The Ambassadorial LPs of Dizzy Gillespie: World Statesman and Dizzy in Greece. Issue 3 (30th August 2016)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: MUELLER, DARREN
• Is Part Of: Journal of the Society for American Music. Volume 10:Issue 3(2016)
• Page Start: 239
• Page End: 269
• Publication Date: 2016-08-30
• Subjects: Music -- United States -- Periodicals; Music -- Periodicals; 780.973
• DOI: 10.1017/S1752196316000201
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1752-1963

Abstract

Abstract: In 1956, trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie became the first jazz musician to participate in the State Department's Cultural Presentations program, a highly public aspect of U.S. Government's Cold War propaganda efforts abroad. Seeking to capitalize on this historic moment, Gillespie's record company issued two LPs featuring his ambassadorial ensemble: World Statesman (1956) and Dizzy in Greece (1957). To date, scholarship about the tours highlights how Gillespie skillfully navigated the shifting political landscape both on and off the bandstand. The role that commercial record making played in the renegotiation of African Americans' social position during this era, however, remains undertheorized. This article reveals how, despite the albums' claims of representation from abroad, the LPs contain only a small portion of Gillespie's tour repertoire. I argue that these LPs were never meant to document the tours with veracity; rather, they were products of a political and technological moment when Gillespie's record label could leverage musical diplomacy to circulate an elevated vision for jazz within the country's cultural hierarchy.