“FROM THE LAND WHERE PALM TREES SWAY” (December 25, 2020)

As you might have guessed from my last name (which isn’t LIVES) I grew up looking at Christmas as something to get through.  And so there’s very little “official” Christmas music I embrace: Johnny Guarnieri’s SANTA’S SECRET; Mark Shane’s Nagel-Heyer CD, WHAT WILL SANTA CLAUS SAY? Louis’s WHITE CHRISTMAS, with its unusual emphasis on the final word of the lyric.  In a pinch, Hampton’s GIN FOR CHRISTMAS, but that’s a stretch.

So I report with pleasure that friends of mine, brilliant joy-makers, created two sweetly rocking versions of this pineapple-scented Christmas song, which I am embarrassed to say I had never listened to until now.  But it takes its place as the Official JAZZ LIVES Christmas Performance, and there’s even an alternate take.

“Mele Kalikimaka” (pronounced [ˈmɛlɛ kəˌlikiˈmɐkə]) is a Hawaiian-themed Christmas song written in 1949 by R. Alex Anderson. The song takes its title from the Hawaiian phrase Mele Kalikimaka, meaning “Merry Christmas.” One of the earliest recordings of this song was by Bing Crosby and the Andrews Sisters in 1950 on Decca.

The BIG FIVE . . . are Robert Young, tenor saxophone; Jeff Hamilton, piano, arranger; Bill Reinhart, banjo and executive producer; Jessica King, vocal; Mikiya Matsuda, National resophonic lap steel guitar; Clint Baker, string bass.

And before you click: they’re just wonderful — easy tender slightly amused melodic swing.  You can hear them smiling.

and the alternate version:

When I look at the new videos on YouTube from “Epiphonatic,” and see that it has only 82 subscribers to this channel, I think, as I often do, “What is wrong with people?”  So get there and get your joys.  Free, buoyant, and one size fits all.  And have a very delightful Christmas.  Eat some fresh pineapple.

May your happiness increase!

“A POST-GRADUATE SEMINAR IN NEW ORLEANS CLARINET,” featuring RYAN CALLOWAY with CLINT BAKER’S NEW ORLEANS JAZZ BAND: RYAN CALLOWAY, CLINT BAKER, RILEY BAKER, JEFF HAMILTON, KATIE CAVERA, BILL REINHART, JESS KING, HAL SMITH (Jazz Bash by the Bay, Monterey, California, March 7, 2020)

“Don’t be afraid,” Clint says to some audience members, timidly straggling in to this session at the Jazz Bash by the Bay, and I would echo his words.  I know that “seminar,” to some, will mean a dry academic exercise . . . heaven forbid, a lecture. But that isn’t the case here.  Clint guides us through the subject, so I don’t have to write much, but this set is a joyous exploration into music that we take for granted, and players unjustly neglected in the rush to celebrate the newest and the most photogenic.  Take your seat: the fun’s about to begin.

This dapper young man spent eight years studying Albert-system clarinet under the tutelage of Professor Baker, and you’ll hear the delicious results.  (More musical than my doctoral orals.)  Clint plays trumpet here; Riley Baker, trombone; Hal Smith, drums; Jeff Hamilton, piano; Katie Cavera, string bass; Bill Reinhart, Jess King, banjo.

JUST A LITTLE WHILE TO STAY HERE, for Willie Humphrey:

PERDIDO STREET BLUES, for Johnny Dodds:

ORIENTAL MAN, for Dodds and Jimmy Blythe:

JUST TELEPHONE ME, for Tom Sharpsteen and the New Orleans revival players:

WOLVERINE BLUES, for Jelly Roll Morton and his clarinetists:

ST. LOUIS BLUES, for Larry Shields and the ODJB:

BURGUNDY STREET BLUES, for George Lewis:

HIGH SOCIETY, for Alphonse Picou and all the giants who play(ed) it:

I didn’t deceive you.  That was fun, and you’ve gotten some post-graduate music and education also.  Hail Ryan Calloway and his bandmates, and Professor Baker!

May your happiness increase!

