MENNO DAAMS and ALEX HILL INTRODUCE US TO GLORY (Thursday, November 4, 2016, 11:30 AM, the Village Hotel, Newcastle, UK)

I admit that my title may seem over-detailed. But take those details with some whimsy, and I will explain. Of course, impatient or eager readers may skip right to the video and return or not. Having retired from what was called “college teaching,” I no longer take attendance. But here are the principal players.

Menno Daams (cornet, trumpet, compositions, arrangements) is a brilliant friend and musical hero, someone balancing taste, wit, bravura, and subtlety in all his musical endeavors. When last seen, he was playing brilliantly at this year’s Ascona Jazz Festival.

Pianist, composer, arranger, singer Alexander Hill, alas, lived a truly intense and truncated life — one of those driven geniuses who didn’t seem to sleep and whose bright spark flickered out at 30. Tuberculosis was the culprit or perhaps he was one of those people meant to cram several lifetimes of art and work into one short span.

I attended the Whitley Bay Jazz Party (now the Mike Durham Classic Jazz Party) from 2009 to 2016, as a jazz enthusiast, blogger, and videographer . . . and in that last capacity I posted almost 450 videos of bands large and small, formal and informal, and a variety of singers. Exhausting but joyous work and you can see the results of my “swingyoucats” YouTube channel.

Certain managerial decisions made it first difficult, then impossible for me to continue, and I haven’t been back. Others have taken on my role, and I now have the perhaps odd luxury of watching their videos from my computer. But that is another novella entirely.

One of the delights of the weekend was the opportunity to watch and record bands rehearsing in the morning and afternoon — large combinations of musicians who didn’t play together, reading manuscripts — reading charts for the first time, stopping and starting. No one told me to leave (bless you, heroes) and once in a great while the rehearsals, unbuttoned and playful, surpassed the evening’s “concert” performance. An example you can find on YouTube is my capture of the rehearsal by a Bent Persson group of CAFE CAPERS. And this: Menno Daams’ International Serenaders paying tribute to Alex Hill by performing his spiritual, KEEP A SONG IN YOUR SOUL.

Menno had granted me permission to post the video, which I did in 2019. Recently, as a delightful surprise, he reposted it with the musical information rolling along above the image. You can call it the “director’s cut” or the “DVD version with special enhanced features.” Call it what you will, but it’s lovely.

I confess to a didactic-emotional-spiritual purpose of mine. The band sounds so good, and the enhanced version is such a work of art, that it bothers me how few people have seen this: fewer than 200 took in the first posting (three years ago) and fewer than 70 have seen this version. People! This will make you sit up straight in your chairs: it will spark joy for free. (Take that, Marie Kondo.)

I bow to Menno, to Alex, and to this great band. Thank you for letting me visit, thank you for certain.

May your happiness increase!

THREE MINUTES WITH MR. LANGHAM, MR. BOWLLY, and FRIENDS: ENRICO TOMASSO, NORMAN FIELD, JENS LINDGREN, EMMA FISK, MARTIN LITTON, MANU HAGMANN, RICHARD PITE (Whitley Bay, October 27, 2012)

Thomas “Spats” Langham by George Coupe

We live in an age of plenitude — for the fortunate entitled ones. I’m not even speaking of commodities we can buy online. I speak of the art we love. There’s more music on YouTube than one could absorb in ten lifetimes; it comes at us through download and streaming and twenty-five track compact discs. So I think we understandably might be both jaded and dazed by the proliferation.

I almost titled this post CHEW SLOWLY, because a story from the past kept nudging itself to the surface. Years ago, a friend of my then-family was a meticulous cook. She had worked many hours one day to perfect some dishes, and proudly served it to her husband and children, who inhaled the results in minutes. “I could have served them hot dogs and they would have been just as happy.”

It made me think of the many audiences I’ve been a part of, where one marvel after another is created for us — magic! the result of how many hundred-thousand hours of practice and experience, and we are just waiting for the next tune, the next hors d’oeuvre to be served.

This is especially true of audiences at jazz parties and festivals, who might hear eight hours of live improvisation in a day — fifty or sixty performances at least? — then shout MORE! MORE! at the end of the evening. What, I wonder, do they and we actually hear?

I think of the jazz fan of 1938 who bought one record a week and had that six minutes of art to study . . . unlike us.

Today, with the Swing Era love song GOT A DATE WITH AN ANGEL in my head, I wandered past this performance: I was in the audience; I had my video camera — double blessings, I think now. The performance is only three minutes, and perhaps to the very elegantly gifted artists on the stand it was only tune six out of eight in the Bowlly set: I can’t know. Those artists, not incidentally, are Thomas “Spats” Langham, guitar and vocal; Enrico Tomasso, trumpet; Jens Lindgren, trombone; Norman Field, reeds; Emma Fisk, violin; Martin Litton, piano; Manu Hagmann, string bass; Richard Pite, drums.

But what they create, with no fuss, is just magnificent: a light-hearted blending of New York and London, as if Al Bowlly had been wooed by John Hammond into making records with Teddy Wilson and his colleagues — a true marriage of sweet and hot, with Martin Littton’s chimes, Spats’ sweet evocation and closing guitar arpeggio all included at no extra charge. V. fetching.

I wonder why the audience wasn’t on its feet, cheering. But we can make up for that now, at home:

The alternate title for this post is SLOW DOWN FOR BEAUTY. It won’t always be around, nor will we. So let us appreciate it, deeply and in a leisurely way, while we are able to.

May your happiness increase!

ANYONE CAN PLAY FAST, BUT IT TAKES YEARS TO UNDERSTAND HOW TO PLAY SLOWLY (MENNO DAAMS, TORSTEIN KUBBAN, LARS FRANK, JON PENN: Newcastle, November 5, 2016) — and a PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT

The v.memorable decor at the Village Hotel.

The song is MEMORIES OF YOU, and this is a performance to remember. It took place after the scheduled musical events had concluded at the 2016 Whitley Bay International Jazz Party, held at the Village Hotel in Newcastle, UK.

Fast tempos wow the crowd, but I think most musicians would agree with me that slow tempos are much harder to handle with coherence, variety, and feeling. When the bars are going along like telephone poles out the window, one can simply rely on learned patterns and hang on. Some trumpet players, and I think of Rex Stewart, play faster as the tempo increases; some, like mid-period Louis (hear the 1932-33 Victors) know that whole notes and “long tones” convey intense emotional messages.

