You’d better dig that JAZZ BAND BALL. As Johnny Mercer told us, “It’s the ball of them all.”
Here the venerable jazz standard gets up on its hind legs and romps around the stage — thanks to leader / trombonist Russ Phillips; Bria Skonberg, Duke Heitger, trumpet; Allan Vache, clarinet; Rossano Sportiello, piano; Sean Cronin, string bass; Darrian Douglas, drums. Never mind that the song was almost a century old, composed by two members of the Original Dixieland Jazz Band: it’s completely at home in 2015. And in 2022.
This joy comes to us thanks to the much-missed Atlanta Jazz Party, where so much good music happened. I know; I was there, as you can guess from the video.
More from the Complete Morton Project, with never a letup: Andrew Oliver, piano, and David Horniblow, reeds. They seem so supercharged that even I, who spend more time at the computer than my MD would like, lag behind. Here’s a roundup of recent delights.
From Morton’s 1938 solo session, HONKY TONK MUSIC:
and Morton’s paean to his common-law wife, Anita Gonzales, SWEET ANITA MINE:
and the rather dark and somber, I HATE A MAN LIKE YOU, recorded by Morton and Lizzie Miles in 1929:
I wouldn’t feel right ending this blogpost on that particularly dark note, so Andrew and David romp for us through THE NAKED DANCE, which must have been exhausting as well as thrilling:
Not surprisingly, Andrew and David and their colleagues have to eat, pay utility bills and rent, do laundry — all things that require funding — so in addition to watching these free videos (that concept unhinges me a bit when I consider an economy for artists who offer us such beneficences for nothing) — I encourage you to support them in tangible ways. If you live in England or thereabouts, go to gigs — the Dime Notes, the Vitality 5, and others; if you are not so close, you can support their efforts buy purchasing CDs, and get some fine music for yourself in this fashion, through a monthly series of e-78s (what a gentle oxymoron of epochs contained there).
David explains: “So this month’s Vitality Five e78 – available on Spotify, Itunes, Deezer etc etc, features a couple of things I did for the band. Firstly the spooky faux-exotic ‘Sphinx’ – originally recorded by the Original Dixieland Jazz Band in London, 1920. The ODJB prided themselves of their supposed roughness and musically illiteracy (although that was more hype than reality). As a contrast, ‘Deep Blue Sea Blues’ pays homage to two of the great sophisticates of 1920’s saxophone, alto player Bobby Davis – ably recreated by Michael McQuaid – and the high priest of the bass sax, Adrian Rollini. Follow the link if you fancy a listen https://vitalityfive.com/…/06/17/sphinx-deep-blue-sea-blues/.”
Here’s a sample of their May e-78 of EVERY EVENING:
Truly remarkable. And generous in ways hard to imagine but glorious to receive.
The Original Cornell Syncopators, relaxing at the 2017 San Diego Jazz Fest.
They’re college students — 20 and 21 — they’re very intelligent and enthusiastic — and they play a kind of hot jazz that’s rarely heard these days. And they play it with love. They’re the Original Cornell Syncopators, led by multi-instrumentalist Colin Hancock. This is their five-piece incarnation, with Colin on cornet and vocal, Hannah Krall on clarinet and saxophones, Rishi Verma on trombone, Amit Mizrahi on piano, and Noah Li on drums. For this Sunday afternoon set at the San Diego Jazz Fest, they were also graced by Katie Cavera, banjo and vocal, who has graduated from her own college and now teaches by exuberant example.
The Syncopators have a special place in my heart because they are exploring different areas of hot improvised jazz that are usually neglected. I revere Louis, but this band is curious about kinds of hot jazz that are not heavily Louis-influenced; they often concentrate on bands from the Middle West: all of this is enlightening and their playing has that delightful youthful zest, the way the music must have sounded when it was brand-new, say, in 1924.
SENSATION RAG:
CHRISTINE:
WHO CAN YOUR REGULAR BE, BLUES:
FIDGETY FEET:
THE CO-ED:
ANGRY:
Here‘s a very recent profile of leader Colin Hancock, an intriguing artist and a good fellow in the bargain. And hereis the band’s Facebook page. The band has just released its debut CD — the cover below — which offers not only the quintet but the twelve-piece dance band and several other combos in between. I’ve heard a few tracks and it’s marvelous. So far, I think it is available on Spotify and iTunes, and a physical disc is in the works. Details here.
I admire these young musicians tremendously, and think you will also.
My dear friend Laura Beth Wyman, Sole Proprietor of Wyman Videoand head of the Michigan branch of JAZZ LIVES, has been busy capturing Hot for us these days. In Ohio, no less. Here are two versions of the same jazz classic for your perusal and pleasure.
CAKEWALKIN’ BABIES FROM HOME is an invitation to rumble when most jazz bands play it, because of the early pugilism of young Louis Armstrong and Sidney Bechet on the two Clarence Williams recordings of the song.
On Saturday, February 25, 2017, Laura captured the Original Downhome Jass Band at “Ye Olde Durty Bird” in Toledo, Ohio. For this performance, the ODJB (yes, you noticed!) was Dave Kosmyna, cornet and leader; Christopher Smith, trombone; Ray Heitger, clarinet and vocal; James Dapogny, piano; Pete Siers, drums; Nicole Heitger, vocal. Hot and exuberant:
A day later, without Nicole, alas, the band had donned tuxedos (and an altered band name) to celebrate the hundredth anniversary of the first jazz recordings in concert at Freed Auditorium, Ohio Northern University. Ada, Ohio. In this version, the band rocks through many more ensemble interludes. Better? No, just different:
Unlike cake, hot music never gets stale. Thanks to the players and to Laura for making these otherwise evanescent beauties permanent and accessible, even for those of us who have never visited Ada, Ohio.
