It’s thoroughly wet and miserably cold – especially considering it’s meant to be summer – so I’ve been looking around for something to brighten up the evening and chanced upon this piece of traditional jazz which did the trick for me. This is the kind of New Orleans style jazz band my Dad used to play the drums for, and the tune is one I actually learned to play on the clarinet so I could sit in with them once or twice so it brought back quite a few nice memories hearing it just now. It’s based on an interesting 16-bar blues theme (in contrast to the usual 12-bar variety) that was ubiquitous in early jazz, appearing in a number of different tunes. In this particular manifestation it’s called The Girls Go Crazy (About the Way I Walk).
It’s neither a famous band nor a famous recording, but I bet everyone who was there that sunny day last year in San Francisco thoroughly enjoyed the occasion, especially the band!
It’s been a tiring and frustrating day during which I accomplished very little, apart from becoming tired and frustrated. I think I’m going to have an early night, but before doing that I thought I’d share this old record with you. There’s not much information about it on Youtube, but I actually have it on an very battered vinyl LP. The sleevenote doesn’t give the exact date of the recording session, but it was somewhere around the middle of December 1945.
The band is dubbed Slim Gaillard and his Orchestra, but it’s just a seven-piece band. It is, however, notable for the presence on it of two giants of the bebop era, Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie. I thought I’d put it on here primarily because it has such a relaxed atmosphere and is a lot of fun to listen to, as well as providing a fascinating window into this transitional period of American Jazz in which Charlie Parker was the leading figure.
Before 1945 Charlier Parker had worked mainly as a featured soloist in big bands of the swing era, including those of Jay McShann, Earl Hines and Billy Eckstine; after 1945 he almost exclusively performed and recorded in small groups. The year 1945 was also important for two other reasons: it was the first year he was able to record any of his own compositions and it was the first time he was able to record with Dizzy Gillespie in a band made entirely of like-minded musicians, rather than a mixed bag as on this track.
Another quite interesting thing I almost forgot to mention is that this particular 1945 track is – I think – the earliest known recording of Charlie Parker’s voice…
This period also marked the beginning of Parker’s acceptance as an important solo voice by music critics and by the “hipper” sections of the American public. This spreading awareness of his importance is why both he and Dizzy were invited to perform on the West Coast of America, specifically at Billy Berg’s club in Hollywood. It was during a short residency there that Slim’s Jam was recorded.
Apart from Charlie Parker (alto sax) and Dizzy Gillespie (trumpet), the band also contained the relatively unknown swing-era musician Jack Mcvea (tenor sax) as well as young bebop devotee Dodo Marmarosa (piano). The drummer was the great Zutty Singleton, who in fact played on some of the Hot Five recordings with Louis Armstrong in the 1920s, and the bass was “Bam” Brown. Slim Gaillard played guitar on this track as well as doing the intros in characteristic fashion.
Slim Gaillard was a truly remarkable character who led a remarkable life, as his wikipedia page makes clear. He was a talented musician in his own right, but also a wonderful comedian and storyteller. He’s most famous for the novelty jazz acts he formed with musicians such as Slam Stewart and, later, Bam Brown; their stream of consciousness vocals ranged far afield from the original lyrics along with wild interpolations of nonsense syllables such as MacVoutie and O-reeney; one such performance figures in the 1957 novel On the Road by Jack Kerouac. It’s also very much the style of the commentary he adds to this track.
In later life Slim Gaillard travelled a lot in Europe – he could speak 8 languages in addition to English – and spent long periods living in London. He died there, in fact, in 1991, aged 75. I saw him a few times myself when I used to go regularly to Ronnie Scott’s Club. A tall, gangly man with a straggly white beard and wonderful gleam in his eye, he cut an unmistakeable in the bars and streets of Soho. He rarely had to buy himself a drink as he was so well known and such an entertaining fellow that a group always formed around him whenever he went into a pub in order to enjoy his company. You never quite knew what he was going to do next, in fact. I once saw him sit down and play a piano with his palms facing upwards, striking the notes with the backs of his fingers. Other random things worth mentioning are that Slim Gaillard’s daughter was married to Marvin Gaye and it is generally accepted that the word “groovy” was coined by him (Slim). I know it’s a cliché, but he really was a larger-than-life character and a truly remarkable human being.
