November 2014, Bent Persson (right) and a humble admirer at the Whitley Bay Jazz Party. Photo by Andrew Wittenborn.
BENT PERSSON is a true hero of mine, and I know I have company around the world. I think of his friendly kind enthusiasm in person — he is ready to laugh at the world’s absurdities — and the soaring trumpet player, at once exact and passionate, who makes Louis and his world come alive in the brightest ways.
I first met Bent in the way that we used to find our heroes in the pre-internet era, sonically. In the middle Seventies, I was passionately collecting records. That meant that I would spend the day in New York City visiting record stores, coming home when I had used up my money. I prowled through Happy Tunes One and Two, Dayton’s, and J&R Records near City Hall, where I spotted a record on a label I hadn’t heard of before (“Kenneth Records”) featuring Bent Persson (someone new) playing his orchestral versions of the Louis Armstrong 50 Hot Choruses book published in Chicago, 1927. Perhaps it was $6.99, the price of two DJ copies or cutouts, but I took the risk. It was electrifying, joyous, and hot beyond my wildest expectations. Here’s what it sounded like.
HIGH SOCIETY, in duet with pianist Ulf Johansson Werre (1977):
I kept on buying every record (then CD) on which he appeared, and he visited the US now and again — although I wasn’t at liberty to meet him — to make sublime hot music, some of it captured in videos from the Manassas Jazz Festival.
CHINATOWN, with Kenny Davern, Jim Dapogny, Tomas Ornberg, and Steve Jordan (1988):
and duets with Jim Dapogny, CHICAGO BREAKDOWN and BLACK BOTTOM STOMP (1985):
At some point, I had acquired a computer and an email account, and was writing for THE MISSISSIPPI RAG, so I remember starting a correspondence with Bent — admiring and curious on my part, friendly and gracious on his. In the intervening years of record collecting, I understood that Bent was a Renaissance man of hot trumpet (and cornet): yes, Louis, but also Bix, Red, Cootie, and others, and no mere copyist, but a great understander and emulator, always himself while letting the light of his heroes shine through him. A great scholar as well, although that might be too obvious to write.
Finally the circumstances of my life changed so that I could fly — literally and figuratively — and in 2009 I made my way to the Whitley Bay Jazz Party, which I attended every year until 2016, video camera at the ready, approaching my heroes, shyly beaming love and gratitude at them. Bent knew me slightly from our correspondence, but I recall coming up to him, introducing myself, hugging him, and saying that he had been a hero of mine for decades. He took it all with good grace.
I created more than a hundred videos of Bent in that series of delightful parties, and I will share only four: you can find the rest on YouTube with a little earnest searching.
CLEMENTINE with Norman Field, Spats Langham, Frans Sjostrom (2009):
DUSK with Frans and Jacob Ullberger (2009):
LOOKIN’ GOOD BUT FEELIN’ BAD with the Red Hot Reedwarmers (2009):
and for an incendiary closer, DING DONG DADDY with Enrico Tomasso, Spats Langham, Kristoffer Kompen, and other luminaries (2015):
Please don’t let the apparent historical nature of these videos fool you into thinking that Bent has hung up his horns and dumped his valve oil into the trash.
He is still performing, and there were gigs with BENTS JAZZ COCKTAIL as recently as mid-August (what a well-dressed crew!) Visit Bent’s Facebook page for the most current news of his schedule.
This is the most fragmentary celebration of Bent, a man devoted to his art but also a first-rate human being who beams when he talks about the family he adores. If he is new to you, I hope you have been as uplifted and electrified by his music presented here as I have been for almost fifty years. If he is a shining light to you, here is another occasion to thank him for being and sustaining the glories of jazz.
It is, although across too many miles, another hug, so well-deserved.
Enrico Tomasso, touched by divinity, leads a big band at the 2015 Whitley Bay Jazz Party in Phil Baxter’s I’M A DING DONG DADDY. Soloists are Rico himself, Bent Persson, trumpets; Kristoffer Kompen, trombone; Lars Frank, tenor saxophone; Spats Langham, vocal and guitar. Supporting players are Menno Daams, trumpet; Richard Exall, Michael McQuaid, reeds; Morten Gunnar Larsen, piano; Malcolm Sked, sousaphone. Apologies to anyone I’ve left out.
In the darkest days of the pandemic, I found myself muttering under my breath, “I want to go home.” It was of course unattainable: my parents had been gone for decades and my childhood home long occupied by others. I have lived in this apartment for sixteen years, so wanting to “go home” was physically attainable and emotionally wavering. I am home. I was home. But not really. Home feels like a peaceful state of mind, somewhere you are safe and welcomed, perhaps even where someone makes a salad and asks if you would like some. In the midst of fear, grief, and uncertainty, “Home” still means to me a time and space where I don’t have to read the headlines in the morning and find out how many have died, been killed, are abused, are suffering.
So even before the pandemic, when the other person in the car asked me, “What’s your favorite song?” I said, “One?” and the first that came to mind was Louis’ THAT’S MY HOME. (Second place was IT’S ONLY A PAPER MOON, which is revealing also.)
But HOME.
And in musical terms, HOME is one of those songs so ennobled by performances, live and recorded. The last time I saw Bobby Hackett, at a January 1976 concert tribute to Louis, it was that song he picked as his feature. I can hear and feel embraced by the performances of Jack Teagarden, Joe Thomas, Coleman Hawkins on a 1944 Keynote Records date.
But for me it all comes back to Louis. I first heard him sing and play HOME on a glorious, touching Verve session, backed by Russell Garcia, LOUIS UNDER THE STARS, and then the 1931 OKeh version. Louis makes me want to stand up and put my hand over my heart, an impulse I must stifle because people at adjacent tables might ask if I need the Heimlich maneuver, but this Louis-inflected reading of the song, by Bent Persson and the Hot Antic Jazz Band, led by Michel Bastide, has me in tears every time. Good tears, rich ones:
We owe deep thanks to musician and videographer Andreas Kågedal for preserving this beauty and sharing it. I apologize to him for not naming him at the start.
Wherever you are, may it be comfortable and haimisch — you don’t need a translation.
What follows is nearly an hour of searing hot music by remarkable players, drawing on the rarely-played repertoire of Clarence Williams, King Oliver, Louis Armstrong, Sidney Bechet, James P. Johnson.
