Talking to Big Jay McNeely on Wednesday gave me tremendous insight into a period of jazz that has always puzzled me: Namely, the years between bebop and hard bop. I've always wondered how r&b split off from jazz at the end of 1948, why teens loved the music so much in the early 1950s, and what role, if any, r&b and subsequently rock 'n' roll played in s…
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to JazzWax to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.