Capstone Project Process Book

CAPSTONE PROJECT PROCESS BOOK Acacia Thalmann

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Acacia Thalmann

Capstone Process Book Kansas City Jazz

Spring 2019

Kansas State University

Professor Daniel Warner

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TABLE OF CONTENTS 06 | KANSAS CITY JAZZ 22 | CAPSTONE PROJECT PROCESS 32 | 18TH & VINE ST WEBSITE

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Kansas City Jazz 6

Jazz is a music genre that originated in the AfricanAmerican communities of New Orleans in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and developed from roots in blues and ragtime. Jazz is now known as “America’s classical music” and one of America’s original art forms.

This style of music quickly spread geographically in the 1920s, but then in the 1930s, jazz came to Kansas City. Jazz grew tremendously in Kansas City and the city really helped the genre evolve into a new style. Many musicians, such as Bennie Moten, Charlie Parker, Count Basie, and Lester Young, influenced Kansas City Jazz in the city

and they went on to become very well-known musicians.

Even though Kansas City’s historic district of 18th and Vine Street was abandoned after the golden age of jazz for a time being, it was eventually restored and now is home to the only jazz museum of its kind. Along with the restoration of 18th and Vine Street has also come a new-found love for one of Kansas City’s oldest traditions of jazz. Kansas City jazz is now celebrated throughout the city with numerous cultural events and historic locations.

BENNIE MOTEN

Bennie Moten

Bennie Moten was the leader of the Bennie Moten Orchestra in Kansas City in the 1920s. He dropped out of high school to pursue his music career and learned ragtime piano.

In 1918, the “B.B. and D.” band was formed, which was Moten’s first band that he formed with Dude Langford, a drummer, and Bailey Handcock, a singer. B.B. and D.’s first performance was at the Labor Temple, an important gathering place for Kansas City’s African American community. Their performances became an important part of this community and B.B. and D became the pride of the African-American

community. By 1922, Bennie Moten became the manager and changed their name to “B.B. and B.” Moten continued to hire many promising musicians in Kansas City and eventually changed the name to Bennie Moten Orchestra. The Bennie Moten Orchestra became known as Kansas City’s first great jazz band. Even Lester Young and Count Basie became part of this band at one point during their careers in Kansas City. On Sept. 23, 1923, the Bennie Moten Orchestra became the first Kansas City band to make a phonograph recording of its jazz tunes. The songs were an early form of

jazz that really just added additional beats to blues music. Bennie Moten did well at always hiring new musicians that added a new style to the band’s music. This is how the Bennie Moten Orchestra kept producing new and different music, and their style got better every time they played, eventually helping the band’s music land the title of “Kansas City style” jazz. This style is characterized by complex rhythms, carefully restrained drum beats, and especially riffs.

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18TH & VINE ST While jazz started in the 1920s, it really began to take off in Kansas City in the 1930s. The center of the African-American community, at 18th and Vine Street, was one of the Kansas City locations best known for jazz. 18th and Vine Street was known for its African-American community that moved there after the segregation influx. They moved there to find better jobs and a new way of life, because they were not allowed to live south of 27th Street.

They made their homes and businesses in two and three-story brick buildings along the district’s cross streets and by the end of the 19th century this small community had flourished into a thriving AfricanAmerican neighborhood.

Kansas City was known as a “wide open” town because during the prohibition era,

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when most cities banned alcohol, Tom Pendergast, a political boss in Kansas City, allowed alcohol to flow freely. Pendergast and gangster Johnny Lazia insured that the police would ignore the illegal alcohol, gambling, and prostitution that permeated the night scene. As a result, the nightlife prospered and Kansas City’s golden age of jazz really thrived in this environment. Because of this,18th and Vine St. remained a vital community throughout the Depression years while Kansas City jazz was at its height of popularity. The depression years did not affect Kansas City as much because Tom Pendergast had a tenyear plan to keep people working. The residents of Kansas City were employed to work on projects such as the Downtown Airport, City Hall, Convention

Center, and Municipal Courthouse. This meant that the musicians from around the Midwest could still find paying crowds in Kansas City because the locals had jobs unlike much of the nation during this time. The influx of musicians from around the country sparked the creation of Kansas City jazz. The problem is that so many big band jazz musicians came into Kansas City that eventually bands started to play a more improvisational tune, which led to the bebop and swing style now known as Kansas City jazz. Another location that was popular with Jazz musicians was Kansas City’s 12th Street. It became nationally known for its jazz clubs, gambling parlors and brothels, earning the city the nick name, “The Paris of the Plains.” At its height, 12th Street was home to more than 50 jazz clubs.