The band is a Swedish-American hybrid, generating incredible heat. Bent Persson, cornet, trumpet; Tomas Ornberg, clarinet and soprano saxophone; Tommy Gertoft, banjo; Ed McKee, tuba. Recorded between November 25-28, 1988, at the Manassas Jazz Festival (the date posted on the video is incorrect).
INTRODUCTION by Johnson “Fat Cat” McRee / MEAN BLUES / HOW COME YOU DO ME LIKE YOU DO? / WHAT MAKES ME LOVE YOU SO? (continued on 2):
WHAT MAKES ME LOVE YOU SO? (continued from 1, with an incredible solo from Bent) / WILD MAN BLUES / MANDY LEE BLUES / OLD FASHIONED LOVE (continued on 3):
OLD FASHIONED LOVE (continued from 2) / WHIP ME WITH PLENTY OF LOVE (with a dazzling four-chorus solo by Bent, followed by rollicking Dapogny):
Such a glorious combination. Never before, never again. Thanks to two gracious gentlemen: Joe Shepherd for these holy relics, Sonny McGown for accuracies.
The received wisdom is that long-playing records (and then CDs) allowed jazz musicians “room to stretch out,” and in many cases that is a boon. But I admire those musicians of all styles who can “get it done” in two choruses, smile, and step back.
Here’s a wonderful example: Bent Persson, cornet, and Goran Eriksson, banjo and stop-time percussive effects, romping through WEARY BLUES in the finest Louis Armstrong-Johnny St.Cyr manner, a performance that feels like the most rewarding dinner on a plate the size of a saucer: compressed, heated, expert:
It’s supposed to rain and be gray for the next three days . . . but in my heart the Louis-sun is blazing bright.
I didn’t create this video, but I bless Bob and Ruth Byler for doing just that: James Dapogny, piano, and Bent Persson, cornet, playing CHICAGO BREAKDOWN / BLACK BOTTOM STOMP at the Manassas Jazz Festival, November 29, 1985. It’s been hidden in plain sight [think of that Poe mystery] in the middle of a much longer video, but it was worth the price of the software needed to dig it out. For me, and of course for you.
Even though the composer credits for WILD MAN BLUES read Armstrong-Morton or the reverse, we know that such a collaboration, on manuscript paper or public performance, didn’t happen. But this episode gives us a chance to imagine the two of them in duet, north of TOM CAT, west of WEATHER BIRD:
What swing, what intensity, what ease — breathing the idiom and making it live. I will have more of Jim and Bent to share with you (when the Swedish Jazz Kings came to Manassas) shortly: for now, bask in these fine hot sounds.
In these most tempestuous times, we need some relief, and the phenomenon known as the Weatherbird Jazz Band offers it — hot jazz with passion and precision. And although I wouldn’t want to move permanently to 1928 Chicago, these musicians make the trip easy and rewarding.
The marvelous players and occasional singers are Bent Persson, trumpet or cornet; Kaj Sifvert, trombone; Tomas Ornberg, clarinet or soprano saxophone; Ulf Johansson Werre, piano; Goran Lind, string bass; Goran Eriksson, banjo or alto saxophone; Sigge Dellert, drums. They don’t rush; they aren’t noisy; they have a deep dark authentic groove over which luminous soloists soar.
LIVIN’ HIGH:
ST. JAMES INFIRMARY:
ORY’S CREOLE TROMBONE:
FUNNY FEATHERS:
FIREWORKS:
Over the past ten months, I’ve posted more than two dozen videos of this reassuringly groovy hot band: you can enjoy them here, here, here, here, here, and here. I don’t know what the CDC says, but if you are suffering from the news, be assured that this band is systemically healing, an anti-inflammatory, anti-anxiety, anti-depressant, anti-nausea, anti-fungal, anti-whatever-the-hell-might-be-ailing-you-at-the-moment panacea, cure, and solution. Or your money back. I speak from experience: playing FUNNY FEATHERS four times in a row has made me feel better about life . . . try it!
Seasonal Hot migrations: the Weatherbird Jazz Band has just paid us another welcome visit. (I’ve posted perhaps two dozen of their performances, which are both gratifying and easy to find.)
Here are six more beautiful performances, mostly celebrating the 1925-28 sides that Louis Armstrong and friends created in Chicago, with celebratory glances at Jelly Roll Morton, Clarence Williams, and the NORK.
The Weatherbirds, for these sessions, are Bent Persson, trumpet or cornet; Kaj Sifvert, trombone; Tomas Ornberg, clarinet or soprano saxophone; Ulf Johansson Werre, piano; Goran Lind, string bass; Goran Eriksson, banjo or alto saxophone; Sigge Dellert, drums. You’ll notice that I refrain from explaining and explicating: this music needs no subtitles, just listeners open to joy.
MY MONDAY DATE:
SOMEDAY SWEETHEART:
TIN ROOF BLUES:
BLACK BOTTOM STOMP (today is Mr. Morton’s birthday):
We like to think that everything can be known, and in many cases answers can be found by the diligent, but I am sharing a small mystery with my readers, for their pleasure and perhaps our mutual enlightenment.
Certain jazz soloists are immediately recognizable: you can make your own list. Other superb players are less familiar because of the paucity of evidence (we know what Charlie Shavers sounds like because of his distinctive approach, but we also have hours of his recorded work to compare any unidentified playing against.) I think also of Coleman Hawkins’ comment about being on the road: that you could go to some small town and there would be a tenor player who no one ever heard of who would be as good as the famous ones.
When I saw this record — rather obscure and rare — I wanted it, for those reasons. Also because Edgar Sampson, saxophonist, composer, arranger, never produced any music that was less than superb. I knew one song — DON’T TRY YOUR JIVE ON ME — because of Fats Waller’s UK recording. When I played it, though, I was impressed and mystified. A great trumpet solo on JIVE, and rippling swing piano on both sides.
I have some vanity about knowing the great soloists of the period, and it piqued me that I couldn’t identify anyone except Sampson. But I have friends who are also experts, and I tried their knowledge as well — let me list their names in alphabetical order: Marc Caparone, Menno Daams, Jan Evensmo, Jon-Erik Kellso, Bent Persson, Rob Rothberg, Bo Scherman — but no definitive answers.