I’ve gotten into trouble for saying this, but I’m not always enthusiastic about note-for-note recreations of recordings. But what follows — music and dance from the Original Cornell Syncopators — has such energy, wit, and life force that I just might have to change my mind. The OCS, led by multi-instrumentalist and wizard Colin Hancock, is Noah Li, drums; Hannah Krall, clarinet; Amit Mizrahi, piano; Rishi Verma, trombone. Their director is Joe Salzano; their “coaches” are Dan Levinson, Hal Smith, and David Sager, so you know — even before you hear a note — that they’re all on the right path. And then there’s the splendidly mobile Crazeology Dance Troupe. I might have to visit Ithaca, New York.
Incidentally, the detailed and articulate description underneath the first video answers all the questions you had and some you didn’t know you did but are glad they are answered.
DARKTOWN STRUTTERS’ BALL is often approached far too quickly: this version is both percussive and lyrical:
BACK HOME AGAIN IN INDIANA has been worn to a nub, but this version allows us to hear it again, afresh (with a few of the original chord changes, which now sound unusual):
Most of us hear OSTRICH WALK through Bix and his Gang: this is what Bix and friends heard:
You’d better dig this JASS BAND BALL is what I say:
How deliciously heretical this music must have sounded a century ago; how refreshing it sounds today. Thank you, Creative Youngbloods! (And the OCS have other projects in mind — I suggest you subscribe to the appropriate YouTube channel for hours of satisfying and thought-provoking music. You could dance to it, I’m told, as well.
If we believed in the narratives forced on us by advertisers, we would know that NEW is best, NEW AND IMPROVED better still, and anything OLD is to be discarded. I present joyous evidence to the contrary. Here’s a tune all the musicians like to jam. And even though it is nearly a hundred years old, no one worries about having to dust it.
This performance was created on November 6, 2016, at the Mike Durham Classic Jazz Party in Newcastle upon Tyne, England. The band was originally called DUKE HEITGER’S RHYTHMAGICIANS, a name Duke politely disavowed, but I hope he doesn’t mind my retitling this group his JOYMAKERS, because that is truth in advertising. This performance speeds my heart rate in the most healthy ways.
The Romping Masters here are Duke Heitger, trumpet; Alistair Allan, trombone; Lars Frank, reeds; David Boeddinghaus, piano; Henry Lemaire, banjo; Malcolm Sked, string bass; Josh Duffee, drums. Please notice Duke’s little Louis-flourish at 3:20 onwards and the immense wisdom of his putting an ensemble chorus at 4:38, in the middle of the performance, to keep it rollin’. Also, riffs, backgrounds. a drum solo with stop-time accents. These fellows are my heroes and I hope yours too.
Once you’ve caught your breath, you may read on.
For the past eight years, I’ve attended the Mike Durham Classic Jazz Party with great pleasure, and I’ve come home with a basketful of videos, which the musicians allowed me to disperse for free. This was generous of them, and it took a good deal of labor for me to create and distribute them.
This year, a variety of difficulties — technical and logistical — got in the way of my being an unpaid Jazz Cornucopia. There will be videos, but perhaps two dozen rather than four times that. I wish it were otherwise, but not everything is within my control.
I write this in sadness, but also with a point.
Several jazz fans, who I am convinced are good people who love the music as I do, came to me during the weekend and were unhappy with my news: “This is not good for us!” said one to me in the hallway.
I am sorry to have let the imagined Team down, but I am not a natural resource like the sun, and I cannot reproduce an entire event for public consumption, nor do I want to. Let these words be a reminder that not everything is for free, nor can it be, and let these sentences act as encouragement for people to slowly and carefully — those who can! — get out of their chairs in front of their computers and GO SOMEWHERE in front of the actual musicians rather than expecting it all to be given to us.
I hope this doesn’t sound excessively rancorous, but it is the truth, at least what the man behind the camera perceives it to be. And I plan to be very selective about posting comments, pro and con, on this point. (To paraphrase Lesley Gore, “It’s MY blog and I’ll post if I want to.”) Exultant praise of Duke and his band is, as always, welcome.
And to mute any bad feelings, or to attempt to, here are Duke and his Joymakers again. I could watch and listen to this a dozen times and not stop marveling:
Thanks to CineDevine for rescuing me so graciously from some of the technical problems: without him, this video would not be shared with JAZZ LIVES.
I don’t mean to be irreverent on this Mother’s Day, or certainly not irrelevant, but here’s a wonderful musical tribute to the women without whom we wouldn’t exist.
The song is an ancient one (recorded by the ODJB and others — a hit in 1919-1920. And I suspect that twenty years later, either Milt Gabler or Eddie Condon or both remembered it as a favorite of their childhood or just a good song to jam on, so we have this recording from 1942, with Eddie Condon And His Band: Max Kaminsky, cornet; Brad Gowans, valve trombone or valide; Pee Wee Russell, clarinet; Joe Sullivan, piano; Eddie Condon, guitar; Al Morgan, bass; George Wettling, drums.
Maternal affection, Chicago-style. For all the Mothers in the house. (My mother’s been gone since 2000, and she would have disliked this music, but as she used to say, “It’s the thought that counts.” So she is being thought of, even in my own left-handed way.)
Even though now and again I feel the signs of a ROYAL GARDEN BLUES overdose approaching, there’s new life in “old music” that nobody can deny.
