came from meager backgrounds and earned small wages.
Therefore they primarily played instruments that were easy to build or readily available and inexpensive.10 It is likely a combination of the aforementioned factors that prevented the harp’s presence in the earliest developments of American jazz. As the genre progressed, however, it spread through the United States and was accessible to a larger, broader population of musicians. By the 8 Roslyn Rensch, Harps and Harpists (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2007), 122-124, 175-179. 9 Ted Gioia, The History of Jazz (New York: Oxford University Press, 1997), 28-32.
10 Ted Gioia, The History of Jazz (New York: Oxford University Press, 1997), 27-29.