Thus it is with this performance: it has its own sustained beauty — no one plays double-time; they let the emotions unfold. Directly in front of my camera was Menno Daams, cornet; to his left, a string bassist whose name I did not learn; Torstein Kubban, trumpet; Lars Frank, tenor saxophone; Jon Penn, keyboard. And although one might associate this Eubie Blake – Noble Sissle evergreen with Benny Goodman, there is Louis in the air — but more so, I am reminded of a Jerry Newman recording from some undocumented early morning in 1941 at Minton’s. Hawkins is here, and so is Frank Newton. At least in my imagination. V.beautiful, as we say at the Village Hotel (with a big wave of my hand to my honoured friend Nicholas D. Ball):

There is drama here, and passion, but no rush: these musicians know (and feel) how to take time to let beauty unfold on its own terms. Even in the pub.

Now for the Public Service Announcement. I began publishing this blog in February 2008, which is an infinity of delighted keystrokes and videos ago. During the pandemic, I felt it was my responsibility to add joy to the air by posting every day. I hope many of you can say along with me, “I have come out of my house. I am less afraid. My life has expanded.” Instead of spending eight hours a day in front of this lit screen, I have returned to a life that resembles the one I cherished sixteen months ago. So this is only to say I am reverting to a summer schedule . . . a day might go by without a post. This is not to cause alarm, but it is a sign that your faithful blogger might have gotten home late from a concert in New Jersey or dinner in Brooklyn and not be up to posting a new blog that day. I don’t intend to stop . . . but this is just to let my faithful, sometimes anxious audience know that if there is no blogpost that day, I am not in the ER.

The blog has been an instrument, rather like a spiritual megaphone, through which I could send love and gratitude, often in the form of music, and I have gotten it back so wonderfully for thirteen years. I am not quitting, but don’t worry if I play hookey (or even hooky). There are something like five thousand blogposts stored here: you might be able to amuse yourself while I am capering in the sunshine (or eating something with capers.) Love, Michael

May your happiness increase!

“IN THAT FREE-AND-EASY MANNER”: MENNO DAAMS’ INTERNATIONAL SERENADERS BRING ALEX HILL TO LIFE (Whitley Bay, November 4, 2016)

Early on November 4, 2016, an august group of informally-attired gentlemen assembled within the Village Hotel in Newcastle, England, at what is now called Mike Durham’s Whitley bay Classic Jazz Party to rehearse their set of songs and arrangements by the most-talented and most short-lived Alex Hill.  Their aims: to have a jubilee and also do some needed functionizin’.

The truly all-star band was led by trumpeter / scholar / arranger Menno Daams,  and was comprised of David Boeddinghaus, piano; Spats Langham, guitar and vocal; Henry Lemaire, string bass; Richard Pite, drums;  Rico Tomasso, Duke Heitger, trumpets; Jean-Francois Bonnel, Richard Exall, Robert Fowler, Lars Frank, reeds; Jim Fryer, Alistair Allan, trombones.

This was a rehearsal: thus, not everything had already been polished through focused playing and replaying, but the absence of an audience occasionally lets musicians cut loose and experiment.  I’ve intentionally left in the pre-and-post comments to give listeners the experience of being there.

And although they knew I was there, they happily managed to ignore me, which was fine then and turned into a great boon for all of us.  I had a wonderful view of the chairs, but one must sit far enough back in the room to capture everyone in the band. My focus wasn’t perfect, but at least you can blame the camera rather than its operator.  The sound is clear, and the absence of an audience, bringing pint mugs back and forth and chatting, is a great boon, although sharp-eared video observers will hear some commentary which usually stops when the band begins.

About the band name: I don’t think Menno and Co. had an official collective sobriquet in the program, and many of the original Hill sessions were issued as “his Hollywood Sepians,” and no amount of linguistic immolation on my part could convert that to a group title both appropriate and inoffensive.  I will leave the possible variations on that theme to you, and comments offering such names will, alas, never see the light of cyber-day.

On to the blessed music.  LET’S HAVE A JUBILEE:

SONG OF THE PLOW:

AIN’T IT NICE?:

DISSONANCE (Mezz Mezzrow took credit, but it is a Hill composition and arrangement):

DELTA BOUND (with wonderful singing by Mr. Langham, typically):

FUNCTIONIZIN’, a close cousin of SQUEEZE ME:

KEEP A SONG IN YOUR SOUL, wise advice:

One of the unannounced pleasures of this Party, held this November in the same space [the “v.snuggly” Village Hotel] is that well-behaved listeners are welcome to sit in on rehearsals — a rare pleasure.  Blessings on Alex, Menno, and the wonderful musicians for their splendid work in keeping the good sounds alive.

And just so you know my enthusiasm is global, not local, this comment, relayed through my good friend Sir Robert Cox: “Tom [that’s Spats] said how brilliant Menno’s arrangements were and how much, to their astonishment, rehearsal had taken only 45 minutes. He said that, never in the history of the party, had a rehearsal lasted less than an hour.”

May your happiness increase!

WHEN BEING “MAD” IS PLEASURE (1924, 1938, and 2017)

Our subjects today are the overlap of “madness” and “pleasure.”  Please be prepared to take notes.

“But first, this,” as they used to say on public radio.

PLEASURE MAD, a Sidney Bechet composition, was recorded in 1924 but the vocal versions weren’t issued, except for this one.  Did the record company find it too direct to be acceptable?  Here’s Ethel Waters’ version, clear as a bell:

Perhaps the song continued to be performed with those lyrics, but I don’t have any evidence.  However, it resurfaced in 1938 as VIPER MAD, new lyrics, as sung — memorably — by O’Neil Spencer:

There might be other ways to pose the rhetorical question, but at what moment in those fourteen years did sexual pleasure become a less interesting subject in popular song than smoking reefers?

While you consider that intriguing philosophical question, I have a new double-CD set (36 tracks!  12 pounds!) to share with you.  A little personal history: I attended the Whitley Bay Classic Jazz Party, then renamed Mike Durham’s International Classic Jazz Party, from 2009 to 2016, and had a fine time: the best American, European, Australian, and occasionally South American musicians turned loose for a long weekend of hot and sweet jazz, its spiritual center the late Twenties and early Thirties.

Here are three samples, videoed by me, songs and personnels named:

and

and

I ended with GOT BUTTER ON IT so that JAZZ LIVES readers can — as they say — get a flavor of the experience.  The Party continues to do its special magic splendidly, a magic that videos only partially convey.  This year it’s November 1-3, and details can be found here.  And if you search JAZZ LIVES for “Whitley Bay” or “Durham,” you will find a deluge of posts and videos.

But this post isn’t exactly about the Party as such, nor is it about my videos.  Its subject — now, pay attention — is a 2-CD set of live performances from the 2018 Party, which is just thrilling.  It’s called PLEASURE MAD: ‘LIVE RECORDINGS FROM MIKE DURHAM’S INTERNATIONAL CLASSIC JAZZ PARTY 2017 (WVR RECORDS WVR1007).  As I wrote above, 36 live performances in beautiful sound.

