J-
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Janissary -
The imperial guards of the Ottoman Empire. The fad for 'Turkish' music in the 18th century included little bells, drums, and cymbals. This fad was elevated by its inclusion in Beethoven's "Ode to Joy" from Symphony No. 9. There it becomes a reminder that "All men become brothers" and that means even the Turks who had laid siege to Vienna only a few generations before.
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Janus -
The Roman god with two faces, one to look forward and the other to look back. January is named for him. The term is sometimes used in speaking of composers whose styles quite obviously look forward and backward. These are usually composers who lived during a watershed period in music history. Gesualdo, Monteverdi, Vivaldi, Mozart, Beethoven, Wagner, and Debussy are good examples,
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Jass -
The original spelling of Jazz.
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Jews prefer to attach a disclaimer (to Mendelssohn) -
In spite of being the grandson of the great Rabbi Moses Mendelssohn, Felix and Fanny were raised as Protestant Christians. It was, of course, the PC thing to do in that period, ensuring a higher degree of social and political advancement. Many Jews today still feel a certain taint to his name. After all, he wrote an oratorio on the life of St. Paul and the Reformation Symphony. Of course, he also wrote The First Walpurgis Night which makes fun of early Christians. More tellingly, in his own writings he pointedly refers to himself as Jewish. The use of Mendelssohn to represent Jewish composers is an issue still debated.
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Joachim (and Brahms' Violin Concerto) -
Joseph Joachim (b. June 28, 1831, d. Aug. 15, 1907) was a close friend of Johannes Brahms. Brahms' Violin Concerto was composed with much advice from Joachim, to the point that, according to some sources, the more technical passages may be considered joint compositions. After early years in Hungary and Vienna Joachim lived in Germany. He also gained a reputation in England, where some of his symphonic compositions were quite popular. In 1869 he organized the Joachim Quartet, the first to use the consistent vibrato we now accept as the norm. Not only did Brahms dedicate his Violin Concerto to Joachim, but so did Dvorák. See *Cook, Will Marion
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Jubilee Singers -
Named after the famous ensemble from Fisk University which has a long history of championing African-American music. It was, in fact, a tour to England by the Fisk Jubilee Singers a century ago which so affected the African-British composer Samuel Coleridge Taylor that he immersed himself in the American experience, becoming one of the most famous composers in the USA.
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'Jupiter' Symphony -
Mozart's last. It contains all kinds of counterpoint and abstract workings out of motives. A major piece of 'headwork.'
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Just pitch -
The kind of scale one would produce in a physics lab. It contains none of the compromises that instruments must contain in order to play in all keys.