Because this post will be more of the history of the area and not necessarily the music, the video is another tune of the time by Wilbur Sweatman's Jazz Orchestra.

There are many factors involved which resulted in the New Orleans birthing jazz as most of us know it.

The French originally owned this land under the Louisiana Purchase and began building settlements in 1718. After just a year, plantations and slaves had already been established. However, the French were a progressive bunch. By 1722, the French had already freed some of their slaves. Why they did this I'm not sure of, but I do know that in Louisiana the main crop was rice and to grow rice was one of the harshest things a person could do. Also, different techniques for growing rice which allowing people in other parts of the country to grow it, reducing demand from swampy areas like New Orleans.

In 1763, the French gave the Louisiana Territory to the Spanish. Because the Spanish were not ones to use slaves, even more slaves were freed. As a result of this, New Orleans saw a rise in interracial marriages. The new Spanish rule didn't dissuade the now freed slaves from changing their ways though. The languages and customs of the area remained true.

In 1803, the area was back under French rule with Napoleon reclaimed the Louisiana Territory. However, to resolve some conflict of the time Napoleon sold the Territory to the United States.

In 1804, the nearby Caribbean nation of Haiti gained their independence from France from what started as a revolt of slaves that ended up overthrowing the French government. Because plantation owners weren't the most popular of folks in Haiti, many of them fled to New Orleans. This germinated a diverse melting pot in New Orleans of French, Spanish, Haitian, and some European-Americans.

This melting pot created what we've come to refer to as Creole Culture. The term "Creole" refers to people born in Louisiana from French and Spanish parents. Creoles often had dark skin, but weren't considered black (initially). Two classes of darker skinned people emerged from this.

The smaller of the two classes were the blacks (those with very dark skin). These people were either free or still working as slaves and were referred to as "negros." The people of this class were strictly African and had no French or Spanish blood.

The other class, that held themselves above the blacks, were the Creoles of Color. These people had much lighter skin, but weren't quite white. CoC were often highly educated and owned businesses. Most spoke French, identified themselves as French, and sent their children to Europe to study. When the Louisiana Legislative Code came to pass (often knows as the Jim Crow Laws), CoC began to lose their middle class status. Jim Crow Laws stated that anyone of African ancestry was a negro, and the racist whites of the time included CoC in that category.

Creoles of Color were categorized even more so with blacks after the 1896 case of Plessy v Ferguson. If we all remember our history lessons of the past, this is the trial that legalized segregation which lasted until the 60s. CoC were segregated along with the blacks from the whites, which began the fusion of black and creole cultures.

As part of this combining, the music of the two groups starts to mesh together, and the two couldn't have been more contrasting. The music of the blacks was heavily African influenced (as we saw in previous history lessons). Creoles took it upon themselves to learn classical music. Over time, these two styles would fuse together to form jazz. Because black music had more appeal to the general public in that there was a sort of mysticism to it, it had a heavier influence as to where the music was going.

"New Orleans is the only place I know of where you ask a little kid what he wants to be and instead of saying 'I want to be a policeman,' or 'I want to be a fireman,' he says, I want to be a musician.'" - Alan Jaffe