****Rok, let me tell you a tru story about slaves here and their drums. At first the boss man didn't mind, and the drums had catchy rhythms, but when somebody told him, "Hey boss man, did you know they could talk with them drums"? That changed things; from that time on, the drum was outlawed. The very next night, "I thought I told yall to stop beatn them damn drums"! How can you have African music without a drum?****
O-10, I am sure that you have heard the term Santeria. Santeria is the religion that African slaves in Caribbean countries "synthesized" by giving their African gods Roman Catholic names in order to bypass the outlawing of their religion by their masters. "How can you have African music without a drum"......How can you have your religion without your Gods?
While it would be ideal to understand the African influence on jazz from the standpoint of musical analysis (which makes it clear and obvious)
looking at this parallel might make it easier to understand the answer to your question; "the math". In answer to your specific question "How can you have African music without a drum"? Easily, the drum is the vehicle, the means to an end; it plays rhythms......so does any other instrument including the human voice. THAT is how the African influence on jazz can be heard: the "blue" notes found in their native music and most importantly the "swing" feeling, the swagger and looseness; these are such a big part of the feeling of jazz as opposed to the more rigid or "square" feeling which is typical of the music of the European tradition. Combine that swagger, "blue" notes with European melody and harmony and you get........jazz. This does not take anything away from the fact that jazz is a uniquely American art form; it IS America's most important art from. However, just as we like to say that America is a "melting pot" of cultures, why should it be any different re it's music. I think that the issue of musical INFLUENCE is something that deserves much more understanding, not just as concerns African music and Jazz, but as concerns jazz in general; and, would be extremely informative as we look at various individual jazz artists. It lets the entire lineage make more sense.
We recently revisited the subject of Coltrane (it never goes away; nor should it). I can't think of a better example of "influence" than this. Coltrane on alto saxophone sounding amazingly like Bird himself. When one listens to late Coltrane the Bird influence is much much harder to discern; he had taken that influence, fused it with his own vision and had taken off. However, it takes more than the ability to simply recognize an alto compared to a tenor in order to hear the Bird influence when listening to later Trane.
https://m.youtube.com/#/watch?v=MGnY-axUH0U