About The Three Swingsters, I can only surmise that they were a vocal group with some regional fame — I think Pennsylvania — but I do not know whether the record was made to showcase them or not.
Before we go deeper, here is the mysterious listing in Tom Lord’s online discography:
Edgar Sampson And His Orchestra : 2 tp, tb, Edgar Sampson (as) unknown p, b and d, The Three Swingsters (vcl-1)
New York, May 25, 1939
WM1023-A Don’t try your jive on me (1) Voc 4942
WM1024-A Pick your own lick (1) –
WM1025-A Sly mongoose (1) (unissued)
My experts (I apologize if that seems too possessive) came up with names of who the trumpet soloist couldn’t be, and proposed Dick Vance or Benny Carter as the trumpeter, and Tommy Fulford as the pianist, with some thoughts of perhaps Eddie Heywood or Kenny Kersey. Vance and Fulford were stalwarts of the Chick Webb band — this disc was recorded very late in Chick’s life — and at that time Sampson was the band’s musical director. I have heard Fulford with Chick’s “Little Chicks,” and he is plausible — fleet and swinging.
On first hearing, I thought the pianist was Billy Kyle, but the player does not reach for Kyle’s beloved downward run, and Billy recorded that day with Jack Sneed for Decca (of course he could have made two sessions in one day). The connection to Master Records suggests the salutary influence of Helen Oakley. And PICK YOUR OWN LICK (written by “newcomers to songdom” Roy Jacobs and Gene de Paul, according to Billboard) was published by Mills Music. de Paul went on to write DON’T TAKE YOUR LOVE FROM ME and I’LL REMEMBER APRIL, but LICK is not his finest hour. Or three minutes.
Here’s DON’T TRY YOUR JIVE ON ME:
About PICK YOUR OWN LICK: I try never to write these words, but what a terrible idea — an attempt to have a pop hit by cannibalizing bits of other pop hits. But the band sounds good, even while the lyrics pummel us with obvious hopeful thefts.
I’m going to allow myself the freedom of not writing the history of this song, nor posting all the versions, but simply offering a few that please me immensely. This post is in honor of Doctor J, who knows why it is.
A little introduction (2006) by the Manhattan Ragtime Orchestra, who closed sets with it: Jon-Erik Kellso, Brad Shigeta, Orange Kellin, Morten Gunnar Larsen, John Gill, Skye Steele, Conal Fowkes, Rob Garcia:
Louis gets to introduce his own performance:
and here’s the lovely 1930 version, with magnificent Louis (yes, I know that’s redundant) and his “Rhythm Boys” drawn from the Luis Russell band, starring J.C. Higginbotham and Pops Foster. Apparently Paul Barbarin plays vibraphone and the band’s valet plays drums: he swings!
Count Basie, slightly less than a decade later, with Buck Clayton, Lester Young, and the rest of the Hawaiians (the trumpets make wonderful derisive noises at the end of Lester’s solo — why? I don’t know, but it’s just splendid):
And a more contemporary version I treasure because it seems to convey decades of vernacular music performance, making the transition from waltz-time to quietly majestic rocking (yes, Louis is standing in the wings, very happy). I imagine the opening choruses as a tea-dance or perhaps a summer band concert in a gazebo in the town park, and then the band takes on restorative color and swing, never aggressively but with sweet eloquence. The group is the 1987 Red Roseland Cornpickers, featuring Bent Persson, Claus Jacobi, and Keith Nichols, and this is taken from my prized “long-playing record” on the Stomp Off label:
Details for those who crave data: Bent Persson (tp-2,vcl) Folker Siegert (tb-3,vcl) Claus Jacobi (as-4,ts-5,cl-6,vcl) Engelhard Schatz (cl-7,sop-8,ts-9,vcl) Lothar Kohn (as-10,g-11,vcl) Joachim Muller (bassax-13,cl-14,as-15) Keith Nichols (p,vcl) Gunter Russel (bj-12,vcl) Ulf-Carsten Gottges (d) Gottingen, January 4 & 5, 1987. SONG OF THE ISLANDS: (2,3,4,6,7,9,12,13,14,15, Bent, Folker, Claus, Engelhard, Lothar, and Keith, vocal).
In these stressful times, this music evokes warm days, cool nights, tropical beaches, and fresh pineapple.
The Weatherbird Jazz Band is slightly mysterious — where did they come from? where are they off to now? But I know two things: they have had a regular migratory pattern: twice in April, once in May, in June, and they’re back!
The marvelous players are Bent Persson, trumpet or cornet; Kaj Sifvert, trombone; Tomas Ornberg, clarinet or soprano saxophone; Ulf Johansson Werre, piano; Goran Lind, string bass; Goran Eriksson, banjo or alto saxophone; Sigge Dellert, drums. And here are four more beauties — compact, hot, intense and pensive, in love with the tradition but seriously personal.
Hes’s the hottest man in town, you know:
I’ll have you to remember:
A blues with many titles, such as THOSE DRAFTIN’ BLUES and STORYVILLE BLUES, with associations to Art Hickman and Bunk Johnson:
and a helpful suggestion about how to get through 2020:
The Weatherbirds will be back soon. I will watch the skies.
I don’t know anything about migratory patterns between suburban New York and Sweden, but when the Weatherbird Jazz Band flies by, our spirits lift. Sightings earlier this year were here and here and here.
So here they are with more hot music: intense, focused, playful, exact, and delicate. You can invent your own words of praise as you listen. And the marvelous players and occasional singers are Bent Persson, trumpet or cornet; Kaj Sifvert, trombone; Tomas Ornberg, clarinet or soprano saxophone; Ulf Johansson Werre, piano; Goran Lind, string bass; Goran Eriksson, banjo or alto saxophone; Sigge Dellert, drums.
The Weatherbirds are eager to please, even when technology arbitrarily subdivides the impulse in two:
and more, because it would be cruel to leave us there (and Goran’s rolling-and-tumbling alto solo is worth hearing twice):
a gorgeously somber 1928 BASIN STREET BLUES with the appropriate vocals:
Mister Morton’s THE CHANT with some (perhaps) early-Thirties touches:
a too-brief trip to CHINATOWN by the band-within-a-band:
SOME OF THESE DAYS, with the verse in the middle — it’s only right:
HIGH SOCIETY, based on a Hot Chorus, a thrilling duet for trumpet and piano:
and, to close this offering, a delightful CHICAGO BREAKDOWN:
The JAZZ LIVES quarantine-collection of venerable lively recordings, ever-expanding.