And the sound is worth noting, with delight.  At the Party, some fans record the music from the audience with everything from ancient cassette recorders to digital ones; when I was there, I videoed as much as I could.  But this CD issue has the benefit of superb sound, because of the young Norwegian trumpeter and recording engineer Torstein Kubban, who has recorded every session for the past six years.  Torstein is a phenomenal player, so I may be permitted this digression:

He’s got it, for sure.  And his recordings are wonderful.

Here are the songs performed — referencing Duke Ellington, Ben Pollack, Bennie Moten, the Halfway House Orchestra, Alex Hill, Rube Bloom, Jabbo Smith, Louis Armstrong,Eddie Condon, Willie “the Lion” Smith, Clarence Williams, Luis Russell, King Oliver, James P. Johnson, and more:

And the musicians: Mike Davis, Andy Schumm, Duke Heitger, Jamie Brownfield, Malo Mazurie, Kristoffer Kompen, Jim Fryer, Graham Hughes, Ewan Bleach, Michael McQuaid, Richard Exall, Claus Jacobi, Matthias Seuffert, Lars Frank, Jean-Francois Bonnel, Emma Fisk, David Boeddinghaus, Martin Litton, Keith Nichols, Morten Gunnar Larsen, Martin Wheatley, Spats Langham, Peter Beyerer, Henry Lemaire, Jacob Ullberger, Phil Rutherford, Elise Sut, Malcolm Sked, Josh Duffee, Richard Pite, Nick Ward, Nick Ball, Joan Viskant, Nicolle Rochelle.  If I’ve left anyone out, let me know and I will impale myself on a cactus needle as penance, and video the event.

I think it’s taken me so long to write this post because every time I wanted to take the CDs into the house to write about them, I would start them up on the car player and there they would stay.  A few highlights, deeply subjective: Martin Litton’s sensitive and tender solo LAURA; the riotous hot polyphony of CHATTANOOGA STOMP (which I recently played six times in the car, non-stop); the exuberant GIVE ME YOUR TELEPHONE NUMBER; Spats Langham’s NEW ORLEANS SHUFFLE; a completely headlong RAILROAD MAN; a version of THE CHARLESTON that starts with Louis’ WEST END BLUES cadenza; SHIM-ME-SHA-WABBLE that rocks tremendously; I FOUND A NEW BABY that sounds as if Hines (in the guise of Boeddinghaus) visited a Condon jam session in 1933; SOBBIN’ BLUES with layers and textures as rich as great architecture.  You will find your own favorites; those are mine of the moment.

My advice?  If you can, get thee to the Party, where seats are going fast.  Once there, buy several copies of this set — for yourself, national holidays, the birthdays of hip relatives — and enjoy for decades.  If you can’t get to the UK, you can still purchase the set, which I urge you to do.

The CD is obtainable from website: https://whitleybayjazzfest.com
email:wbjazzfest@btinternet.com.  For more information, contact patti_durham1@btinternet.com.

And when the authorities knock on your door to ask about the ecstatic sounds coming from within, you can simply show them this CD and say, “Well, Officers, I’m PLEASURE MAD!  Would you like to come in?” And all will be well.

May your happiness increase!

PARADISE FOR STRINGS: MARTIN WHEATLEY’S IMAGINATIVE WORLDS

Photograph by Andrew Wittenborn, 2015

I know Martin Wheatley as an astonishingly talented player of the guitar, banjo, electric guitar, ukulele.  I’ve heard him on a variety of recordings as a wonderful rhythm player and striking soloist, and had the good fortune to see him in person at the Whitley Bay Classic Jazz Party (now the Mike Durham Classic Jazz Party) from 2009 to 2015.

One facet of his talent is as a virtuosic ukulele player (and arranger for that instrument): a 2010 solo performance of THE STARS AND STRIPES FOREVER:

Here’s Martin on electric guitar from the November 2015 Party in a salute to Artie Shaw’s Gramercy Five, with Lars Frank, Martin Litton, Enrico Tomasso, Richard Pite, Henry Lemaire:

From that same weekend, here are Emma Fisk, Spats Langham, Henry Lemaire, and Martin doing their own evocation of the Quintette of the Hot Club of France on J’ATTENDRAI:

Here’s Martin on banjo in 2010 with the Chalumeau Serenaders — Matthias Seuffert, Norman Field, Nick Ward, Keith Nichols, Malcolm Sked — performing A PRETTY GIRL IS LIKE A MELODY:

And there’s more.  But the point of this blogpost is to let you know that Martin has made a truly imaginative CD under his own name, called LUCKY STAR — a musical sample below:

Martin says of LUCKY STAR, “Quite a mixture of things, lots of my own compositions and some standards.  Some solos –  plenty of overdub extravaganzas.  All me apart from Tom Wheatley (one of Martin’s sons) on bass.”

Solo efforts that have a good deal of overdubbing might suffer from sameness, because of the strength of the soloist’s personality, but not this CD: Martin is seriously and playfully imaginative.  And when you open the disc and read the instruments he plays, you know the disc is expansive, not constricted: guitar, tenor guitar, Hawaiian guitar, lap steel guitar, soprano / tenor / baritone ukulele; tenor / five-string / fretless banjo; moonlute, mandolin, octophone, percussion, keyboard, vocals.

The five standards are IF DREAMS COME TRUE, ALL GOD’S CHILLUN GOT RHYTHM, YOU ARE MY LUCKY STAR, MY ONE AND ONLY LOVE, and MY SWEET.  I couldn’t tell absolutely which instruments Martin is playing on any track, but I can say that DREAMS sounds like a one-man Spirits of Rhythm, with a swinging bass interlude by Tom after Martin’s absolutely charming vocal (think Bowlly crossed with McKenzie, Decca sunburst edition); CHILLUN is Pizzarelli-style with more of the same swing crooning intermingled with virtuosic playing — but no notes are smudged or harmed, and there’s a cameo for Hawaiian guitar at a rocking tempo.  LUCKY STAR begins with harp-like ukulele chords and Martin picks up the never-heard verse, turning the corner into the sweet chorus in the most light-hearted sincere way, and MY ONE AND ONLY LOVE follows — a quiet instrumental masterpiece, a hymn to secular devotion. MY SWEET — beloved of Louis and Django — begins with serene chiming notes picking out the melody delicately and then builds into a rocking vocal / guitar production worthy of the QHCF — ending with waves rhythmically yet gently coming up the beach.

I’ve given these details because if I had heard one of those tracks I would want to know who the fine singer and the fine guitarists were, and I would buy the CD. They are that delightful.

