One evening in the 1950s a sweet old lady went up to a Jazz musician and said, “Tell me Mr Waller. Just what is Jazz?” The great New York pianist rolled his eyes, looked up heavenward and said, “Madam, if you don’t know by now, don’t mess with it.” Waller had a point, for Jazz is much easier to recognise than to describe.

However, I suppose one could portray the genre as the result of a 300-year-old blending in the United States of the music of West Africa and Europe. The music, whether it was part of the Great Awakening, the Work Song, the Blues, Minstrelsy, the Spiritual, Ragtime or Bop, has its roots in the African slaves and it is therefore no wonder that the finest Jazz musicians have been Afro Americans from New Orleans, Chicago, New York and Kansas City.

Of course, there have also been accomplished white musicians like the trumpeter Bix Beiderbecke and the clarinetist Benny Goodman, but they were never in the class of Jelly Roll Morton, King Oliver, Duke Ellington and Louis Armstrong .The renowned white bandleader Paul Whiteman, who starred in The King of Jazz (which a black musician ridiculed on the grounds that Whiteman didn’t know the first thing about Jazz, ) once confessed to a friend that night after night he used to visit the Cotton Club in Chicago, just to hear Duke Ellington play. And by Gad, he could never produce the Blue Note, a quality which gives Jazz much of its appeal. To be technical, two areas in the octave—the third and the seventh in the scale—are attacked with an endless variety of swoops, glides, slurs, smears and glisses.

A number of these famous Jazz musicians visited Karachi in the 1950s, ’60s and ’70s. To honour these remarkable men a photographic exhibition organised by the US consulate general was held at the VM Gallery, Karachi, last week. The title was most apt. ‘America’s Jazz ambassadors embrace the world…’ In this well organised and well laid out display the audience got a glimpse of some of these remarkable men who had visited and performed in Karachi—stars such as Duke Ellington, Dizzy Gillespie, Benny Carter, Clark Terry and the Jolly Giants. These renowned musicians and cultural diplomats have brought the richness of the American experience to people around the world.

Tucked away in one corner of the gallery the visitor was also shown a 180-minute documentary on the origin and development of what is America’s only indigenous art form. The exposition was inaugurated by the press attaché of the US consulate general in Karachi, Amanda Cauldwell, who in a remarkably short time has made a lot of friends in the media. The American community was represented by Leslie Derryberry and Kimberly Jilani from the American Women’s Club, the consulate by Ali Chauhan of the cultural affairs department, and the VM Gallery by Riffat Alvi and Fasiha Batool.

Jazz musicians are the true ambassadors of the United States. Children and adults in Asia, Africa and Europe flocked to these modest and humble human beings who would often, after a successful concert in a theatre, enter the town square and perform for folk who could not afford the price of a ticket. They were also greatly admired by royalty. On one occasion Louis Armstrong (Satchmo) performed in the Albert Hall in front of the late King George VI, father of Queen Elizabeth. Looking up at the royal box, Satchmo said, “This one’s for you, Rex.” And he played ‘You old rascal you’.

Now a word about the photographs. Meridian’s Travelling Education Service who put the package together has done a splendid job. It probably involved exhuming a lot of old trunks in forgotten attics, rummaging through old archives and digitally restoring some of the old clips that must have been dog-eared and yellowed with age. But they have come out remarkably well.

The picture of the great Louis Armstrong surrounded by Egyptian children is a classic. And so is the one of Dizzy Gillespie snapped among snake charmers. Karachi could do with a few more exhibitions like these. They help to make friends; and because art is one of the highest forms of individual and political expression the exchange of art and culture is a powerful tool in finding common ground and building more stable relationships between countries.