Sandy Brown Jazz
What's New
September 2024
Jazz For Kids: Introducing jazz to young children is a valuable initiative. This picture comes from an scheme in America Music For The Young Child, but closer to home in the UK, now is the time to book tickets for Juliet Kelly's Jazz Kids event on 14th November at the EFG London Jazz Festival and vocalist Verona Chard is running another of her Musical Ballooon Band series at Barton-le-Clay in Bedfordshire (between Bedford and Luton) in Septembe if you know children in that area. If you know of other events, please let us know.
Ronnie Scott's Club Birthday
Ronnie Scott's Club in London first opened on 30th October 1959 and so is celebrating its 65th birthday. It has been closed during August for its first major refurbishment in almost 20 years - the Main Auditorium will include refreshed wall decorations, carpets and ceilings, a new bar in its same location, plus upgraded lighting and furniture. Their website and programme of upcoming shows is here.
Jimmy Thomson Book
Caricaturist Jimmy Thomson sends us this picture of Eddie Condon and tells us that plans are in hand to publish a book of Jimmy's artwork. We shall let you know when it becomes available but in the meantime our page on Jimmy - 'Truths In Disguise' - is here.
Jazz Dance Weekend
Howard Lawes reports that for anyone who likes dance with their jazz there is a bumper helping of entertainment from 19th to 21st September in London. On all three nights, Clod Ensemble and Nu Civilisation Orchestra present a celebration of Charles Mingus' Black Saint and the Sinner Lady at the Barbican Theatre. Mingus' cult classic, composed in the 1960s, fuses jazz, classical and African folk music into a style labelled Third Stream. Clod Ensemble is directed by Suzy Wilson with choreography by Paul Clark, Nu Civilisation Orchestra is directed by Peter Edwards and Gary Crosby. This combination of jazz and dance was a sold-out production at the 2023 EFG London Jazz Festival. Details are here. On 20th and 21st September the BOP Jazz Theatre Company UK are producing Jazz Conversations at The Place in London. During the day on the 20th, BOP will conduct workshops for those who want to dance while on the 21st, they present two of their best-known pieces, Footprints in Jazz and Touches of Miles. BOP brings together a company of national and Internationally acclaimed dance artists and theatre practitioners and a band of top jazz musicians. "Footprints in Jazz " is a suite of contemporary jazz dance theatre where every step and every story will take you on a theatrical journey that represents the richness and depth of Paul Jenkins's original jazz compositions and Dollie Henry’s enthralling choreography. Details are here.
Blue Plaque For Adelaide Hall
English Heritage are recognising singer Adelaide Hall with a blue plaque outside her former home in Kensington London. Adelaide was born in Brooklyn, New York but spent 55 years in the capital. She was a pioneer of "scat" singing, renowned for using her voice as a pure jazz instrument, and is believed to have had the longest recording career of any 20th-century artist. She was recognised by Guinness World Records in 2003 for releasing material over eight consecutive decades. More details are here.
Parliamentary Jazz Awards
Delayed by the UK general election, the shortlisted nominees for the APPJAG Parliamentary Jazz Awards have now been announced. The winners will be named at an event on 29th October sponsored by PPL. The shortlisted nominees are:
Jazz Vocalist of the Year: Emma Smith, Anita Wardell, Liane Carroll, Imogen Ryall
Jazz Instrumentalist of the Year: Emma Rawicz, Deschanel Gordon, Ross Stanley
Jazz Album of the Year: Yussef Dayes “Black Classical Music”, Zoe Rahman “Colour Of Sound”, corto alto “Bad With Names”, Imogen Ryall “Sings The Charlie ingus/Joni Mitchell Songbook”
Jazz Ensemble of the Year: Blue Lab Beats, Five Way Split, Alina Bzhezhinska’s HipHarp Collective
Jazz Newcomer of the Year: Alex Clarke, Amy Gadiaga, Donovan Haffner, Ife Ogunjobi
Jazz Venue of the Year: Café Oto, Swansea Jazz Club, 91 Living Room, Verdict Brighton
Jazz Media Award: Richard Williams, Kevin Le Gendre, Gilles Peterson
Jazz Education Award: Paula Gardiner, York Music Forum, Nikki Yeoh
Services to Jazz Award: Joe Paice,George Nelson – Moment’s Notice, Jean Toussaint
Mercury Prize 2024
The Mercury Prize promotes the best of UK and Irish music and the artists who produce it. This is done through the celebration of the 12 ‘Albums of the Year’, recognising artistic achievement across a range of contemporary music genres. There is usually a 'Jazz' album included amongst the variety of albums shortlisted and the jazz album Freenow by Ezra Collective won the award last year. This year the 'jazz' album is Bad With Names by corto alto. The winner will be announced on 5th September at an event at Abbey Road studios. We'll add the result to this item when the winner is known ... 5th September: .. and the winner is ...... the band English Teacher and their album This Could Be Texas.