They don’t make ’em like Slim any more, but you can get a good idea of what a blast he was by listening to this record, which is bound to bring a smile to the most crabbed of faces. But alongside the offbeat humour there’s some terrific playing too. Charlie Parker’s virtuoso blues-inflected choruses and Dizzy Gillespie’s dissonant pyrotechnics form a strong stylistic contrast with Jack McVea’s earlier tenor sax solo which sounds positively old-fashioned by comparison.
Anyway, it’s time for bed-o-voutie so I’ll say goodbye-o-reenie with a little hot cocoa on it. I gotta get up early in the mornin’ myself…
This is something I found recently and couldn’t resist sharing. This track from Ornette Coleman has only been on Youtube a month or so and I just found it last night, but I’ve got it on a vinyl LP I bought about 30 years ago. I think the music is completely wonderful on its own, but the idea of accompanying it with examples of the art of Joan Miro was a brilliant one!
European Echoes was recorded live at the Golden Circle club in Stockholm in 1965, and is part of a famous album that was proclaimed “Record of the Year” the following summer in Downbeat magazine. By the mid-60s Ornette Coleman had already established his reputation as leading light of avant-garde saxophonists and, in his own way, was as great an influence on jazz as Charlie Parker, Sonny Rollins and John Coltrane had been earlier.
The track features a trio of Coleman on alto sax, David Izenzon on bass, and Charles Moffit on bass. It starts in a deceptively simple manner, with Ornette’s little two-note statements over a fast waltzy 3/4 foundation provided by Izenzon and Moffitt. It then eases into a passage marked by freer improvisations by Ornette, the meter changing at the same time to 4/4. Ornette plays for more than half the track, after which Izenzon and Moffitt take over for all but the final minute, at which point Izenzon drops out and Moffitt plays an intricate percussion solo.
Although most people I know recognize the virtuosity of modern jazz musicians they don’t really like the music very much. I fell in love with this track as soon as I heard it, partly because it begins simply enough for a beginning saxophonist to play along with, but also because it’s highly original without being at all self-indulgent. In fact, at one level, everything Ornette Coleman does on this track is quite simple; he plays the saxophone here like he’d just invented the instrument. In fact, at least in his early years, he didn’t have much of a technique at all in the conventional sense but nevertheless managed to produce amazingly fresh sounds. This a view echoed by the great Charles Mingus in quote I got from another blog about Ornette Coleman
Now aside from the fact that I doubt he can even play a C scale in whole notes—tied whole notes, a couple of bars apiece—in tune, the fact remains that his notes and lines are so fresh. So when [the jazz dj] Symphony Sid played his record, it made everything else he was playing, even my own record that he played, sound terrible.
I did learn to enjoy and admire Ornette Coleman’s more “difficult” music later on, but this was the track that convinced me that Ornette Coleman was a genius. I hope to get the time over the summer to write a few more posts in appreciation of my favourite jazz artists, but for the time being I’ll just let this piece speak for itself…
This is a recent discovery I just had to post. It was was made at a private recording session in 1943 in Kansas City, the home town of Charlie Parker. It was never released commercially and features Parker on alto saxophone with just a guitar and drum accompaniment. This recording must have been made during the musicians’ strike of 1942-44 that contributed to the fact the bebop movement (which Parker pioneered) was out of the public eye during its incubation period. Parker had moved to New York City in 1939 and was playing regularly in Harlem jazz clubs during the recording blackout, so I don’t know what he was doing back in Kansas City in 1943 to be making this track.
It’s a fascinating version of the tune calledCherokhee that Parker used as the basis of the bebop classic Ko-ko I discussed in a post last year, and which shows him already playing in a recognizably Parkeresque style, but only hinting at the harmonic adventurousness he was to develop just a year or two later; Ko-ko was first performed, I think, in 1945. Very few examples survive of his playing from this transitional period, so this is a fascinating bit of musical history as well as being a fine performance in its own right.
I couldn’t resist putting up this jaunty duet version of the old Hoagy Carmichael song “Up a Lazy River”, which I first heard over 30 years ago, not only because the (British-born) pianist George Shearing plays so wonderfully on it (listen to his little foray into Harlem Stride around 3.00), but also because it gives me a chance to pay homage to the bass player Brian Torff. Just listen to his solo (starting around 1.55) and you’ll immediately understand why he’s revered amongst jazz musicians for his incredible technique and musical imagination and why so many other double bass players are completely terrified of him!
