lipi

Thanks for the kind words.

I'm pretty sure Nance plays both.

Link to revelatory thread, so that future generations searching through the archive will have an easier time.

Ladies Being Good 11. Benny Goodman Trio Chicago, 1936-04-27: Benny Goodman (cl), Teddy Wilson (p), Gene Krupa (d) Those two runs of four and five notes at the very start get me every time. I'm simple that way. 12. Trio de Violons Paris, 1937-09-29: Eddie South, Stéphane Grappelli, Michel Warlop (vln), Roger Chaput (g), Wilson Myers (b) Because more violin is always better. 13. Dicky Wells and Bill Coleman Paris, 1937-07-12: Dicky Wells (tb), Sam Allen (p), Roger Chaput (g), Bill Beason (d) One of the two tunes not ID'ed! I thought for sure that someone would recognize Dicky Wells. 14. Artie Shaw and His Orchestra Probably Hollywood, some time in 1939 (or possibly late 1938). It's from the soundtrack to the 1939 short "Artie Shaw's Symphony of Swing." Artie Shaw (cl), Buddy Rich (d), and your usual 1939 Shaw band usual suspects. I don't have a source for an exact make-up of the band, but you can try and ID people in the video of the short... 15. Dark Was the Night - Cold Was the Ground, Blind Willie Johnson Dallas, 1927-12-03: Blind Willie Johnson (g,vcl) If it deserves to leave the Solar System, it deserves to be on a BFT. (Come to think of it, that may not be the best way to think about it. There are many things I'd love to see leave the Solar System and never return. Anyway.) Thanks for listening! If you want to know what specific sources I used for any of these, ask away.

Honeysuckle Roses 3. Coleman Hawkins & his All-Star "Jam" Band Paris 1937-04-28: Benny Carter, André Ekyan (as), Hawkins, Alix Combelle (ts), Stéphane Grappelli (p), Django Reinhardt (g), Eugène d'Hellemmes (b), Tommy Benford (d) The first record released on Delaunay's Swing label. The B side was Crazy Rhythm. 4. Benny Goodman and His Orchestra NYC, 1939-11-22: Maxwell, Martel, Elman (tp), Vesely, Ballard, Brown (tb), BG (cl), Mondello, Estes (as), Jerome, Bassey (ts), Henderson (p), Christian (g), Bernstein (b), Fatool (d) 5. Kay Starr with Joe Venuti and the Les Paul Trio Hollywood, 1945-05: Joe Venuti (vln), Tommy Todd (p), Les Paul (el-g), Cal Gooden (g), Clint Nordquist (b), Kay Starr (vcl) 6. Duke Ellington and His Orchestra with Django Reinhardt Chicago, 1946-11-10: Django Reinhardt (el-g), Hemphill, Jordan, Anderson, Baker, Nance (tp), Brown, Jones, De Paris (tb), Procope, Hodges, Hamilton, Sears, Carney (rds), DE (p), Guy (g), Pettiford (b), Greer (d) One of the four recordings (three with the orchestra, one solo) that we have from Django's not-terribly-successful 1946 tour with Ellington. Django had expected to be received by an adoring public, but found himself largely unknown, except among the hardcore jazz fans. He didn't bother to bring a guitar, supposedly because he thought American luthiers (guitar makers, you philistine!) would be clamouring to hand him their instruments. (I say "supposedly" because Django was famously lax about bringing an instrument to gigs, trusting one of his band members would bring it. He may just have not thought to pack it.) Though Django was displeased with the tour and even called it a failure, critics and audiences were mostly enthusiastic. (I can't remember now which of the big critics didn't like Django. Possibly Leonard Feather?) Sonny Greer was a big fan (the Dregni biography of Django has some choice Sonny Greer comments), as was Rex Stewart (who said "In my opinion, of the ten greatest guitarists, Django is five of them!", apocryphal but too wonderful a line not to share). Anyway, I'm glad this exists. Were it not for someone sneaking in an early reel-to-reel recorder into the theatre, we would not have had any recordings of this meeting of giants. I wish someone had done the same when Bechet played with Ellington. *melancholy sigh* Sunny Sides of the Street 7. Django Reinhardt et le Quintette du Hot Club de France Paris, 1946-05-15: Hubert Rostaing (cl,as), Django Reinhardt (g), Jacques Diéval (p), Lucien Simoens (b), Arthur Motta (d) 8. The Dizzy Gillespie Sextet NYC, 1951-10-25: Dizzy Gillespie (tp, vcl), Bill Graham (as, bar), Stuff Smith (vln), Milt Jackson (p, org, vib), Percy Heath (b), Al Jones (d), Joe Carroll (vcl) More or less about as modern as I tolerate my jazz! 9. Harold Nicholas et son orchestre Harold Nicholas (vcl), rest unknown It was a surprise to me when I found this CD (Jazz in Paris 20). I knew Harold sung with his brother Fayard in several movies, but I did not know he recorded some numbers outside the movies. His voice sounds Nat King Cole-ish to me here; that "hear" at 0:27 in particular. Also a bit of Sammy Davis in there. 10. James Booker Schützenhaus Albisgüetli, Zürich, 1977-11-27: James Booker (p,vcl)