The JAZZ ME BLUES is surely an old chestnut, a “Dixieland classic,” a “good old good one” that some listeners and musicians assume comes from the era of faux-jazz: straw hats and striped jackets, jazz half-recreated rather than created. But no material is in itself alive or dead; it depends on the energy, wit, ingenuity, and feeling that musicians can bring to it.
Thus, this artifact —
became something quite vivid and lively in an April 25, 2014 performance at the Atlanta Jazz Party by Dan Barrett, trombone; Ed Polcer, cornet; Dan Block, clarinet; John Cocuzzi, piano; Frank Tate, string bass; Ed Metz, drums (and a cameo appearance by Chair):
Notice the nice relaxed tempo, the little ingenuities, the backing figures, the eloquent but understated playing. Nothing’s dead unless we choose to make it so is the moral of this particular story. Also that the Atlanta Jazz Party is alive and well in 2016! More details as the date approaches.
It’s not often that I receive a new CD on Monday, play it on Monday and Tuesday, and sit down to write about it on Wednesday, but the new reissue (I know, illogical but true) of a March 1968 session led by Wild Bill Davison, issued on Delmark Records, has inspired me. The session was originally recorded by John Norris for Sackville Records, and the band — for once — deserved the title, with Wild Bill, cornet; Benny Morton, trombone; Herb Hall, clarinet; Claude Hopkins, piano; Arvell Shaw, string bass; Buzzy Drootin, drums.
What makes this CD so endearing is not a whole host of rare / previously unissued material — although there is one new performance and one unissued take. No, it is the band, the music, and the repertoire.
Although Davison was praised by none other than Ruby Braff, who said that the pride of Defiance, Ohio, had “drama,” I found Davison’s appeal limited in his later years. He passionately got up and played for all he was worth — he never seemed to coast — but his solos were often set-pieces, established in 1947 and played verbatim night after night. I recall seeing him in New York City in the Seventies, and it was rather like watching a polished stand-up comedian do identical material. All one could say was, “Well, Bill’s timing tonight is off,” or “He’s on fire tonight!” but he rarely surprised. But on this disc he seems inspired sufficiently by his colleagues to venture from his time-tested solos, and the result often made me look up and think, “I never heard him play that before,” which, for me, is one of the great pleasures of improvisation.
Herb Hall sounds lovely and liquid; Arvell Shaw is more than reliable. Claude Hopkins was never captured enough on record, so his particular version of stride — polite but classically perfect — is a delight, in solo and in ensemble.
But this CD is unusually valuable for the opportunity to hear Buzzy Drootin and Benny Morton — players held dear by their colleagues but rarely given any opportunity to lead sessions. I saw Buzzy in person many times in the early Seventies, and I fear I did not appreciate him sufficiently. But now, heard afresh, how arresting he sounds! Yes, there are echoes of Catlett in his four-bar breaks, but he is entirely his own man with his own sound-galaxy and his own way of thinking, as individualistic as Cliff Leeman. Instantly recognizable, always propulsive, ever engaged. And Benny Morton, who recorded with a wide range of players and singers over a half-century (appearing live with Louis, Bird, and Benny Carter!) is in peerless form, his eloquent phrasing, his yearning tone, a great boon. Sadly, Morton, a terribly modest man, doesn’t have a solo feature (which might have been WITHOUT A SONG).
The CD isn’t perfect. A few of the solo features sound overdone and the band is, for me, a little too cleanly miked (each instrument rings through, as if there were six separate tracks rather than one — the perils of modern recording and the horror of “leakage”), but it is a rewarding hour-plus.
And it made me think, which is always an enjoyable unexpected benefit — about the repertoire. Consider this list: STRUTTIN’ WITH SOME BARBECUE / DARDANELLA / BLACK AND BLUE (two takes) / I WOULD DO ANYTHING FOR YOU / I FOUND A NEW BABY / BLUE AGAIN / I SURRENDER, DEAR / YESTERDAYS / THEM THERE EYES / THREE LITTLE WORDS. What struck me about that assortment is that most of the band’s choices were “popular songs” known to the larger audience rather than “jazz favorites” known only to the cognoscenti.
Repertoire in jazz has often served artists as ways to define themselves and their allegiances. If you are a young singer or player, and you offer a performance (or a CD) of your original compositions, you are in effect saying, “Take me seriously as a composer; I have ideas and feelings to offer you that aren’t Cole Porter, Shelton Brooks, or Ornette Coleman.”
Some players and singers use repertoire as loving homage: Bix Beiderbecke played AT THE JAZZ BAND BALL because his heroes, the Original Dixieland Jazz Band, had written and recorded it; Eddie Condon and his friends played the song because it was a good one but also as a loving bow to Bix; players in this century offer it as an extension of the Condon tradition. In any jazz club or festival, one can hear people playing the music of Louis, Bird, Hawkins, or a hundred others. Even if one is playing the blues or a song built on familiar changes, the choice of the melodic line superimposed on top says, “Here’s to Don Byas. Here’s to Roy Eldridge,” and so on.
But this CD reminds me of something Davison told an interviewer. When he came to New York City in 1943, he was asked by Commodore Records’ saintly founder Milt Gabler to make 12″ 78s of “classic jazz tunes,” for instance PANAMA, THAT’S A PLENTY, and more. Davison remembered that these songs were not what he was used to playing — for audiences that had come to hear jazz — in Chicago and Milwaukee, but they had played popular songs of the day. And when I heard him in New York, he was most likely to play AS LONG AS I LIVE, SUNDAY, or THEM THERE EYES. And no one, sitting in the audience, demanded their money back because he wasn’t playing “authentic” jazz.
