Well it could be. Sidney Bechet moved to Chicago in 1917, and the first published review of a Jazz show occurred in 1918. So if, as I theorize, the word was a slot concoction dealing from "syncopation" and "aesthetic", it could have started the rounds that early. Syncopation means, literall, a slicing together; so the combined words mean a cross-cutting beauty, a syncopated style, a sharing of cool rhythm.

Makes sense to me!


A