THE BLUES CAN ROCK, TOO: CLINT BAKER’S NEW ORLEANS JAZZ BAND at the JAZZ BASH BY THE BAY (Monterey, California, March 6. 2020): CLINT BAKER, CARL SONNY LEYLAND, HAL SMITH, KATIE CAVERA, RILEY BAKER, RYAN CALLOWAY, BILL REINHART, JESS KING

This band was a real treat at the March 2020 Jazz Bash by the Bay — their enthusiasm, their willingness to get dirty, their skill, their passions, and in a repertoire that went comfortably from Ellington to a Buck Clayton Jam Session to Johnny Dodds.  I’m speaking of Clint Baker’s New Orleans Jazz Band, which in that weekend’s incarnation, was Clint, trumpet; Riley Baker, trombone; Ryan Calloway, clarinet; Carl Sonny Leyland, piano [for this set]; Jess King, guitar, banjo, vocal; Bill Reinhart, banjo; Katie Cavera, string bass; Hal Smith, drums.  And today I want to share only one performance — because it knocked me out, as they used to say and still do — the groovy Ellington blues, with Rex Stewart certainly a co-composer, SOLID OLD MAN.  (I worry about the punctuation of that title, but you should hear the music first.)

SOLID OLD MAN is perhaps most famous as a tune that Rex, Barney Bigard, and Billy Taylor brought to Europe for their recording session with Django Reinhardt — a recording session that is completely ingrained in my heart for perhaps fifty years.  Note the more accurate composer credits!

But two postscripts.  I taught college English for a long time (a LONG time!) and I know that punctuation makes a difference.  I can see the recording supervisor at Brunswick or Master Records, after the session, saying to Ellington, “Duke, what do you call that one?” and Ellington answering in the common parlance of the time, “Solid, old man!” in the sense of “Great work!” or “I totally agree with you, my friend!” or “You and I are brothers.”  But it always has had an implicit comma, a pause, as it were.  And certainly an explicit exclamation point.  So, to me, its title is lacking and perhaps misleading: when I see SOLID OLD MAN, I think of someone over six feet, weighing over three hundred pounds, who has been collecting Social Security for years.  Perhaps a security guard at the mall.

The second postscript is not a matter of proofreading.  Last night I was on Facebook (my first error) and reading a controversy in a jazz group about who was good and who was bad (my second) that got quite acrimonious.  Facebook encourages bad-mannered excesses; I was uncharacteristically silent.  But I noted one member of the group (an amateur string player) made a snide remark about “California Dixieland,” and when a professional musician of long-standing asked him to define what he was mocking, the speaker — perhaps having more opinions than knowledge — fell silent.  Unnamed adjudicator of taste, I don’t know if you read this blog.  But if you do, I suggest you listen to SOLID OLD MAN ten or twenty times to get your perceptions straight before you opine again.  And those of us who know what’s good can simply enjoy the performance many times for its own singular beauties.

May your happiness increase!

WELCOME, JESS KING!* (with Clint Baker’s New Orleans Jazz Band, Jazz Bash by the Bay, March 8, 2020) [*AGAIN!]

It’s presumptuous of me to welcome Jess King — a warm-hearted swinging singer and banjo-guitarist-percussionist — to the world, since she has been making music in the Bay Area most happily for a time.  But this is the first opportunity I have to post videos of her performance, so that could count as a welcome — to JAZZ LIVES, at least.  [On Facebook, she’s Jessica King Music.]

I knew of her work for some time with Clint Baker’s All-Stars at Cafe Borrone, performances documented by Rae Ann Berry, and a few other lovely videos of Jess with hero-friends Nick Rossi and Bill Reinhart, and Jeff Hamilton at Bird and Beckett, have appeared in the usual places. . . such as here, which is her own YouTube channel.  I am directing you there because there are — horrors! — other people with the same name on YouTube.  The impudence.

In researching this post, however, I found that my idea of “welcome” above was hilariously inaccurate, because I had posted videos of Jess singing with Clint’s band at a Wednesday Night Hop on January 8, 2014.  That’s a long time back, and I am not posting the videos here because she might think of them as juvenilia, but both she and I were in the same space and moment, which shows that a) she’s been singing well for longer than I remembered, and b) that it’s a good thing that I am wielding a video camera rather than something really dangerous, like a scissors.  I tell myself, “It was really dark there.  I apologize.”

But enough verbiage.

Jess herself is more than gracious, and when I asked her to say where she’d come from, she wrote, “I’d say I’m inspired by blues, traditional jazz, swing, Western swing, and r&b.  Vocally, Barbara Dane has been a big influence on me. I also really love Una Mae Carlisle, Peggy Lee, Nat Cole, Bessie Smith, Anita O’Day, and of course Ella Fitzgerald. I grew up listening to a lot of Nat Cole, Patsy Cline, Aretha Franklin, and Lauren Hill. Random enough for ya? 😂 Clint Baker and Isabelle Magidson have both been so good to me as mentors and dear friends. They’re a huge part of my musical growth in this community.”

