The social atmosphere of the primarily artistic movement known as the Harlem Renaissance exhibited a social atmosphere of rebirth and celebration of newfound self-potential among African Americans. The Harlem Renaissance unfolded against the backdrop of the "Jazz Age" in the 1920s in American culture, a period Arnold Shaw notes was characterized by "an aura of darkness and romance, gaiety and melancholy" (3). Harlem represented a new home for African Americans that would become the showcase for their talent in music, dance, literature, theater, painting and other art forms.
Writers like Langston Hughes, W.E.B. Dubois, Nella Larson and others redefined African American liberation as well as newfound potential for black self-development and artistic expression. Billie Holliday defined the blues, while Louis Armstrong and Dizzy Gillespie played trumpet like few others before or after them. Jazz music and its influence pervaded artistic output during the Harlem Renaissance, whether it was in the form of music, literature or painting. This analysis will use music, literature and painting of the Harlem Renaissance to demonstrate the significant impact of jazz during this unprecedented period of achievement in African American artistic output.
Two developments led to a major migration of African Americans to Harlem, New York, during the 1920s. In what was known as the "Great Migration," over 100,000 African Americans came to Harlem because of dissatisfaction with living conditions in the South and because a new subway linked Harlem to the downtown area for the first time (Robinson 14). This concentration of African Americans, many from a growing black middle- and upper-class, led to unprecedented artistic output known as the Harlem Renaissance. Robinson argues African Americans were "ready to set an example of what black people could really achieve" (14). This achievement occurred in all fields but was...