Swing music is a style of jazz that developed in the United States during the late 1920s and early 1930s. It became nationally popular from the mid-1930s. Swing represents the most famous era of jazz as a genre of entertainment, before the emergence of modern jazz.Elisabeta Campău-Firtescu, Jazzul anilor 1940 în spațiul nord-american", Editura Artes, Iaşi, 2025, p.70 Swing bands usually featured soloists who would improvise on the melody over the arrangement. The danceable swing style of big bands and bandleaders such as Fletcher Henderson and Benny Goodman was the dominant form of American popular music from 1935 to 1946, known as the swing era, when people were dancing the Lindy Hop. The verb "to swing" is also used as a term of praise for playing that has a strong groove or drive. Big band leaders of the swing era include Benny Goodman, Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Jimmie Lunceford, Cab Calloway, Benny Carter, Jimmy Dorsey, Tommy Dorsey, Earl Hines, Bunny Berigan, Harry James, Lionel Hampton, Glenn Miller, and Artie Shaw.
Overview Swing has its roots in 1920s dance music ensembles, which began using new styles of written arrangements, incorporating rhythmic innovations pioneered by Louis Armstrong, Coleman Hawkins, Benny Carter and other jazzmen. During the World War II era, swing began to decline in popularity, and after the war, bebop and jump blues gained popularity.
Swing blended with other genres to create new musical styles. In country music, artists such as Jimmie Rodgers, Moon Mullican, Milton Brown and Bob Wills introduced elements of swing along with blues to create a genre called "western swing". Famous roma guitarist Django Reinhardt created gypsy swing musicDregni, Michael (2008). Gypsy Jazz: In Search of Django Reinhardt and the Soul of Gypsy Swing. Oxford University Press. pp. 10–13. . and composed the gypsy swing standard "Minor Swing".Dregni, Michael (2004). Django: The Life and Music of a Gypsy Legend. Oxford University Press. . In the late 1980s to early 1990s, new urban-styled swing-beat emerged called new jack swing (New York go-go), created by young producer Teddy Riley. In the late 1990s and into the 2000s, there was a swing revival, led by Squirrel Nut Zippers, Brian Setzer orchestra and Big Bad Voodoo Daddy.
1920s: Roots
Developments in dance orchestra and jazz music during the 1920s both contributed to the development of the 1930s swing style. Starting in 1923, the Fletcher Henderson Orchestra featured innovative arrangements by Don Redman that featured call-response interplay between brass and reed sections, and interludes arranged to back up soloists. The arrangements also had a smoother rhythmic sense than the ragtime-influenced arrangements that were the more typical "hot" dance music of the day. In 1924 Louis Armstrong joined the Henderson band, lending impetus to an even greater emphasis on soloists. The Henderson band also featured Coleman Hawkins, Benny Carter, and Buster Bailey as soloists, who all were influential in the development of swing era instrumental styles. During the Henderson band's extended residency at the Roseland Ballroom in New York, it became influential on other big bands. Duke Ellington credited the Henderson band with being an early influence when he was developing the sound for his own band. In 1925 Armstrong left the Henderson band and would add his innovations to New Orleans style jazz to develop Chicago style jazz, another step towards swing.
Traditional New Orleans style jazz was based on a two-beat meter and contrapuntal improvisation led by a trumpet or cornet, typically followed by a clarinet and trombone in a call-response pattern. The rhythm section consisted of a sousaphone and drums, and sometimes a banjo. By the early 1920s guitars and pianos sometimes substituted for the banjo and a string bass sometimes substituted for the sousaphone. Use of the string bass opened possibilities for instead of time at faster tempos, which increased rhythmic freedom. The Chicago style released the soloist from the constraints of contrapuntal improvisation with other front-line instruments, lending greater freedom in creating melodic lines. Louis Armstrong used the additional freedom of the new format with time, accenting the second and fourth beats and anticipating the main beats with lead-in notes in his solos to create a sense of rhythmic pulse that happened between the beats as well as on them, i.e. swing.Harker, Brian C. (1997). Early Musical Development of Louis Armstrong, 1921–1928. PhD Dissertation. Columbia University. .
In 1927 Armstrong worked with pianist Earl Hines, who had a similar impact on his instrument as Armstrong had on trumpet. Hines' melodic, horn-like conception of playing deviated from the contemporary conventions in jazz piano centered on building rhythmic patterns around "pivot notes". His approaches to rhythm and phrasing were also free and daring, exploring ideas that would define swing playing. His approach to rhythm often used accents on the lead-in instead of the main beat, and mixed meters, to build a sense of anticipation to the rhythm and make his playing swing. He also used "stops" or musical silences to build tension in his phrasing.Cook, Richard (2005). Jazz Encyclopedia. London: Penguin. .Kirchner, Bill, ed. (2000). The Oxford Companion to Jazz. New York: Oxford University Press. . Hines' style was a seminal influence on the styles of swing-era pianists Teddy Wilson, Art Tatum, Jess Stacy, Nat "King" Cole, Erroll Garner, Mary Lou Williams, and Jay McShann.
