 It is not clear who first applied "jazz" to music.A leading contender is Bert Kelly, a musician and bandleader who was familiar with the California slang term from being a banjoist with Art Hickman's orchestra.Kelly formed Bert Kelly's Jazz Band and claimed in a letter published in "Variety" on October 2, 1957, that he had begun using "the Far West slang word 'jazz,' as a name for an original dance band" in 1914.