I’ve had a lot of readers this week, largely down to Anton’s inflammatory guest post about mathematics. In order to return to my normal situation as an idle backwater of the blogosphere I thought I’d do a quick post about something that probably not many people will like (apart from me).
A few weeks ago I stumbled across a short clip on Youtube which intrigued me, so I sent off for the DVD it was taken from. It arrived last week and I’ve watched the whole thing three times since then. In short, I’m captivated. The film in question is a realisation of Arnold Schönberg’s extraordinary work Pierrot Lunaire.
It’s hard to know exactly what to call this. It’s basically a musical setting of a series of poems (by Albert Giraud, but translated into German) so you might be tempted to call it a song cycle. However, it’s not quite that because the words are not exactly sung, but performed in a half-singing half-spoken style called Sprechstimme. Moreover, they’re not really performed in the usual kind of recital, but in a semi-staged setting rather like a cabaret. It’s not really an opera, either, because there’s only one character and it doesn’t really have the element of music drama.
The whole thing only lasts about 40 minutes so the 21 individual pirces are quite short, and they’re arranged as three groups of seven with the narrator Pierrot dealing with different themes in each group. The work was written in 1912 and is his Opus 21, so it’s a relatively early example of Schönberg’s atonal music but before he turned towards full-blown serialism. Atonalism isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but it can (and does in this case) allow a hugely varied orchestral landscape.
I’ve heard this work before, on the radio, and found it very intriguing but then I saw a youtube clip of the film version made in 1997 with Christine Schäfer as Pierrot. This is not a film of a concert or a recital, but an extraordinary visual response to the remarkable music and words. The director, Oliver Hermann, creates a grotesque dreamlike urban setting through which Pierrot wanders like a ghost, with emotions alternating between desperate alienation and amused reflection. I think music and film together create a wonderful work of art, which has gone right to the top of my list of favourite music DVDs.
Atonal music is very good for communicating a sense of disorientation and loneliness, course. The lack of tonal centre (or key) means that the listener is denied the usual points of harmonic reference. Hum doh-ray-me-fah-soh-la-ti and you’re drawn very powerfully back to the tonic doh. Deny this framework and the listener feels discomforted, but also, at least in my case, gripped.
Miles Davis’ classic album Kind of Blue – arguably the greatest jazz record of all time – was the first record I heard in which jazz musicians experimented with atonalism, and it has the same effect of most listeners, a spreading sense of melancholia and introspection. Perhaps not great for party music, but, in its own way, extremely beautiful.
Here’s the clip I saw on youtube that started me off on this. It’s the eighth item of Pierrot Lunaire (or, more accurately, the first of the second group of seven; Schönberg was quite obsessed with the number 7, apparently). It’s quite short, so hopefully won’t upset those who can’t stand atonal music for more than a few seconds, but it nicely exemplifies the extraordinary surreal imagery conjured up by the director as a response to the equally extraordinary music. Fantastic.
Another quick break from writing gives me an excuse to post another favourite tune…
If you thought that raunchy lyrics were bound to be banned from records made 80 years ago, then just get a load of this.
It was recorded in 1928 by the greatest female blues singer of them all, Bessie Smith (“The Empress of the Blues”), together with Clarence Williams on piano and Eddie Lang on guitar. Bessie Smith was a notoriously loud and sometimes violent woman, who had an insatiable appetite for booze and sex (with, it’s said, both men and women). She also had a voice like no-one else on earth before or since.
This is one of several very naughty records she made in the late twenties, others including “Do your duty” and “Take me for a buggy ride” but this is probably the rudest of the lot. I like the video too. Enjoy!
Well, it’s a cold and rainy Good Friday holiday and I’ve got a stack of work to catch up on. Before I resume after my coffee break, however, I thought I’d share this little bit of Caribbean sunshine with you.
I first came across the name of Othello Molineaux about 30 years ago on a record he made with Monty Alexander, and was completely blown away by his virtuosity on the steel drum, an instrument I thought was very limited until I heard him play it! Here he is demonstrating his astonishing skill and musical imagination at a live concert recorded only last year. It’s great to see he’s still going strong 30 years after I first heard his music!
About a month ago, a typically rambling blog post of mine led to a discussion of the use of unusual instruments in jazz. This would have fit nicely into that thread if I’d remembered it at the time! Better late than never. Remember that if you enjoy this half as much as I do, then I enjoyed it twice as much as you..