Black territory dance bands in the southwest were developing dynamic styles that often went in the direction of blues-based simplicity, using riffs in a call-response pattern to build a strong, danceable rhythm and provide a musical platform for extended solos.Russell, Ross (1971). Jazz Style in Kansas City and the Southwest. Berkeley, CA, University of California Press. The rhythm-heavy tunes for dancing were called "stomps". The requirement for volume led to continued use of the sousaphone over the string bass with the larger ensembles, which dictated a more conservative approach to rhythm based on time signatures. Meanwhile, string bass players such as Walter Page were developing their technique to the point where they could hold down the bottom end of a full-sized dance orchestra.
The growth of radio broadcasting and the recording industry in the 1920s allowed some of the more popular dance bands to gain national exposure. The most popular style of dance orchestra was the "sweet" style, often with strings. Paul Whiteman developed a style he called "symphonic jazz", grafting a classical approach over his interpretation of jazz rhythms in an approach he hoped would be the future of jazz. Whiteman's Orchestra enjoyed great commercial success and was a major influence on the sweet bands. Jean Goldkette's Victor Recording Orchestra featured many of the top white jazz musicians of the day including Bix Beiderbecke, Jimmy Dorsey, Frank Trumbauer, Pee Wee Russell, Eddie Lang, and Joe Venuti. The Victor Recording Orchestra won the respect of the Fletcher Henderson Orchestra in a Battle of the Bands; Henderson's cornetist Rex Stewart credited the Goldkette band with being the most influential white band in the development of swing music before Benny Goodman's. As a dance music promoter and agent, Goldkette also helped organize and promote McKinney's Cotton Pickers and Glen Gray's Orange Blossoms (later the Casa Loma Orchestra), two other Detroit-area bands that were influential in the early swing era.
Early swing As the 1920s turned to the 1930s, the new concepts in rhythm and ensemble playing that comprised the swing style were transforming the sounds of large and small bands. Starting in 1928, the Earl Hines Orchestra was broadcast throughout much of the Midwest from the Grand Terrace Cafe in Chicago, where Hines had the opportunity to expound upon his new approaches to rhythm and phrasing with a big band. Hines' arranger Jimmy Mundy would later contribute to the catalog of the Benny Goodman Orchestra. The Duke Ellington Orchestra had its new sounds broadcast nationally from New York's Cotton Club, followed by the Cab Calloway Orchestra and the Jimmie Lunceford Orchestra. Also in New York, the Fletcher Henderson Orchestra featured the new style at the Roseland Ballroom and the swing powerhouse Chick Webb Orchestra started its extended stay at the Savoy Ballroom in 1931. Bennie Moten and the Kansas City Orchestra showcased the riff-propelled, solo-oriented form of swing that had been developing in the hothouse of Kansas City. Emblematic of the evolving music was the change in the name of Moten's signature tune, from "Moten Stomp" to "Moten Swing". Moten's orchestra had a highly successful tour in late 1932. Audiences raved about the new music, and at the Pearl Theatre in Philadelphia in December 1932, the doors were let open to the public who crammed into the theatre to hear the new sound, demanding seven encores from Moten's orchestra.
With the early 1930s came the financial difficulties of the Great Depression that curtailed recording of the new music and drove some bands out of business, including the Fletcher Henderson Orchestra and McKinney's Cotton Pickers in 1934. Henderson's next business was selling arrangements to up-and-coming bandleader Benny Goodman.
At this time, "sweet" dance music remained most popular with white audiences and was successfully showcased by bandleaders such as Guy Lombardo and Shep Fields, but the Casa Loma Orchestra and the Benny Goodman Orchestra went against that grain, targeting the new swing style to younger audiences. Despite Benny Goodman's claim that "sweet" music was a "weak sister" as compared to the "real music" of America, Lombardo's band enjoyed widespread popularity for decades while crossing over racial divides and was even praised by Louis Armstrong as one of his favorites. "Armstrong and Lombardo did not view their worlds as diametrically opposed, nor did many other contemporary musicians of the 1930s. ...Lombardo himself always took great pride in the number of black orchestras that imitated his style."
1935–1946: The swing era
In 1935 the Benny Goodman Orchestra had won a spot on the radio show Let's Dance and started showcasing an updated repertoire featuring Fletcher Henderson arrangements. Goodman's slot was after midnight in the East, and few people heard it. It was on earlier on the West Coast and developed the audience that later led to Goodman's Palomar Ballroom triumph. At the Palomar engagement starting on 21 August 1935, audiences of young white dancers favored Goodman's rhythm and daring arrangements. The sudden success of the Goodman orchestra transformed the landscape of popular music in America. Goodman's success with "hot" swing brought forth imitators and enthusiasts of the new style throughout the world of dance bands, which launched the "swing era" that lasted until 1946.
A typical song played in swing style would feature a strong, anchoring rhythm section in support of more loosely-tied woodwind and brass sections playing call-response to each other. The level of improvisation that the audience might expect varied with the arrangement, song, band, and band-leader. Typically included in big band swing arrangements were an introductory chorus that stated the theme, choruses arranged for soloists, and climactic out-choruses. Some arrangements were built entirely around a featured soloist or vocalist. Some bands used string or vocal sections, or both. Swing-era repertoire included the Great American Songbook of Tin Pan Alley standards, band originals, traditional jazz tunes such as the "King Porter Stomp", with which the Goodman orchestra had a smash hit, and blues.