"Morning Dove Blues" by Sippie Wallace is a perfect work of art. Every detail is just right, and each works to heighten the emotional affect of the song: Wallace's strong voice, with its pleasing Texas accent, the rich piano accompaniment by her nephew, Hersal Thomas, and the simple, well-chosen fills provided by King Oliver on cornet. It's all just perfect.
And the amazing thing is that nobody involved, from the musicians to the Okeh record company officials who set up the date in 1925, had any thoughts of creating a work of art. Yes, they wanted to make a quality product, but product it was - designed to fill the demand for "race" records. It took record companies until 1920 to realize that African-Americans would buy records, wanted to buy records, if the recording industry would give them something they liked. For the next nine years, until the depression all but wiped out the record business, the companies threw an astonishing variety of black music into the marketplace, with no idea what would sell. Much forgettable music resulted, but they also recorded, almost in spite of themselves, some masterpieces like this one.
Some of Sippie's records sold pretty well, but "Morning Dove Blues" apparently didn't - not many copies have survived, and all the LP and CD issues I've heard have lots of surface noise competing with the music. For those with ears to hear, though, it doesn't matter. 84 years after this performance was recorded, I'm able to hear Sippie sing "Early in the morning, I rise like a mourning dove...." King Oliver answers her with his muted cornet, and my heart constricts. Art in spite of itself.
Saturday, May 23, 2009
Monday, May 18, 2009
Gil Evans and the Magic Moment
I discovered two of my heroes, Steve Lacy and Gil Evans, at one fell swoop at age 18 when I bought a reissue of Gil's first album as leader, Gil Evans & Ten. I've loved Gil's music ever since, from the highly detailed charts he created for Miles Davis in the late fifties and early sixties, to the loose, improvising big band he had late in his career. Evans had many strengths, but one of them was the knack for creating the magic moment that would lift the music to another plane.
Gil spoke on several occasions about his debt to Louis Armstrong. In a 1986 interview with Ben Sidran, he said, "I bought every one of his records from 1927 till around 1936.... In every one of those three-minute records, there's a magic moment somewhere. Every one of them." And he's right. No matter how lame the song, how clunky the rhythm section, how corny the arrangement, Louis was always able to lift it to another level, even if only for a moment.
Gil apparently learned this lesson well. Of course, many of his great recordings don't need the magic moment, because they are incredible from beginning to end. But when they weren't, Gil could make something magical happen. An unlikely example is the main title theme from the movie The Color of Money. I don't know how much Evans contributed to this film's music (his name is barely to be found on the soundtrack album), but the exact moment he took over the arranging of the main title is apparent. 45 seconds in, the trendy (mid-1980's style), ordinary music we have heard so far takes a darker turn. The real magic moment comes about 10 seconds later, when an ominous bass clarinet riff, a trombone lip trill, and a tightly muted trumpet solo occur simultaneously. It's an unexpected combination of sounds that only someone of Evans' genius could have conceived.
Often, especially in later years, the magic moment manifested itself by Evans simply knowing which soloist to point to. Listen to "Half Man, Half Cookie," from Bud & Bird from 1986. This comes from the period in which Evans' band played at Sweet Basil every Monday night. He encouraged his band members to contribute to the book, so that they would have plenty of different material to play. Saxophonist Bill Evans wrote "Half Man, Half Cookie," a big-band funk piece that is competent rather than outstanding. That is, until guest star Johnny Coles, an Evans associate for years, steps up to solo about two-thirds of the way through the piece. The atmosphere instantly changes, becomes more mysterious and unpredictable. Coles, of course, deserves much of the credit for raising the musical level, but Evans chose to have him on hand and knew just when to add him to the mix.
Like I said, most of Gil Evans' music was all magic. But when it wasn't, he could make that magic moment happen.
