Great records from bands on the trad jazz festival circuit

[Rabshakeh]

Here's a hyper specific one: does anyone have any suggestions for good records by the established Dixieland / classic jazz / trad bands that used to play the traditional jazz festival circuit in the 1980s-90s, pumping out music in their competing micro-niches. I'm thinking of bands like the Black Eagles. 

Fully anticipating crickets on this one, but if anyone has any that they feel like suggesting I'd welcome them. 

Edit: I don't think I have asked this before but there's a prospect that I might have done. I have checked but can't find. 

[Niko]

One album that I like quite a bit and that almost fits the bill is Echoes of Chicago by Art Hodes... It's from 1978 though and it's not Hodes' working band (it is a full dixieland band though, the usual Atlanta crew found on GHB Productions of that era)

[Rabshakeh]

Thanks, I will listen to that one. I love Hodes.

I'm looking for slightly less A list bands: Those groups of portly men who were born in the 1940s and by the 1980s were playing the dixieland festival circuit in straw hats and stained stripey shirts, selling CDs at the merch table, and arguing about whether or not Eddie Condon should even be considered jazz, with beer foam on their beards.

I'm making this all up, but hopefully you get the drift. Some of that music is quite good in its way and I enjoy it. 

I don't know how many fans of that sort of music are on this forum, but thought it was worthwhile asking. As always, the 1980s - 1990s is a hard area to research via the internet, and trad / classic jazz more difficult than others. 

[Royal Oak]

Maybe check out Sammy Rimington? Looking at his Wiki, he was born in 1942 and is now quite portly. I have come across plenty of his 80s LPs in the past, but moved them on without listening (not proud of this but hey-ho) as it's not really my bag. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sammy_Rimington

The Jazz North West page is also good, but more for live music. I get the impression these cats are well into their 80s and 90s. The website is a triumph of substance over style. https://jazznorthwest.co.uk/

Edited 23 hours ago by Royal Oak

[clifford_thornton]

Jim Cullum would get my vote. Saw him & his band in San Antonio, where he had a club. Definitely seemed like a solid group of players that he brought together.

https://www.tpr.org/arts-culture/2019-08-11/jim-cullum-jr-jazz-band-leader-and-cornetist-dies-at-77?_amp=true

[Rabshakeh]

8 hours ago, Royal Oak said:

Maybe check out Sammy Rimington? Looking at his Wiki, he was born in 1942 and is now quite portly. I have come across plenty of his 80s LPs in the past, but moved them on without listening (not proud of this but hey-ho) as it's not really my bag. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sammy_Rimington

The Jazz North West page is also good, but more for live music. I get the impression these cats are well into their 80s and 90s. The website is a triumph of substance over style. https://jazznorthwest.co.uk/

Rimington is exactly the sort of person I had in mind, and I have a couple of those. 

I was also thinking of Tex Wyndham and his bands. He published a monthly column at one point which is now available on the Syncopated Times website. It is full of comments about how people should live and let live, even if "Chicago Style" jazz isn't really jazz and its followers will burn in hell. 

6 hours ago, clifford_thornton said:

Jim Cullum would get my vote. Saw him & his band in San Antonio, where he had a club. Definitely seemed like a solid group of players that he brought together.

https://www.tpr.org/arts-culture/2019-08-11/jim-cullum-jr-jazz-band-leader-and-cornetist-dies-at-77?_amp=true

Yeah. Cullum is good. 

[Big Beat Steve]

2 hours ago, Rabshakeh said:

.... It is full of comments about how people should live and let live, even if "Chicago Style" jazz isn't really jazz and its followers will burn in hell.

 

LOL! 

As if the early post-war "moldy figs" fights hadn't been enough - now they are "battling" each other WITHIN the "traditional/classic" jazz field? 

[Rabshakeh]

6 hours ago, Big Beat Steve said:

LOL! 

As if the early post-war "moldy figs" fights hadn't been enough - now they are "battling" each other WITHIN the "traditional/classic" jazz field? 

Sadly, I think that too is now pretty historical, and by some decades.

As I remember, Tex Wyndham had some five way genre distinction:

1. Black Downtown New Orleans Jazz (King Oliver, Louis Armstrong's 5s and 7s, Lu Watters, Turk Murphy),

2. White Downtown New Orleans Jazz (ODJB, NORK, the Dukes, Al Hirt, Pete Fountain),

3. New Orleans Uptown Revival (Bunk Johnson, George Lewis, Ken Colyer),

4. Chicago Style (Condon and co), and

5. European Trad (Ball, Bilk and Barber).

I may have misremembered or mischaracterised this.

If you read his column it seems like there were different definitions of "classic jazz", with some festivals permitting some styles and others not. Wyndham was very condescending in his pleas for forbearance and understanding. It's like a glimpse into a vanished world.

Edited 6 hours ago by Rabshakeh

[JSngry]

Vanished indeed.

[jazzbo]

Yes, Cullum was the real deal, as was his Dad I've heard. I saw Cullum several times, twice at The Landing, once with Peanuts Hucko which was one helluva night of jazz.

Edited 4 hours ago by jazzbo