What the moral of all this is I can’t say. Perhaps it’s only that I would like to hear Mainstream / traditional ensembles remember the treasures of popular song. There are worlds to be explored beyond the same two dozen favorites — favorites often chosen as markers of ideology / regional or stylistic pride (BIG BEAR STOMP and RIVERBOAT SHUFFLE). I’d love to hear such bands play THERE’S A SMALL HOTEL, YOU CALL IT MADNESS, or WHERE THE BLUE OF THE NIGHT MEETS THE GOLD OF THE DAY.
I offer musical evidence:
Wild Bill paying tribute to Louis at the 1970 Newport Jazz Festival by playing THEM THERE EYES, supported by Dave McKenna, Larry Ridley, Oliver Jackson (there is an unsubtle edit in the film, probably removing a Ridley solo, alas) with even more beautiful — although subtle — backing from Ray Nance, Bobby Hackett, Benny Morton, and Tyree Glenn. “Indecent exposure” for sure.
Louis Armstrong reached his artistic peak somewhere before 1929, when his recording of commercial songs — I CAN’T GIVE YOU ANYTHING BUT LOVE as opposed to POTATO HEAD BLUES — was ruinous. Right?
As we say in my country, “Oh, please!”
You play what you are! And Louis in 1954 and 1960 still embodied the deepest human truths of joy and sorrow.
These two videos are now available widely thanks to the tireless collector, historian, and archivist Franz Hoffmann.
The first, from May 9, 1954, is part of a wonderfully odd CBS-TV program,
“YOU ARE THERE: “THE EMERGENCE OF JAZZ,” which purports to recreate the closing of Storyville as if it were a news story happening at the moment. In 1954, I wasn’t sufficiently sentient to have been watching this episode, but I gather that this neat gimmick allowed various actors to recreate events in history — with light brushes with accuracy and the help of Walter Cronkite to make it seem “real.” Here, Louis was asked to become King Oliver, fronting his own All-Stars . . . all African-Americans, with the exception of drummer Barrett Deems, who had his face blacked to fit it. The other band members are Barney Bigard, Trummy Young, Billy Kyle, Arvell Shaw. In other segments, Louis Mitchell was played by Cozy Cole and Jelly Roll Morton by Billy Taylor. No doubt. Here, much of the fun is that the Oliver band is “challenged” by an offstage White band — the Original Dixieland Jazz Band — impersonated by Bobby Hackett, Bill Stegmeyer, Lou Stein, Cliff Leeman, and Lou Mc Garity. To see and hear Louis play BACK O’TOWN BLUES and read his lines is enough of a pleasure; to hear Louis and Bobby improvise on the SAINTS is a joy.
Six years later, with no faux-news report, just a substantial production for a BELL TELEPHONE HOUR (January 1, 1960), we see Louis in magnificent form (although this segment is taxing). After SUNNY SIDE OF THE STREET and LAZY RIVER — with the plastic mute Jack Teagarden made for him — there is one of the most touching episodes of Louis on film, beginning at 3:30. If you ever meet anyone who doubts Louis’ sincerity, his acting ability, his skill in conveying emotion, please play them this video and let them hear and see the ways he approaches SOMETIMES I FEEL LIKE A MOTHERLESS CHILD, intensely moving. Then the mood switches to an early-television meeting of Louis with an unidentified vocal quartet for MUSKRAT RAMBLE. In all, eight minutes plus of wonderful music.
Louis sustains us as he sustained himself.
Thanks to Franz Hoffmann and of course to Ricky Riccardi, who has done so much to remind us that Louis never, ever stopped creating.
WHY JAZZ HAPPENED (University of California Press), the new book by Marc Myers, whom many know for his blog JAZZ WAX, his liner notes, his articles in The Wall Street Journal, is a great accomplishment.
I have written here before how disappointing I find much that is written about jazz — a tepid stew of theorizing, of ideological scraps, an inedible pottage of what everyone else has said. Readers like myself long for some bracing first-hand research, new points of view that illuminate rather than divide.
WHY JAZZ HAPPENED does all the right things. For one, it moves away from the star system: Louis begat Bird who begat Miles who begat Trane. It leaves behind the understandable (but sometimes worn-out) historical cliches; it takes jazz beyond the sound of the recordings: too many “jazz books” sound greatly as if the writer had decided to create “reaction” papers to every track X played in chronological sequence . . . an audio diary of one’s iPod.
I knew Marc was capable of arresting writing from reading JAZZ WAX, and I also was eager to read the book-in-the-making he was creating from his candid, searching interviews with jazz players otherwise ignored. But he has done much more than assemble a pastiche of voices telling their sweet or odd stories. He has written a social history of jazz, measuring the effects of non-musical forces on the music.
He has chosen to examine the period 1942-72 (which he feels is the music’s “golden era of improvisation, individualism and recording freedom”) through an analytical lens that is both microscopic and panoramic. His premise is “approaching jazz history from the outside in,” which means a clear-eyed historical reading of the factors outside the studio and the clubs that shaped the music we adore, the way we hear it, the way it developed.
Thus: the long-playing record; suburbanization in California and the G.I. Bill; the role of concert promoters and disc jockeys; ASCAP and BMI, the role of the “British Invasion”; the connections between late Sixties jazz and racial tension. If any of this sounds like a cultural anthropologist’s work, I assure you it is far from academic (although the book’s research is beautifully documented.)
The book is consistently lively because Marc, like the best investigator, is deeply curious and not easily satisfied with the pat answers previous works have (sometimes) offered. And his curiosity has taken him to contemporary reporting . . . but most often it has taken him to the primary sources, for which relief much thanks.