Video Juke Box
Click on the pictures to watch the videos..... or take pot luck and click on the picture of the Juke Box and see what comes up.
Monkin' Around - Dave O'higgins and the Trio play I Mean You - one of their explrations of Thelonious Monk's repertoire. Their debut album comes out in October.
This uplifting video of Chatanooga Choo Choo is from the 1941 film Sun Valley Serenade and feratures the Glenn Miller Orchestra with Tex Beneke and the Modernaires, Dorothy Dandridge and some fine dancing by the Nicholas Brothers.
Organist / keyboard player Ross Stanley is one of the shortlisted nominees for Instrumentalist Of The Year at the Parliamentary Jazz Awards. He is a member of Trish Clowes' band My Iris, but here he is four years ago playing Joni Mitchell's A Case Of You.
Led by trumpeter Sheila Maurice-Grey here is Kokoroko in 2017 playing Uman.
Bernard Victor reminds us of this Pathé News film of the Humphrey Lyttelton band playing at Mack's Restaurant (100 Oxford Street) in London in 1950. Bernard says: "I was there that night, one of the dancers. A very young Chris Barber dancing can be seen at 1.00 min. when the announcer was introducing Snake Rag."
Trumpeter Ife Ogunjobi is also shortlisted for the Parliamentary Jazz Awards in the Newcomer category. Here he is playing Peace Of Mind in 2019.
Two Ears Three Eyes
Eriko Ishihara
Photographer Brian O'Connor from imagesofjazz.com took this picture when pianist Eriko Ishihara was playing with her Trio (Colin Oxley, guitar and Andy Cleyndert, bass) at the Clocktower Cafe in Croydon, London. in August.
Brian says: "It was a relaxed gig full of well executed standards and, of course, Bossa Novas. Just sometimes in a very troubled world it's good to listen to excellent musicians not trying to make a statement, but providing a couple of hours of relief from life's problems."
Born in Tokyo, Eriko started playing the piano when she was four. She graduated from the Kunitachi College of Music where she studied classical piano, then came to London to attend the jazz course at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, Since then she has been playing in the UK with her own band at venues such as the 606 Club, Vortex, Royal Festival Hall, Concorde Club, Boxford Fleece Jazz Club and weekly residencies at Pizza On The Park. Eriko is married to guitarist Colin Oxley.
In 2003, Eriko signed a major record deal with the Japanese record company, Ponycanyon and has released 4 CDs, the latest of which featured US saxophonist Scott Hamilton. She also regularly tours in Japan and other Asian countries.
Here is Eriko's trio playing at the Clocktower Cafe in Croydon where Brian O'Connor took the photograph:
Did You Know?
Soda Fountain Rag
Soda Fountain Rag (also known as Poodle Dog Rag) was an early, perhaps the earliest, real Duke Ellington composition. He was seventeen and working as a 'soda jerk' at the Poodle Dog Café - the inspiration for the title. At that time he didn't read or write music, so the piece was composed by ear. "I would play the 'Soda Fountain Rag' as a one-step, two step, waltz, tango and fox trot", Ellington recalled. "Listeners never knew it was the same piece. I was established as having my own repertoire." The scene is described in this extract from a fictional piece on a pianoparentpodcast (here):
"The Poodle Dog Café was a favorite stop for lots of teens in Eddie’s neighborhood because behind the counter there was an amazing soda fountain where they could order any combination of refreshment their imagination could muster. Besides the great food, watching the soda jerks work and communicate with each other was very entertaining. Eddie could watch a customer place their order and hear the guy behind the counter call out, “Order in for a traffic light sundae!” (translation: three scoops of vanilla ice cream, each with a red, white, or green cherry on top). After the next customer ordered, the soda jerk yelled “Stretch one and paint it red!!” (translation: large cherry coke)."
"Eddie was trying to figure what wild concoction he would order when over in one corner of the café he noticed a tall, upright piano. The owner of the Poodle Dog hired a man to keep the place hopping with lively music during peak hours. (this was 1913, before the days of the ‘50’s jukebox). No one was playing it today and what really caught Eddie’s attention was a sign in the window and the answer to his summer financial conundrum: Help Wanted."
"Even though he was barely 14, Eddie convinced the owner of the Poodle Dog that he was the right man for the job. “I’m a quick learner and I’ve got a good eye for detail.” Eddie said, recalling something his art teacher had told him last year in school. The café owner noticed the sophisticated manner of the young man, he seemed to carry himself like someone much older and more mature, so he decided to give Eddie a chance."
