From Boogie-Woogie to Bop
Kansas City Jazz - A Little Evil Will Do You Good - Con Chapman
Con Chapman [+ ]
Music writer
Con Chapman is the author of Rabbit’s Blues: The Life and Music of Jonny Hodges (Oxford University Press, 2019), winner of the 2019 Book of the Year Award by Hot Club de France, and a 2020 Certificate of Merit for Best Historical Research from the Association for Recorded Sound Collections. His writing on jazz has appeared in The Boston Globe, The Boston Herald, Syncopated Times, and Brilliant Corners, among other publications.
Description
Two distinct styles on the tenor saxophone developed out of the Southwest; the first, a harsh, gruff approach favored by tenors such as Herschel Evans, was the musical progeny of Coleman Hawkins, the first great jazz tensor saxophonist. The other, lighter in tone, was the creation of Lester Young, a native of New Orleans who traveled extensively in his youth throughout the west and southwest as a member of his family’s band. Basie would play the two styles off against each other in “tenor” battles when Evans and Young were members of his band, and Young’s style would serve as the model for Charlie Parker on alto sax that would bring the development of Kansas City jazz to a close with the emergence of bebop.