Old Jazz Songs You'd Share

[Soandso]

 

[Soandso]

Hot music from 1929 includes the record TOO TIGHT from a band led by Johnny Dodds calling themselves "The Hot Six" which included brother "Baby" Dodds, Lil Hardin Armstrong, Honoré Dutrey, "Natty"Dominique, and Bill Johnson.

 

[Soandso]

 

[Soandso]

 

[Barrelhouse Solly]

As mentioned back in post #1 (2nd paragraph) there was an early shift in developing jazz tastes away from the New Orleans/Dixieland style of polyphony which submerged musical tension in a blend of sounds. Next popularity increased for so-called hot musical lines varying tone, rhythm and using harmonic patterns as springboards for improvising melody. Hot music deployed changes and re-formatted attacks which elicited excitement more-so than polyphony had done for white listeners who were used to diatonic music; hot music wasn't just about really fast playing as some white music critics/fans back then thought. [ Historically before the labelling of jazz took hold the description ragtime (at least in New Orleans until the late 1910s) covered hot music. For a while hot music was the name for what became widely called jazz - some notable African-American musicians would object to the appellation jazz.]

Below are 2 songs by Louis Armstrong from his Hot Five and Hot Seven recording period (1925-1928); for example the 1st is rich in polyphony and the 2nd is not. Armstrong became the premier jazz exponent when he moved on from his native New Orleans polyphony.

This is my favorite Armstrong period. I've been listening to the Hot 5 and Hot 7 recordings since 1970 or so and still play them regularly.

 

[Soandso]

…my favorite Armstrong period… Hot 5 and Hot 7 recordings ….

The first time Louis Armstrong ever recorded was in a Chicago rectangular warehouse with blankets hung on the walls. After testing sound it was determined he had to stand way in the back.

Armstrong´s Hot group recorded in 1926 what contains (to my knowledge) the first jazz "scat" singing on record SKID-DAT-DE-DAT beginning at 1:27 minutes into the song (see screen shot below of Tidal's copy).

Another 1926 Armstrong Hot group fun record is THE KING OF THE ZULUS (see screen shot below of Tidal's copy). The King of the Zulus was traditionally a New Orleans Mardi Gras parade personage of note who this song's band members don't seem to be taking all that seriously. Such joking around goes way back with Armstrong who, like most New Orleans musicians, came through a period when their performing acts included a vaudeville type of sketch. [Armstrong's nickname "Satchmo" came from his invented character Reverend Satchel Mouth; previously explained elsewhere on ASR.]

 

[AndyMorris]

Horace Silver - Song For My Father

Also LOVER MAN Vocal-Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, and Sarah Vaughn 1945

 

[Soandso]

Helen Humes' (1913-1981) ever delightful THEY RAIDED THE JOINT was recorded in 1927.

 

[Soandso]

THE GOUGE OF ARMOUR AVENUE was recorded in 1924 (remarkable trombonist was Charlie Green). A gouge was street slang for a swindler (USA popular jargon still uses the descriptive "price gouging") and at that time the red-light area of Chicago included Armour Ave.

 

[Soandso]

 

[Barrelhouse Solly]

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"That streamline train goes a mile a minute." He recorded several songs with the same melody. I love them all. He's one of those players who figured out how to do a small number of things perfectly correctly. There aren't many of those. There's a much smaller number who could do a large number of things correctly. Also, his vocals are great. His "Policy Blues," which is similar to other policy themed songs by other players, has a menacing quality to the vocal that makes me concerned for the policy "writer's" safety.

 

[Soandso]

 

[Barrelhouse Solly]

Trixie Smith backed by players from the Fletcher Henderson band including Louis Armstrong, Charlie Green, and Buster Bailey. I've been playing this tune since 1969 or so, solo and in a jug band. This song does make clear what the word "jazz" meant back when it was not considered respectable.

 

[Soandso]

…what the word "jazz" meant back when it was not considered respectable.