"Every afternoon, Eddie spent his time learning the special soda jerk lingo and serving customers. As he worked, he picked up interesting rhythms in his head from the sounds the soda fountain handle made when he jerked it back to fill a glass with carbonated water and from the sounds of ice cream plopping in a coke float, a “Brown Cow”. When the piano player was there, his music added to the cacophony of sounds and rhythms."
"Eddie loved listening to that piano player. Why hadn’t Ms. Clinkscales taught him how to play like that? He might not have stopped lessons! After listening to the Poodle Dog performer, Eddie would tinker on his piano at home trying to recreate the same sounds, which would often lead to new sounds of his own. That was a lot more fun than 1 + 2 + !"
Here is a brief video from Ken Burns' film Jazz where Duke Ellington gives a taste of Soda Fountain Rag.
Take Two
Work Song
Breaking rocks out here on the chain gang
Breaking rocks and serving my time
Breaking rocks out here on the chain gang
Because they done convicted me of crime
Hold it steady right there while I hit it
well reckon that ought to get it
been working and working
but I still got so terribly far to go
Trumpeter Nat Adderley wrote the tune for Work Song inspired by a childhood experience of seeing a group of convict labourers singing while they worked on a chain gang, paving the street in front of his family’s home in Florida. It was featured on his 1960 album of the same name. The lyrics were added the next year by Oscar Brown Jr. for his album Sin & Soul.
The first of our two takes has to be a video of Work Song with Nat Adderley and the Cannonball Adderly Sextet from 1962:
When it comes to our second take we need to include the lyrics. It is a shame that a video was not made of the charasmatic Oscar Brown Jr singing the song when he first released his album Sin & Soul. There is a fine video of him singing it (here) with his bass player son in 1996 shortly before Bobo died in a car accident that August. Oscar died in 2005.
Less successful, I think, was Nina Simone's daughter, Lisa, singinging Work Song in Marciac, France in 2015 (here), but then it would be difficult to replicate her mother's performance. For our second take we can see a video of Nina Simone singing on the Merv Griffin Show in 1966. The video is 'available for licence' which presumably means one can pay to see it without the 'reelinintheyears' address on the screen, but despite that, it is a moving performance:
Gonna see my sweet honey bee
Gonna break this chain off to run
Gonna lay down somewhere shady
Lord I sure am hot in the sun
Hold it right there while I hit it
well reckon that ought to get it
been workin' and workin'
been workin' and slavin'
an' workin' and workin'
but I still got so terribly far to go
Anagram
Lens America
Isaiah Collier
Journalist/guitarist Filipe Freitas and photographer Clara Pereira run JazzTrail in New York City. They feature album and concert coverage, press releases and press kits, album covers and biographies. They are valued contacts for Sandy Brown Jazz in the United States. You can read Filipe's reviews of album releases here and see Clara's gallery of pictures here.
Clara Pereira took this picture of saxophonist Isaiah Collier at the Vision Festival in New York earlier this year. when Isaiah's band the Chosen Few was playing at The Roulette in Brooklyn. Filipe Freritas wrote: "Vibrant up-and-coming saxophonist Isaiah Collier and his ever-changing muscular trio The Chosen Few - here featuring bassist Nat Reeves and drummer Warren Trae Crudup - were super inspired, rewarding the audience with another moment of glory. A tenor saxophone riff over a blistering 3/4 rhythm gradually climbed to heaven both in pitch and intensity. After exploring with arco, Reeves imposed a reiterative pizzicato figure with multiple percussion threads in the background. Collier switched to soprano, channeling the energy of Coltrane’s “My Favorite Things” through his effusive side-stepping soloing. The energy was limitless, and the trio delved into a minor modal mood, then Latin terrain, before culminating with a feel-good, emphatic blues."
Here is a video the band playing 'Love' at the PBS Stuio in April:
The Story Is Told
Fats Waller's Way With Words
"We all had to know the dirty lyrics that got involved with some of the best-known popular tunes, because we had so many requests from the customers in the cabarets. It got so we had to be very careful to sing the right words when we were working in front of the general public."
"Eugene Sedric, a clarinetist, once told me what happened when he was on the road with the Waller group. They had been using up the time on the bus improvising new barroom verses for "Blues In The Night" and Fats was having a ball."
"They opened at the Paradise Theatre in Detroit after an all-night run on the highway. During the first show, Fats started singing some of the smelliest phrases from the night before into the microphone. The management banged down the curtain and called the cops. It took them all day to get Fats out so that his show could finish the week."
From Music On My Mind by Willie The Lion Smith.
Hey delivery man, where have you been?
Oh mercy, it sure is a sin.
Mama mama don't be fast.
Do not show your big fine......shortnin bread.