Apologies for being a day late. Here's a link to the discussion thread, for closed loop recursive completeness: 1. Indian Cradle Song, Louis Armstrong and His Orchestra NYC, 1930-05-04: Louis Armstrong (tp,vcl, Ed Anderson (tp), Henry Hicks (tb), Bobby Holmes, Theodore McCord (cl,as), Castor McCord (cl,ts), Joe Turner (p), Bernard Addison (g), Levat Hutchinson (tu), Willie Lynch (d) I included quite a few recordings with Django Reinhardt in this BFT, which is why included this Louis Armstrong tune. Supposedly, this is the record Emile Savitry played for Django and which made the latter cry and exclaim "Ach moune!", Romani slang for "My brother!" 2. Nada mas que un poquito de swing, Oscar Alemán y su Orquestra de Jazz Buenos Aires, 1953-12-16: Mario Felix (cl), Carlin Traversa, Julio Grana, Raul Casanova (vln), Alberto Barbera (p), Oscar Aleman (g, vcl), Alberto Ramos (g), Nene Nicolini (b), Raguza (d), unknown (fechas) One of two tunes not identified. I'm glad it stumped everyone. (I'm sorry it wasn't everyone's cup of tea. I hope the rest made up for it!)

That's a wonderful line. The reason the mastering is bad, is that it's from a 1939 WB Vitaphone reel, "Symphony of Swing": https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0142885/ Here's the full reel (LBG is the last tune): And here's just LBG, if you're in a hurry: For full thread-convergence, note that there are couples dancing Collegiate Shag during the second half of the tune.

That's an empty argument. They might as well have said "This is a magazine article, and holding people to a finished works standard is over the top" or "This is a novel, and holding people to a finished works standard is over the top." Even if it were *not* an empty argument, it misses the point about what the internet (or rather, the web) is, the place it takes in modern society, and the place it will take as historical document in the future so utterly and completely that it is not worth bothering with. Consider this: if I make a mistake in a scientific article I publish, or in a book I publish, given the stranglehold the publishing houses currently have on copyright law it is nearly impossible to find that mistake with a simple search, and the number of people who will be influenced by my mistake will be limited to those who read the hardcopy. If, on the other hand, I make a mistake in a post here, it's a simple Google search (Bing search, for the unsophisitcates) away. A mistake in this forum, if anything, will have a larger impact on the world, and should therefore count as a more grievous one. For those tempted to go the register or authority argument at this point, I invite you to turn to a high school or even college student acquaintance and ask them whether they use the web or books as sources for their papers. (If they say "books" they are statistically probably lying.) Grumble, grumble. So, tell me more about this jazz thing. I hear it's nice.

I like them. I think the sound is on par with the Chrono Classics. You won't be able to get the complete output of any artist, but then again, how often do you *actually* want to? (And I say this knowing full-well I usually try to get the complete output...) I'm particularly fond of a series of four discs of live Count Basie recordings titled "The Golden Years 1-4" (#73-76). They have some interesting compilations, too, like "Washboard Story" (#25), "Drums Parade" (#96), and "Kansas City Legends" (#5).

