New Jazz Conceptions

This volume builds on recent studies by considering the production, reception, adaptation, and survival of jazz. It captures the vibrancy of British-based jazz studies in the early 21st century, highlighting the developing methodologies and growing interdisciplinary nature of the field. In particular, the collection breaks down barriers between jazz historians, theorists, and practitioners, questioning popular American-centered narratives of jazz, and casting fresh light on the cultural processes and economic circumstances that make the music. Essays explore the role of the musician and administrator, the critical and historical reception of jazz, the saliency of its recorded legacy, its situation within debates on trade and labour, its pedagogic and educative role, its interaction with broadcast media, and its persistent survival as a digital artefact. This book promotes a critical and democratic engagement with jazz, and sets a ‘new’ new jazz studies in motion.

Roger Fagge teaches history at the University of Warwick, UK?and his publications include The Vision of J.B Priestley (2013). He has taught and presented widely on social and cultural history, including on jazz history, and is currently working on the relationship British writers and jazz in the 1950s and 60s. He was co-organiser of the New Jazz Conceptions conference, and is involved in promoting jazz events within the University and wider local community.

Nicolas Pillai teaches in the School of Media at Birmingham City University, UK?and is an Associate Fellow of the University of Warwick, UK. He has lectured on improvisation at the National Jazz Archive, the British Music Experience and Rollins College, Florida, and gave the keynote address at Cardiff University’s Jazz and Cinema conference. Last year, he co-organized the New Jazz Conceptions conference and curated the Jazz projector screening season at The Vortex Jazz Club. His first book Jazz as Visual Language: Film, Television and the Dissonant Image will be published next year.