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What Is Collective Improvisation?

Written by user on September 28, 2015

(Evan Christopher, Photo: Eric Hartman)

If you’ve listened to very early recordings of Jazz (for example, the first instances of recorded Jazz, played by the Original Dixieland Jazz Band), you’ll notice something unusual: the solo is missing. The solo – an artist stepping to the front to improvise on the melody and chord changes while backed by the rest of the band – is such a staple of Jazz that it’s very odd not to hear it in these first recordings.

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