Every Monday night, Matthew “Fat Cat” Rivera has been gathering the Hot Club of New Yorkfor a Zoom session from 7-10 PM, playing wonderful 78 rpm jazz records with great flair and great sound. You can become a member here. And there’s more information here.
Last Monday night, one of the sides was Clarence Williams’ MISTER, WILL YOU SERENADE? — whose composer credits read Clarence Williams, (Banjo) Ikey Robinson, and Alex Hill. My money is on Mister Hill. Matthew, who knows things, has suggested wisely that Mister Robinson would have been responsible for the jivey lyrics. I wish I could trace the story I once read that Clarence, late in life, told someone that none of the compositions under his name had been his. Amazing if so.
But this post is about MISTER, WILL YOU SERENADE? — a song of great melodic simplicity, with two-note phrases that have burned themselves into my brain, and lyrics that are unforgettable because they are so much a part of their time that they have a majestic silliness. And we could all use a Serenade. Please join me in Incid. Singing.
Here’s the first version, with Eva Taylor singing first (her voice is catnip) and Cecil Scott, clarinet; Herman Chittison AND Willie “The Lion” Smith, piano; Ikey Robinson, banjo, tenor-guitar; Clarence Williams, jug; Willie Williams, washboard; Clarence Todd, vocal. New York, August 7, 1933:
That recording has so many delights: the almost staid way it begins with Eva’s demure yet emotive delivery, and the underrated Cecil Scott, Chittison’s very “modern” piano — remember, this is 1933 . . . then the short pause while the band has to get it together for the key change into Clarence Todd’s much more exuberant Calloway-inflected vocal AND the rollicking duo-piano background. It may be a Silly Symphony, but it is a symphony nonetheless.
Here’s the second Williams version, brighter, with the leader’s potato-ey vocal: Ed Allen, cornet; Cecil Scott, clarinet; James P. Johnson, piano; Roy Smeck, guitar, steel guitar; Cyrus St. Clair, tuba; Floyd Casey, washboard. New York, January 17, 1934:
Notable for me is the emphasis on steady rocking ensemble playing — and the sound of Clarence’s closing inquiry: he means it.
But wait! there’s more! — a frolicsome big band version from the little-known Tiny Bradshaw band: Lincoln Mills, Shad Collins, Max Maddox, trumpet; George Matthews, Eugene Green, trombone; Russell Procope, Bobby Holmes, alto saxophone; Edgar Courance, clarinet, tenor saxophone; Clarence Johnson, piano; Bob Lessey, guitar; Ernest Williamson, string bass; Harold Bolden, drums; Tiny Bradshaw, vocal. New York, September 19. 1934:
The Williams recording looks backwards to chugging leisurely ways (it feels rural in its approach) where the Bradshaw band is aerodynamic, speeding down the Swing highway — beautiful solos (Maddox, Procope, Courance, Matthews?) and an uncredited effective arrangement. That band’s eight Decca sides (autumn ’34) deserve more attention.
Here’s a more recent version, at a lovely tempo, with the verse, the group led by Ted des Plantes with some of my friends : Leon Oakley, cornet; Larry Wright, clarinet, saxophones, ocarina; John Otto, clarinet, alto saxophone; Ted des Plantes, piano; John Gill, banjo; Ray Cadd, tuba, jug; Hal Smith, washboard. Berkeley, California, August 15-17, 1997:
The most contemporary version — reminiscent of a Teddy Wilson session! — by Hal Smith’s Rhythmakers: Marc Caparone, cornet; Alan Adams, trombone; Bobby Gordon, clarinet; John Otto, alto saxophone, clarinet; Chris Dawson, piano; Rebecca Kilgore, vocal, guitar; Clint Baker, string bass; Hal Smith, drums. San Diego, California, November 29 & 30, 1999.
See if you can go through the next few days without humming a phrase from this song. I dare you.
I love the arc of this chronology — even though I couldn’t produce versions by Mike Durham and Bent Persson — that starts with a rare record from 1933 and ends up with performances by some of my most respected friends.
Everyone I know, and I include myself, is slightly unhinged these days: you can name the emotions, so drastic measures are needed. I can’t send homemade soup through the ether, so here’s another infusion of warmth and energy from the Weatherbird Jazz Band, featuring Bent Persson, trumpet and cornet; Kaj Sifvert, trombone; Tomas Ornberg, clarinet and soprano saxophone; Ulf Johansson Werre, piano, vocal; Goran Lind, string bass; Goran Eriksson, banjo and alto saxophone; Sigge Dellert, drums.
AFTER YOU’VE GONE starts in a pensive mood, and then heats up:
Look out — it’s the WILD MAN!
Only a short leap from WILD MAN to Bechet’s brightly-colored WILD CAT BLUES, featuring Tomas:
I hope your ROAD isn’t LONESOME:
I’ve posted other videos by another edition of the Weatherbirds here and here — for your dining and dancing pleasure. And Christophe from Lugano suggests that the supply is not yet depleted, so hold on tight.
For the moment, it has stopped raining where I am, but skies worldwide still need to be brightened. Music is one of the best ways I know. Hot music.
You can read more about how these videos came to me (thanks to Kriss) and hear a wonderful WOLVERINE BLUES here.
For these performances, the Birds are Bent Persson, trumpet / cornet; Goran Stachewsky, banjo; Goran Lind, string bass; Ulf Johansson Werre, piano; Tomas Ornberg, reeds; Jens “Jesse” Lindgren, trombone.
Today, a quartet of songs / performances associated with Louis in his late Twenties cosmology. And please listen closely to Bent, who has spent years in study and performance of the Louis Hot Choruses / Hot Breaks book from 1927: an ascending break can be heard late in NEW ORLEANS STOMP, and a whole chorus in JIMTOWN BLUES, a song Louis never recorded. And the Weatherbirds romp . . . if birds can be said to romp! (Perhaps another verb for jubilation? No matter.)