Rather than assuming what the battle over 78, 33, and 45 rpm record technologies was like, he has spoken at length to George Avakian. Other figures who pop up to add their irreplaceable, salty or affectionate stories to this study are Dave Pell, Creed Taylor, Sonny Rollins, Rudy Van Gelder, Burt Bachrach, Lou Donaldson, Chico Hamilton, and three dozen more.
Faithful readers of Marc’s JAZZ WAX have delighted in these interviews, but one of the pleasures of this book is the beautifully organic way the material is handled: it never feels like pastiche, and the balance between fact, interpretation, and a quick-moving narrative is delightful.
My only regret is that this book begins — because of Marc’s perspective, which I would not deny him — in 1942. I can only imagine the much larger-scale book he might have written which would have spoken of Prohibition, of the Great Northern Migration, bobbed hair, of the role of Thirties radio . . . and on.
But to his credit, WHY JAZZ HAPPENED has a true feeling for jazz as a seamless whole, so that Louis Armstrong appears alongside Joseph Jarman in the pages of the index, and the book begins and ends with a truly moving episode devoted to the Original Dixieland Jazz Band. My hope is that other writers genuinely devoted to an accurate analysis of how and why this music happened — for the world of an art’s development is much larger than a survey of the individual musicians’ idiosyncracies and a list of record dates — will use WHY JAZZ HAPPENED as a flexible, energetic model and write their own books that look back to Marc’s. Because he is neither didactic nor over-emphatic, I can even envision books based on his model that say, “No, these are MY ten events or forces that made jazz what it is.”
For its ingenuity, subtlety, surprises, and depth, WHY JAZZ HAPPENED deserves to be ranked along the best recent studies of jazz — Randy Sandke’s WHERE THE DARK AND THE LIGHT FOLKS MEET and Ricky Riccardi’s THE WONDERFUL WORLD OF LOUIS ARMSTRONG.
Visithere to see Marc speaking about WHY JAZZ HAPPENED in a multi-part video interview. It won’t satiate your desire for the book. I suggest you go here for the next logical step . . . your own copy.
Who says that hot jazz is solely the purview of a generation of elder statesmen? Certainly not the young brassmen Justin (trumpet) and Brandon Au (trombone), who paid a social call to the High Sierra Jazz Band at the Sacramento Music Festival on May 27, 2012.
Justin and Brandon joined leader / reedman Pieter Meijers, their Uncle How (Howard Miyata on trombone and vocal), Bryan Shaw on trumpet, Stan Huddleston on banjo, Bruce Huddleston on piano, Earl McKee on sousaphone and vocals, and Charlie Castro, drums — for a program of hot cross-generational jazz and hijinks.
The HSJB began with a nineteenth-century favorite, sung with great honest feeling by Earl, THE OLD SPINNING WHEEL:
Then, one of the many animal-themed compositions dear to the Original Dixieland Jazz Band and, a bit later, Bix Beiderbecke, OSTRICH WALK:
Here, after Pieter introduces the boys, everyone creates a wonderful street-parade CANAL STREET BLUES:
Justin, Brandon (vocal), and Pieter swing out on NAGASAKI:
And, as an aside, here is what I believe to be the performance — captured for posterity — that Peter refers to. A slippery composition, CAPITOL-BOUND, performed at the Pismo Jazz Jubilee by the Sea — October 28, 2011 — by Justin, Brandon, Gordon, Uncle How, Danny Coots, and Katie Cavera:
One of the High Sierra’s patented specialties, FROM MONDAY ON, with a vocal by Earl and a five-horn recreation of Bix’s solos at the end:
And, to close, a hot blues for Louis, MAHOGANY HALL STOMP:
Age doesn’t matter in jazz if the spirit is right.
A set of hot music by Ed Polcer, cornet; Duke Heitger, trumpet; Russ Phillips, trombone; Allan Vache, clarinet; Matt Munisteri, guitar; John Cocuzzi, piano, Frank Tate, string bass; Chuck Redd, drums. Recorded April 21, 2012 at the Atlanta Jazz Party.
Ageless music — even if the repertoire comes from 1917-1935, the energy, wit, and passion are unabated.
ROYAL GARDEN BLUES (for Louis and Papa Joe, Bix and his Gang, Condon and his boys, whether at the Park Lane, the Newport Jazz Festival, 47 West Third Street, or the New School):
LOUISIANA FAIRY TALE (in honor of Fats Waller, Danny Coots’ “Uncle Fred,” and the crew of THIS OLD HOUSE):
FIDGETY FEET (recalling the Original Dixieland Jazz Band and the Big 72 and all the bands worldwide in between):
Sometimes a piece of music, beautifully performed, catches you right in the heart. The late Sam Parkins would say, “Gets you right in the gizzard,” and he was so right. Here’s something PRETTY — not hot at all, but swinging in 3 / 4 time. It’s the waltz I’M FOREVER BLOWING BUBBLES, performed by Les Rois du Fox-trot, and in the ideal world I would listen to this performance at least once a day:
Because their notes are so much better than what I might write, I include them here, with thanks:
This is a small tribute to the late Pierre Atlan, Pierre Merlin and Martine Morel, who played this famous waltz so many times with the High Society Jazz Band of Paris.
“I’m Forever Blowing Bubbles” was composed in1919 by Jaan Kenbrovin and J.W.Kellette. Jaan Kenbrovin was a collective pen name for James Kendis, James Brockman and Nat Vincent. In January of 1920, the Original Dixieland Jazz Band made a fine recording of this waltz in London.
Today “Bubbles” has become the anthem of the West Ham United football club. The times they are a-changin’ !…
On this video, musicians are Shona Taylor (vocal and cornet), Laurence Bridard (drums), François Fournet (banjo), Gérard Gervois (tuba), Bernard Thévin (piano), Patrick Bacqueville (trombone and slide-whistle), Jean-Pierre Morel (cornet), Stéphane Gillot and Marc Bresdin (alto-sax) and Michel Bescont (tenor-sax).