18th & Vine St.

At 18th and Vine St. people could attend performances by legendary musicians such as Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald, and Count Basie. In the 1930s, jazz music turned into more of a swing jazz music, all thanks to popular jazz musicians such as Count Basie. He was part of the Bennie Moten Orchestra. They created the “Moten Swing” which Basie took credit for, which was widely acclaimed and was

an invaluable contribution to the development of swing music. When Bennie Moten died after a routine tonsil removal surgery, Count Basie took over the Bennie Moten Orchestra.

The members followed him and the Bennie Moten Orchestra became a lot more popular than it ever was when Bennie Moten was in control. But the band did not stay together long and eventually Basie created his

own band called the Barons of Rhythm, which included many original members of the Bennie Moten Orchestra, including Lester Young. The Barons of Rhythm played at the Reno club often and sometimes for radio shows.

Late one night with time to fill, the Barons of Rhythm started improvising. Basie enjoyed the results and named the piece “One O’Clock Jump.” According to Basie, “we hit it with the

rhythm section and went into the riffs, and the riffs just stuck. We set the thing up front in D-flat, and then we just went on playing in F.” It became his signature tune. His band became Count Basie and the Barons of Rhythm and moved on to play in major cities such as Chicago and New York City. Bringing with them the swing music they created in Kansas City.

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LESTER YOUNG Lester Young was a prominent saxophone player that was very influential.

Lester Young’s saxophone playing also marks the transition into the bebop jazz. Young played with many bands in Kansas City, such as Fletcher Henderson’s orchestra and the Andy Kirk band, but was most popular with Count Basie’s Barons of Rhythm. While Lester Young was part of Count Basie’s band, he made small group recordings for the Milt Gabler’s Commodore Records, called The Kansas City Sessions.

His style of play was very different compared to other musicians. Young played a more relaxed style which contrasted with the more forceful approach of Coleman Hawkins, even though Hawkins was the dominant tenor sax player of the day. With his clarinet,

Young played what was to be described as a liquid, nervous style of music. He was later inducted into the U.S. Army and unlike his fellow musicians, who were placed in band outfits and got to play their instruments, Young was not allowed to play his saxophone. After the war Lester Young became far more famous, with a JATP concert at Carnegie Hall with other notable musicians such as Charlie Parker and Roy Eldridge.

Lester Young

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JAZZ AND WAR Jazz was greatly affected by World War II. With all the resources going to the war effort, many bands could not produce records because of a lack of shellac and many bands also could not travel to perform their jazz music because rubber was also being donated to the war effort. The normal big bands that played jazz grew smaller because their members were being recruited for war.

Some big bands started to recruit younger musicians, but with that they started to return to the pre-swing jazz, basically taking a step back in jazz’s movement to a new style. Smaller jazz bands would come together with other small bands and work on new music that focused on a new tempo, that contrasted the old-style jazz. This improvised jazz became a new music called bebop jazz. Charlie Parker helped with this new style in the 1940s and he became one of the most influential musicians for bebop. Bebop jazz featured a wider set of notes, played in more complex patterns and at

faster tempos compared to previous jazz styles.

According to Clive James, bebop was “the post-war musical development which tried to ensure that jazz would no longer be the spontaneous sound of joy... Students of race relations in America are generally agreed that the exponents of post-war jazz were determined, with good reason, to present themselves as challenging artists rather than tame entertainers.”

