News flash: the song is OH BABY — with or without comma and exclamation point — thanks to Rob Rothberg for the gentle correction. But I don’t have the time to fix the PETTIN’ references, so I hope readers will forgive me my ignorances, plural. The music remains!
It’s a wonderful song — verse and chorus — first made memorable in jazz by Bix Beiderbecke and the Wolverines, then by Bud Freeman’s Summa Cum Laude Orchestra and several other Bix-inspired groups.
The undocumented but hot version I present here comes from September 19, 2013, at the informal-jam session held before the Jazz at Chautauqua weekend officially began. The hero-participants are (from the back) Arnie Kinsella, drums; Kerry Lewis, string bass; John Sheridan, piano; Dan Levinson, clarinet; Andy Schumm, cornet:
and, just because JAZZ LIVES needs a regal guiding spirit, here’s someone who is always teaching the lesson: know when to pet, know when to stop:
JAZZ LIVES 