The video was posted on YouTube in the “jpmfm54” channel, where you may enjoy many more performances by Les Rois (why limit them just to Fox-trot?).
Another version of this pretty tune that sticks with me is the duet between Ralph Sutton and Vic Dickenson — at a cheerful medium tempo. Irreplaceable! (If you have the original Chaz Jazz lp, you know what I mean.)
In my imagination I hear the Goldkette band doing it in 3 /4 time and then shifting into 4 / 4 so that Bix can solo for a few choruses . . . especially because today, March 10, is his eternal birthday.
I hope that Fortune is kind to you, whoever you are, reading this post.
The AFRICANA Souvenir Edition – – – very good marketing tie-in for 1927.
One for our very own Sister Katie Cavera.
Obviously a later edition — note the connection to Dick Hyman — with the “original” cover. What’s intriguing to me is not the racial stereotyping, but that the banjoist doesn’t feel at all threatened by the presence of a woman improviser. Obviously a musician enlightened before his time!
I don’t have a garage anymore, but I am thinking of buying this folio (starting bid $45 on eBay) and getting together with the other kids on the block and having a garage band that plays BLUIN’ THE BLUES:
I’ll talk to the neighbors when they complain . . . .
First off: the High Sierra Jazz Band is color-coordinated. They have red shirts for one gig, teal (or is it mint green?) for another. Very snappy. Nattily dressed. It also makes it easy to identify the guest star, who has different plumage. In these five performances from Dixieland Monterey 2011, that stellar personage was our friend, cornetist Marc Caparone, standing next to Bryan Shaw to give the music a wonderful Louis (Armstrong) and Papa Joe (Oliver) flavor.
The High Sierra Jazz Band is led by reedman Pieter Meijers — very articulate and witty, even when he is measuring out the amount of applause he expects for the next song and threatening the audience (gently) that he will speak more if the applause is inadequate. The front line is filled out by the beaming Howard Miyata on trombone, euphonium, and vocals. Clint Baker calls Howard “the happiest man in Dixieland” and that might be an understatement or it might unintentionally restrict Howard’s range: he glows like the sun. The rhythm section is a fraternal affair, with Bruce Huddleson on piano and Stan Huddleston on banjo and guitar. Then there’s the singing tubaist Earl McKee and drummer Charlie Castro.
All aboard!
This session began with a nicely rocking ALEXANDER’S RAGTIME BAND, in what I think of as Joe-and-Bessie Smith tempo (and it is one of the lesser-known Louis Deccas):
Then, after an elaborately funny Pieter Meijers shaggy-dog-in-Dixieland announcement, we had FIDGETY FEET:
Howard came into his own with a soulful A KISS TO BUILD A DREAM ON: another Louis-homage, full of sweet feeling:
We never did find out Pieter’s explanation of what Mabel was dreaming of, but the band played MABEL’S DREAM (with its down-home hymnlike trio strain) with mutes in, passions to the forefront:
Finally, a romping CAKE WALKING BABIES FROM HOME:
They do take the cake, don’t they? And Marc Caparone is the fellow who’s not wearing a red shirt. All hail the rest of the band, but the interplay between Bryan and Marc brings tears to my eyes. I don’t know which of them is Little Louis and which is Papa Joe (my guess is that the roles, after nearly ninety years, have fused into one Mobius strip of hot cornet / trumpet) but they sound lovely!
SWING OUT TO GENEROSITY: CLICK HERE TO GIVE SOMETHING BACK TO THE MUSICIANS YOU SEE IN THESE VIDEOS (ALL MONEY COLLECTED GOES TO THEM):
Having taken the opportunity to celebrate the 105th birthday of one Eddie Condon, I remain convinced that he did much more than play rhythm guitar and talk to the customers at a variety of saloons in New York City.
Although some I’ve spoken to seem to find the topic of racial integration no longer interesting, Condon has never gotten the credit he deserves as a pioneer.
His achievement was more than shepherding Fats Waller to the Victor studios so that he could make two sides with a mixed band in 1929. It was larger than quietly playing his banjo alongside Louis Armstrong and the Luis Russell band in that same year.
It can’t be overemphasized that Eddie was one of the earliest figures to make sure that black and white musicians could stand on an equal footing, playing their music for posterity.
It was one thing to have a mixed jam session at 4 AM in Harlem; it was quite another thing for records featuring mixed-race bands to be made, to be known as such, to be recognized as classics. Much attention has been paid (rightly so) to the roles of Benny Goodman and John Hammond in encouraging mixed ensembles in public.
But that was 1936: Condon’s efforts had been going on for seven or more years. If you could get listeners accustomed to hearing mixed bands on record, then they would be more eager to see their favorite artists perform in public. Condon had the first mixed band on Fifty-Second Street; his mixed troupe of jazz artists was closed out of a Washington, D.C., concert hall because of protests from the DAR.
He was genuinely color-blind when it came to music, and that equality of thought and feeling had an impact. When white and black troops were serving in the legally sagregated armed forces, both sets of soldiers could hear color-blind music coming from V-Discs and AFRS transcriptions.
I think of Charles L. Black, a young Southern lawyer who found himself shaken out of his racist assumptions by hearing Louis Armstrong in 1931: Black went on to write the legal brief for Linda Brown in Brown vs. the Board of Education, the decision that made such segregation illegal in the United States.