Here’s Jess, with Clint Baker’s New Orleans Jazz Band, on March 8, 2020, at the Jazz Bash by the Bay (the four selections taken from two sets that day).  The NOJB is Clint, trumpet; Ryan Calloway, clarinet; Riley Baker, trombone; Bill Reinhart, banjo; Carl Sonny Leyland, piano; [Jeff Hamilton is on ROSETTA]; Katie Cavera, string bass; Hal Smith, drums.

ROSETTA:

SAN FRANCISCO BAY BLUES:

HESITATIN’ BLUES (or HESITATING or HESITATION, depending on which sect you belong to, Reform, Conservative, or Orthodox):

and her gentle, affectionate take on SUGAR:

She has IT — however you would define that pronoun — and the instrumentalists she works with speak of her with admiration and respect.  And when the world returns to its normal axis and rational behavior is once again possible, Jess has plans for her first CD under her own name.  I suggested that the title be THE KING OF SING, but I fear it was too immodest for her.  She makes good music: that is all I will say.

May your happiness increase!

WHEN IN DOUBT, PLAY THAT THING! (March 8, 2020)

From here

to here

is a wonderful wiggly line, elevated by individualism and joy, expertise and passion.

I present here a glorious burst of enthusiasm — in honor of Joe Oliver and Little Louis — created by Clint Baker, trumpet; Ryan Calloway, clarinet; Riley Baker, trombone; Carl Sonny Leyland, piano; Bill Reinhart, banjo; Katie Cavera, string bass; Hal Smith, drums. Jess King also sang, but not on this performance. And late in the video, we have an unscheduled cameo appearance by RaeAnn Berry, the queen of Bay Area videographers. Don’t miss it.

I was privileged to witness and record this on March 8, 2020, at the Jazz Bash by the Bay, Monterey, California.

A postscript, and those who are tired of words on a lit screen have my encouragement to skip it and watch the video again.  The other night, I had an extended telephone conversation with a person who might have become a new friend, who chose to tell me that my emphasis on happiness was inexplicable, because it meant I was ignoring the full range of emotions.  I wish I’d thought to play that person this DIPPER MOUTH BLUES: maybe it would have made tangible some of the things I believe in.  (If art doesn’t evoke feeling, it may be splendid intellectually, but to me it seems incomplete.)  And should you wonder, the conversation is not continuing.  There!  Ruminate on that, if you like.

For now, go and PLAY THAT THING! — whatever shape it might take.  You understand that you don’t need a cornet to be joyous.

May your happiness increase!

TAKE THE SWING CURE, AS PRESCRIBED BY MY MEDICAL GROUP: DOCTORS DURHAM, DONALDSON, KAHN, MOTEN, BAKER, LAMBETH, CALLOWAY, BAKER, LEYLAND, REINHART, KING, CAVERA, SMITH (Jazz Bash by the Bay, March 7, 2020).

Some of the doctors were too busy for photographs, but here are four images of this superb medical group:

Doctors Baker, C.; King; Calloway.

and

Doctors Leyland, Lambeth, Reinhart, Baker, C; King.

and

All this marvelous cure-by-swing took place over several days and nights at the Jazz Bash by the Bay in Monterey, California — a positively elating experience.  Here’s another name for this assemblage of healing, Clint Baker’s New Orleans Jazz Band.  For this weekend, they were Hal Smith, drums; Katie Cavera, string bass; Bill Reinhart, banjo; Jessica King, banjo, guitar, vocal; Clint Baker, trumpet; Riley Baker, trombone; Ryan Calloway, clarinet, and for this set, Dawn Lambeth, vocal; Carl Sonny Leyland, piano.  As Clint explains, this combination of YOU’RE DRIVING ME CRAZY and MOTEN SWING was inspired by a Big Joe Turner recording (BIG JOE RIDES AGAIN, Atlantic) and the blessed Buck Clayton Jam Sessions.  So now you know all  you need.  Prepare to be uplifted. I was and continue to be so.  And I can share more performances by this group.

Keep swinging . . . it’s the opposite of emotional distancing.

May your happiness increase!