But that survey would leave out the majority of the disc, Martin’s original compositions: STARGAZING / ON THE BANKS OF THE WINDRUSH, FAR AWAY / EPPING FOREST / GOLDEN HILL / THE OTTER / BRUNTCLIFFE / FOUND & LOST / COLONEL FAWCETT’S UKULELE / IN THE MERRY LAND OF UZ / X.  They aren’t easy to describe, much less categorize.  I hear lullabies, rhapsodies, inquiries, echoes of Hawaii, of Weill and Broadway shows, of Bach and modern classical, Forties film soundtracks, harp choirs, Scottish folk music, bluegrass, birdsong and forest sounds — all immaculately and warmly played.  Words fail me here, but the journey through this CD is rather like reading short stories or being shown a series of watercolors — nothing harsh, but everything evocative.

Martin told me, “Over the last seven or eight years I’ve returned to writing music and wanted it to have an outlet, which it wouldn’t get on gigs.  Although jazz is what I do, I have other musical interests and have played other sorts of music in the past. Without making any self-conscious attempts at ‘fusions’ I’ve tried to allow it all to come out – English folk tunes, Psychedelia, classical music – especially English 20th century, Hawaiian music, doubtless others. I don’t know how evident any of those is but they’re in there somewhere!

It probably is evident that most of it is romantic – Bruntcliffe, for example, I wrote as an organ piece to be played as entrance music for my wedding to Lindsay in 2011.  Most of it is less specific.  One piece with something of a programme is Colonel Fawcett’s Ukulele. Aside from punning on Captain Corelli’s Mandolin, it was inspired by reading about Colonel Percy Fawcett and his habit of playing his ukulele to the natives he encountered in the Amazon.  What he played and how they reacted is unrecorded.  It’s an amazing tale.  The obvious conclusion is that he was deluded in his belief in the Lost City of Z and its civilization from which we could learn; however, we know that with no more certainty than we know what he played on his ukulele.”

A technical note: “Overdubs were done usually to a guide track which is not heard on the final mix (pulling up the ladder after climbing up!).  This allows for a steady pulse and changes in tempo when required.  Wayne McIntyre, the sound engineer, did a terrific job.”

“If anyone would like a copy please contact me. £10 incl p&. Hope you like it!”

Find Martin on Facebook here.  If it’s not evident, I recommend this disc fervently.  It’s original yet melodic, lyrical, sweet and rocking.

May your happiness increase!

 

“SECOND REUNION”: THE UNION RHYTHM KINGS ON DISC and LIVE

The Union Rhythm Kings at the 2013 Whitley Bay Classic Jazz Party

The debut CD of this wonderful hot band, A HOT REUNION, on Herman Records, came out in 2009.  So the second one is long overdue, and I am happy to report that it is here, and as delightful as its predecessor.  (I am grateful to Trygve Hernaes, the band’s enthusiastic guide and supporter, for enabling me to hear them on disc before I’d met them all in person.)

The band, the Union Rhythm Kings, is a wonderful hot hybrid of Norwegian and Swedish musicians — Kristoffer Kompen, trombone; Bent Persson, trumpet; Lars Frank, reeds; Morten Gunnar Larsen, piano, Frans Sjostrom, bass saxophone; Jacob Ullberger, banjo / guitar.  For the geographers keeping score, Kris, Lars, and Morten are from Norway; Bent, Frans, and Jacob from Sweden. The band even has its own Wikipedia page.

What sets the URK apart (and above) many other “traditional” jazz bands is the excellence of their solo and ensemble work, expert and impassioned, and free from cliche.  They are inspired by the original recordings and arrangements, but they bring their own energy to the repertoire.  They’ve broken free of the Jazz Museum.

On this disc, much of that repertoire is comfortable Morton, Ellington, Armstrong, Luis Russell, and Beiderbecke — but the URK takes pleasure in Jack Purvis and obscure Morton. Thus, CLARINET MARMALADE, CROCODILE CRADLE, DAVENPORT BLUES, SARATOGA SHOUT, HUMPTY DUMPTY, WHEN YOU’RE FEELING BLUE, I DIDN’T KNOW, I AIN’T GOT NOBODY, MILENBERG JOYS, RIVERBOAT SHUFFLE, WHAT’S THE USE OF CRYIN’, BABY, SANTA CLAUS BLUES, BLUES OF THE VAGABOND, SOMEBODY STOLE MY GAL, DUSKY STEVEDORE.

I’ve listened to them with great pleasure at their recent annual appearances at the Mike Durham Classic Jazz Party, and I have some performance video from November 5-8 to share with you — which will embody the band’s virtues better than paragraphs of enthusiastic prose.  The great young drummer Nick Ball helps out on all these performances.

Here are four from their Sunday-evening concert:

DAVENPORT BLUES:

BLUES OF THE VAGABOND:

HUMPTY DUMPTY:

CLARINET MARMALADE:

and four from the Thursday-night pub session:

In honor of the Luis Russell band, SARATOGA SHOUT:

For solitaries everywhere, I AIN’T GOT NOBODY:

and these last two (with Bix in mind), with Thomas Winteler sitting in for Lars:

SORRY:

JAZZ ME BLUES:

The URK discs (beautifully recorded), can be obtained from Sonor Records AS,
Postboks 4275, NO 7436 Trondheim, Norway.  Information at email: sonoras@online.no.  Price: NOK 200 or USD 25, packing and postage included. Payment via Paypal, to the email address above.

May your happiness increase!

“EAST COAST TROT”: THOMAS WINTELER, MATTHIAS SEUFFERT, DUKE HEITGER, KEITH NICHOLS, JACOB ULLBERGER, PHIL RUTHERFORD, NICHOLAS D. BALL at the 2015 MIKE DURHAM CLASSIC JAZZ PARTY (November 7, 2015)

I’ve been back in New York for eleven months now, and it does move at a fast pace now and again.  I still don’t walk at a proper Manhattanite tempo, but I’m getting back into tempo.  So when I was at the Mike Durham Classic Jazz Party on November 7 of this year and heard Thomas Winteler announce the next song as EAST COAST TROT, I thought, “They’re playing my song.”

Originally, it was an etude for two clarinets (Johnny Dodds and Junie Cobb), piano (Tiny Parham) and the irreplaceable Eustern Woodfork, banjo.  This session offers a splendidly enhanced ensemble: Thomas Winteler and Matthias Seuffert, clarinet; Duke Heitger, trumpet; Keith Nichols, piano; Jacob Ullberger, banjo; Phil Rutherford, brass bass; Nicholas D. Ball, washboard.

Trot along!

And just to show the phenomenal emotional range of this  group, I would point readers to the performance that took place just before the TROT — an immensely soulful reading of BLUES IN THIRDS.

Great things happen at the Mike Durham Classic Jazz Party, and will happen again in November 2016 . . . from the 4th to the 6th.  Details to come.

May your happiness increase!