Gil spoke on several occasions about his debt to Louis Armstrong. In a 1986 interview with Ben Sidran, he said, "I bought every one of his records from 1927 till around 1936.... In every one of those three-minute records, there's a magic moment somewhere. Every one of them." And he's right. No matter how lame the song, how clunky the rhythm section, how corny the arrangement, Louis was always able to lift it to another level, even if only for a moment.
Gil apparently learned this lesson well. Of course, many of his great recordings don't need the magic moment, because they are incredible from beginning to end. But when they weren't, Gil could make something magical happen. An unlikely example is the main title theme from the movie The Color of Money. I don't know how much Evans contributed to this film's music (his name is barely to be found on the soundtrack album), but the exact moment he took over the arranging of the main title is apparent. 45 seconds in, the trendy (mid-1980's style), ordinary music we have heard so far takes a darker turn. The real magic moment comes about 10 seconds later, when an ominous bass clarinet riff, a trombone lip trill, and a tightly muted trumpet solo occur simultaneously. It's an unexpected combination of sounds that only someone of Evans' genius could have conceived.
Often, especially in later years, the magic moment manifested itself by Evans simply knowing which soloist to point to. Listen to "Half Man, Half Cookie," from Bud & Bird from 1986. This comes from the period in which Evans' band played at Sweet Basil every Monday night. He encouraged his band members to contribute to the book, so that they would have plenty of different material to play. Saxophonist Bill Evans wrote "Half Man, Half Cookie," a big-band funk piece that is competent rather than outstanding. That is, until guest star Johnny Coles, an Evans associate for years, steps up to solo about two-thirds of the way through the piece. The atmosphere instantly changes, becomes more mysterious and unpredictable. Coles, of course, deserves much of the credit for raising the musical level, but Evans chose to have him on hand and knew just when to add him to the mix.
Like I said, most of Gil Evans' music was all magic. But when it wasn't, he could make that magic moment happen.
Saturday, April 25, 2009
CT
Cecil Taylor, I have read, is ill and has canceled a concert tour. Here's hoping he has a speedy recovery. And without wishing to be morbid, I decided that now would be a good time to write something about this great musician, who is 80 years old; I don't particularly want to write a memorial piece about him, and I hope this doesn't turn out to be one.
I'm not sure if I remember the first what the first Cecil Taylor music I heard was. It may have been Indent, a protean solo piano piece from the early seventies. I picked up that album in a junk store, and I remember being awestruck with Taylor's ability to improvise atonally at such length, with such intensity, and with such logic. The music made sense to me right away, even if I didn't (and still don't) always understand the principles that guide the construction of CT's music.
And it's obvious that the music is carefully constructed, even when it's mostly improvised. Taylor has made it clear over the years that he considers the idea of "composing" music in the western sense to be a highly dubious concept. But at the same time, his music hangs together in a compositional way - he seems to control the predetermined and spontaneous elements of his music in such a way that they form a unified whole. I feel this, even if I am not always able to look back at a Taylor piece when it is over and describe how that compositional unity was achieved. And others who have attempted to analyze CT's music have made similar observations. There's a wholeness to his music, and a mystery as to how that wholeness is achieved.
I have been lucky enough to hear Cecil Taylor perform only once, when he presented a solo concert in Atlanta in 1986. Taylor is also a trained dancer, and he began the concert, as he often does, with a series of ritualistic movements that slowly brought him from the wings to the piano bench. (He has said that "you don't just walk up to a piano.") At the same time, he intoned words and phrases, sounds and poetry; some of these vocalizations were intelligible and some were not. When he reached the keyboard, he began playing fairly sparely, but the music quickly increased in intensity and complexity. After about five minutes of atonal piano fireworks, large parts of the audience gave up and started leaving in droves. The rest of us were enthralled.
Listening to the recorded music of Cecil Taylor presents certain challenges. It's intense, the pieces are usually quite long, and the recordings are often hard to find. His two mid-sixties Blue Note albums (Unit Structures and Conquistador) are usually easy to find and are excellent representations of Taylor's music. They both feature his longtime musical partner, alto saxophonist Jimmy Lyons, and no piece on them is over 20 minutes long. Other Cecil Taylor recordings may feature one piece which lasts for an hour or two, spread over a couple of CDs or several LPs. Listening to these obviously requires an investment of time and concentration, which, however, is always rewarded.
