This post was written by Caitlin Ervin ’28, Special Collections & University Archives Student worker
Jazz at MWC: From Appreciation to Performance
On Thursday, February 19th, guest speaker and author Larry Tye will present on the legacies of three pioneering jazz musicians – Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong, and Count Basie – as part of the Great Lives lecture series.
In honor of this lecture, Special Collections and University Archives is proud to present a short history of jazz music at Mary Washington College.
Club Socials and Events
Some of the earliest instances of jazz at Mary Washington come from when it was still named the State Normal School for Women. In the 1920s, campus organizations used jazz bands as musical entertainment at dances and social events. The first found employment of a jazz band was by the Kotillion Klub in January 1921, who organized a dance featuring the Marine Jazz Band. This trend continued through the 1950s, with the performing jazz band changing depending on the year.
In the 1930s, the Junior and Senior Dance Clubs, also known as the Modern Dance Clubs, began featuring jazz as one of the musical styles in their performances. These were referred to early on as “Jazz-Ma-Tazz” and were performed with music specifically composed for the piece, often by Mr. Levin Houston, who taught music at the college. In 1944, the Modern Dance Club chose jazz as the theme of their annual dance program, named “American Primitive 1944.”
Student News and Radio
Much of student life at MWC was recorded in The Bullet, the student newspaper that preceded our own Weekly Ringer. Jazz music was frequently included in reviews and recommendations printed in columns such as “Round the Dial” (1939-40), “Platter Chatter” (1944-45, ‘48), and “Slip-ped Disc” (1948-49). These columns advertised the latest album releases for Mary Washington students and often featured the latest jazz recordings, including those of Raymond Scott, Stan Kenton, and Thelonius Monk. Similar music review columns continued into the 1980s.
Another frequent column, “Radio Speaks” (1949-50), provided students with the schedule for WMWC, Mary Washington College’s own on-campus radio station, which still exists today. November 1949 saw the broadcast of the “Evolution of Jazz,” hosted Wednesday afternoons from 4:30-4:45, discussing the music history of the genre, and December 1949 saw the introduction of “Charlie’s Jazz Jamboree” from 3:00-3:15 on Fridays.
Other articles published well into the late 1950s, detail which clubs, hotels, and theatres in Washington, D.C. and Richmond were hosting live jazz bands for students to see.
Concerts
In the 1960s and 1970s, jazz concerts became a favorite among students on campus, leading to their inclusion in the Concert Series hosted annually by MWC. One of the first of these events was a performance by the American Jazz Ensemble in February 1963. A decade later, the college upped the ante by hosting The World’s Greatest Jazz Band (the ensemble’s official name) in March 1973. In the run-up to the band’s performance, Mr. Levin Houston, associate professor of music, led a lecture for students in the Virginia Hall parlor on the history of jazz. Another notable favorite was the 1973-74 Concert Series’ inclusion of the Preservation Hall Jazz Band in February 1974. This band was unique because it was comprised almost entirely of elderly musicians in their 60s to 80s. February 1983 brought the Howard University Jazz Ensemble to campus not just for a concert series, but as part of Black Culture Month hosted by the MWC’s Afro-American Association. This marks perhaps the first time that a jazz band was invited by a college cultural club, rather than an arts or performance club.
Education
The first scholarly work from MWC to include jazz music can be found in Modern Canons, a collection of music compiled by MWC music professor Dr. Herman Reichenbach in 1947. Despite this early appearance, it took an additional 27 years before the college actually offered a class on jazz. The very first class, called “Evolution of Jazz,” was taught in the Spring semester of 1974 by Mr. Levin Houston – the very same professor that hosted the jazz history lecture in 1973 and composed jazz numbers for the Modern Dance Club in the 1940s.