“BLUES IN THIRDS”: THOMAS WINTELER, MATTHIAS SEUFFERT, DUKE HEITGER, KEITH NICHOLS, JACOB ULLBERGER, PHIL RUTHERFORD, NICHOLAS BALL at the MIKE DURHAM CLASSIC JAZZ PARTY (November 7, 2015)

Let us begin at the beginning: Earl Hines’ composition, called CAUTION BLUES, offered as a piano solo in 1928:

and the next evocation, a 1940 trio of Hines, Sidney Bechet, and Baby Dodds for Victor.  Hines remembered Bechet as being “evil” that day yet repeating, “I want to play Hines’ tune,” which he did, by then titled BLUES IN THIRDS:

Both those performances — one for solo piano, the other for a trio — are full of variations: improvisations on the theme, variations in timbre and dynamics, and an impressive compositional variety.  So, in its own way, is this magical performance from our century — November 7, 2015 — at the Mike Durham Classic Jazz Party held in Newcastle, England, not a month ago.  The inspired participants are Thomas Winteler, clarinet / leader; Matthias Seuffert, clarinet; Keith Nichols, piano; Duke Heitger, trumpet; Jacob Ullberger, guitar; Phil Rutherford, brass bass; Nicholas Ball, spoons.  Yes, spoons — and since Nick is a beautifully imaginative percussionist, hear the variety of sounds and effects he obtains from what we take for granted in the silverware drawer.  Notice, please, how no one chorus is exactly like the one before or after it, and how this performance — without getting louder or faster — builds and ascends to something like true majesty:

A glorious performance — the sort of thing that has happened regularly at this party and its predecessors.  And I guarantee it will happen again in 2016.  Details to follow.  And, this just in!  The next Party will take place at the comfortable Village Hotel Newcastle, Friday, November 4 to Sunday the 6th.

May your happiness increase!

WHERE I’VE BEEN, AND WHAT I HEARD (November 5, 2015)

There won’t be much prose in this blogpost: a seventeen-hour travel day has a way of overpowering ordinary cognition (Newcastle to Amsterdam to New York to home, including a taxi, two planes, two airports, a shuttle, and a drive home in rush hour).

But I wanted to let the JAZZ LIVES faithful know that I hadn’t decided to abandon them or the blog.   I will have something to say about the glorious cabaret evening that singer Janice Day and pianist Martin Litton put on in Hay-on-Wye.  And I assure you I will have much more to say about the Mike Durham Whitley Bay Classic Jazz Party, which is still ringing beautifully in my ears.

Nick Ball and Josh Duffee in the Victory Pub, November 2015, at the Party

But music speaks louder than words, as Charlie Parker reminded Earl Wilson. So here’s a sample from the Thursday, November 5, 2015, after-hours jam session at the Victory Pub in the Village Hotel Newcastle . . . on RIVERBOAT SHUFFLE.

The energized participants are Torstein Kubban, cornet; Frans Sjostrom, bass saxophone; Thomas Winteler, clarinet; David Boeddinghaus, piano; Jacob Ullberger, banjo; Nick Ball, drums:

The Party will go on in 2016, but it needs you to survive and flourish.  So do make a note of that, in honor of hot jazz, in honor of Hoagy and Bix too.

May your happiness increase!

BEHIND THE SCENES: BENT PERSSON, THOMAS WINTELER, GRAHAM HUGHES, MORTEN GUNNAR LARSEN, MALCOLM SKED, HENRI LEMAIRE, NICK BALL (Whitley Bay Classic Jazz Party, Nov. 8, 2014)

“How do they do it?” is the question, uttered or thought, that we all ask when we hear our admired jazz musicians sing or play as part of an ensemble.  “How do they know where to go?  Even when they have music in front of them, how are there no collisions?”

The answers are deep and not easy to put into words.  Professionalism is part of it, a common language, experience with hours of practice (solo and with others), the great gift to improvise.  It’s deeply intuitive, and the only analogy for non-musicians might be, “How do we know what to say — if, in fact, we do — when among people we don’t know?  How do we know how to be part of a conversation, how to follow the general threads of thought and feeling?”

One of the great pleasures of what is now called the Mike Durham Classic Jazz Party (colloquially known to its friends as “Whitley Bay”) is that, because the music can be complicated, and the musicians don’t all play with one another regularly, there are hours of open rehearsals.  People like myself can sit in the Village Hotel ballroom and watch and listen for hours.  I do it with my camera, because once in a great while a band catches fire are plays gloriously, as if the musicians were in a back room in a Chicago nightspot.

Late last year, after the 2014 Party was over, I’d sent one of the rehearsal videos to trumpeter Bent Persson — it was a Bechet tribute with Thomas Winteler on clarinet and soprano saxophone, Graham Hughes, trombone; Morten Gunnar Larsen, piano; Henri Lemaire, guitar and banjo; Malcolm Sked, brass and string bass; Nick Ball, drums — and asked him if he thought it could be shared with the public.  The song was ACHIN’ HEARTED BLUES, which contains a labyrinth of instrumental breaks.  This year, Bent said I could go ahead and post it.

It is, of course, a rehearsal.  So there are long pauses.  Questions are asked. Some of this will be curious to non-musicians.  But it is a wonderful opportunity, I think, to see how — without words, magically — a performance comes together. And the rocking complete version of ACHIN’ HEARTED BLUES is, for me, magical:

Words would not be terribly useful to explain what happens here — part knowledge, part empathy, part wizardry.  But I see and hear something new each time I revisit the video.

In case you need more encouragement to get yourself to this year’s Party — which starts November 5 and ends November 8 or perhaps in the early hours of the 9th — here is a list of the musicians who will be there.  Astounding, in short. I’ve left my comfortable New York nest every year since 2009 to be there, and the rewards are huge.

May your happiness increase!

“BIX OFF THE RECORD” and ON THE BANDSTAND

I confess I come late to this party — the delightful CD below was released almost five months ago — but I don’t arrive empty-handed.  The words tell it all.

And the music is joyful — more than the solemn faces on the cover suggest.

For whatever reasons — an elusive individual who thrills his contemporaries and vanishes, a creator of inexplicable delicate beauty — Bix Beiderbecke has been the subject of more inquiry, more debate, and more mythology than any other jazz musician.  I stand back from such diligence, although I admire its limitless energy.  What fascinates me is the music: the music Bix created and its reverberations after his death.

Many “Bix tributes,” to my ears, are laboring under burdens even before the first note is played or recorded.  Audiences sigh more fervently than they ever did for the young Sinatra when the first cornet notes of the SINGIN’ THE BLUES solo launch into the air.  Other bands offer exquisitely accurate copies of those OKehs and Gennetts.  Just the sort of thing for those who like that sort of thing.  “Perhaps if we can summon up GOOSE PIMPLES note for note, Bix will never have died?”