CHARLIE PARKER Charlie Parker was born in Kansas City, Kansas, and grew up in Kansas City, Missouri. Parker played in jazz clubs around the area as a teen and dropped out of high school to pursue his music career. He then joined the local musicians’ union. In his early days, Charlie Parker practiced improvisation and learned techniques in music that later contributed to his bebop style that he created.

Charlie Parker never gave up on his unique playing techniques even though he was sometimes discouraged from playing that way. One night at Reno Club while playing with Count Basie’s Orchestra in Kansas City he failed to improvise and lost track of his chords. The drummer, Jo Jones, threw a cymbal at his feet so he would know to get off the stage for his failed attempt.

This did not discourage him from playing his one of kind technique and instead he became motivated to practice even more on this style. And good thing Charlie Parker did, because when he moved to New

York City, his unique playing techniques became popular.

His bebop style was created when he was jamming with a fellow guitarist.

Bebop was an upbeat style that emphasized random harmonic structures and did not adhere to the melodybased compositions used in the traditional big band style. The Kansas City jazz of the 1930s and 1940s really helped bring this style to a new era. Although at first clubs would reject Charlie Parker and would not let him play his new style. Bebop musicians such as Charlie Parker had a hard time getting their music to gain popularity because of the two-year Musicians’ Union ban on all commercial recording.

But as soon as the ban was lifted the music of Charlie Parker and other musicians had a great effect on the jazz world and changed it forever. The bebop style was greatly epitomized

by Charlie Parker. Charlie Parker’s influence on jazz was very influential and to commemorate his

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achievements the Graphon alto saxophone played by him at the famous January 1953 Massey Hall concert in Montreal is displayed in the American Jazz Museum located in Kansas City.

“MUSIC IS YOUR OWN EXPERIENCE, YOUR OWN THOUGHTS, YOUR WISDOM. IF YOU DON’T LIVE IT, IT WON’T COME OUT OF YOUR HORN. THEY TEACH YOU THERE’S A BOUNDARY LINE TO MUSIC. BUT, MAN, THERE’S NO BOUNDARY LINE TO ART.” - CHARLIE PARKER The Pendergast political machine collapsed after Tom Pendergast, who helped jazz flourish by ignoring the prohibition laws, was indicted on tax evasion.

Reform elements took over and nightclubs and cabarets shut down. Jobs for musicians dried up and the bands took to the road.

By 1942, with the turmoil of World War II, many of the

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musicians had been drafted.

Finally, by 1944, the great Kansas City jazz era slowed down. And by the 1950s the historic district of 18th and Vine Street, known as the “Jazz District” for developing jazz as it is known today, began to decline. Many of the jazz clubs were being used less because many popular musicians, such as Charlie Parker, Lester Young and Count Basie, began to move to new cities such as Chicago and New York City, but these Kansas City jazz musicians kept the Kansas City Jazz music styles alive and carried the music with them to whichever new city their career took them to. From there the music continued to grow in popularity and helped these musicians gain great fame and popularity throughout the nation.

Charlie Parker

HISTORY The Compulsory segregation that once forced African Americans to live on 18th and Vine began to go away and the community members moved away to grow their businesses in other parts of the city. Eventually this led to the area being run down and full of vacant business in the 70s and 80s. Many buildings were torn down to make room for new business offices and warehouses.

Luckily Horace Pearson kept the idea of it being an important cultural and art district for Kansas City and in 1989, Councilmen Cleaver took control and started the “Cleaver Plan.” It would cost $22 million to renovate the area and give it the historical significance it deserved.

This plan did two things.

First it would renovate the Gem theater into a 550-seat Gem Theatre Cultural and Performing Arts Center, and second it would construct a new facility that now houses the American Jazz Museum,

Negro Leagues Baseball Museum, the Horace M. Peterson Visitors Center and the Blue Room. After many hard years of work, The Gem Theatre Cultural and Performing Arts Center, Jazz and Negro Leagues Baseball Museums and Visitors Center located along 18th Street were opened in 1997. The Mayor started a new group called The Jazz District Redevelopment Corporation (JDRC) that would be in charge of the redevelopment of the 18th and Vine Street area. He wanted it to help the city culturally and economically prosper in new ways for many years to come. The

JDRC’s plans were to reconstruct the area in the same architectural style and character to show off the area, just like it had been in its prime during the jazz era of Kansas City.