Odd One Out
Which is the 'odd one out'?
Artie Shaw; Tommy Dorsey; George Gershwin; Irving Berlin
Click on the picture for the answer
Asha Parkinson
Possession
by Howard Lawes
The Swanage Jazz Festival has a reputation for being a showcase for the best of British jazz and 2024 was no exception being blessed with great weather and great bands. The line-up included three young female tenor saxophonists who are all exceptional but intriguingly have embarked on strikingly different career paths within the jazz envelope. Alex Clarke was playing as part of the TJ Johnson Band, performing a selection of popular jazz, blues and soul music, Emma Rawicz led both her quintet playing colourful, contemporary jazz from her recent album and a large jazz orchestra while Asha Parkinson led her Kalpadruma quintet performing reduced versions of tracks from her soon to be released album Possession, that fuses jazz, classical and world music. As an aside all three women have reached the final stages of the BBC Young Jazz Musician Competition but none have won it.
Of the three, Asha's choices are perhaps the most courageous. She is both an excellent improviser as well as a very accomplished composer and arranger of jazz, classical and vocal music and her new album demonstrates her mastery of these skills. Possession is due to be released on Ubuntu Records on 20th September and talking with Asha via Zoom she described some of her recent activities before discussing Possession in more detail. (Details about her earlier life and career are described in a previous article here).
In 2017 Asha created a project called 'Voices Beyond Division' that brought together children from Christian, Jewish and Moslem schools. Asha worked with the children and composed the music for them to sing together at a concert in London. The hope was that encouraging children from different backgrounds to create music together would promote greater understanding between cultures reducing the risk of conflict.
Asha continues to believe that music is a force for good in the world and is currently involved in a project with the organisation 'Rosetta Life'. Together with Syrian composer Marwan Nakhleh, she is creating the music to accompany a young leaders' project that will be presented at a Climate Change conference in New York. Composition for small and medium ensembles together with arranging and orchestration is a large part of Asha's work. She has led composition workshops at Cambridge University, and is preparing a newly commissioned piece for an ensemble at Oxford University for her Master of Studies in Music (Composition) degree. Other commissions include original music for students performing exhibition pieces on graduation from their conservatoires and she also composes and arranges all the words and music for her band, Kalpadruma.
Asha has continued to perform with the National Youth Jazz Orchestra and with Kalpadruma during the past few months and has performed several gigs in London. She has also been part of the Sam Eastmond Band for his project, John Zorn's Bagatelles Vol 16 which was performed at the Cheltenham Jazz Festival. At the Swanage Jazz Festival, playing music from Possession, she had the misfortune to be scheduled to perform at the same time as England was losing to Spain in the UEFA Championship. Ironically, festival goers had become possessed by the need to watch football on television.
To realise the Possession album, Asha brought together a small orchestra comprised of her jazz quintet, string quartet and voice plus qanun, flutes, reeds and trumpet. The quintet is Asha Parkinson (saxophones), Charlie Heywood (guitar), Alex Wilson (piano), Hamish Nockles-Moore (bass) and Alex Taylor (drums). The string quartet is Abbie Davis and Chloe Meade (violin), Andrew Liddell (viola), and Cubby Howard (cello). Vocals are from Rebecka Edlund and the remaining musicians are Meera Maharaj (flute), Simeon May (baritone saxophone/bass clarinet), Christie Smith (trumpet), Konstantinos Glynos (qanun) with Gareth Lockrane (flute/alto flute) guesting on tracks 2 and 3. Some of the musicians Asha has known for a long time. Gareth Lockrane was one of her tutors at the Guildhall School of Music while Asha met Konstatinos Glynos, whose qanun brings a unique timbre to the ensemble, during her Jazz South commissioned 'Encounters' project in 2021. Asha formed Kalpadruma in 2017 and guitarist Charlie Heywood is a founding member. Bass player Hamish Nockles-Moore, drummer Alex Taylor and Rebecka Edlund are recent additions and Rebecka’s distinctive voice has brought a new dimension to the band.. The other players in the ensemble are all skilled readers and need to understand contemporary classical harmony while being equally at home playing jazz. Inevitably, a large ensemble inhibits the interplay between musicians that could occur in a small jazz band who are well-known to each other but as in classical music, the beauty comes from the composition.
Here is the title track:
The theme of the album is possession, in its various forms. These forms are exemplified in the title track and other key tracks such as Urban Fantasy reflecting the manic energy of city life, Distant Devotion, a poignant portrayal in song and music of a lover, remote from their loved one, and Mirror Image is inspired by Tolstoy's novel Anna Karenina, a story of conflict between human desires and societal roles .........
Time Out Ten
Feelin' No Pain
Adrian Rollini
For this item you need to be able to stop for ten minutes.