It has struck me that the titles of Taylor's pieces can be seen as little poems, as mysterious as the music itself: "Air Above Mountains (Buildings Within)," "With (Exit)," "It is in the Brewing Luminous." The title which keeps coming to my mind, given the state of Taylor's health, is "One Too Many Salty Swift and Not Goodbye."
I'm not sure if I remember the first what the first Cecil Taylor music I heard was. It may have been Indent, a protean solo piano piece from the early seventies. I picked up that album in a junk store, and I remember being awestruck with Taylor's ability to improvise atonally at such length, with such intensity, and with such logic. The music made sense to me right away, even if I didn't (and still don't) always understand the principles that guide the construction of CT's music.
And it's obvious that the music is carefully constructed, even when it's mostly improvised. Taylor has made it clear over the years that he considers the idea of "composing" music in the western sense to be a highly dubious concept. But at the same time, his music hangs together in a compositional way - he seems to control the predetermined and spontaneous elements of his music in such a way that they form a unified whole. I feel this, even if I am not always able to look back at a Taylor piece when it is over and describe how that compositional unity was achieved. And others who have attempted to analyze CT's music have made similar observations. There's a wholeness to his music, and a mystery as to how that wholeness is achieved.
I have been lucky enough to hear Cecil Taylor perform only once, when he presented a solo concert in Atlanta in 1986. Taylor is also a trained dancer, and he began the concert, as he often does, with a series of ritualistic movements that slowly brought him from the wings to the piano bench. (He has said that "you don't just walk up to a piano.") At the same time, he intoned words and phrases, sounds and poetry; some of these vocalizations were intelligible and some were not. When he reached the keyboard, he began playing fairly sparely, but the music quickly increased in intensity and complexity. After about five minutes of atonal piano fireworks, large parts of the audience gave up and started leaving in droves. The rest of us were enthralled.
Listening to the recorded music of Cecil Taylor presents certain challenges. It's intense, the pieces are usually quite long, and the recordings are often hard to find. His two mid-sixties Blue Note albums (Unit Structures and Conquistador) are usually easy to find and are excellent representations of Taylor's music. They both feature his longtime musical partner, alto saxophonist Jimmy Lyons, and no piece on them is over 20 minutes long. Other Cecil Taylor recordings may feature one piece which lasts for an hour or two, spread over a couple of CDs or several LPs. Listening to these obviously requires an investment of time and concentration, which, however, is always rewarded.
It has struck me that the titles of Taylor's pieces can be seen as little poems, as mysterious as the music itself: "Air Above Mountains (Buildings Within)," "With (Exit)," "It is in the Brewing Luminous." The title which keeps coming to my mind, given the state of Taylor's health, is "One Too Many Salty Swift and Not Goodbye."
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
Matt Perrine
New Orleans is full of incredible musicians who are hardly known outside the Crescent City. One of these remarkable musicians is bassist/sousaphone player Matt Perrine. With all due respect to Kirk Joseph, etc., Perrine is my favorite New Orleans tuba player, and with all due respect to James Singleton, etc., he is my favorite NOLA acoustic bassist – I try to hear him play every time I visit the city. On my recent trip (only four days long) to New Orleans, I heard Perrine play three times. That seems about right. Perrine plays regularly with several different bands and always seems to be playing somewhere with somebody. He is a member of the Tom McDermott/Evan Christopher Danza Quartet, the New Orleans Nightcrawlers brass band, Bonerama, and the Tin Men, which of course is “New Orleans' premiere guitar/tuba/washboard trio.” As busy as he is, Perrine doesn’t seem inclined to coast - whoever he’s playing with, and whatever kind of music they’re playing, Perrine's playing is imaginative and fully involved.
