Is Cajun Music Jazz?

by Ryan Thomson, accordionist and fiddle player. This article was originally written for the

New Hampshire Seacoast Jazz Society Newsletter, in 1990. Except for the question and

answer dialogue section, it is a true story.

"But we don't play jazz," my guitar player exclaimed, as I described a gig I had booked for

the band. "Don't we improvise our solos and play heads when they come around?" I

countered. "Yes, but we're not a jazz band," he complained. It was a great gig as far as I was

concerned, and I pressed on: "Our music comes out of the same traditions and melting pot

as Louie Armstrong's, and besides, the money's good, we'll have fun, and its good exposure

for the band!" I talked the gig up a while longer to the other members and we finally came

to a concensus: We would accept the offer to perform at the 1987 Portsmouth Jazz

Festival.

I'll admit that I worried some about how we would be received, but once I viewed the

bobbing heads and tapping feet on Bow Street, I knew that we had it made. The glowing

Rockingham Gazette review of our performance capped it off. It wasn't until I attended the

the New Orleans Jazz Festival the following year though, that I discovered just how right I

had been: Cajun and zydeco music is considered such an important part of early developing

jazz that it is featured prominantly in New Orleans, with many excellent bands performing.

Where else can one attend a workshop exploring the differences and similarities between

"cajun," and "zydeco," accordion styles, and then stroll over to the next stage where

Wynton Marsalis is doing his thing? My friend, who couldn't make the trip to Lousiana that

year, traveled instead to the Montreal Jazz Festival, and spent a weekend listening to jazz

fusion and dancing the cajun jitterbug to some rocking zydeco bands from Louisiana.

A: "But is cajun music jazz?"

B: "They feature it at major jazz festivals, so it must be jazz."

A: "Thats a ridiculous argument. If it was really jazz, local cajun and zydeco performances

would be listed in the Seacoast Jazz Society Newletter."

B: Maybe cajun music isn't really jazz, but it does have many of the elements of jazz,

besides, wouldn't the people who put together big time jazz festivals know the

difference?"

A: "Do cajun bands play 'On the Sunny Side of the Street?'"

B: "No, but its amazing how much rhythmic and melodic improvisation a good zydeco band

can get from a one chord dance tune."

A: "Aha!, got you there. Everyone knows that good jazz has LOTS of fancy chord changes.

One chord doesn't qualify."

B: "Well, I guess that knocks out a number of modern jazz pieces from consideration."

A: "Wrong, Its common knowledge that "jazz" can't be precisely defined, and besides, the

guys that play some of the more modern stuff know how to play 'On the Sunny Side of the

Street' if they wanted to."

B: "I could play 'On the Sunny Side of the Street,' cajun style, on my accordion, if I wanted

to."

Its no accident that modern dancing to cajun music is described as the "Cajun Jitterbug."

Since cajun music and swing music come from the same roots in Louisiana, it makes sense

that the dance moves are almost completely interchangeable despite the fact that cajun

rhythms are often very different than swing rhythms. Cajun dancers just change the

footwork to follow the different beat while incorporating all of the upperbody turns and

variations standard to big band swing dancing.

Similarly I find it easy to make the transition from playing swing piano in the Swing Pirates

to playing cajun/zydeco tunes on my accordion with the Crawdad Wranglers. I'm biased. I

like to dance. I like dance music. I like music with lots of improvisation. I like insistant,

pulsating, repetitive rhythms. I like Count Basie's rhythm section. I like sizzling zydeco

rubboard rhythm. I like to express myself with open ended soaring solos. Is cajun music

jazz? I'll let the scholars and festival promoters decide. Would I perform cajun music again

at the jazz festival? Easy answer.

Will I keep on playing swing piano and cajun accordion and calling them both jazz? Yes, as

long as my finger tips can keep striking the keys, I keep getting gigs, and until the great

goddess of jazz strikes me dead!

Ryan Thomson leads two bands: The Swing Pirates, who play 30's and 40's swing music for

jitterbug dances, and the Crawdad Wranglers, who perform cajun and zydeco dance music

from Louisiana. He teaches both swing and cajun dancing to beginners and has recently

published a book: "Swing Fiddle, an Introduction," which surveys the field of early jazz and

western swing violin playing. ISBN 978-0-931877-19-3. You can contact him at 4 Elm Court,

Newmarket, NH 03857, 603-659-2658.

This article by Ryan J Thomson, 1996