NEW ORLEANS STOMP:
SAVE IT, PRETTY MAMA, with a Hines-chorus from Ulf and an evocative vocal by Jesse, while Tomas imagines Bechet joining Louis in the OKeh studios:
WILLIE THE WEEPER — so much swing in under three minutes:
JIMTOWN BLUES:
Kriss has promised me more, as these wonderful Birds fly over . . .
My dear jazz friend Christophe from Lugano, who happily answers to the sobriquet “Swiss Kriss” just sent me a present, a video-performance by the Weatherbird Jazz Band of Mister Morton’s WOLVERINE BLUES, which he asks that I share with you, as an antidote to isolation. (The photograph below is from the cover of their Stomp Off Records lp, which may still be available through that company. Inquire here.
The Weatherbirds (named for that famous Louis-Earl duet) flourished about forty years ago, but many of their members are thriving and continuing to make music — chief of them being Bent Persson, trumpet, who is also a Louis scholar making black marks on the page come alive. You’ll hear it in his second solo chorus, which is his interpretation of a chorus Louis played that was notated in 1927 for the “Fifty Hot Choruses” folio.
But here’s some hot music! The other Birds are Sigge Dellert, drums; Goran Eriksson, banjo; Goran Lind, string bass; Ulf Johansson Werre, piano; Tomas Ornberg, reeds; Kaj Sifvert, trombone. And here they are, making music and raising our collective spirits:
This post is also for Laura Wyman, who knows all about being a Wolverine. And there will be more music from this terrific band to come.
Festivals and jazz parties make it possible for me to greet old friends again and bask in their music, but a great thrill is being able to meet and hear someone I’ve admired for years on record — people who come to mind are Bent Persson, Jim Dapogny, Ray Skjelbred, Carl Sonny Leyland, Rebecca Kilgore, Hal Smith (it’s a long list) and now the wonderful pianist John Royen, whom I met for the first time at this year’s San Diego Jazz Fest.
At work / at play, 2014, with Marty Eggers and Katie Cavera. Photo by Alex Matthews.
For John’s New Orleans Rhythm, the first set, he was joined by Dan Levinson, clarinet and tenor; Marty Eggers, string bass; Katie Cavera, guitar; Hal Smith, drums. I hear someone’s therapy dog, or an audience member was whimpering with delight.
SOME OF THESE DAYS:
WABASH BLUES:
WOLVERINE BLUES:
That was Friday. We didn’t see John, and Conal Fowkes took his place at a set; we heard that John had decided (not really) on an internal home improvement, and had had a defibrillator installed at a nearby hospital. This surprised me, because his beat has always been terribly regular.
But he reappeared magically on Sunday, looking like himself. Virginia Tichenor graciously ceded some of her solo piano time so that he could play. And play he did.
His solo playing was both assertive and delicate, spicy yet respectful of the originals. John’s relations with the audience are so charming . . . and his playing, while not always fast or loud, is lively — lit brightly from within.
The Lion’s HERE COMES THE BAND:
ATLANTA BLUES, or MAKE ME A PALLET ON THE FLOOR:
and John’s delightful improvisations on MY INSPIRATION:
There will be a Part Two: John with Joe Goldberg, Marty Eggers, Riley Baker, and a brief visit from John Otto. An honor to encounter the Captain, who creates such good music.
I think of the deliriously pleasurable precedent established by Bent Persson and friends some forty years ago — that of understanding Louis Armstrong and colleagues so deeply and expertly that they could move in and out of his music, embellishing a characteristic phrase here or there, reminding us gently of a particularly memorable invention, but ultimately, going for themselves. Bent and colleagues are still playing beautifully, but here are some slightly younger players from Norway, having the most wonderful time with Louis’ music. These three performances were recorded at Stortorvets Gjæstgiveri, Oslo, on February 17, 2018, and they are made available to us through reed virtuoso Lars Frank’s YouTube channel.
They are the Norwegian Jazz Kings, and I am not going to argue with a single letter of that band-title. On trumpet and cornet, Torstein Kubban; on clarinet and saxophone, Lars Frank; playing the bass saxophone and sousaphone, Christian Frank; piano, Morten Gunnar Larsen; banjo and guitar, Børre Frydenlund. I have a particularly warm feeling for Torstein, Lars, and Morten, because I met and spoke with them several times at the jazz party formerly known as the Whitley Bay Jazz Party. Christian and Børre I know from recordings, and admire them deeply as well. (Incidentally, the gentleman sitting right in front of the sousaphone is friend-of-jazz, patron-of-the-arts, and record producer Trygve Hernaes, whom I also know from visits to Newcastle.)
These three videos honor the exalted period of Louis’ life when he was working with Earl Hines, Johnny Dodds, Baby Dodds, and Zutty Singleton. Certainly regal even if not Norwegian.
I don’t know the order in which these pieces were performed, but let’s begin this blogpost with the lyrical and majestic TWO DEUCES, by Miss Lil:
Here’s a riotous but precise frolic on COME ON AND STOMP STOMP STOMP. I had to play it several times because I couldn’t believe it. I’m amazed that the fire marshals were not called in. (I adore the translated title on the Dodds record. Don’t you?):
And for me what is the piece de reistance, POTATO HEAD BLUES. In case of historical quibbling, just remember Louis’ words, “Cat had a head shaped like a potato”:
As befits any person or organization in this century, the Norwegian Jazz Kings have a Facebook page. Those in the know will immediately go there and do the fashionable act of “liking” it. And since the wonders of cyberspace are limitless, here you can read the menu of the Stortorvets Gjæstgiveri, an Oslo landmark since the 1700s. It made me hungry and wistful at the same time.
What a band, balancing elegance and focused power. I wish them well and look forward to more marvels.
In my world, there’s always a time and place for Louis-devotion and devotions.
First, some healthy carbohydrates — the Swedish Jazz Kings playing POTATO HEAD BLUES at the Wangaratta Festival of Jazz in 2000:
The Swedish Jazz Kings are a wonderful band with Bent Persson on trumpet or cornet; Tomas Ornberg on clarinet and soprano saxophone. I don’t know the remaining members of the orchestra, but they all sound better than Pretty Good.
