Earliest "jazz" composition? (May 18, 1916)

[Jesse Sheidlower]

On Sun, Dec 06, 2009 at 11:50:42PM -0500, Benjamin Zimmer wrote:
>
> I wonder if, despite the copyright date, "When I Hear That Jaz Band
> Play" really didn't get released until later in the year after the
> boom in "jazz" titles began in November and December. That might
> justify Jasen's chronology. But as things stand, this composition from
> May 18 appears to be the earliest known use in musical composition --
> and (excluding the ambiguous "jazbo"/"jasbo" cites) the second
> earliest from any source, after the July 11, 1915 Chicago Tribune
> article, "Blues Is Jazz and Jazz Is Blues." I believe the next known
> appearance in print is a May 22, 1916 mention in the Tribune of a "Jaz
> band". Or am I missing something?

What is the exact question here? The "Jaz band" in the Tribune
is about an actual jazz band, it's not about a
composition. And OED does have a May 1 1916 of "Jass band", so
that's three weeks earlier.

OED also has an example from Chicago of "jad orchestra" from
May 22, 1915. It's not clear what this represents, but it is
earlier than the Tribune article. (My thanks to Lawrence
Gushee for sending me this quotation, and an image of its page
from the _Chicago Examiner_.)

Jesse Sheidlower
OED

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