The JDRC succeeded in building many apartments that are at 100% capacity today. The buildings have been designed with brick facades, stone detailing, flat roofs, traditional cornices and trim to fit into the fabric of existing buildings in the 18th and Vine Street Historic District.

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American Jazz Museum

AMERICAN JAZZ MUSEUM The American Jazz Museum is the only museum in the world to solely focus on jazz music and its preservation, exhibition and advancement in today’s culture. The museum also displays one of Charlie Parker’s saxophones that he played and a sequined gown worn by Ella Fitzgerald. It also displays sights and sounds of jazz with many interactive exhibits and

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films. It also consists of a changing gallery exhibit space, Horace M. Peterson III Visitors Center, Blue Room jazz club and Gem Theater. The American Jazz Museum holds one of the largest collections of jazz memorabilia in our nation and is diligently working to preserve the heritage of jazz.

Not only in Kansas City, but also across the nation.

Blue Room

BLUE ROOM

GEM THEATER The Gem Theater was originally built in 1912 by the Shriner and Powellson Amusement Company as a silent movie palace and was called the Star Theatre. It targeted African-Americans as customers during the days of segregation. In 1914, it was renamed the Gem Theater. By the time motion pictures had audio in 1929, it had become an established fixture on 18th Street. Sadly, the movie theatre eventually closed and as a result of the “Cleaver Plan” vision and perseverance of Kansas City’s civic leaders, the Gem was restored into a beautiful, state-of-the art performance venue. The lobby of the

theater is decorated with classic photos of legendary jazz performers. Shows are hosted here, as well as the NLBM “Legacy Awards.” As well as the annual “Jammin’ at the Gem” jazz masters’ concert series. The Blue Room Jazz club was named after the famed 1930s Street Hotel club in the Historic 18th & Vine Jazz District.

This club has an exhibit that celebrates the past countless musicians who crafted “Kansas City jazz,” a sound known all over the world.

They also showcase current jazz musicians that are popular in jazz music today.

The Blue Room is known for finding new Jazz talent and also locally and nationally known talent to play in their club in a nice intimate setting. There are more than 130 artifacts in the Blue Room, which also serves as a part of the permanent museum exhibitions. One artifact, that is located in the large cases along the south wall of the Blue Room, is Leroy “Buster” Berry’s actual guitar, played while he was a member of Bennie Moten’s band.

There’s also an issue of DownBeat, a jazz and blues magazine that has been in circulation since 1939, that

features many Kansas City greats in their Hall of Fame including Charlie Parker, Count Basie, Lester Young and Pat Matheny. DownBeat has even named the Blue Room in the top 150 Jazz Clubs several times since its opening in 1997. The Blue Room also has “soundies” from a video jukebox that features performances of jazz greats such as Louis Armstrong, Billie Holiday and John Coltrane.

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Green Lady Lounge

GREEN LADY LOUNGE Kansas City has many other jazz clubs that help keep the culture of jazz alive. The Green Lady Lounge is an authentic source for Kansas City jazz. This exclusively jazz lounge features Kansas City jazz musicians in the Rich Kansas City tradition.

The Green Lady Lounge has jazz seven nights a week. A Hammond B-3 organ and a drum set take up residence on the main floor stage.

Having the instruments always in place allows the bands to do their shows with a minimum of disruption to themselves and the patrons.

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The lower level of the Green Lady Lounge is known as the Orion Room. The downstairs stage has more of a theatre presentation while the upstairs stage is in the middle of the guest seating. With two stages, the weekend performances can alternate with almost no time between shows.

The owner of Green Lady Lounge, John Scott, says,

“IN KANSAS CITY THERE’S JAZZ EVERYWHERE. IT’S SO RICH. IT’S LIKE GOLD TO THE MAYANS.”