We are often moving on to the next job, the next meeting, scrolling down social media, taking the next call ......'Time Out Ten' asks you to stop for ten minutes and listen to a particular piece of music; to find a time when you won't be interrupted, when you can put in/on your headphones and chill out. Ten minutes isn't long.
This year, 2024, Retrospective Records have released a new compilation album of Adrian Rollini's recordings Swing Low. On the album he plays his wide range of instruments from bass saxophone to goofus to hot fointain pen with a variety of different groups from between 1927 and 1938.
One of these tracks is Feelin' No Pain, our Time Out Ten selection this month. Here Adrian Rollini is playing with Red Nichols and his Five Pennies in 1927. The track does not appear to be played widely these days, but it is worth hearing. It is quite short, so there is time to play it a couple of times in our ten minutes break.
This version of Feelin' No Pain was recorded in 1927 with Red Nichols (cornet); Miff Mole (trombone);, Pee Wee Russell (clarinet); Lennie Hayton (piano), Dick McDonough (guitar), Adrian Rollini (bass sax and goofus) and Vic Berton (drums). The tune must have been particularly popular at the time as there are a number of other recordings with different line-ups from that same year. On this recording Pee Wee Russell's clarinet stands out but Adrian Rollini's bass sax solo does too, as does Miff Mole's trombone played against Adrian Rollini's goofus, and Red Nichols brings in a short, clean solo showing the influence Bix Beiderbecke had on his playing.
The Jazz Quiz
Well, What Do You Know?!
In the quiz this month we give you fifteen questions related to jazz,
How many can you answer?
The September Jazz Quiz is
Tracks Unwrapped
Exploring the stories behind the music
Rose Room
I want to take you to a little room
A little room where all the roses bloom
I want to lead you into Nature's hall
Where ev'ry year the roses give a ball
They have an orchestra up in the trees
For their musicians are the birds and bees
And they will sing us a song
As we are strolling along
The song Rose Room was written by West Coast drummer, pianist and bandleader Art Hickman and composer, lyricist and publisher Harry Williams as far back as 1917 (it was Williams who wrote In The Shade Of The Old Apple Tree). The number is named after the Rose Room of the St. Francis Hotel in San Francisco where Art Hickman was playing at the time. Two years later, Columbia took the band to New York for a recording session that included Rose Room - the recording became a best-seller for the record label and the band the following year. We can listen to the recording on an old 78 rpm record:
The St. Francis Hotel is located on Powell and Geary Streets in San Francisco. It was built in the early 1900s from the estate of Charles Crocker, a railroad magnate, as an investment for his children. Originally it was to be called The Crocker Hotel, but was finally named after one of the San Francisco Gold Rush hotels. The hotel opened in 1904 and went on to host many celebreties including Presidents Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson. By the 1920s, it became a favourite place for film stars - Charlie Chaplin, Douglas Fairbanks, Mary Pickford .... and a young Art Hickman led the orchestra in the Rose Room where he played music similar to that of Paul Whiteman. Art subsequently moved on to New York and the Biltmore Hotel and the roof garden of the New Amsterdam Theatre.
The St Francis Hotel in 1904
One of the visiting celebrities to the hotel was film comedian Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle. In 1921, Arbuckle and friends were staying at the St Francis and held a party for people from the Hollywood scene. Apparently, during that afternoon, Arbuckle called the house doctor to see a young actress, Virginia Rappe, who had been taken sick. A day or two later, the young woman died. Another woman, a friend of the actress, who had also been at the party claimed that Arbuckle had assaulted and raped the actress and the story hit the headlines. Later, the woman's testimony was considered to be unreliable as she had a lengthy record of extortion. Nevertheless, Arbuckle was brought to trial in 1921. After two trials where the juries were unable to reach a verdict, Arbuckle was finally aquitted after a third hearing ... but his career was ruined. There are a number of videos on YouTube telling the story of Arbuckle (e.g. here).
Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle and Charlie Chaplin
The first recording of Rose Room was actually recorded by Joseph C. Smith's orchestra a year before Art Hickman's recording, since then it has become a jazz standard. Duke Ellington recorded it in 1932 and used the chord changes as a basis for his composition In A Mellotone.
The first recording with the lyrics appeared in 1928 on Columbia by the Garden Dancing Palace Orchestra - apparently collectors and historians feel this was a psuedonym for a Seattle-based group led by trombonist Jackie Souders. Souder’s orchestra was a popular Northwest group with a residency in the mid-1920s at Seattle’s Olympic Hotel, and Bing Crosby and Al Rinker both worked with the band before joining Paul Whiteman where with Harry Barris they became The Rhythm Boys. Listen here to the Garden Dancing Palace Orchestra playing Rose Room in 1928 - the vocalist here is possibly Walton McKinney.
