Up until this point, I have made little mention of different Jazz Genres. This is because most Jazz Genres use the same underlying Jazz (or Music) theory. Most Jazz styles use chords, so most employ guide tones and avoid notes in their improvisation. All Jazz, almost by definition, employs improvisation and therefore some kind of scales. And yet, each subgenre is distinct and separate. Each has it's own particular characteristics that make it recognisably itself.
So, in this series of lessons I will cover a number of Jazz Genres to explain what makes them unique. Some genres employ a particular theoretical concept (modal harmony in Modal Jazz, polyphony in Dixieland Jazz); some employ particular instrumentation (gypsy guitars and violin in Gypsy Jazz); some employ particular rhythms (the clave in Latin Jazz, straight rhythm in Fusion); some employ elements from other genres of music (Blues in Hard-bop, Rock and Funk in Fusion). By the end of this module you should have at least a basic understanding of the key characteristics of each major Jazz Genre and be able to recognise and categorise any Jazz Song into a particular subgenre.
