1st Edition

The Routledge Companion to Diasporic Jazz Studies

Edited By Ádám Havas, Bruce Johnson, David Horn Copyright 2025
    496 Pages 24 B/W Illustrations
    by Routledge

    The Routledge Companion to Diasporic Jazz Studies recognizes the proliferation of jazz as global music in the 21st century. It illustrates the multi-vocality of contemporary jazz studies, combining local narratives, global histories and cultural criticism. It rests on the argument that diasporic jazz is not a passive, second-hand reflection of music originating in the US, but possesses its own integrity, vitality and distinctive range of identities. This companion reveals the contradictions of cultural globalization from which diasporic jazz cultures emerge, through 45 chapters within seven thematic parts:

    ·       What is Diasporic Jazz?

    ·       Histories and Counter-Narratives

    ·       Making, Disseminating and Consuming Diasporic Jazz

    ·       Culture, Politics and Ideology

    ·       Communities and Distinctions

    ·       Presenting and Representing Diasporic Jazz

    ·       Challenges and New Directions

    The Routledge Companion to Diasporic Jazz Studies traces how cultural dynamics related to “race”, coloniality, gender, and politics traverse and shape jazz. Employing a cross section of approaches to the study of diasporic jazz as eloquently showcased by the entries, this book seeks to challenge the dominant jazz narratives through championing a more all-encompassing, multi-paradigmatic alternative. Bringing together contributions from authors all over the world, this volume is a vital resource for scholars of jazz, as well as professionals in the music industries and those interested in learning about the cultural and historical origins of jazz.

    Preface

     

    Part 1: What is Diasporic Jazz?

    1.       Tony Whyton: Jazz as Diaspora Space

    2.       Christopher Ballantine: What is “Jazz”? Categories, Passages, Contradictions and Power

    3.       Jonathan Wipplinger: Ways of Conceptualising the Global Jazz Diaspora

    4.       Philipp Schmickl: Rethinking Diaspora in Diasporic Jazz

    5.       Carol Muller: Diaspora in South African Jazz History and Contemporary Performance

    6.       Mikkel Vad: The Diaspora Swings Back: Expat Jazz Musicians in Europe and their Return Home to the United States

    7.       Ádám Havas: Identity Politics and Diasporic Jazz: Reflections from the European Semi-Periphery

     

    Part 2:  Histories and Counter-Narratives

    8.       Catherine Tackley: “Snakehips Swing:” The West Indian Contribution to British Dance Band Music

    9.       Federico Ochoa Escobar: Jazz Diaspora and the Colombian Caribbean: From the Jazz Band to the Big Band

    10.   Jason R. Borge: Booker T. Pittman and the Mid-Twentieth Century South American Jazz Diaspora

    11.   Martin Breternitz: Individuality in Collectivism – Jazz Clubs in the GDR as Nonconformist Diasporic Institutions

    12.   Aleisha Ward: “Real Dance Music in Your Town Soon!” The Importance of Jazz as Dance Music in Aotearoa New Zealand 1920s-1940s

    13.   John Whiteoak: Jazz Diaspora, Latin Musical Influences and Australia

    Part 3:  Making, Disseminating and Consuming Diasporic Jazz

    14.   Pekka Gronow: Music Industry and the Media

    15.   Mischa van Kan: Public Broadcasting Companies and Jazz Outside of the United States

    16.   Haftor Medbøe and José Dias: First Monday Revisited: Production and Dissemination of Diasporic Jazz in the Digital Age

    17.   Ryan Gourley: Soviet jazz on American Vinyl: Consuming Diasporic Jazz at Home

    18.   François Mouillot: “L’Autre Musique du Québec:” Musique Actuelle and the Making of an Experimental Jazz Scene in Quebec