About a year ago I picked up the first CD under his name, Sunflower City. The cover actually put me off for a minute – it’s features a close-up photo of a large sunflower. I thought, “Great – this is just good-time happy music.” But then I looked at the picture again, and saw that in the background, to the right of the flower, you can see an “X” and some numbers painted on the front of a house. This, of course, is the code sign used by the search and rescue teams after Katrina; the “X” shows that the house was searched, and the numbers indicate how many living people, bodies, and pets were found in the house. Perrine has explained in interviews that sunflowers were the first wild plants to grow in post-Katrina New Orleans. It’s a great cover, symbolizing rebirth and renewal after disaster.
The music is, for the most part, joyous rather than happy, if that distinction makes any sense.* There is traditional jazz, straight-ahead jazz, Caribbean music, and even a touch of avant-garde. The opening track is the most elaborate arrangement of the hoary old New Orleans warhorse “Muskrat Ramble” that I’ve ever heard. The instrumentation and color of the track is constantly changing. But it works – it's one of the most enjoyable “Muskrat Rambles” I’ve heard. Perrine plays a stunning solo on this track; the range, technique, and conception of this tuba solo must be heard to be believed. I played it for a friend who is a low brass specialist, and he was convinced that it must have been played on a higher, four-valve tuba in E flat or F. He actually wrote Perrine to ask; MP confirmed that it was played, as were all of his tuba parts, on a standard double B flat sousaphone.
I definitely recommend hearing on of Matt Perrine’s bands when visiting New Orleans. He shouldn’t be hard to find.
*To me, “happy music” is mindless music. Much New Orleans music, however, is full of the joy of life, but seems to have an underlying awareness of how short that life is.
About a year ago I picked up the first CD under his name, Sunflower City. The cover actually put me off for a minute – it’s features a close-up photo of a large sunflower. I thought, “Great – this is just good-time happy music.” But then I looked at the picture again, and saw that in the background, to the right of the flower, you can see an “X” and some numbers painted on the front of a house. This, of course, is the code sign used by the search and rescue teams after Katrina; the “X” shows that the house was searched, and the numbers indicate how many living people, bodies, and pets were found in the house. Perrine has explained in interviews that sunflowers were the first wild plants to grow in post-Katrina New Orleans. It’s a great cover, symbolizing rebirth and renewal after disaster.
The music is, for the most part, joyous rather than happy, if that distinction makes any sense.* There is traditional jazz, straight-ahead jazz, Caribbean music, and even a touch of avant-garde. The opening track is the most elaborate arrangement of the hoary old New Orleans warhorse “Muskrat Ramble” that I’ve ever heard. The instrumentation and color of the track is constantly changing. But it works – it's one of the most enjoyable “Muskrat Rambles” I’ve heard. Perrine plays a stunning solo on this track; the range, technique, and conception of this tuba solo must be heard to be believed. I played it for a friend who is a low brass specialist, and he was convinced that it must have been played on a higher, four-valve tuba in E flat or F. He actually wrote Perrine to ask; MP confirmed that it was played, as were all of his tuba parts, on a standard double B flat sousaphone.
I definitely recommend hearing on of Matt Perrine’s bands when visiting New Orleans. He shouldn’t be hard to find.
*To me, “happy music” is mindless music. Much New Orleans music, however, is full of the joy of life, but seems to have an underlying awareness of how short that life is.
Monday, March 16, 2009
Fleas Come With the Dog
I have felt kind of out of touch with the rest of the jazz world lately. I’ve been listening to (and writing about) a lot of older jazz – 1940 and earlier. Comments from friends and on my favorite jazz forum have let me know that a lot of folks just don’t relate to the older stuff at all.