When Ellington recorded the tune, it also gained a subtitle 'Rose Room - In Sunny Roseland'' and the number can be found under both titles. Here's the Ellington Orchestra playing the tune:
There is a story that in 1939, guitarist Charlie Christian came on to the bandstand one night where the Benny Goodman Quartet was playing and jammed Rose Room for 45 minutes of solo after solo. Goodman was impressed - Charlie Christian was hired. Listen here to Charlie Christian soloing on Rose Room with the Benny Goodman Sextet in 1939 with Benny Goodman (clarinet), Charlie Christian (guitar), Fletcher Henderson (piano), Lionel Hampton (vibraphone), Artie Bernstein (bass) and Nick Fatool (drums).
The website jazzstandards.com says that: “Rose Room” was an unusual tune for its time when ragtime’s popularity was fading in favour of the 32-bar song and the 12-bar blues. Composer Alec Wilder, in his book American Popular Song: The Great Innovators, 1900-1950, calls it “a good, loose, natural song, definitely ahead of its time.” Wilder’s assessment is spot-on, as the tune’s heyday was during the swing era when the open melody and moving chord changes found favor with arrangers and improvisers alike.'
The website also says: 'Vocal recordings of “Rose Room” are few and far between, with good reason. The lyrics are very flowery, almost an early 20th century period piece. No doubt the lyrics were tacked on by a worrisome publisher knowing that instrumental sheet music sold less than songs. The title is never even mentioned in the tune, and the lyrics’ sole purpose is to relate how wonderful it is to be in “sunny roseland,” where flowers sway and breezes blow.
Five Levels Of Jacob Collier
by Matt Fripp of Jazzfuel
Matt Fripp set up his own music agency and website, Jazzfuel, in 2016, since when he has established a client base across many countries. Although born in the UK, Matt is currently based with his family in Paris, France, but the international aspects of his work make little difference to his location. What is different about Matt and Jazzfuel is the information that he shares publicly on his website. Matt has kindly agreed to share some of his thoughts as an agent with us from time to time:
Have you seen that video where Jacob Collier is challenged to explain the concept of harmony to 5 different people; a child, a teen, a college student, a professional, and jazz legend Herbie Hancock?
The Jacob Collier video is here. If you can't bring yourself to watch that, there's the same concept with a chess pro here.
It's an interesting reminder about how drastically differently we can explain the same thing.
Your music, for example... That description about the harmonic structure of the title track is perfect for your musician friends, and even journalists, but what about the 'average' listener? If your project is going over their heads, you're missing out on listeners and potential supporters.
Most of the time, music fans don't need 'simpler' music, they just need a simpler way in to engage with it.
All the best.
Matt
Jazz Remembered
Rosetta Howard
Rosetta Howard was born Rosetta Maxey on 30th August 1914 (some references say 2013) in Woodruff County, Arkansas. She was one of three children (Leroy, Rosetta and Earnest) of John Maxey and Addie Bridges. By 1920 her mother had remarried to William Aaron and the family was living in Point, Woodruff County. About 1928 Rosetta married at age 15 to (first name not known) Howard and by 1930, along with her mother, two brothers, and sister-in-law Carrie, had moved to the south Chicago area of Bremen Township (Robbins), living on Ridgeway Ave around 139th Street. There she worked as a dancer at a club where she began singing along to the jukebox. Around 1932, she began singing professionally with clarinettist Jimmy Noone and other bandleaders and made a number of recordings during the 1930s into the 1940s. In 1937 she began to work with the Harlem Hamfats - Herb Morand (trumpet); Odell Rand (clarinet); Horace Malcolm (piano), Joe McCoy (guitar), Charlie McCoy (guitar and mandolin); Ransom Knowling (bass) and Fred Flynn (drums). They were Chicago, not Harlem based, and were initially a studio band drawn together by record producer and entrepreneur J. Mayo Williams. It is suggested that they might have been the first studio recording band to become a performing act in their own right, recording extensively. Some of their numbers, such as Oh! Red and Why Don't You Do Right? went on to be recorded by more famous jazz musicians.
The Harlem Hamfats
A number of recordings were reflective of the time and perhaps one of Rosetta's most famous was If You're A Viper. (1937). The song is, of course, a nod to marijuana : "Dreamed about a reefer five foot long ...." and the phrasing is similar to that of Fats Waller who recorded the number in 1943. Fats' recording is interesting in that it was apparently 'a subtle poke at Harry Anslinger, the first head of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics, who had declared marijuana use by swing musicians a menace and had promised to prosecute.' You can read more about Fat's recording here.
