Jazz 201: Unsung Legends and the Hartford Jazz Scene
Hartford Public Library
Hartford
May 13, 2024
There’s a special sound that only jazz musicians trained in Hartford can perform.
That was the main lesson that Professor Haneef Nelson of the University of Massachusetts Amherst drove home during his lecture “Jazz 201: Unsung Legends and the Hartford Jazz Scene.”
Professor Nelson embodies this lesson in his own life. He’s a transplant to Hartford from New York City. For those of us who grew up in the shadow of the Big City, it has always felt like NYC was the center of the creative universe, and anyone who was serious about their craft was doing their best to make it there. To hear such an accomplished musician say that, in fact, Hartford has just as much to offer filled me with pride.
Professor Nelson took the crowd through a whirlwind tour of Hartford’s history of jazz, starting with the Prohibition era and the speakeasies that cropped up all over the city. Although the popular image of jazz and booze-fueled nights endures, the reality is that jazz was not readily accepted in Hartford. The Hartford Courant even ran a poll which asked if jazz should be allowed to be played on Sundays because it was regarded as “satanic music” (read: Black music).
Despite the initial pushback, Hartford attracted the best of the best, including legends such as Duke Ellington, who enjoyed playing for servicemen in the city. Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie were also known to frequent Hartford for performances.
It wasn’t just the attraction of stars that set Hartford apart from other jazz cities. Hartford developed some of the greatest talent of the postwar era. Saxophonist Harold Holt, drummer Walter Bolden and Clifford Gunn Sr. were dedicated to helping Hartford develop as a jazz mecca and building a legacy within the city.
Eventually that work was taken up by Paul Brown Jr., a world-class bassist, and Jackie McClean, one of the great saxophone players of the 20th century. Professor Nelson told the story of how Paul Brown started what has become the Greater Hartford Festival of Jazz. At first Brown and friends rode around in a pickup truck, playing music throughout Hartford; the event has grown into the largest free jazz festival in New England, with performers from all over the world.
Brown and McClean further cemented Hartford as a jazz city by co-founding The Artists Collective with several others in 1970. The culture and arts center still stands on Albany Avenue to this day. Both I and my son have taken arts classes there, becoming part of the tradition.
“All of the things that have happened, from the ’20s until now, has helped carve out what is called ‘the Hartford Sound’,” Nelson said towards the end of his lecture. “I tell my students all the time when they want to go to New York, if you can’t play, don’t say you’re from Hartford, because we have a reputation of producing some of the world’s greatest musicians.”
I have to admit that I am not a jazz aficionado. I enjoy the sound, but I can’t tell the difference between swing, jazz and big band music. Aside from a few luminaries who have crossed over into mainstream cultural knowledge, I’m not familiar with many jazz performers by name. Which is why I appreciated Professor Nelson’s lecture so much. It gave me insight into the musical history of my own backyard, and pride in the small city that casts such a large shadow in the world of jazz.
NEXT
The Hartford Public Library continues its Jazz 201 series with Professor Zaccai Curtis on Monday, May 20th.
Jamil goes to the Mark Twain House to learn about one of his longtime employees.