His favorite band that plays at his club is the OJT. Scott describes OJT as “a kind of a north star, a point to guide everything else by. It is a sound that I feel combines a dirt road kind of blues and a real jazz sophistication. OJT is a Kansas City sound to me that combines swing with a lot of sophistication.”

THE MAJESTIC Another popular jazz club in Kansas City is The Majestic.

Originally bought as The Fitzpatrick Saloon Building, owners Frank Sebree, II and James B. Nutter, Sr., and their wives Annabelle Nutter and Mary Ann Sebree, spent two years restoring the building the old building with its polished exterior copper facade, original molded tin ceiling, and they even shipped in a 1900 40-foot long bar from New Orleans, and acquired an 1880 bar for The Jazz Club.

The Sebree’s and Nutter’s also commissioned famed local artist Jack O’Hara to paint an original oil on canvass mural for the entrance to Fitzpatrick’s called “From Kansas City to… Fame”, which depicts more than a dozen people with strong Kansas City ties who achieved great success in some area of the

arts, including Walt Disney, Count Basie, Charlie Parker, and Ernest Hemmingway. It was not until 1992 that the buildings full potential was met. This was when Doug Barnard brought the idea of serving Kansas City Steaks along with Kansas City Jazz for this restaurant. The New Majestic was a huge success and helped give diners the ultimate “Kansas City” experience in the beautiful downtown saloon. Although it is known now for its steak and jazz, the history of the building goes back even farther. The Fitzpatrick Saloon was a part of the beginning of Kansas City.

James A. Fitzpatrick opened his saloon in 1911. The first floor featured libations while the upper floors housed a notorious brothel as well as Fitzpatrick’s residence.

When prohibition rolled around, Fitzpatrick moved

the saloon to the lower level. Fitzpatrick was able to keep a very profitable speakeasy throughout prohibition because of Tom Pendergast and his help with prohibition laws. But the Fitzpatrick Saloon could not survive forever. Eventually it turned into a garment manufacturing building. The Garment District of Kansas City was surpassed only by New York. The Fitzpatrick Saloon building was lost during the rest of twentieth century until it was turned into The Majestic restaurant building it is known as today.

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KC ORCHESTRA More recently, the Kansas City Jazz Orchestra was founded in 2003 by Jim Mair, Mary Mair and Gene Hall. The first concert was performed on November 21, 2003, at Unity Temple on the Plaza by 17 jazz musicians from Kansas City. These musicians were directed

by Jim Mair. In 2010, the Mairs stepped down and Gene Hall became president of the board of directors.

In 2012, The Kansas City Jazz Orchestra moved to the fabulous Helzberg Hall in Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts for its

subscription series of four concerts per season. The Kansas City Jazz Orchestra is an internationally acclaimed, premier performing arts icon providing jazz entertainment and education. Kansas City is the home of jazz and the Kansas City Jazz Orchestra is one of the finest representatives of that heritage.

Kansas City Jazz Orchestra

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CONCLUSION Kansas City still thrives in jazz. The city has more than 200 music events occurring year-round. One popular event in the jazz community put on by The Kansas City Zoo is called Jazzoo. Jazzoo is an event put on every year that celebrates jazz and the money raised goes to supporting the specifically formulated diets required by more than 1,700 animals at the Kansas City Zoo. It was founded in 1990 by The Junior League of Kansas City, Mo. The guests of this event can enjoy continuous live music from local artists at five different stages all around the zoo.

In 2017, Kansas City was named a Creative City by UNESCO. It was honored for promoting Jazz heritage and honoring the historic and existing culture of the 18th and Vine Historic District. Kansas City really did a great job of renewing the 100-year history of jazz that was so prominent in the 18th and Vine St. district in Kansas City at one point in time.

In conclusion, Kansas City was a very prosperous town all thanks to the golden jazz era in the 1930s. The location of 18th and Vine St. and from the help of a thriving area during the prohibition really pushed jazz to grow in ways that were not capable anywhere else in the nation at the time.