Why Don't You Do Right was also originally recorded as The Weed Smoker's Dream with numerous references to drugs. The lyrics were later changed to Why Don't You Do Right, a song about 'a conniving mistress and her broke lover', and was later recorded by Peggy Lee with the Benny Goodman Orchestra (here).
As with some of Fats Waller's songs Rosetta's lyrics could also be suggestive such as The Candy Man and Men Are Like Street Cars (featuring Henry 'Red' Allen on trumpet). Let Your Linen Hang Low was apparently described by one music journalist as "Howard engaging Kansas Joe McCoy in sexy banter".
In April 1938 clarinettist Buster Bailey stepped in to replace Odell Rand with the Hamfats on several numbers such as How Long Baby and he is featured here on Stay On It. He would return again with the Harlem Blues Serenaders the following year. In 1939 Rosetta recorded with the Harlem Blues Serenaders, who included Charlie Shavers, Buster Bailey, Lil Armstrong, Henry "Red" Allen and Barney Bigard. Here she is with the Serenaders in June 1939 with Come Easy Go Easy. On this recording she has Charlie Shavers (trumpet); Buster Bailey (clarinet); Lil Armstrong (piano); Ulysses Livingston (guitar); Wellman Braud (bass) and O'Neill Spencer (drums):
She continued to perform in Chicago in the 1940s, and in 1947 featured on recordings with the Big Three, including Willie Dixon and Big Bill Broonzy. There are one or two recordings with the Big Three on You Tube - here is Rosetta singing Big Bill Broonzy's When I Been Drinking. Some of Big Bill's lyrics (here) are questionable but are more meaningful when Rosetta sings her version (here)!
One of Rosetta's last recordings was in December 1947 when she sang Sweep Your Blues Away with Johnny Morton (trumpet); Oett Mallard (alto sax); William Casimir (tenor sax); Robert Call (piano); Big Bill Broonzy (guitar); Ransom Knowling (bass) and Judge Riley (drums). Her voice is noticeably different here but her sense of phrasing remains.
Generally speaking her later recordings were less successful than her earlier work and she did not record again, although in the 1950s she sang with the pianist and Gospel composer Thomas A. Dorsey (who wrote the well known Gospel song Take My Hand, Precious Lord ) at the Pilgrim Baptist Church in Chicago.
Later identified in some formal records as Rosetta Howard Armstrong, she died in Chicago at Rush Presbyterian St. Luke's Hospital on the 8th October 1974 at the age of 61. She is buried at Burr Oak Cemetary. Alsip, Cook County, Illinois. (details here)
There are many of Rosetta's recordings on YouTube and collections of her recordings are available online if readers would like to explore her music further.
Rosetta Howard with Big Bill Broonzy
Forum
Shrivenham Jazz Festival
Kieran Holling writes to tell is that Jazzin Shrivenham, a small group of jazz enthusiasts in Oxfordshire "... are running an inaugural Shrivenham Jazz Festival on 5 October 2024. It will be a small affair in one venue, on one day, but with 3 really good professional acts and support by local amateur artists. A community event, with all proceeds going to the upkeep of the village hall (Memorial Hall)" . Details are here and we wish them success with their event - do support them if you are in the area.
National Jazz Archive Fundraiser - Gypsy Jazz
Mark Kass sends us details of the Archive's Fundraiser on 14th September in Loughton, Essex at 1.30 pm when De Fuego (guitarists Tony Calvo and Edina Balczo) play and talk about the story of the guitar in jazz. "Think Flamenco meets Grappelli meets Pastorius meets Jazz and bring the whole family to be inspired and enthralled as award-winning Tony and Edina - two incredible proponents of the guitar - deftly demonstrate just what this beautiful instrument was designed for!" Details are here.
Bristol Chinese Jazz Club
Dan Catsis writes about our page on Uncle Bonny's "Chinese Jazz Clubs" (here): "Hi,fascinating to find out about all these bands that played at the Chinese jazz club …. my wife and her friend used to help out at the Corn Exchange when they were 15 which would have been around 1962/63 and met The Rolling Stones, the Animals, etc. but there seems to be virtually no historical record of these gigs and following on from what I’ve just read, would these gigs have taken place on the Wednesday evenings as opposed to the Tuesdays? …..was the Chinese club going in 62/63? ….. can you enlighten me?….. it would seem to me that these might have been the first gigs that these bands ever played in Bristol as it wasn’t long before they came back and were playing at Colston hall."
[Can anyone enlighten Dan? The Colston Hall is now of course the new 'Bristol Beacon'. Ed]
Albert Hall
My thanks to Martin Davies who has located some old press cuttings concerning trumpeter Albert Hall. I shall share these in an updated article with Albert's story next month. Ed.