A lot has been written by people trying to fix the origin of the word jazz. I don't intend to deal with all of that. My perspective has become that in the late 1800s and early 1900s within the USA the word should be recognized as having different sociological and mixed cultures' context

For example when a New Orleans band went to Chicago the local musicians union tried to keep people from patronizing the outsiders by decrying it as Jass/Jazz. At that time a large Chicago population base was from what generally was called Germany. These included craft makers who had apprenticed and sojourned for work; these were known as journeyman which for purposes here translates into unter.

There was a mid-1800s European card game called JASS and in Bavaria (located in modern Germany) their style of deck since 1865 had a suit (equivalent to the suit of clubs) that had the image for an unter shown below. Being a man myself I can readily imagine how hard living fellows pulling certain cards out crudely sexualized it's context leading to jass (jazz) becoming part of Chicago slang initially among carpenters, carvers, roofers, instrument makers and other working class poor.

However, I think there is a valid reason to think that in New Orleans the usage of Jazz arose differently considering it being an early international port with French language linkage. A French word for dance chassé would have been part of visiting mixed nationality sailors' polyglot vocabulary without their pronunciation always being precise; this sounded out by New Orleans' mixed English speaking population as "jazz". [This is not my original idea just a summarization.]

As for the west coast of USA it is worth remembering that for decades San Francisco was reached by sea and not in any economic sense overland. And for that matter it had it's own early jazz era musicians/venues when jazz was music for dancing not a recital event.

Printed early usage of the word jazz for California can be found before 1900 referring to sportsman with a connotation of attitudinal ability (baseball jargon 'pep'). One writer contends it was borrowed from usage pertaining to women without suggesting any insinuation. Again, San Francisco being an international port I can imagine it's meaning of liveliness derives from when new dances called chassé were introduced leading to Anglicized pronunciation approximating the sound "jazz."

In closing: it seems to me that it was after the New Orleans bands exposure to Chicago that jass -> jazz spread as slang for "disrespect-able" activity into the more southern regions. And it was the maritime USA dynamics which spread chassé -> jazz.

 

[Soandso]

They recorded THE NEW CALL OF THE FREAKS which added lyrics to the older song "The Call of the Freaks". In 1920s the call was to come to dance floor and freaks were uninhibited dancers. Like a surprising number of early jazz songs the words have double meaning as in this one's "…stick out your can …for the garbage man…."

 

[Soandso]

Stomp style of jazz pre-dates swing jazz which had melody overlaying harmonic lower notes starting to gain in popularity in the 1930s. Stomp was also called "step" by some with a main feature of stomp being the bands' rhythmic instruments (ex: drums, bass/tuba, banjo/guitar) deliver a beat in time without any improvisation. Meanwhile the horns and wind sections provide rhythmic counterpoint along with the majority of held notes.

In the late 1920s Casa Loma was a 100 room Canadian hotel (pictured above) that had booked bands but closed leaving some white U.S.A. musicians out of work. From among those adrift in Canada would arise the formative group calling themselves The Casa Loma Orchestra that, unheard of at the time, actually incorporated. The band became a beloved swing success; as the memorable Coleman Hawkins said of them (quote): "… my favorite band."

There is an extensive Casa Loma Orchestra recording archive covering many years and though a lot of the lyrical stylizations are dated they've also left a number of instrumental songs that are still sounding impressive today. An introduction to their professionalism in 1933 is BLUE PRELUDE.

 

[Soandso]

…the formative group calling themselves The Casa Loma Orchestra … became a beloved swing success ….

In 1932 Casa Loma Orchestra recorded RHYTHM MAN:

"…
Let me hear that
music start to play.
Let me see those people start to sway.
It's the rhythm man, swingin' band,
Rock my blues away.
Let me hear those trumpets in the groove.
…."

Another memorable recording titled WHITE JAZZ was made in 1931.