What follows is one of those pleasantly explosive surprises one stumbles across if one is (like myself) deeply engrossed by the YouTube Palace of Pleasures. I believe the video was shot by Michel Laplace, or at least he is the generous soul who made it available to us. It features Bent with Bob Barnard — some incredible brass conversations — and the irreplaceable Joe Muranyi.
That’s Joe Muranyi, clarinet, soprano saxophone, vocal; Bob Barnard, cornet; Swedish Jazz Kings — Bent Persson, cornet; Tomas Ornberg, clarinet, soprano saxophone; Joep Peeters, piano; Ollie Nyman, banjo; Frans Sjöström, bass saxophone. August 13, 1997 : playing and singing HOUSE RENT BLUES / I’M A LITTLE BLACKBIRD / KANSAS CITY MAN BLUES / I DIG SATCH.
Thanks again to Michel Laplace. And to these magnificent musicians. And of course to Louis, who lights our way.
The late clarinetist Alan Cooper deserves to be better-remembered. Here he is in 1991 (courtesy of John Jamie Evans, who is not only the pianist in the photograph but also maintains the site devoted to Cooper and contemporaries, Alan Cooper Remembered.
To begin, here is Cooper’s obituary in The Guardian, by the fine jazz writer and scholar Peter Vacher:
The early 1960s was the era of the curious and brief British “trad jazz” boom. In those years the Temperance Seven, who played a version of 1920s white American dance music, achieved such success that in 1961 they had a British No 1 hit, You’re Driving Me Crazy, produced by George Martin in his pre-Beatles days. The follow-up, Pasadena. made No 4, and there were two other top 30 hits.
The clarinettist Alan Cooper, who has died of cancer aged 76, was a founder member of the group in 1957. Usually a nine-piece, and invariably billed as “one over the eight”, the Temps wore Edwardian clothes, played bizarre instruments, and projected vocals through a megaphone. Most of the band could play a variety of instruments, and Cooper – who arranged Pasadena – doubled on clarinet, bass-clarinet, soprano saxophone and the obscure phonofiddle. The band appeared on television shows such as ITV’s Thank Your Lucky Stars and a special featuring Peter Sellers – with whom they recorded. Cooper’s quirky playing style and wheezy sound were exactly right for the band. Even so, he left in 1962 after “internal dissensions”.
Born in Leeds, he fell in with traditional jazz at the city’s college of art, where aspiring guitarist Diz Disley was a fellow student. They played together in the college jazz band, the Vernon Street Ramblers, and were founder members of the Yorkshire Jazz Band, with which Cooper turned professional, recording in London in 1949.
After national service as a flying officer, Cooper moved to London in the mid-1950s. Initially a Royal College of Art student, he became a part-time lecturer at St Martin’s School of Art and at Chelsea Art School. He also performed in a quartet with bassist Bernie Cash and drummer Lennie Hastings, and recorded in 1958 with trombonist Graham Stewart’s Seven.
After the Temperance Seven, Cooper freelanced as a musician and lecturer, deputising in the Alex Welsh and Freddy Randall bands, and also appeared regularly with the Anglo-American Alliance alongside his old Temps bandmate John RT Davies (obituary, May 29 2004) and sundry Americans then resident in London, notably cornettist/journalist Dick Sudhalter. This informal outfit were the ideal backing band for the veteran blues singer Eva Taylor and former Paul Whiteman trombonist Bill Rank when they performed and recorded in London in the 1960s.
It was during this time that Cooper created his monument to Edwardian design and style with his three-storey house in Wandsworth. Formerly owned by the water-closet pioneer Thomas Crapper, it was taken over by Cooper on the understanding that it would be left untouched by modernity. He filled it with period artefacts and statues, vintage equipment including gramophones, and old instruments. He also kept open house for musician friends but moved, after a series of burglaries, to a tower in Hay on Wye, Herefordshire, which he restored, and where he recreated the Edwardian ambiance of his former home.
Cooper joined the revived New Temperance Seven in 1969 and recorded with them before working regularly with pianist Keith Nichols and touring overseas with drummer Dave Mills. He was also an occasional guest with Bob Kerr and His Whoopee Band, and led his own small groups.
He is survived by his second wife Jenefer and sons Boris and Rollo.
· Alan Swainston Cooper, musician, born February 15 1931; died August 22 2007.
An interlude for music and for a few words of my own. I first heard Cooper on several recordings featuring Dick Sudhalter and his father, with John R. T. Davies, Henry Francis, and others — issued as “Sudhalter and Son” on the “77” label and (perhaps without a band title) on Davies’ own “Ristic” label. [The Sudhalter and Sons records disappeared in one or another seismic life-change and I miss them.]
Cooper was impossible to ignore, difficult to describe, more eccentric than Pee Wee or Chace, often sounding as if he had sunk his clarinet into a bowl of soup and was playing the liquefied version. Gurglings, mutterings, and other sounds made perfect sense, and I remember feeling admiration and hilarity and befuddlement all at once. Bent Persson, who knows and feels the music deeply, has told me of his appreciation of Cooper’s true originalities.
Here, thanks again to Mr. Evans, is a sample of Coops at work on the closing choruses of BETWEEN THE DEVIL AND THE DEEP BLUE SEA:
Mr. Evans has posted seven such rare and delicious effusions hereon his YouTube channel, well worth subscribing to.
Effervescent tributes, the first by Ray Smith, from Just Jazz Magazine in November 2007:
Alan always answered the ‘phone, in a rather dignified voice, by stating simply: “Cooper”. He always signed his letters “Coops”. I once made the mistake of introducing him as “My old friend, Alan Cooper”; “I’m not old” came the reply. Indeed, he wasn’t ever old. “I don’t know what I’m going to do when I grow up,” was one of his observations during a discussion about young children. We were playing, as a duo, at a school in the Middle East. I don’t quite remember why we were without the other members of the British All-Stars, but we had to play for a half hour to 5-10 year-olds. At the end of the informal concert, the children’s appreciation was loud and long. I glanced at Alan, and I believe I saw tears glistening in his eyes. Warm-hearted wouldn’t begin to describe him, as any one of his many friends will confirm.
