Recorded Jazz’ 100th Birthday Still Shrouded in Racial Myths

Although it’s conceded that The Original Dixieland Jass Band (ODJB) cut the first so-called Jazz record early in 1917, 100 years haven’t diminished the band, and its cornetist Nick LaRocca’s, spurious claim to have invented Jazz. In a reasoned report on the subject, The New Orleans Advocate’s Katy Reckdahl speaks to noted historians at Tulane University as well as descendents of ODJB’s musicians, who repeat LaRocca’s shibboleths about how whites invented Jazz rather than African-Americans with more than skepticism. Eventually the mixing of so-called Black and White musics is agreed upon as the reason for Jazz’s birth, and this was reflected in subsequent post-ODJB recordings.