Enjoying early jazz has never been a problem for me. Yeah, my first jazz album was a Budd Johnson album which featured a really out-there, avant bass solo by Richard Davis, but after that, I learned about jazz more or less chronologically. My grandmother gave me a stack of 78s, mostly pre-WWII. And the first jazz album I ever bought was a collection of Bix Beiderbecke’s 1924 recordings. I liked some tracks better than others, but I responded to the music right away. I knew Louis Armstrong’s Hot Five before I knew the Miles Davis Quintet, Coleman Hawkins before I knew Ornette Coleman, and Sidney Bechet before I knew John Coltrane.
Anyone who loves early jazz knows that fleas come with the dog; you have to put up with a lot in order to enjoy the music. For some people, just the sound of the music prevents them from enjoying it – it just sounds like “old folks’ music” to them. To them I would say: keep listening; get past the surface into the substance of the music. It’s not exactly like learning a new language, but maybe it’s like becoming familiar with a different dialect – once it no longer sounds “funny” you can start to hear what the musicians are really saying.
And the quality of the recordings themselves can be pretty grim. Before 1925, everything was recorded acoustically – the music was played into horns, which had tubes leading to membranes which vibrated the recording needle. You can imagine how little of the music actually made it to the records. Even after microphones were common in recording studios, the music was still recorded onto wax or acetate discs instead of tape until after World War II, so there was plenty of surface noise, and frequency response was limited.
Then there are the strictly musical issues. If you want to listen to the great improvised solos of the 1920's, 1930's, and before, you're going to have to put up with lame sidemen, clunky rhythm sections, sappy arrangements, and (worst of all), incredibly bad vocals. The best (worst) example of this is "Sweet Sue," by Paul Whiteman and his orchestra. This 1928 recording contains one of Bix Beiderbecke's greatest recorded solos near the end, but before that... well, allow me to quote from myself, from my blog entry on Beiderbecke:
It is an act of faith to listen to this recording. The first three and a half minutes of this portentous and pretentious arrangement are so bad that it's hard to believe that anything could be worth enduring them. Jack Fulton's singing is like nothing you're ever heard, and like nothing you'll ever want to hear again. But if you make it through all that, there is a magnificent 32-bar Bix solo that floats and dances over the rhythm section. It's one of the most "modern" and imaginative things he ever played.
It could be argued that Bix, along with Louis Armstrong and some of the other giants, seldom or never recorded with adequate musicians. In Louis’ case, how could it be otherwise? He was head and shoulders above almost everyone else in jazz. Johnny Dodds and Kid Ory, from the early Hot Five sessions, are fine early jazzers. But they’re just not on the same page as Louis – he was a few chapters ahead.
I’ve also always sensed the connections between jazz from different eras. Baby Dodds, Big Sid Catlett, and Philly Joe Jones don’t sound very much alike, but they were all trying to do a lot of the same things: keep the music moving forward, inspire the soloists, change the color of the music. And I’ve said before that I never liked the old-time New Orleans trumpeter Kid Thomas Valentine until I heard Lester Bowie – they were doing a lot of the same things. To me early jazz and contemporary jazz are two points on a continuous line, and I like them equally well.
So, fleas come with the dog. Many early jazz classics are mixed bags – the sublime and the painful are side by side. If cut yourself off from those classics, though, you’ll miss out on some incredible music. And those who ignore the past will be unable to repeat the cool parts.
Enjoying early jazz has never been a problem for me. Yeah, my first jazz album was a Budd Johnson album which featured a really out-there, avant bass solo by Richard Davis, but after that, I learned about jazz more or less chronologically. My grandmother gave me a stack of 78s, mostly pre-WWII. And the first jazz album I ever bought was a collection of Bix Beiderbecke’s 1924 recordings. I liked some tracks better than others, but I responded to the music right away. I knew Louis Armstrong’s Hot Five before I knew the Miles Davis Quintet, Coleman Hawkins before I knew Ornette Coleman, and Sidney Bechet before I knew John Coltrane.