Spending time with Coops was always good value, and we had plenty of time on the various Middle-East tours that Dave Mills put together. There are dozens of stories…. Bruce Turner was guesting on one trip. It was like working with Jimmie Noone and Johnny Hodges in the front line. Alan’s feature number was Strangler on the Floor (with apologies to Mr. Acker Bilk). Resplendent in his white dinner jacket, black bow tie, etc., his attire was completed – for said solo outing – by a battered bowler-hat which perched on the top of his head, looking slightly embarrassed by being there.
The routine went something like this: The first chorus – in the key of Eb – was played most beautifully in tribute to the original version. In the second chorus, Alan changed to the key of E Major. However… the rhythm section section stood its ground, and continued on its way – in Eb. The effect of the resulting non-euphonious sounds registered disbelief on the faces of the audience. On completing the second chorus, the clarinet was building-up for the big finish, when Dave Mills – secreted in the audience with a bird call about his person – started twittering on that very instrument. Alan – head cocked to one side – twittered back. This went on for some time; most of the audience had realized by this time that it was a spoof. Cooper remained dignified, as always, even after the big-finish – or rather “the business” to quote a Cooperism.
Unfortunately, on one occasion, a member of the audience was a native of Pensford – Acker’s home town – and set about Alan verbally, accusing him of insincerity, amongst other things. He just wouldn’t listen to Alan’s reasoning – or ‘piff-paff’, as he would have described it. Bruce Turner was jumping up and down saying, “Hit him, Dad, hit him” to no-one in particular. I had affected a burnt-cork mustache for that particular evening. Alan pointed at said affectation. “Would you say that was displaying insincerity?” “Well no, I suppose not.” “I rest my case,” and so saying, Alan strode off in the direction of the bar. The following year, we toured in the summer time, which was stiflingly hot. Alan and I shared hotel room for four or five days in Abu Dhabi. Two single beds, one on either side of the room. The air-conditioning could be adjusted easily enough – there was a small light over the box on the wall – but knowing whether it should be left on… halfway… or turned off completely was a subject for experiment. On the first night, I adjusted the air-conditioning, and on the second night, Alan adjusted it. By the third night – my turn again – I forgot about until in bed with the lights out. I said something profane, and, without turning on the light, made my way noisily to the air-conditioning controls. Not being able to remember what the setting had been the previous night, I said, “Coops… did wehave it off last night?” There was a brief silence whilst we both thought about the question. Suddenly, a sort of gurgling noise issued from the direction of Cooper.. and then gales of laughter from us both. We didn’t actually stop laughing for an hour… Well, about twenty-five years really.
The following story illustrates the regard in which Alan was held by his fellow musicians… We visited the Pizza Express one evening to listen to Kenny Davern. Having found a seat not too near the orchestra, Kenny Davern saw Coops, and whilst announcing the next number, said “Ladies and Gentlemen, there is only one clarinetist in England who scares the hell out of me, and he’s here tonight. Sitting over there – Alan Cooper.” Alan raised his hand, and sort of wiggled his fingers in acknowledgement.
The voice at the end of the telephone is no more. Thankfully, Alan’s clarinet playing can be heard on a host of recordings. It’s safe to say that we will always remember him. God Bless, Coops.
And from Johannesburg.. (by David Mills)
On the 15 February, 1931, Gordon Alan Cooper, Alan Swainston Cooper, The Professor, and Coops – all one person – entered this world on the same day and year as Claire Bloom. Coops, as I remember him, brought with him a wealth of talent – as a painter, sculptor, teacher and musician, became one of the most original Classic jazz clarinetists in the UK and Europe – if not the World! I have very many fond memories of Coops and I list but a few. We formed the British All Stars Band in 1979, primarily to tour the Gulf States, the first time any British entertainers, let alone jazzers, had done this. Prior to that, Coops and I dreamed up the idea of taking The Temperance Seven on to Concorde, to be the first musicians to play at the speed of sound. In fact, Coops composed the Mach 2 March to celebrate this. After two years of planning and negotiating with BA, on the 31 March, 1976, we all boarded the BA Concorde flight to Bahrain and, an hour into the flight, the Chief Steward asked if the two of us would like to look at the flight deck. When Coops and I went to the flight deck, the Captain and Coops greeted each other: “Inky!” “Stinky!” Both had been pilots in the RAF at the same time, so Stinky asked Inky, “Would you like to fly us to Bahrain?” Coops took over, from Cyprus, and did! The following 25 years work in the Middle East was the result of that trip.
I’ll never forget in Muscat, Oman, on one occasion, when he rushed around all the band members’ rooms at the Ruwi Hotel saying, “Quick, quick, you must come. The Ruler is about to open the country’s first traffic light!”
Coops was a multi-talented, eccentric, loveable character whom no-one will forget, and whose presence made my, and many other lives much richer. Coops, we loved you and will continue to do so.
More music — the performance that sticks in my psyche as well as my ears and is the inspiration for this long tribute. It was recorded at the 100 Club in London on June 10, 1984, by Dave Bennett. The band, in addition to Coops, is Ken Colyer, trumpet; Graham Stewart, trombone and vocal; Johnny Parker, piano; Jim Bray, string bass; Dave Evans, drums; guests Wally Fawkes, clarinet; Diz Disley, guitar — and they embark on a leisurely GEORGIA GRIND. Not only do you hear Coops’ singular weird majesty on clarinet, entering through the window at :41, and he continues to enhance the solos and ensemble for the remaining eight minutes, masterfully:
In the past year, I’ve seen Coops’ house in Hay-on-Wye and had tea with his widow, the charming Jenny (thanks to Martin Litton and Janice Day) who showed me some intriguing Cooper-objects and told stories. I’ve learned even more from my dear friend Sarah Spencer, who knew Coops well, and I present these fragments.
Coops added “-iness” to words (hungriness instead of hunger and the like) and he used to say “Hem Hem,” which came from a book of tales of schoolboy mischief, when talking about anything of a slightly risque nature. He used to ingest Fisherman’s Friends lozenges by the handful constantly and so seemed, when his temperature reached that zone, to sweat or exude that scent from his pores. For those of us fond of Coops, the smell of Fisherman’s Friends may make us slightly nostalgic. For others, they may smell somewhat vile. I remember, with myparents being from Yorkshire (as was Coops), we took a trip ‘oop north’ to Sheffield and came back with some local candy. I brought him some. When he popped them into his mouth, the look on his face was one of utter nostalgia. “I doubted I would ever taste this again!” He played a Clinton system clarinet, a Boosey and Hawkes variant of the Albert system and practically unheard-of outside of the U.K. I have found it almost impossible to find photographs of them online.