It’s been a pretty exhausting few weeks, but now we’ve reached the end of teaching term. Not that I’ve got nothing to do, but I should be able to concentrate on writing up a few papers that I’ve struggling with for many months.
Anyway by way of a celebration, and to correct for the fact that I haven’t posted much music recently, here are two totally different versions of a great tune by Herbie Hancock called Cantaloupe Island. The original recording of this came (made on June 17 1964) appeared on the album Empyrean Isles which came out on the Blue Note Records label. Its instantly catchy riff and fine solo playing turned it into a big hit, and it quickly became a standard.
The first video clip features the original personnel of Herbie Hancock (piano), Ron Carter (bass), Tony Williams (drums) and Freddie Hubbard (trumpet) but with the addition of the great tenor saxophonist Joe Henderson. It was recorded during a special concert in 1985 to celebrate the Blue Note label. It’s got a similar groove to the original version, but the live performance allows the players to stretch out a lot more than on the original, so it’s about twice as long.
The second rendition also features Herbie Hancock on piano (and other keyboards), but it’s totally different. Taken at a faster tempo, and firmly in the style of Jazz-rock Fusion that Hancock gravitated towards later in his career, it features Pat Metheney (on electric guitar), Dave Holland (bass) and Jack de Johnette on drums. They’re all great, but the drummer on this track is sensational! I saw Jack de Johnette playing years ago – at the Jazz Cafe, I think – and I couldn’t believe the speed of his hands and the immense drive he generated even while playing complicated patterns. Awesome.
PS. I’ve used the spelling I believe to be correct, as that’s how it’s written on the original Blue Note record (of which I have a copy). I’ve seen many variants, though, including those on the youtube clips shown here.
Being a bit busy last week I didn’t have time to celebrate Mardi Gras or, as it’s known here in Britain, Shrove Tuesday. I was fresh out of shroves last Tuesday anyway.
Last year at this time I blogged a bit about Mardi Gras parades in New Orleans, the home of Jazz and that came to mind again when I found the following clip on Youtube. It’s from an experimental film made in the 1950s called Cinerama Holiday which involved shooting the film using three cameras and projecting the results onto a curved screen to make the viewer feel in the middle of the action. There was also an early attempt at surround sound. Interesting though this is as a bit of film history, the thing that caught my eye was the little bit of Jazz history it captures.
Jazz began with the marching bands that performed in New Orleans but then largely moved into the bordellos of Storyville, the biggest (legal) red light district in the history of the United States. When Storyville was closed down in 1917 most professional jazz musicians lost their only source of regular income. However, a few years later, in 1919, the United States Senate proposed the 18th Amendment to the Constitution which prohibited the manufacture, distribution and sale of alcohol for human consumption and ushered in the era of Prohibition. This turned Chicago into a bootlegger’s paradise and jazz musicians flocked there to perform in the numerous speakeasies. That’s why the great New Orleans Jazz records of the 1920s were all made in Chicago and it also caused the music to evolve in new directions.
However, not all Jazz musicians left New Orleans. Many stayed there and kept the music going in authentic style. One of the characters who did so was the legendary Oscar “Papa” Celestin who led various bands through the 20s and 30s, including one called The Original Tuxedo Jazz Orchestra. Everything was an orchestra in those days, come to think of it. These bands kept going through the depression but never really achieved great commercial success until the traditional Jazz revival of the 1950s.
It must have been strange for Papa Celestin to have become a celebrity in his old age – he was born way back in 1884 – but that’s what happened in 1955 when he appeared in this film. I never knew that he’d appeared on the big screen and it’s great to see him in the flesh, even if the Cinerama format doesn’t lend itself to Youtube particularly well. He turns out to have been quite a showman and is clearly having a lot of fun in the “hold that tiger” chorus. I would love to have seen these guys play live. I bet they were a blast!
The tune they’re playing is another New Orleans flag-waver called Tiger Rag. This was first recorded in 1917 by the Original Dixieland Jazz Band and its composition is credited to Nick Larocca and Larry Shields who played with that band. There is a considerable argument about who actually wrote it, and the first section is definitely taken from a dance called the quadrille that was popular in New Orleans around the turn of the century, but it’s too ancient now to matter much anyway.
You can find countless renditions of Tiger Rag on record and on the net, but this is just a bit special. I hope you like it.
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In the Dark 