With Jazz having been around for so long, it`s no surprise that certain people have been instrumental in making this musical genre what it is today. These leaders in the industry aren`t always the most famous, but they have lent their expertise and talent to the music and helped it become something special over the years.

Early Jazz Leaders and What They Did

One of the very first important jazz artists was Joe Jordan. The main music organizer in Chicago, he pioneered the Memphis Students, the very first modern jazz band to perform in New York.

Fletcher Henderson was one of the early jazz leaders. Though he did play piano, this wasn`t his main contribution. Instead, he was best known for his arrangements, which ended up changing the face of jazz. Both Fletcher and his brother Horace worked on some very influential jazz arrangements, starting in the 30`s. He also was one of the founders of the jazz offshoot, swing.

Benny Goodman, a successful musician from a young age, was one of the first white jazz artists to really build a career in jazz music, taking it from something that was considered to be a black-only genre to a truly international music. The transition was a big one that would allow more influential artists to add their piece to jazz history.

More Recent Influences

One of the most well-known names in jazz is Billie Holiday. Her unique vocals were what brought this music genre to the public eye and really took it out of the clubs. While there were hundreds of other jazz artists, her smoky voice caught the attention of the masses and jazz became a far more popular medium thanks to this talented woman.

Even more recently, artists like Norah Jones and Michael Bublè have taken jazz to a whole new level, blending it with other genres to create a unique mix of jazz and pop or other fusion music. The implications of this could be huge in the future as jazz continues to diversify and spread, making its way through nearly every known music genre.

There have been many heavy influences in jazz. It would literally be impossible to cover them all, each artist has given something to the world of this music genre and turned it into a musical adventure that continues to this day and will continue long into the future.