But BIX OFF THE RECORD is a more imaginative project.  It doesn’t seek to say, “What would Bix have played had he been on Fifty-Second Street alongside Hawkins in 1944,” or “Let’s score Bix for string orchestra.”  Rather, it imagines a lovely, plausible alternate universe where Bix, in the recording studios more often (although never enough) got to play and record songs he would have known, was known to have played, among his peers and contemporaries.

Enough words for the moment?  Hear sound samples here: three full tracks from the CD, ending with a touching cornet-piano duet on MEAN TO ME.  Aside from the brilliant (although honest) recorded sound, the first thing you will notice is the band.  No one is imitating Lennie Hayton, Bill Rank, or Min Leibrook.  The musicians — not tied to the original Bix oeuvre — are free to roam within the conventions of the genre, but not stiffly or formally.  And rather than having this session be a feature for the heartening cornet of Andy Schumm, it features everyone, with delightful arranging touches that make the result more than “Let’s blow on DINAH for five minutes, solos for everyone.” Each performance has sly, sweet, effective glances at other Bix recordings and recordings of the time.  It’s truly uplifting fun, not a class trip to the Museum of Jazz.  And you can’t read the very fine and informative liner notes by Julio Schwarz Andrade here, but they are worth the price of admission.

The Lake Records Facebook page is full of good things, including news of a new duo-release by Jeff Barnhart and Spats Langham called WE WISH THAT WE WERE TWINS, a title both enticing and philosophically deep.

But back to Bix — in his century and in ours simultaneously.

I said I came to this party with gifts, and here are two.  On November 7, 2014, eleven months ago, a sextet assembled on the bandstand of the Village Hotel Newcastle Inspiration Suite — where the glories of the 2014 Whitley Bay Classic Jazz Party took place — to play some of the songs that would be explored on the CD above.  Messrs Duffee, Sjostrom, Boeddinghaus, Porro, Kompen, and Schumm, if you need reminding.  I was there with one of several video cameras and (although there are heads intermittently in the way) the sound of the band was thrilling.  Here are two selections from that evening’s offering.

One, a pop song of the day much beloved by Bix (an improvisation on its chords and its intent became FOR NO REASON AT ALL IN C), I’D CLIMB THE HIGHEST MOUNTAIN:

Then, Morton’s WOLVERINE BLUES as if imagined by the Wolverine Orchestra:

These two performances are, I hope, inducements for those who can to hie themselves to the Mike Durham Classic Jazz Party — the Whitley Bay party appropriately renamed for its beloved, intent, humorous founder — which will start on Thursday night, November 5, 2015, with a concert / jam session by the exalted Union Rhythm Kings, and end somewhere between Sunday night and Monday morning, leaving us all weak with pleasure. Here is all you need to know to make that state of being yours. See you there in a month’s time!

And just because it is possible to do so . . . here is the brilliantly screwy surrealistic Fleischer Screen Song (1931) of I’D CLIMB THE HIGHEST MOUNTAIN — primitive karaoke through a distorting lens:

May your happiness increase! 

THAT LOCALITY, THOSE SOUNDS, THAT PAPER

First, the uplifting and relevant soundtrack.  Recorded January 30, 1940, by Jelly Roll Morton’s Seven for General Records: Henry “Red” Allen, trumpet; Claude Jones, trombone; Albert Nicholas, clarinet; Eddie Williams, alto saxophone; Jelly Roll Morton, piano, vocal, composer; Wellman Braud, string bass; Zutty Singleton, drums:

Morton made such an impact as composer, arranger, pianist . . . that we run the risk of forgetting just how wonderful he was as a singer.  This record, and others from these late session, show his awareness of what a hit Fats Waller was for Victor, the record company that Morton may have felt had shown him only intermittent love.  Finally, this song is very contemporary — in Morton’s mythical Southern town, much of the lyric has to do with produce, obviously organic, locally grown, and no doubt delicious.

I’ve seen photographs of the sheet music for several late Morton songs.  Most sheet music issued by the major companies had photographs and elaborate artwork: Tempo Music had a much smaller budget:

Two more improvisations on SOUTHERN TOWN, before we move on.  A contemporary version (from December 1995):

Bob Barnard, cornet; Keith Ingham, piano; Earl May, string  bass; Jackie Williams, drums.

Even more contemporary!  From November 7, 2014, at the Whitley Bay Classic Jazz Party, with Bent Persson, trumpet; Graham Hughes, trombone; Jean-Francois Bonnel, Thomas Winteler, reeds; Morten Gunnar Larsen, piano; Jacob Ullberger, guitar; Henri Lemaire, string bass; Nick Ball, drums.

Attentive readers will notice “that paper” in my title, and here it is.

Here is an astonishing item for sale on eBay.  My friend Kris Bauwens (of Gent, Belgium) — one of the great collectors of jazz autographs — told me about it yesterday.  Yes, six thousand dollars.  But an easy payment plan:

a closer look at that signature:

and the inside:

continued:

turning the page:

continued:

and the back cover:

At the end of Eudora Welty’s classic 1941 story, “A Worn Path,” an elderly lady from the Mississippi backwoods, Phoenix Jackson, plans to buy her grandson a paper windmill.  “He going to find it hard to believe there such a thing in the world.”  That is my reaction to the autographed MY HOME IS IN A SOUTHERN TOWN.

Should you like more information about Mister Jelly Lord, I urge you to read SO WHO KNEW?  —  a brief post that attracted a good deal of attention.

May your happiness increase!

LO AND BEHOLD! — “THE FAT BABIES” at WHITLEY BAY (Nov. 9, 2014)

“Lo and behold!” is, by now, an archaic expression by which one refers to something surprising that has happened.  In this case, the surprises are all good ones.  (The record below belongs to William Berndt, who also took the photo.)

 

When Andy Schumm (multi-instrumentalist, arranger, composer, bandleader) came to the 2014 Whitley Bay Classic Jazz Party, he brought arrangements with him for a ten-piece band — which would have been a characteristic instrumentation in the late Twenties and early Thirties: three brass, three reeds, four rhythm.  At home, Andy and string bassist Beau Sample pilot a hot band called THE FAT BABIES (they’ve made two delightful CDs for the Delmark label and they have a regular gig in Chicago) . . . but the charts Andy brought held no terrors for the international luminaries at Whitley Bay.  In addition to Andy, there’s Menno Daams, cornet; Alistair Allan, trombone; Jean-Francois Bonnel, Lars Frank, Claus Jacobi, reeds; David Boeddinghaus, piano; Henri Lemaire, banjo; Malcolm Sked, bass and sousaphone; Josh Duffee, drums.  They performed — nobly — a lengthy set of hot music, dance music, an Oriental fox-trot . . . full of surprises, including a new Schumm composition in the best style and many new arrangements of venerable songs.  Herewith!