Anyone who loves early jazz knows that fleas come with the dog; you have to put up with a lot in order to enjoy the music. For some people, just the sound of the music prevents them from enjoying it – it just sounds like “old folks’ music” to them. To them I would say: keep listening; get past the surface into the substance of the music. It’s not exactly like learning a new language, but maybe it’s like becoming familiar with a different dialect – once it no longer sounds “funny” you can start to hear what the musicians are really saying.
And the quality of the recordings themselves can be pretty grim. Before 1925, everything was recorded acoustically – the music was played into horns, which had tubes leading to membranes which vibrated the recording needle. You can imagine how little of the music actually made it to the records. Even after microphones were common in recording studios, the music was still recorded onto wax or acetate discs instead of tape until after World War II, so there was plenty of surface noise, and frequency response was limited.
Then there are the strictly musical issues. If you want to listen to the great improvised solos of the 1920's, 1930's, and before, you're going to have to put up with lame sidemen, clunky rhythm sections, sappy arrangements, and (worst of all), incredibly bad vocals. The best (worst) example of this is "Sweet Sue," by Paul Whiteman and his orchestra. This 1928 recording contains one of Bix Beiderbecke's greatest recorded solos near the end, but before that... well, allow me to quote from myself, from my blog entry on Beiderbecke:
It is an act of faith to listen to this recording. The first three and a half minutes of this portentous and pretentious arrangement are so bad that it's hard to believe that anything could be worth enduring them. Jack Fulton's singing is like nothing you're ever heard, and like nothing you'll ever want to hear again. But if you make it through all that, there is a magnificent 32-bar Bix solo that floats and dances over the rhythm section. It's one of the most "modern" and imaginative things he ever played.
It could be argued that Bix, along with Louis Armstrong and some of the other giants, seldom or never recorded with adequate musicians. In Louis’ case, how could it be otherwise? He was head and shoulders above almost everyone else in jazz. Johnny Dodds and Kid Ory, from the early Hot Five sessions, are fine early jazzers. But they’re just not on the same page as Louis – he was a few chapters ahead.
I’ve also always sensed the connections between jazz from different eras. Baby Dodds, Big Sid Catlett, and Philly Joe Jones don’t sound very much alike, but they were all trying to do a lot of the same things: keep the music moving forward, inspire the soloists, change the color of the music. And I’ve said before that I never liked the old-time New Orleans trumpeter Kid Thomas Valentine until I heard Lester Bowie – they were doing a lot of the same things. To me early jazz and contemporary jazz are two points on a continuous line, and I like them equally well.
So, fleas come with the dog. Many early jazz classics are mixed bags – the sublime and the painful are side by side. If cut yourself off from those classics, though, you’ll miss out on some incredible music. And those who ignore the past will be unable to repeat the cool parts.
Thursday, March 12, 2009
A Hipper-Than-Thou Geek and Willie Lewis
Sometimes I worry a little about the tone of this blog, or the way people might take it: “Oh, great – another post about an obscure musician. What an annoying, hipper-than-thou geek!” Well, that’s not my intention – I write about what I’m interested in, but I am a geek. From the time I discovered jazz at the age of 15, I’ve wanted to know it all: all the history, all the musicians, and to understand how it all fits together. I remember (I was about 20) reading about pianist Elmo Hope, and thinking, “Great – I just got a grasp on Bud Powell, Al Haig, and Dodo Marmarosa, and now I’ve got to check out Elmo Hope. Does it ever end?”
No, it doesn’t, and that’s the cool thing about exploring jazz – new discoveries are always waiting just around the corner, even for an old dude like me who has been listening to and reading about jazz for 35 years. I recently picked up an LP of mid-thirties recordings by Willie Lewis and His Entertainers. I listened to it for the first time last night, and my reaction was, “Jesus, this is incredible!” How could I have never heard this music before now?
Well, at least I was aware of this stuff before, mostly from articles about Benny Carter, who plays and arranges on one of the sessions. But Lewis, although African-American, was based in Paris and recorded for French labels, so he has remained obscure. I remember seeing a reissue album of his stuff back in the 70’s, but didn’t pay attention at the time. The album I have is on the French Pathe label. I poked around Amazon and the Red Hot Jazz Archive a little, and Lewis’s mid-thirties material doesn’t seem to be available at all at the moment.