    19.   Otto Stuparitz: Forum Jazz Indonesia: Organizing and Branding Indonesian Jazz Festivals

    Part 4:  Culture, Politics and Ideology

    20.   Frederick J. Schenker: The Making of Jazz in Colonial Asia: Imperial Legacies

    21.   Alexander Gagatsis: Jazz in the Global Arena: The Case of Colonized Bombay, 1920-1947

    22.   Yoshiomi Saito| 齋藤 嘉臣: Jazz in Japan: From Post-war US-Japan Relations’ Perspective

    23.   Michael J. Kellett, Dave Wilson, Robert L. Burke: Settler Colonization and Austrological Improvisative Musicality Since the Late Nineteenth Century

    24.   Ricardo Álvarez Bulacio: Jazz with Mapuche Inspiration: Identities and Political Links in Contemporary Chilean Jazz

    25.   Stan BH Tan-Tangbau: Patient Infusion: Strategies of Community Formation in the Vietnamese Jazz Scene

    Part 5:  Communities and Distinctions

    26.   Jiang Yuhan | 蒋玉涵: Becoming Cultural Elites in China: Jazz, Modernization and Professionalism

    27.   Eric Petzoldt: Jauk Armand Elmaleh-Lemal and the Casablanca Jazz Scene of the 1950s and 1960s

    28.   Lauren Istvandity: DIY Jazz Cultures in Queensland, Australia

    29.   Simon Petty: The Isle s Full of Noises: Tasmania’s Unique Jazz Identity

    30.   Robert Smith: Improvised Music in Wales

    31.   Pedro Cravinho: Urban Jazz Scenes in Portugal: Culture, Spaces and Networks

    32.   Pedro Roxo and Tiago Pereira Simões: “Conceptual Jazz” and “Jazz-Off:” Avant-garde, Globalization and Personal Interpretations of Jazz in Portugal – The Legacy of Jorge Lima Barreto (1968-1974)

    33.   Petter Frost Fadnes: Jazz City Pigeonics: Jazzloftet as a Diasporic “Ground Zero”

     

    Part 6:  Presenting and Representing Diasporic Jazz

    34.   Marie Buscatto: Beyond Frontiers: From Japanese Traditional Koto to Transnational Improvised Music

    35.   Marc Duby: “Säd Afrika:” Django Bates and the South African Imaginary 1985-2012

    36.   Alex de Lacey: Bridging the Gap: Re-rendering Jazz Practice in London’s Displaced Diasporas

    37.   Roger Fagge: “Angry Young Men,” Jazz and Englishness

    38.   José Dias: Centre-Periphery relations and European Jazz Identities

    39.   Josep Pedro and Begoña Gutiérrez-Martínez: Jazz in Spanish Film Noir: Modernity and Youth Cultures During Late Francoism

     

    Part 7:  Challenges and New Directions

     

    40.   Robert G. H. Burns: Indigeneity Meets Improvisation as Free Jazz: A Musical Director’s/Editor’s Perspective

    41.   Andrew Wright Hurley: Jazz as Postwar West-German Cultural Catalyst and African American Resistance

    42.   Haftor Medbøe, Diane Maclean and Sarah Raine: Vivid Stories: Oral Histories, Collective Memory, and the Scottish Jazz Scene

    43.   André Doehring: Diasporic jazz Among the Disciplines

    44.   Walter van de Leur: Is Jazz in Europe European Jazz? Countries, Continents, and Cultural Ownership

    45.   Bruce Johnson: Diasporic jazz and the “material turn:” A Case Study   

    Biography

    Ádám Havas is a Marie Skłodowska-Curie postdoctoral researcher at the University of Barcelona (2022-2024) and a member of The Center for the Study of Culture, Politics, and Society (CECUPS) at the University’s Sociology Department.

    Bruce Johnson currently holds honorary professorships in Departments including Music, Cultural History, Communications and Media in the universities of Glasgow, Turku (Finland) and University of Technology Sydney and the University of New South Wales in Australia.

    David Horn was the first Director of the Institute of Popular Music (IPM) at the University of Liverpool.