Jazz Still Unites People 100+ Years After Its Birth

Every night at New York's Village Vanguard, something magical happens when the music starts. People of all ages and backgrounds lean forward in their seats, connected by melodies that have been breaking down barriers for over a century.

Jazz pianist Sullivan Fortner sees it firsthand when he performs at the legendary Greenwich Village club. "Jazz means freedom. It means humanity. It means love," says the three-time Grammy winner, who spoke with UN News ahead of International Jazz Day on April 30.

The art form that began in New Orleans in the late 1800s was born from rebellion. Marginalized Black communities created something entirely new, blending African rhythms with American sounds to protest injustice and claim their voice.

That spirit of unity and resistance never left. Billie Holiday used jazz to challenge racial segregation during the Civil Rights Movement, turning music into a tool for equality.

Today, the Village Vanguard keeps that legacy alive as the world's oldest continuously operated jazz club. Owner Deborah Gordon describes the energy that fills the triangular basement room when musicians take the stage.

"It's like an energy going from the music, from the stage to the people and back. You can really feel the uniting force of what the music can bring," she says.

The club's audience reflects jazz's broad appeal. "There's a lot of gray heads like me, and there are a lot of young people too. It's a big mix of people," Gordon notes.

The Ripple Effect

Jazz keeps evolving while staying true to its roots. The genre now incorporates instruments and styles from around the world, constantly reinventing itself while maintaining its core message.

"It's incorporating different kinds of music all the time from different places," Gordon explains. That adaptability has helped jazz remain relevant across generations and cultures.

Fortner believes the music's emotional honesty is what makes it so powerful. "It's about emotional transmission and communicating those feelings to each other. Jazz is 100 percent about that, about the good, the bad and the ugly all in one."

Musicians emphasize that jazz must remember where it came from even as it grows. "We can't forget that this was birthed in the streets, that it was birthed in brothels," Fortner says.

Gordon sees jazz's position outside the mainstream as a strength, not a weakness. "It's still a peripheral kind of music in the culture, and I'm good with that because to me, that means it will last."

As long as artists keep creating and improvising together, jazz will continue doing what it's always done best: bringing people together through the universal language of freedom and hope.