But this music knocked me out – not so much for originality or quality of the arrangements (they’re pretty pedestrian, except for those Carter did), but because of the spirit of the band and the incredible soloists. Carter’s alto playing is superb, as usual, but he also contributes several trumpet solos which are just stunning, considering that trumpet was probably his third instrument, after alto and clarinet. And his excellent arranging features those delicious saxophone soli passages that he was famous for.
Carter was only around for one session (six tunes), but the rest of the tracks feature Bill Coleman on trumpet and two excellent, although almost forgotten musicians: New Orleans reedman Frank “Big Boy” Goudie and pianist Herman Chittison. Just as these tracks convinced me that Carter was really a trumpet player (as opposed to a dabbler), they put me on notice that Bill Coleman was one of the greats. Why didn’t I realize that before? Goudie and Chittison deserve to be better remembered, but from what I could tell, they also spent most of their careers in Europe, so they were pretty much forgotten here.
I would say to check out Willie Lewis and His Entertainers, but I’m not sure how you’re going to be able to. Damn! There’s so much incredible music out there.
No, it doesn’t, and that’s the cool thing about exploring jazz – new discoveries are always waiting just around the corner, even for an old dude like me who has been listening to and reading about jazz for 35 years. I recently picked up an LP of mid-thirties recordings by Willie Lewis and His Entertainers. I listened to it for the first time last night, and my reaction was, “Jesus, this is incredible!” How could I have never heard this music before now?
Well, at least I was aware of this stuff before, mostly from articles about Benny Carter, who plays and arranges on one of the sessions. But Lewis, although African-American, was based in Paris and recorded for French labels, so he has remained obscure. I remember seeing a reissue album of his stuff back in the 70’s, but didn’t pay attention at the time. The album I have is on the French Pathe label. I poked around Amazon and the Red Hot Jazz Archive a little, and Lewis’s mid-thirties material doesn’t seem to be available at all at the moment.
But this music knocked me out – not so much for originality or quality of the arrangements (they’re pretty pedestrian, except for those Carter did), but because of the spirit of the band and the incredible soloists. Carter’s alto playing is superb, as usual, but he also contributes several trumpet solos which are just stunning, considering that trumpet was probably his third instrument, after alto and clarinet. And his excellent arranging features those delicious saxophone soli passages that he was famous for.
Carter was only around for one session (six tunes), but the rest of the tracks feature Bill Coleman on trumpet and two excellent, although almost forgotten musicians: New Orleans reedman Frank “Big Boy” Goudie and pianist Herman Chittison. Just as these tracks convinced me that Carter was really a trumpet player (as opposed to a dabbler), they put me on notice that Bill Coleman was one of the greats. Why didn’t I realize that before? Goudie and Chittison deserve to be better remembered, but from what I could tell, they also spent most of their careers in Europe, so they were pretty much forgotten here.
I would say to check out Willie Lewis and His Entertainers, but I’m not sure how you’re going to be able to. Damn! There’s so much incredible music out there.
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
Don, John, and the Cotton Pickers
In the last few days, I've listened to all the recordings I have by McKinney's Cotton Pickers, the great band with the unfortunate name. Anyone with a taste for early jazz should check out this band, if you don't already know them. The Cotton Pickers were one of the great early big bands, and in their brief heyday could almost rival Fletcher Henderson's band. But jeez, that name!
William McKinney, a drummer, had a little Midwestern jazz band in the early 1920's called the Synco Jazz Band. It grew into a full-size big band for the time (11 pieces), based out of Detroit. There they were heard by Jean Goldkette, a (white) big band impessario of the the time. He signed a management contract with the band, changed the name (Dan Morgenstern has written, with some understatement, that the new name was "not well received by the band members"), and got them a recording contract with Victor records.