Kansas City has become known for historic roots in jazz. It’s amazing how relative the city is to so many renowned jazz musicians such as Charlie Parker, Count Basie, and Lester Young. Kansas City helped form new music styles in Jazz such as the Moten swing and bebop jazz. These styles were formed in Kansas City and became widely popular in other cities as musicians began to move to bigger cities. If it was not for Kansas City jazz would have stayed the original classical tone and would not have grown to its success it has reached. Historians of Jazz say that while New Orleans was the birthplace of jazz, America’s music grew up in Kansas City.

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“KANSAS CITY, I WOULD SAY, DID MORE FOR JAZZ MUSIC, BLACK MUSIC, THAN ANY OTHER INFLUENCE AT ALL. ALMOST ALL THEIR JOINTS THAT THEY HAD THERE, THEY USED BLACK BANDS. MOST MUSICIANS WHO AMOUNTED TO ANYTHING, THEY WOULD FLOCK TO KANSAS CITY BECAUSE THAT’S THE PLACE WHERE JOBS WERE PLENTIFUL.” - JESSE STONE 20

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caPSTONE PROJECT PROCESS

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THINKING OF AN IDEA For my capstone project, I wanted to find the best way to display the rich culture and history of Kansas City Jazz for everyone to enjoy. I found the website for the Kansas City Jazz District when I was researching for my paper. The website has some great content but the design and interface just doesn’t showcase it. I decided to makeover the website so that it can better showcase the feel of the KC Jazz District.

The problem currently with the website is that it isn’t very visual, has an old design and format, and doesn’t showcase the feeling of jazz. It has a unique color scheme and the logo is interesting but not quite there.

The website redo will be for those who wanna know more about the history of KC Jazz and also how they can get involved today and experience it. It will also help people not from the area learn about the district and it’s history from their own home.

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CURRENT WEBSITE home screen

history page

list of businesses

contact page

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RESEARCH I wanted to research the relationship of jazz and Kansas City, and also how jazz in Kansas City affected the nation. I discovered that many of the jazz clubs from 1920-1940 were in the 18th and Vine St. area. I also discovered that the jazz musicians from Kansas City also went to many big cities to spread jazz music across the nation.

J A ZZ C L U BS I N KC 1920 - 1940

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18TH & VINE ST

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PASEO & 12TH

CHERRY & 12TH

POWER & LIGHT DISTRICT

JAZZ ACROSS THE NATION

CHICAGO

NEW YORK CITY

KANSAS CITY LOS ANGELES

NEW ORLEANS

JAZZ ARTISTS MOVING FROM KC JAZZ MOVEMENT ACROSS U.S.

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LOGO The new logo design is inspired by the 18th & Vine St. sign that is located in the jazz district. I based the colors off of classic colors you would find in a jazz club and gave them a fresh twist. Purple tones of the dimmed lights, blue like the night sky, and gold like the jazz instruments.

INITIAL SKETCHES

COLORS

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CMYK 59, 56, 32, 7

CMYK 39,37,15,0

CMYK 35, 3, 7, 0

CMYK 6, 22, 91, 0

RGB 116,109,133

RGB 160,154,182

RGB 159, 212, 230

RGB 240, 196, 59

HEX #746D85

HEX #A09AB6

HEX #9FD4E6

HEX #F0C43B

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WIREFRAMES For the layout of the website I wanted to keep it simple and intuitive. I compressed it down to four pages which are home, history, explore, and events. Below you can see the first sketches I drew and to the right are the final wireframes used for the website.

INITIAL SKETCHES

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home

history

explore

events

explore-detail

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Kc JAZZ WeBsITe desIGn

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PAGE DESIGN The web page design is meant to be simple and easily understood by the user. I used the map as an accent to the design because the location is one of the key elements to the 18th and Vine St. Jazz District.

The home page displays a picture of the main street of 18th and Vine St. I designed the history page like a timeline, so that the user can scroll through the jazz times. The explore page includes a map of the jazz district and categorized lists of the businesses in the area. Lastly the events page displays the events in order that they will happen.

HOME

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HISTORY

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EXPLORE

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EVENTS

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