Red Note Jazz Club, Mars
Peter Maguire from Jazz Clubs Worldwide is aiming for the stars with this video of his Intergalactic Jazz Club Guide in Preparation and the Red Note Jazz Club from the Missoula Crater on Mars!:
Remembering The 100 Club
Ken Fletcher who wrote to us last month about vocalist Beryl Bryden, adds something of his discovery of jazz at that time:
"My post-war introduction to live jazz in London, began in 1948, when I was sixteen. I went to go with a friend to a concert by Graeme Bell’s Australian Jazz Band at The Scala Theatre, but could not get in as it was sold out. Somebody suggested that we go to Mack’s Rehearsal Rooms in Soho, as John Haim’s Jelly Roll Kings, were playing there. We did this, and I enjoyed the music. We were told that Humphrey Lyttelton’s new band were playing at 100 Oxford Street every Saturday, so the next Saturday I went there, and I thought that this was a much better band and place, and there was dancing. The atmosphere was great and really exciting once the band has warmed up. From then on I went virtually every Saturday, and soon plucked up enough courage to ask a girl and join in the rather ecstatic dancing. I made friends with a young Chris Barber, who had just started to learn the trombone, and with the singer Beryl Bryden, who worked in the record business, as did I. I later got friendly with a guy called Monty Feldman, who was another regular attendee. Many other bands played there, including Mick Mulligan’s Magnolia Jazz Band, and occasionally one of my favourites, Bob Barclay’s Yorkshire Jazz Band. I also met my first real girl friend there. However I got friendly through the record shop that I worked in with two semi-pro saxophonists, who introduced me to modern jazz,and I gradually deserted the 100 for The Flamingo, which is another story." Ken adds this video from Britsh Pathe News of the club in 1950, he was there on this occasion and points out that Chris Barber appears among the dancers talking to one of the girls at about 0.56 seconds into the film:
Requests For Information
We have received requests for information about the following topics - can you help?
The Folk Barge, Kingston-upon-Thames
Oscar Rabin
The Viaduct Pub, Hanwell
The Blue Circle, South Ruislip
Departure Lounge
Information has arrived about the following musicians or people connected to jazz who have passed through the 'Departure Lounge' since our last update.
When this page first started, links to newspaper obituaries were free. Then increasingly advertisements were added and now many newspapers ask for a subscription to read a full obituary. Where possible, we initially link to a Wikipedia page which is still free of charge, but we also give links to newspaper obituaries in case you want to read them.
Lord Tony Colwyn
Born Ian Anthony Hamilton-Smith in 1942, Tony Colwyn succeeded to his father's titles in 1966. In that same year he graduated as a dentist and worked as a dentist until 2005. He was also a politician, played trumpet and had a variety of other roles as can be seen from his obituaries. In particular from a jazz perspective, he co-chaired the All Party Parliamentary Jazz Appreciation Group for a number of years. He passed through the Departure Lounge on 4th August from complications of Covid. Obituaries: Wikipedia : UK Jazz News : The Telegraph : In 1979, Lord Colwyn recorded an album with his dance band, the Three B Band, and the track Affirmation is here.
Irène Schweizer
Born in 1941, Irène Schweizer was a Swiss jazz and free improvising pianist. She performed and recorded numerous solo piano performances as well as performing as part of the Feminist Improvising Group, and played with many notable musicians including John Tchicai, Evan Parker, Yusef Lateef and others. Irène passed through the Departure Lounge on the 16th July. Obituaries: Wikipedia : The Guardian : There is a short video documentary here.
Russell Malone
Born in Georgia in 1963, Russell Malone was an American jazz guitarist who began working with Jimmy Smith in 1988 and went on to work with Harry Connick Jr and Diana Krall throughout the 1990s. He toured with Ron Carter, Roy Hargrove and Dianne Reeves and did session work with Kenny Barron, Branford Marsalis and others. He recorded his first solo album in 1992 and led his own trio and quartet. He passed through the Departure Lounge on 23rd August. Obituaries: Wikipedia : New York Times : A video of Russell playing Gut Bucket Blues with Emmet Cohen is here.
Recent Releases
A few words about recent releases / reviews:
Apart from where they are included in articles on this website, I don't have a 'Reviews' section for a number of reasons:
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I receive so many requests to review recordings it is impossible to include them all.
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Unlike some publications/blogs, Sandy Brown Jazz is not a funded website and it is not possible to pay reviewers.
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Reviews tend to be personal opinions, something a reviewer likes might not suit you, or vice versa.
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It is difficult to capture music in words, so much better to be able to listen and see whether the music interests you.
For these reasons in particular I just include a selection of recent recordings below where I share the notes issued by the musician(s) as an introduction and links to samples so you can 'taste' the music for yourselves. For those who like to read reviews, these, of course, can be checked out on other sites.