#8 Rick--
"should i understand that second line drummers are not playing straight up marching music, but rather a jazz version? "
Yes, you're right; most marches, coming from the British Military Band tradition, are subdivided into "duple" feel, while jazz swing is a "triple" feel. But that's only part of it. 2nd line is caribbean clave, played in a triplet "swing" feel.
2nd line originated while bands were marching, but it isn't march music; it's just early jazz that musicians happened to be walking to while playing.
In my previous post, I mentioned the "Bo Diddley" rhythm. Do you know the old 50s tune "Bo Diddley?" You hear the 2nd line rhythm churning away after each lyric:
"Bo Diddley bought a nanny goat" (bump, skibump, skibump, skibumpBUMP)
"To make his pretty baby a Sunday coat" (bump, skibump, skibump, skibumpBUMP)...
That's 2nd line. True, it's incorporated into early rock & roll, but a perfect example of the 2nd line rhythm nonetheless.
As for the videos you linked, the first one is absolutely awful, incompetent, and has nothing to do whatsoever with 2nd line. The hyper critical comments on that one are dead on target. What a douche.
The next two are okay, but watered down, and not really indicative of the full flavor of that music.
I found a couple things for you. This first one breaks it down very well, at least for the first minute and a half. (After that, this video is irrelevant to the subject.) The best part of this video is the music played over the opening credits; it is almost textbook 2nd line rhythm (except he's reversed the clave; most 2nd line is 3/2, where here he plays 2/3. Reversing the two is very common in afro-cuban music, but not so much so in 2nd line.)
Did you hear the Bo Diddley rhythm "bump, skibump, skibump, skibumpBUMP?" (Technically, since he's reversed it, which I'll discuss below, you'll hear this as "skibumpBUMP, bump, skibump, skibump." The "bump, skibump, skibump" is the bar with 3 accents or "bumps", while the other bar "skibumpBUMP" has 2 accents or "bumps." )
That's what 3/2 clave (pron. CLAH-vay) means. Clave is a two bar figure; 3/2 clave has 3 accents in the first bar, and 2 accents in the second bar; this pattern repeats throughout an entire tune. In the link above, he's reversed it to 2/3. (He also puts the 2nd accent in the bar of 2 in the wrong beat for 2nd line; he's doing Bossa Nova clave, but that's another subject.)
Nonetheless, this one pretty clearly exhibits the combination of clave with a triplet eighth note (swing) feel, which is what defines 2nd line. Think of the video above as a classroom example, taught by someone who, like many teachers, almost gets it.
After you check that one, and hopefully comprehend my disjointed ramblings about the basics (sorry), check the one below. It's the real ****. It's very refined, complicated, and authentic, but try to hear the underlying clave pulse and swing feel as I've tried to explain above.
It's also cool because you can see the dude using a freakin' screwdriver for a drum stick. Bad ass!
As a side note, you might enjoy understanding how 2nd line drumming was essential to how American popular music evolved. Clave is African, and was imported to the West via slave trade. Early slave traders went mostly to the Caribbean, so African rhythms, especially clave, became the pulse of Caribbean music, such as Afro-Cuban salsa, mambo, and rhumba. And since New Orleans is adjacent to the Caribbean, it was the point of entry of this rhythm into the US. Early New Orleans musicians also invented the swing (triplet) feel, and that became the rhythmic pulse of early Jazz. When they combined swing and clave, 2nd line was born.
2nd line remained mostly a regional form, in its native New Orleans, for the first half of the 20th century; meanwhile, jazz took off, and spread throughout the country. NYC became the hub of modern jazz in the 30s & 40s, where jazz evolved into modern jazz (aka bebop.) Bebop, or Bop (for short), became (and remains) a highly technical music, intended mainly for listening, not dancing.
In the late 40s, the public still loved listening to jazz, but wanted to dance, too. The dance music that evolved at that point was called Rhythm and Blues. Early R&B retained the swing (triplet) feel of jazz, but was much simpler harmonically, quite often based on 3 chord blues forms. Check out Louis Jordan for an example of this.
Soon, as always happens in American popular music trends, white bands adopted this formula, and called it Rock & Roll. Early R&R retained the swing triplet rhythmic feel of jazz, e.g., Bill Haley's "Rock Around the Clock," the Crew Cuts' "Sha Boom," or Elvis's "Don't be Cruel."
In the late 50's, rockers began abandoning the jazz swing triplet feel, opting instead for duple (or straight eighth note) rhythms. "Long Tall Sally" is an early example. Buddy Holly, the Beach Boys, and the Beatles cemented this feel into the public consciousness. It became a popular rhythmic feel, because it's driving and aggressive.
Meanwhile, some black groups opted to keep the swing feel, and slowed it down. Lots of great black vocal groups had many hits, such as "Only You," in this vein. Today we refer to this as Doo Wop.
In the late 70s, the rhythm of popular music had been dominated by the duple, straight-eighth feel for over two decades. At this point, some black artists began experimenting again with 2nd line rhythms. The first rappers used it (sorry, I can't think of examples--not my thing), and Al Jarreau used it for his mega-hits "Roof Garden" and "We're in this love together."
Jarreau's hits made 2nd line mainstream again, and it has been used ever since in rap, funk, jazz, and instrumental pop (aka "smooth jazz").
Sorry this is so wordy, but I thought that since you expressed an interest in it, the historic context info above might clarify your understanding further and heighten your appreciation.
Hope it helps--I'll STFU now--enjoy!