FIVE FOOT TWO, EYES OF BLUE:

BABY (in the Guy Lombardo arrangement, with heat):

SHE REMINDS ME OF YOU (a song associated with Bing):

I WANT YOU, JUST MYSELF (homage to King Oliver with new solos):

CHINA GIRL (the aforementioned “Oriental fox-trot” with a wonderful outchorus):

I WANT TO GO HOME (a Joe Sanders arrangement):

LO AND BEHOLD! (from 1932):

SMILE WHEN THE RAINDROPS FALL (for Stan and Ollie, with a group vocal):

WHEN SHE CAME TO ME (comp. Schumm; manner, Goldkette):

LIVIN’ IN THE SUNLIGHT, LOVIN’ IN THE MOONLIGHT:

And if you’d like to hear more music like this, the Mike Durham Classic Jazz Party is taking place in Newcastle-upon-Tyne, England, November 5-8, 2015.

A postscript.  I take public transportation to get in and out of New York City, preferring that to the stress of finding parking for my car.  So on the bus and on the commuter railroad, everyone has earbuds firmly mounted.  Often I can hear what they are listening to through the earbuds, which means that audiologists will never want for work — but I digress.  Whether or not you can make it to Whitley Bay, I would like all my readers who commute to save some of these videos for their trek to and from work.  It would please me immensely to think of people on the bus or train happily grooving to BABY or LO AND BEHOLD!  Do what you can, please, to help make my hot jazz / hot dance fantasy a reality.

May your happiness increase!

HOMAGE TO ADRIAN: FRANS SJOSTROM’S NEW YORK GANG: DUKE HEITGER, LARS FRANK, KRISTOFFER KOMPEN, MORTEN GUNNAR LARSEN, JACOB ULLBERGER, NICK BALL (Whitley Bay Classic Jazz Party, November 7, 2014)

From the JAZZ LIVES Collection (currently on display in the JAZZ LIVES kitchen)

I’d love to have this Gang in my neighborhood: paying tribute to Adrian Rollini, they make beauty, not violence.  This session took place at the 2014 Whitley Bay Classic Jazz Party, and the “New York Gang” evoked five classic recordings with connections to Rollini from 1928 to 1934.  They were Frans Sjostrom, bass sax / leader; Morten Gunnar Larsen, piano; Jacob Ullberger, guitar; Nick Ball, drums; Duke Heitger, trumpet; Lars Frank, tenor saxophone; Kristoffer Kompen, trombone.

IF I HAD YOU (if memory serves, the 1928 arrangement from a Sam Lanin record featuring one Bing Crosby, vocal):

DAVENPORT BLUES by our man from that town:

SOMEBODY LOVES ME:

SUGAR:

RIVERBOAT SHUFFLE:

Such sessions have been the hallmarks of every Whitley Bay Classic Jazz Party since before my time — my first was in 2009.  Notice, please, the enchanting mix of expertise and casualness, while great recordings and great performers are evoked, more than imitated.  It’s a wonderful party — now renamed the Mike Durham Classic Jazz Party — and this year’s version begins with a jam session by the Union Rhythm Kings, a glorious band, on November 5, and the party goes until November 8, or perhaps the early hours of November 9.

You’ll be more than satisfied.

May your happiness increase!

JANICE DAY IS OPTIMISTIC AND RIGHTLY SO

And in a few seconds more than three minutes — the length of a 78 — she makes us all feel more optimistic.  Janice can affect us in many ways, but at her core is a gentle winsomeness, which comes through so easily here.

This performance of LAUGHING AT LIFE — at its 1930 tempo — comes from the 2014 Whitley Bay Classic Jazz Party, and Janice’s accompanists are Keith Nichols, piano; Menno Daams, cornet; Graham Hughes, trombone; Mauro Porro, reeds; Martin Wheatley, guitar /banjo; Malcolm Sked, bass; Emma Fisk, violin; Richard Pite, drums:

“Why not grin?” indeed.  We have Janice Day and Her Gang to inspire us.  And this November, there will be another Party — celebrating a quarter-century of the best hot music, November 6-8, 2015.

May your happiness increase!

DON’T GET MAD, GET HOT! CLAUS JACOBI, MORTEN GUNNAR LARSEN, MAURO PORRO, ANDY SCHUMM SPATS LANGHAM, JOSH DUFFEE, PHIL RUTHERFORD, ALISTAIR ALLAN at the WHITLEY BAY CLASSIC JAZZ PARTY (Nov. 8, 2014)

At the 2014 Whitley Bay Classic Jazz Party, someone titled this band and this set “The Freshmen,” but it’s clear the players were well beyond post-doctoral studies. Claus Jacobi, Mauro Porro, reeds; Alistair Allan, trombone; Andy Schumm, cornet; Morten Gunnar Larsen, piano; Spats Langham, banjo; Phil Rutherford, bass; Josh Duffee, drums.

First, two from the collaboration of the New Orleans Rhythm Kings and Jelly Roll Morton:

MAD:

MILENBERG JOYS:

And from the Wolverines book —

SUSIE (she was from the Islands, if I recall.  Which ones?):

LAZY DADDY:

If you feel like visiting the real thing in its native element, I can’t urge you too much to investigate an actual pilgrimage to the Mike Durham Classic Jazz Party which will happen Nov. 6-8, 2015.  I know from past experience that tickets and seats are quickly getting snapped up.  And it’s never to early to make plans to get hot.

Before the band starts MILENBERG JOYS, Claus asks, gently, “Wonderful, isn’t it?”  I would change the question to an affirmation.

May your happiness increase!

THE JOHNNY DODDS JUBILEE, PART TWO at the WHITLEY BAY CLASSIC JAZZ PARTY (Nov. 8, 2014)

This is the final portion of an ecstatic set of music devoted to the clarinet master Johnny Dodds — as created on November 8, 2014, at the Whitley Bay Classic Jazz Party.  The participants: Thomas Winteler, Matthias Seuffert, Claus Jacobi, reeds; Rico Tomasso, cornet; Emma Fisk, violin; Martin Litton, piano; Malcolm Sked, string bass; Martin Wheatley, Spats Langham, Jacob Ullberger, banjo; Nick Ball, washboard.  The other postings from this set can be found here and here.

MELANCHOLY (featuring Martin Litton, piano; Claus Jacobi, reeds, Matthias Seuffert, clarinet; Malcolm Sked, bass; Thomas Winteler, clarinet; Rico Tomasso, cornet; Martin Wheatley, banjo):

MY BABY (add Nick Ball*, washboard; Spats Langham, banjo, replaces Martin Wheatley):

HEN PARTY BLUES (add Emma Fisk, violin):

MEMPHIS SHAKE (as HEN PARTY):

Frank Melrose’s FORTY AND TIGHT (tout ensemble, posted once, but it should be posted evermore):

These hot ecstasies have been a hallmark of the Whitley Bay Classic Jazz Party for decades; now renamed the Mike Durham Classic Jazz Party in honor of its beloved founder. This year it will be held from November 6-8, and it will be delightful.  (*If you want to know my feelings about being there, you have only to watch Nick’s face — joy and surprise tumbling on one another constantly.)

