The Main Trends in the Development of the Moscow Jazz School (1950s – 1960s)

Abstract

The present paper deals with the leading trends in the development of Russian jazz art. The authors substantiate high productivity of the “thaw” era in Russian art leading to the emancipation of society, the expansion of the range of cultural communication and formation of the auto-image of Russian jazz. The research explores refraction of jazz aesthetics in stylistics as a youth subculture with its own slang, musical preferences and behavioral models. While the negative consequence of the promotion of jazz as a musical reference point for representatives of this youth subculture was the narrowing and stereotyping of listeners' expectations, the emergence of new artistic types, themes and images that do not lose their significance at the turn of the 21 century came to be the positive side of the popularity of jazz among young people. The paper reveals how Moscow jazz of the 1950s and 1960s entered a period of active development of jazz improvisation techniques, as well as embraced the experience of foreign collectives. Basing on the study of bibliographic sources and musicological literature, the authors identify the leading trends of the Moscow jazz school of the given period: transformation of ensemble interaction strategies, intellectualization of the perception of jazz music, institutionalization of jazz in Russian musical culture. The paper specified socio-cultural factors that determined the leading role of the Moscow jazz school in the period of the 1950s and 1960s in the creation of youth clubs, amateur associations and jazz study centers, jazz festivals, the appearance of the first professional educational institutions of the pop-jazz profile.