Sarah told me, before I’d ever heard GEORGIA GRIND, that Cooper’s term of affection and esteem for men was “Dear Chap,” or sometimes “Dear Boy.”
Dear Coops, I am sorry that I never got to admire you at close range, in person. This blogpost will have to do as one tribute to someone who went his own way always and always spread joy.
SWING indeed. It gets very hot in Newcastle during the long weekend when the Mike Durham Classic Jazz Partygently but firmly occupies the Village Hotel in Newcastle, England.
Nick Ball and Graham Hughes at the 2015 Mike Durham Classic Jazz Party. Photograph by Emrah Erken.
This year, the Party begins with a jam session on Thursday, November 3 . . . and runs almost without a letup until late Sunday (really, early Monday morning) — either November 6 or 7, depending on what your watch or smartphone tells you.
I’ve posted links to the Party site below, but before you venture into the land of Clicks, how about some hot music? This rousing performance (from November 8, 2015) was part of a set led by Thomas Winteler paying tribute to the 1938-41 recordings Bechet made for Victor Records.
The heroes onstage are Thomas Winteler, soprano saxophone; Bent Persson, trumpet; Graham Hughes, trombone; Morten Gunnar Larsen, piano; Jacob Ullberger, guitar; Henry Lemaire, string bass; Nicholas Ball, drums.
To see who’s playing, click here. And to book your seat, click here.
The Party’s webpage has a number of delightful videos, so prepare to spend some happy (hot) minutes. I’ve posted a substantial number myself from 2009 on, on this site, too. Maybe we’ll see each other there this November.
I first became aware of Bob Byler — writer, photographer, videographer — when we both wrote for THE MISSISSIPPI RAG, but with the demise of that wonderful journalistic effusion (we still miss Leslie Johnson, I assure you) I had not kept track of him. But he hasn’t gone away, and he is now providing jazz viewers with hours of pleasure.
“Spill, Brother Michael!” shouts a hoarse voice from the back of the room.
As you can see in the photograph above, Bob has always loved capturing the music — and, in this case, in still photographs. But in 1984, he bought a video camera. In fact, he bought several in varying media: eight-millimeter tape, VHS, and even mini-DVDs, and he took them to jazz concerts wherever he could. Now, when he shares the videos, edits them, revisits them, he says, “I’m so visual-oriented, it’s like being at a jazz festival again without the crowd. It’s a lot of fun.” Bob told me that he shot over two thousand hours of video and now has uploaded about four hundred hours to YouTube.
Hereis his flickr.com site, full of memorable closeups of players and singers. AND the site begins with a neatly organized list of videos . . .
Bob and his late wife Ruth had gone to jazz festivals all over the world — and a few cruises — and he had taken a video camera with him long before I ever had the notion. AND he has put some four hundred hours of jazz video on YouTube on the aptly named Bob and Ruth Byler Archival Jazz Videoschannel. His filming perspective was sometimes far back from the stage (appropriate for large groups) so a video that’s thirty years old might take a moment to get used to. But Bob has provided us with one time capsule after another. And unlike the ladies and gents of 2016, who record one-minute videos on their smartphones, Bob captured whole sets, entire concerts. Most of his videos are nearly two hours long, and there are more than seventy of them now up — for our dining and dancing pleasure. Many of the players are recognizable, but I haven’t yet sat down and gone through forty or a hundred hours of video, so that is part of the fun — recognizing old friends and heroes. Because (and I say this sadly) many of the musicians on Bob’s videos have made the transition, which makes this video archive, generously offered, so precious.
Here is Bob’s own introduction to the collection, which tells more than I could:
Here are the “West Coast Stars,” performing at the Elkhart Jazz Party, July 1990:
an Art Hodes quartet, also from Elkhart, from 1988:
What might have been one of Zoot Sims’ last performances, in Toledo, in 1985:
a compilation of performances featuring Spiegle Willcox (with five different bands) from 1991-1997, a tribute Bob is particularly proud of:
from the 1988 Elkhart, a video combining a Count Basie tribute (I recognize Bucky Pizzarelli, Milt Hinton, Joe Ascione, and Doc Cheatham!) and a set by the West End Jazz Band:
a Des Moines performance by Jim Beebe’s Chicago Jazz Band featuring Judi K, Connie Jones, and Spiegle:
and a particular favorite, two sets also from Elkhart, July 1988, a Condon memorial tribute featuring (collectively) Wild Bill Davison, Tommy Saunders, Chuck Hedges, George Masso, Dave McKenna, Marty Grosz, Milt Hinton, Rusty Jones, John Bany, Wayne Jones, in two sets:
Here are some other musicians you’ll see and hear: Bent Persson, Bob Barnard, Bob Havens, the Mighty Aphrodite group, the Cakewalkin’ Jazz Band, the Mills Brothers, Pete Fountain, Dick Hyman, Peter Appleyard, Don Goldie, Tomas Ornberg, Jim Cullum, Jim Galloway, Chuck Hedges, Dave McKenna, Max Collie, the Salty Dogs, Ken Peplowski, Randy Sandke, Howard Alden, Butch Thompson, Hal Smith, the Climax Jazz Band, Ernie Carson, Dan Barrett, Banu Gibson, Tommy Saunders, Jean Kittrell, Danny Barker, Duke Heitger, John Gill, Chris Tyle, Bob Wilber, Gene Mayl, Ed Polcer, Jacques Gauthe, Brooks Tegler, Rex Allen, Bill Dunham and the Grove Street Stompers, Jim Dapogny’s Chicago Jazz Band, the Harlem Jazz Camels, and so much more, more than I can type.
Many musicians look out into the audience and see people (like myself) with video cameras and sigh: their work is being recorded without reimbursement or without their ability to control what becomes public forever. I understand this and it has made me a more polite videographer. However, when such treasures like this collection surface, I am glad that people as devoted as Bob and Ruth Byler were there. These videos — and more to come — testify to the music and to the love and generosity of two of its ardent supporters.
JAZZ LIVES 