May your happiness increase!

ALTHOUGH IT IS HIS BIRTHDAY, ENRICO TOMASSO GIVES US A PRESENT (Nov. 8, 2014)

As a child, Enrico (“Rico”) Tomasso was full of music, a young member of the family band, someone whose epiphany through Louis Armstrong was a life-changing experience — a lightning-stroke of joy.

He had the immense good fortune to play his trumpet for Louis when the great man visited Britain.  Louis was enthralled by young Rico, and they remained dear friends.

When I first heard Rico at the Whitley Bay Classic Jazz Party, I was moved to happy tears, and when I caught up with him later, I beamed at him and said, “The spirit of Louis shines through you,” words that pleased him.

A day ago Rico celebrated a birthday, but he is the kind of fellow who doesn’t stand with his hand out for his gift.  Rather, he is a generous giver all the time  — so here is his tribute to Louis and my tribute to both of them.  It is a glorious evocation.  Look carefully behind and to the right of Rico, and you will see Duke Heitger, who knows his Louis deeply, smiling and nodding while Rico plays and sings.

The ensemble behind our man is Menno Daams, Duke Heitger, Kristoffer Kompen, Lars Frank, Claus Jacobi, Matthias Seuffert, Keith Nichols, Spats Langham, Emma Fisk, Malcolm Sked, Richard Pite, and other luminaries, including Josh Duffee as entering master of ceremonies.

Happy birthday, dear Rico.  Thank you for being born.  We’re always in the market for you.

And Mister Tomasso will again be gracing the Mike Durham Classic Jazz Party in November 2015!

May your happiness increase!

THE JOHNNY DODDS JUBILEE, PART ONE: WHITLEY BAY CLASSIC JAZZ PARTY (November 8, 2014)

This was a truly delightful set, balancing neatly between uproarious riot and precise tribute, where the participants paid tribute to New Orleans / Chicago clarinetist Johnny Dodds by evoking some of his less famous recordings.  Those expert participants were Claus Jacobi, reeds; Matthias Seuffert and Thomas Winteler, clarinet; Rico Tomasso, cornet; Martin Litton, piano; Spats Langham, Jacob Ullberger, Martin Wheatley, banjo; Malcolm Sked, bass; Nicholas Ball, washboard. (That’s the collective personnel: you’ll see / hear who is playing on each number.)

Here’s the first part, as captured at the Whitley Bay Classic Jazz Party on November 8, 2014.

I note with pleasure how happy the musicians look — and that’s no stage joke. The most accurate emotional barometer on this little stage is the visage of one Nick Ball, percussionist supreme: he looks as if he’s going to explode with rhythmic joy.  You can imagine how happy I was from behind my camera.

IDLE HOUR SPECIAL (with an unexpected cameo by a t-shirted jazz fan at 4:00, who momentarily blocked the view but thankfully not the sound — I knew he was a “jazz fan” because it was written on his shirt, thus saving me the need to speculate):

ORIENTAL MAN:

39TH AND DEARBORN:

CARPET ALLEY BREAKDOWN:

More to come.  And you might want to investigate this year’s Mike Durham Classic Jazz Party.  It’s a place where such things happen — beautifully — throughout a long weekend.

May your happiness increase!

 

 

 

HOTTER THAN THE DEVIL’S KITCHEN: DAVID BOEDDINGHAUS and his BOYS at the WHITLEY BAY CLASSIC JAZZ PARTY: ANDY SCHUMM, KRISTOFFER KOMPEN, MAURO PORRO, SPATS LANGHAM, MALCOLM SKED, JOSH DUFFEE, MATTHIAS SEUFFERT (November 8, 2014)

David Boeddinghaus is a superb pianist and arranger, but I’ve never had the pleasure of watching him time-travel back to the Twenties in ways exuberant and exact.  Here he is at the 2014 Whitley Bay Classic Jazz Party, with Andy Schumm, cornet; Kristoffer Kompen, trombone; Mauro Porro, Matthias Seuffert [only on SHE’S CRYING FOR ME], reeds; Spats Langham, banjo; Malcolm Sked, brass bass; Josh Duffee, drums.

SHE’S CRYING FOR ME:

FIREWORKS (harking back to the Original Memphis Five, not Louis and Earl):

A JAZZ HOLIDAY:

FRESHMAN HOP (all hail Jack Pettis!):

WALKIN’ THE DOG (in honor of Carmichael’s Collegians):

What fine hot music they make.  And there’s more to come in November 2015 at

the Mike Durham Classic Jazz Party.

May your happiness increase!

RICO and his RUG-CUTTERS! (WHITLEY BAY CLASSIC JAZZ PARTY, Nov. 8, 2014)

One of the many highlights of the 2014 Whitley Bay Classic Jazz Party was a “Duke’s Men” set led by trumpeter / vocalist Rico Tomasso — where he beautifully evoked the recordings made by small Ellington units in the Thirties.

We heard music from the Jazzopators (Barney Bigard), the Fifty-Second Street Stompers (Rex Stewart), the Rug-Cutters (Cootie Williams), as well as compositions associated with Johnny Hodges, Sonny Greer, Juan Tizol.

One of the first things I did when I came back from Whitley Bay was to post Rico’s AIN’T THE GRAVY GOOD? — which has received some of the attention it deserves.  But a number of people, both musicians and fans, have asked, “Is there any more from Rico’s small-band Ellington set?” and I am happy to oblige here by presenting the entire set as it happened.

The band Rico assembled is David Boeddinghaus, piano; Malcolm Sked, bass; Henri Lemaire, guitar; Richard Pite, drums; Alistair Allan, trombone; Matthias Seuffert, Claus Jacobi, reeds.

KRUM ELBOW BLUES and DROP ME OFF IN HARLEM:

(For more about “Krum Elbow,” although the evidence is complex, click here.)

JEEP’S BLUES:

BIG HOUSE BLUES:

DRUMMER’S DELIGHT:

PRELUDE TO A KISS:

CARAVAN:

AIN’T THE GRAVY GOOD?:

FROLIC SAM:

The gravy is good!  I know there will be more delicious music this coming November 6-8 at the Mike Durham Classic Jazz Party.  (The new name is an appropriate tribute to its beloved founder: the music and the guiding principles remain unchanged so, and that’s a good thing.)

May your happiness increase!