The history of singing in jazz is not without complexity . For many , the music is definitively an instrumental art . The arrival of a lyric – and thus some kind of narrative or explicitly stated mood – violates an essential purity of expression . This is an odd and relatively modern prejudice , but it echoes through jazz criticism . A random scan of review sections in jazz magazines throws up countless diffident references to the role of singers on otherwise instrumental sessions . The tendency to bring in a singer for just one or two numbers on an album seemed to signal that musicians also were a little unsure . Or perhaps the singer is the leader ’ s wife , given her slightly patronised moment in the spotlight .
It was not always the case . Most of the old New Orleans stars were singer / instrumentalists , and raucous vocals , marked more by energy than subtlety or sophistication , remain a staple of Dixieland and trad jazz . Throughout the swing era , big bands almost invariably featured singers , albeit snobbishly and misogynistically dismissed as “ chirpers ”. The advent of bebop marginalised the singer somewhat , though a grand star like Ella Fitzgerald carried on in her queenly way , and new types of vocalists , bold , experimental and easily capable of keeping up with bop ’ s rapid , almost violent transitions began to emerge .
The issue is perhaps best approached through the admittedly special case of Louis Armstrong . In the 1920s , Pops pioneered hot jazz playing and the sound of his trumpet is one of the timeless signatures of the music . And yet , Armstrong went on to affect another small revolution in the music by becoming its most distinctive vocalist . He had started out in the 1920s as an accompanist to singers , and even while his Hot Five and Hot Seven were setting the seal on instrumental jazz as an improvisatory art , he was found in the company of great blues singers such as Ma
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