 

[Soandso]

"Rex" Stewart (1907-1967) pictured above who came from a musical mixed heritage African and Native American Indian family began playing cornet professionally at age 14 leading to his leaving home embarking on a significant jazz career. His Christening name was Reginald and his family called him Reggie until when still young he decided Rex was more masculine sounding like his absentee father's first name of Rex.

Rex Stewart was from the eastern U.S.A. African-American neighborhood of Washington, D.C. which itself was originally part of plantation slavery territory. He recounts how earlier plantation slaves on Saturday night held the "walk around" dance contest with a cake for the prize giving origin to the term "cake walk." Early in his musical endeavors he played at what were called "bow wow" house parlor socials (akin to the Chicago "rent party") where a 25 cents entry got you music, food and "plenty of corn liquor … until everybody passed out or the cops broke it up." Elsewhere as a professional he recalls the morning gathering of musicians (and performer scouts) to participate in the "all on" which years later were what came to be called spontaneous "jam sessions."

Quite emphatically Rex Stewart took issue with the contention early jazz nationwide derived from New Orleans. On this subject he recalled: "… many musicians who were playing ragtime [which he elsewhere described as having "an unspeakable connotation"] and funk [a word according to him as unmentionable in polite society] and other forms of music [presumably he means blues] which were the forerunners of jazz. None of these people were influenced by anyone from New Orleans, as far as I know." He does however feel the arrival of Chicago recordings by New Orleans born King Oliver's Creole Jazz Band with Louis Armstrong in 1923 to New York City quite significantly excited him and fellow eastern musicians who called it "Western" style; an innovation characterized by Rex Stewart as having "heavily accented 2nd and 4th bars" [which I'll propose was the introduction of a "hot" style that the Eastern musicians took a liking to].

Here's his unique recording BOY MEETS HORN from 1938 with "Duke" Ellington who he played for in 1934-1945. Ellington once said of Rex: "… exciting player… his virtuosity on … "Boy Meets Horn"… half-valved effects …have never been forgotten."

 

[Soandso]

Earl Kenneth "Fatha'" Hines (1903-1983), pictured above, had a father with a band who brought home a piano young Earl played perfectly by ear after hearing a song once. By the age of 15 or 16 years old he was living and playing at a Pittsburgh venue even participating in a 1922 recording. Moving to Chicago in 1923 he in time became a fixture of bands at a Chicago club called the Grand Terrace performing 7 nights per week from 10:30 pm to 4:30 am doing 3 shows of 1 to 1.5 hour sets.

The nickname Fatha' arose from when beginning in 1928 Hine's band was broadcasting from The Grand Terrace on NBC radio affiliate stations' "blue line" to New York City starting at 11:00 pm and starting at 11:30 pm via NBC's "red line" to California and Canada. One night their wine sodden broadcast engineer/announcer was hastily revived by the musicians during a transmission changeover period and as the band launched into their theme song for the next broadcast that man's voice went out over the air on the "red line" announcing: "Here comes Fatha' Hines through the Deep Forest [their theme song's title] with his little children."

Hines and Louis Armstrong became fast friends in 1925 Chicago and often collaborated musically. To get an idea of just how great Fatha Hines piano talent was he related how once in a 1928 cold recording studio with Armstrong "… just to keep my fingers warm. I was fooling around … I had no idea they were recording…." The invented name for the track was 57 VARIETIES which can be heard on the album shown below.

 

[Soandso]

Paul Howard (1895-1980), pictured above with his popular Californian regional band was an Ohio teen cornet phenom who moved to Los Angeles shifting to playing clarinet and tenor saxophone when hired by Wood Wilson's Syncopators who promoted themselves as a "Jass Band." He formed the Paul Howard Quality Serenaders in 1923 which the young singing drummer/pianist Lionel Hampton joined in 1926. [ Hampton's first singing track ever recorded was with the Serenader's in 1929 "scat" singing on "Moonlight Blues" and "Stuff."] Here below is a screen shot of Tidal's copy for the Quality Serenader's nicely relatable band recording from 1930 titled NEW KINDA BLUES.