The records, made between 1928 and 1931, sound great today. The band swung hard for the late twenties and featured a four-piece saxophone section, as opposed to the then-standard trio of reeds. Don Redman, who had been writing most of Henderson's charts, was music director of the band and did about half of the arrangements, while John Nesbitt, almost forgotten today, wrote most of the rest. The work of both men sounds very modern for the time, with lots of tricky rhythmic displacement and full, imaginative harmonies. Redman knew how to rehearse a band, and the ensemble work was tight and impressive.
What the Cotton Pickers didn't have was a set of great soloists, although it could be argued that trombonist Claude Jones achieved greatness during his tenure with the band.* Jones, Redman (on alto sax and clarinet), Nesbitt (on trumpet), and Prince Robinson on tenor and clarinet were the main soloists; they were usually adequate rather than inspired. To counter this weakness, Redman arranged three days of recording in November, 1929 with some of the band replaced by the cream of the New York City's jazz talent: Coleman Hawkins, Fats Waller, Benny Carter, Joe Smith, Kaiser Marshall. Hawkins and Carter came up with some of their best early solos on record - hear Hawkins' frighteningly virtuosic playing on "Plain Dirt." Claude Jones was retained on trombone for this session, and was seemingly inspired - his solos had always been good, but here his playing is truly distinguished; in solo after solo he creates unusual, original, and very satisfying melodies.
When Redman left to form his own band in 1931, the band was never again the force it had been. Like I said, you've got to have a feel for early big-band jazz to appreciate the music. But in their prime, occasional silly vocals and all, this was one of the great big bands.
*By the way, the underrated Jones is one of my very favorite jazz trombonists; in my opinion he is the equal of better known players of the time like J.C. Higginbotham and Benny Morton.
William McKinney, a drummer, had a little Midwestern jazz band in the early 1920's called the Synco Jazz Band. It grew into a full-size big band for the time (11 pieces), based out of Detroit. There they were heard by Jean Goldkette, a (white) big band impessario of the the time. He signed a management contract with the band, changed the name (Dan Morgenstern has written, with some understatement, that the new name was "not well received by the band members"), and got them a recording contract with Victor records.
The records, made between 1928 and 1931, sound great today. The band swung hard for the late twenties and featured a four-piece saxophone section, as opposed to the then-standard trio of reeds. Don Redman, who had been writing most of Henderson's charts, was music director of the band and did about half of the arrangements, while John Nesbitt, almost forgotten today, wrote most of the rest. The work of both men sounds very modern for the time, with lots of tricky rhythmic displacement and full, imaginative harmonies. Redman knew how to rehearse a band, and the ensemble work was tight and impressive.
What the Cotton Pickers didn't have was a set of great soloists, although it could be argued that trombonist Claude Jones achieved greatness during his tenure with the band.* Jones, Redman (on alto sax and clarinet), Nesbitt (on trumpet), and Prince Robinson on tenor and clarinet were the main soloists; they were usually adequate rather than inspired. To counter this weakness, Redman arranged three days of recording in November, 1929 with some of the band replaced by the cream of the New York City's jazz talent: Coleman Hawkins, Fats Waller, Benny Carter, Joe Smith, Kaiser Marshall. Hawkins and Carter came up with some of their best early solos on record - hear Hawkins' frighteningly virtuosic playing on "Plain Dirt." Claude Jones was retained on trombone for this session, and was seemingly inspired - his solos had always been good, but here his playing is truly distinguished; in solo after solo he creates unusual, original, and very satisfying melodies.
When Redman left to form his own band in 1931, the band was never again the force it had been. Like I said, you've got to have a feel for early big-band jazz to appreciate the music. But in their prime, occasional silly vocals and all, this was one of the great big bands.
*By the way, the underrated Jones is one of my very favorite jazz trombonists; in my opinion he is the equal of better known players of the time like J.C. Higginbotham and Benny Morton.
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