I believe that soldiers who thought that “Negroes” were inferior had their beliefs changed, however subtly, by hearing Hot Lips Page and Pee Wee Russell play thousands of miles away at a Condon concert. Consider someone with similar inbred views, ten years later, seeing Ralph Sutton, Walter Page, Edmond Hall, and George Wettling play at Eddie’s club, noting that these four men got along especially well, no one was superior or inferior to anyone else on the stand.
Eddie Condon made such things possible. It’s a cliche of the theatre that you can make people think about larger issues if you make them laugh in the process or if you set the ideas to music: Eddie did both, in person and as part of many ensembles.
He also improved every band he was a part of: Joe Bushkin insisted on acknowledging Condon’s phenomenal harmonic sense and knowledge of songs (and, in fact, Eddie helped Bushkin through his early shaky beginnings on Fifty-Second Street by calling out the chords to songs Bushkin only half-knew).
Eddie also had a fine dramatic or structural sense — listen closely to any recorded performance, in the studio or in concert. Riffs, backgrounds, knowing when to encourage one player to go on or to subtly say to another, “You’ve had your say,” all of this was second nature to Eddie — a great orchestrator who didn’t work from a printed score.
How anyone ends up to be what they are as an adult may be mysterious, but Condon’s growth and development seem particularly remarkable. His birthplace, Goodland, Indiana, was not exactly the cradle of jazz. He came from a large family; his father was somewhere between a saloon-keeper and the man who greeted people in the saloon, sat down and chatted with them. It would have been very easy for Eddie to become nothing more serious than a young man who played the banjo now and again while someone else sang pop hits of the day, or while someone else played the C-melody saxophone.
But something hit the young man from Goodland with the force of religious revelation. I don’t know quite how it appeared to him: was it a record by the Original Dixieland Jazz Band, or one by the New Orleans Rhythm Kings? Was it the proximity to Chicago? Jazz music — and playing that music — must have seemed the most thrilling things possible. However it grew, the transformation from Indiana boy to Chicago jazzman was quick, and it gave shape to Eddie’s life, and thus gave pleasure to so many.
Eddie Condon’s club on West Third Street no longer exists: it is now part of the New York University conglomeration of buildings. Nick’s on West Tenth Street is now a gourmet supermarket. So the Condon landscape has shifted and been obliterated.
But one shrine remains: the New York apartment still inhabited by his daughter Maggie, her husband Peter, their son Michael. I paid them a return visit (with my camera) and have some new delights to share — holy artifacts, as far as I’m concerned.
Although many of Eddie’s effects “went away” after hie death (Maggie thought that Phyllis Condon had simply given away many things to Eddie’s relatives), she still has “Slicker” Condon’s first banjo, circa 1924. It no longer has its neck or strings, but what remains is delicate and precious (even if a few of these photographs unintentionally intensify its resemblance to a nicely browned souffle). The stenciled lettering on the front reads _ _ _ _ _ JAZZ BAND, but the top line is somewhat difficult to decipher.
From the top!
An alternate take . . .
“Slicker” Condon! I don’t know if that is Eddie’s Twenties handwriting or not . . .
Another view . . .
And one more. That looks like May 1, 1924, but rry Kaylor is elusive, although I don’t have my copy of WE CALLED IT MUSIC nearby.
And one more series of photographic studies. Consider this:Collage, anyone?
Not an exhibit at MOMA (not yet).
One of Eddie’s trademarks was his hand-tied bowties, and here’s a whole stash of them (with a birthday drawing done by brother-in-law Paul Smith as ornament).
More to come! But for the moment, listen closely to one Eddie Condon recording and celebrate the man who made it possible. And, in doing so, slowly changed the world.
We were very fortunate that Andy Schumm had three concert-length appearances at the Whitley Bay International Jazz Festival, each with his Bixologists. On the final day of the festival, the Bixologists were Norman Field, reeds; Paul Munnery, trombone; Keith Nichols, piano and vocals; Spats Langham, guitar, banjo, vocals; Frans Sjostrom, bass saxophone, with guest appearances by Michael McQuaid, clarinet, and Nick Ward, drums (the latter in the second part of this posting).
Here are ten marvelous performances from that session!
Howdy Quicksell’s SINCE MY BEST GAL TURNED ME DOWN is unusually sprightly for its rather sad theme. Two conventions are also at work here: the witty imitation of a wind-up phonograph at the start, sliding into pitch on the first note, and the slow-drag break at the end. (They are as solidly accepted pieces of performance practice as the whole-tone break in SOMEBODY STOLE MY GAL, something that Dan Barrett and Jon-Erik Kellso do perfectly when the stars are right.):
SUGAR isn’t the more famous Maceo Pinkard song, beloved of Ethel Waters and Louis Armstrong, but a bouncy concoction on its own, here sung most convincingly by Mr. Langham:
RHYTHM KING (listen to that Rhythm King, I tell you!) falls to Keith Nichols, so ably:
Bix and his friends didn’t exist in a vacuum, though: while they were in the OKeh studios, so were Louis and Bessie Smith and Clarence Williams. Andy invited our friend Michael McQuaid up to the stand to whip up a ferocious version of Clarence Williams’ CUSHION FOOT STOMP, which suggests a healing visit to the podiatrist or something else whose meaning eludes me:
Letting Michael off the stand after only one number would have been a bad idea, so he and Norman embarked on a two-clarinet version of the ODJB (and Beiderbecke) CLARINET MARMALADE, which paid homage not only to Johnny Dodds and Boyd Senter but to Olympic gymnasts as well:
Who was CLORINDA? Only the Chicago Loopers knew for sure:
The Original Dixieland Jazz Band affected everyone who had even fleeting thoughts of playing jazz at the beginning of the last century: here’s their ORIGINAL DIXIELAND JAZZ BAND ONE-STEP, which has no relation whatsoever to CUSHION FOOT STOMP:
Andy Secrest would be jazz’s most forgotten man if it weren’t for the affectionate recall of people like Andy Schumm and Dick Sudhalter, who brought him out of the shadows (he was rather like the understudy forced to step into an unfillable role). WHAT A DAY! is in his honor:
I’M GOING TO MEET MY SWEETIE NOW — always a delightful thought — brings us back to the days of those all-too-few romping recordings the Jean Goldkette Orchestra made for Victor Records:
And (finally, for this posting) another version of BALTIMORE — the new dance craze — a rhythm that’s hot, as Keith Nichols knows so well:
Originally I thought of calling this post COULDN’T BE BETTER, but I decided to be less emphatic. Still, I am a devout and devoted admirer of the Hot Jazz Trio, one of the few aggregations on this planet that not only lives up to their billing but usually transcends it.