*boop* One week left! I've been trolling for judgemental posts, but you're all so well-behaved. So let me incite some: this stuff is real jazz, and Miles Davis was a jerk and a crook, taking beautiful music and destroying it! OK, now tell me what you really think.

Not born into it, so I wasted twenty years not dancing! In college I was lucky to have a very good dance history teacher, who got me into lindy hop, and a graduate student friend who was (and still is) a professional tap dancer, who got me into tap. I watched as much of the existing video as possible, and talked to and studied with the old timers (Norma Miller, Frankie Manning, etc.) or those one step removed (Sylvia Sykes, Rusty Frank, Chester Whitmore, etc.).

TL;DR: it's mostly (Collegiate) Shag, and, no, it is not an early form of Lindy Hop. (Shag developed parallel to Lindy Hop.) It's actually a bit of a mess, because different couples are dancing different dances. Keep in mind that at the time, many people weren't as uptight about "this is dance X and you're doing dance Y." A lot of that came in with formalized instruction of the Arthur Murray form (the cynical view is that you can't teach what you don't know, so you'd better call it "wrong" or "a different dance" to save face and keep your students...). In any case: it's a mix of Charleston, Shag, and Foxtrot steps. I saw a bit of Texas Tommy (the dance, after which the Lindy Hop figure was named), and I think even some Swing, i.e. "LA Swing," the swing dance that was danced in the Los Angeles area and that was not Balboa. (Getting confused yet? Yes, the names are terrible, but that's what they called it at the time: swing.) To further the confusion: the Texas Tommy had likely been mostly abandoned by young dancers by 1936, and what was left of it was probably called Two Step (not to be confused with Texas Two Step or any of the other myriad Two Steps) or even Lindy Hop at the time. The couples that are doing a bit of traveling seem to mostly be doing standard Foxtrot steps. They may have called it Foxtrot, or they may have called it One-Step (unlikely), or they may have called it Walk (that was the name used at the Savoy Ballroom), or they may have called it Peabody... Yes, the terminology is a mess. Aren't you glad you asked?

YES. Alphonse Trent is totally worth listening to. Most importantly, Stuff Smith was in his band for a while. Oh, and the Lunceford clip I said I'd post:

Missing a link to the video...?

Yeaaaaah, Alphonse Trent! How about a little Mills Blue Rhythm?

Not enough women with big hats?

We're getting into repeating ourselves an awful lot, but let me quickly mention that Cab had *plenty* of instrumentals. You don't have to listen to his vocals. JSP has two cheap sets with most of his output, and Mosaic has some of the stuff on the Chu Berry set. Just listen to this amazing thing ("A Minor Breakdown," 1937 take 2, Cab Calloway and His Orchestra): Also, Allen's "Devilin' Tune" is indeed a great introduction. And however much I love Eddie Condon and the rest of the Chicago gang, calling any of Condon's recordings Big Band Swing seems stretching the genre beyond its sensible limits. Finally, if we're getting into the Stan Kenton's, Raymond Scott's, and Boyd Raeburn's of the world, we can go on for several hours (and possibly flame war each other about what is Swing and what is not). I'd shy away from these for now, not because they're bad (they're not), but because they're not that close to the music Captain Howdy originally mentioned. Another approach: pick up one of the books by George T. Simon and just go down the list.

Ooooh, baby! I'm glad you asked! (Aside: you might enjoy this month's BFT. It's mostly smaller groups from that era.) It depends on what you mean by "big band": how many brass and reeds satisfy you? The number steadily increased from 2 trumpets, 1 trombone, 1 reed (King Oliver) to 5 trumpets, 4 trombones, and 5 reeds (the late forties stuff). It also depends on what you mean by "need to hear." What was popular? What was seminal? What was/is great for dancing? The first thing I'd say is: you haven't heard enough Duke. Go listen to some more! And then listen to all the things under his sidemen's names. For the period you mention, Basie is as important as Duke, so listen to all of him, too. All that said... From the era you mention, and in the traditional Big Band mould: Charlie Barnet ("the blackest of the white bands"; a great admirer of Ellington's, which you can easily hear) Cab Calloway (he had quite a good band for a while, with Chu Berry, Milt Hinton, Cozy Cole, and famously a young Dizzy) The Casa Loma Orchestra/Glen Gray Lionel Hampton Andy Kirk (Mary Lou Williams is seminal) Jimmie Lunceford (to get the true experience, you have to see the band; we have one soundie and I think part of another performance; will insert the soundie below) Glenn Miller (perhaps a surprising recommendation; I suggest the album "The Spirit is Willing" on RCA to hear the non-schmaltzy stuff) Lucky Millinder (together with Hampton crucial if you want to understand where Jump Blues and later Rhythm & Blues/Rock & Roll came from) Those are a good place to start, at least. To understand where all these guys came from, the twenties and early thirties are important. If you want to dig there, I suggest: Bennie Moten (to understand where Basie came from) Fletcher Henderson (to understand where Goodman and Webb came from, and, well, everyone, really) King Oliver (to understand where Louis came from) Luis Russell (which became the Louis Armstrong Orchestra when Louis joined) Blanche Calloway (Cab's older sister; arguably the musically more talented, and a big influence on her brother; recorded very little; you want the 1930s recordings) Frank Trumbauer (for all the obvious reasons: Bix, Teagarden, and Tram himself) Historically extremely interesting, but woefully under-recorded: the all-female bands of the 1930's and 1940's. These two are good places to start (and relatively easy to find recordings of): Ina Ray Hutton and Her Melodears The International Sweethearts of Rhythm Especially in the 1940's there were a bunch of all-female orchestras due to the draft. Sherrie Tucker's book "Swing Shift" is good if you want to learn more. Not mentioned above, because, you gotta stop somewhere: Benny Carter, Woody Herman, Earl Hines, Billy Eckstine, Bob Crosby, Les Brown, Larry Clinton, Claude Thornhill, Buddy Rich, Ray McKinley, Red Norvo, Fess Williams (the first house band at the Savoy Ballroom), Jan Savitt, Dizzy Gillespie, Jean Goldkette, ... If you want specific recommendations for some of these, I'm sure we can collectively suggest some.

Thank you for listening! JSngry and His Merry Band of Posters have identified most of the tracks above, but there are details to fill in, and preferences to express, of course. Particularly curious to hear if you intensely disliked any of it. Did any of the Roses, Suns, or Ladies stand out as particularly good or bad?

I don't know that Benny Carter album, but it wouldn't surprise me in the least! The recording of "Honeysuckle Rose" on Swing is a classic that's been highly regarded by almost everyone from the day it was released. (Almost everyone except Bean, who apparently said something like "They're just jam sessions, nothing special.") Not specifically in response to medjuck's post: I know it's anathema to the usual BFT discussions here, but any thoughts of comparison between the tracks? The identification is part of the fun, but really listening to the music is most of it. (Unless you hate the music, of course! Skip those tracks!) Which of the Honeysuckles did you enjoy most? Which least? Why? Which musicians, if any, would you have fired from the gig?

According to Michael Dregni's "Django: the life and music of a gypsy legend," they were released as Coleman Hawkins and his All-Star "Jam" Band, just as on the Swing and Victor labels above. Carter had apparently been charged with writing some arrangements, but never came through. (Dregni, 125)

That's the CD I pulled this from. They were singing and dancing from the very start. And here they are singing and dancing in 1936. Harold is the little one: About fifteen years ago, I took a tap workshop where I learned this routine from Cathie and Nicole Nicholas, Fayard's granddaughters. They still perform it occasionally. They also did some impressions in their act. Here Harold is hamming it up as Cab in 1937: That's the one! The why is in some way linked to parts of the rest of this BFT.

Speaking of Harry Connick, Jr...this video of his went viral a few years ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yD3iaURppQw Without reading the comments on the video, can you tell what/how/where the magic occurs?

(I hate the quoting function on this board so very, very much.)

That's the one, of course. And you even picked the reason I decided to include it. This time a West Wing video. The writing for this series was the best I've ever seen for television. Sorkin seems to have taken a liberty with the exact cause of death, but whatever.