Who are (or is?) the Hot Jazz Trio? The simple answer is Bent Persson, trumpet, cornet, mellophone, and even vocals; Frans Sjostrom, bass saxophone and masterful master of ceremonies; Jacob Ullberger, banjo, guitar, and more.
These three musicians are Swedish, but they don’t get together that frquently for gigs, because they don’t all live nearby. So what I have in my mind and ears is a wondrous CD on the Kenneth label, titled HOT JAZZ TRIO, their 2009 performance at Whitley Bay, and their briefer one this year. That’s not enough, but it will have to do for the moment.
The three videos below tell the story of a versatile jazz ensemble, who (collectively and singly) are able to get inside the skins of Jelly Roll Morton’s Red Hot Peppers, Louis Armstrong and his Hot Five, the Ellington orchestra of the late Thirties and early Forties, Bix Beiderbecke and his Gang. They aren’t trying to “play old records live,” but they do bring those noble ghosts into the room and make them welcome.
Here’s their AT THE JAZZ BAND BALL, both energized and focused:
And in the name of good Middle East relations, they summon up not only an amusing period piece (LENA suggested EGYPTIAN ELLA and more) but also the ODJB and all that vaguely exotic splendor of the beginning of the last century — in LENA FROM PALESTEENA:
And, because everyone needs a little more disposable income, here’s BEAU KOO JACK — in honor of Louis, Earl, and Don Redman:
Brought to you by Rae Ann Berry, friend of Hot music: here’s a new version of the Yerba Buena Stompers that covers all the bases: Leon Oakley, Clint Baker, Marty Eggers, from the Bay Area in California, Tom Bartlett from Illinois, Orange Kellin from New Orleans, John Gill and Kevin Dorn from New York, Duke Heitger from Germany . . . international stomping for sure.
William H. Tyers’ PANAMA:
Joe Oliver’s DIPPERMOUTH BLUES:
The ODJB’s AT THE JAZ BAND BALL:
SAN FRANCISCO BAY BLUES:
SOME OF THESE DAYS:
And my favorite, JUST A GIGOLO:
These performances were done on August 7, 2010, at the Orange County Classic Jazz Festival in Costa Mesa, California.
It’s deeply foggy here in Halifax, Nova Scotia. And although my thoughts might turn to myriad possibilities for indoor edification and soul-solace, today they turn to YouTube.
Tom Warner, ever diligent, has just posted a number of video clips from the most recent Bix Beiderbecke Festival held each year in Davenport, Iowa. The one that caught my attention was “Clarinet Marmalade,” a set-closing performance by Randy Sandke’s New York All-Stars: Randy on cornet, Dan Barrett on trombone, Dan Block on clarinet, Scott Robinson on C-melody and bass saxophones, Mark Shane on piano, Nicki Parrott on bass, Howard Alden on guitar, and the Invisible Man — I presume it’s Rob Garcia, by the sound of his cymbals — on drums.
It’s a very satisfying performance, both evoking the original recording (itself a cut-down version of the famous arrangement Bill Challis did for the Jean Goldkette Orchestra) and building upon it in lively ways. “Clarinet Mamalade,” one of the Original Dixieland Jazz Band records Bix so loved, is also a refreshingly old-fashioned piece of music. Harking back to ragtime and brass bands, it has several strains, which might make it a minefield for players who know it only slightly, but it also has more substance than the usual thirty-two bar AABA tune. I particularly like the strain that comes after Mark Shane’s piano solo: it always makes me think of silent film music, the soundtrack for something particularly ominous (the demure heroine tied to the track, the approaching train, the storm at sea, perhaps?) while the band is swinging.
Here, for your dining and dancing pleasure, are Randy’s All-Stars:
Musically, it’s greatly rewarding. But there’s something delightful about watching musicians at work, feeling the spirit without showing off, when they are not constrained by the knowledge of someone with a video recorder getting it all down for posterity. It’s a treat to hear Mark Shane’s Wilson-inspired stride playing, light yet forceful, but my pleasure is intensified by the sight of Nicki, rockin’ in rhythm, during his solo. And watch her, hard at lip-biting work, during hers! It adds to the pleasure of hearing Dan Barrett’s fearless Miff Mole-staccato leaps to see his slide moving, to see the rest of the musicians acting out their notes and phrases in the language of their whole bodies, to see Dan Block express his enthusiasm by moving in time while Barrett plays.
Sometimes the visual aspect detracts from what we’re trying to hear. Musicians have a casual way of chatting and guffawing while someone else is soloing. But even though Warner’s cinematography is functional, seeing adds to hearing in this instance, and the ovation this band gets is well-deserved. I don’t know if you will leave your chair in front of the computer monitor, but you will understand why the Bix Fest audience did.
JAZZ LIVES 