It started in Europe and made its way to the Americas via French and English colonists.
You may know it as the Square Dance.
Nothing “square” about how they did it in old Cuba, old Jamaica…or old San Francisco.
San Francisco – 1914 (no music)
Cuba – filmed 2010
Jamaica – filmed 2012
– Ken McCarthy
Jazz on the Tube
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You’ve heard about it.
What was the Cotton Club like in its heyday?
No need to wonder.
This is the context in which the music appeared. It was NOT concert music ala Jazz at Lincoln Center. It was part of the entertainment industry. It just so happened that the composers, arrangers and performers were geniuses.
All three of these short films are marvelous, but if you only have time for one, make sure you see the last one in the series. It features Cab Calloway three years into his residency at the Cotton Club at the height of his powers with occasional flashes of documentary-style film work.
First we walk down Harlem streets circa 1930s. Soundtrack provided by Duke Ellington. (6:17)
A Cotton Club floor show – part of which the film censors blocked from public screening (6:41)
Cab Calloway Cotton Club floor show – and a lot more (1934) (9:55)
– Ken McCarthy
Jazz on the Tube
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Count Basie and his orchestra, recorded in NYC August 9, 1937.
Written and arranged by Eddie Durham, one of the most important and underappreciated artists in jazz and American music history.
Irish, Mexican and Afro-American on his father’s side and Native American on his mother’s, in his childhood Durham grew up wearing his hair long and braided, Native American-style.
Born and raised in rural San Marcos, Texas (1906), he learned to ride, drive cattle, shoot and hunt rattlesnakes. He was also a fine carpenter.
One of the legendary Oklahoma City Blue Devils, he was a mainstay of the Count Basie band.
A first rate composer and arranger, he wrote for Artie Shaw and Glenn Miller and is reputed to have been the key arranger on “In the Mood”, the anthem of the Big Band Swing era.
As if that weren’t enough, Durham was the pioneer of the jazz electric guitar (Charlie Christian quoted him in his early recordings). Durham was also a virtuosic trombone player who invented the Non-Pressure technique for the trombone.
Here he is at age 73 (born 1906). This was filmed in 1979.
Serious guitar players know that Django Rheinhardt wasn’t the only inspiration for today’s guitar-based “Gypsy Jazz” movement.
Here’s some folks from around the world honoring Durham’s art with their own versions of “Topsy.”
Arranged by Alexander Vinitsky (Russia)
From the Netherlands
Henk Sprenger guitar, Gideon Tazelaar (13) baritone sax, Stefan Bos (15) piano, , playing Topsy by Eddie Durham.
Recorded 30 July in Hilversum Netherlands
Way Down Yonder in New Orleans (1938) – both takes
Recorded in New York City, NY September 27, 1938. Eddie Durham takes a solo – on electric guitar – in this jewel-like ensemble piece with Lester Young (tenor sax, clarinet) Buck Clayton (trumpet) Eddie Durham (guitar) Freddie Green (guitar) Walter Page (bass) Jo Jones (drums)
Listen to the intro. You’ll hear the riff that became “In the Mood.”
A long interview with Eddie Durham by Stanley and Helen Dance (The audio quality is terrible and it’s unedited, but contains a lot of gems.)
https://rucore.libraries.rutgers.edu/rutgers-lib/52035/#playback/M4A-1
Click here for the Dave Oliphant bio of Eddie Durham
– Ken McCarthy
Jazz on the Tube
P.S. Our unique programming is made possible by help from people like you. Learn how you can contribute to our efforts here: Support Jazz on the Tube
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Nfamara Badjie Master drummer from Gambia watches Cándido Camero
Up until the middle part of the 20th century, hand drumming followed a pretty simple rule: One man, one drum (unless it was a two headed drum, tablas, or bongo drums.)
Then something changed.
What was it?
Bobby Sanabria interviews Cándido Camero, the most recorded conga player in jazz history.
October 14, 2017 – Jazz Forum: Conga master Candido (age 96) surprises the crowd with his rarely-seen bass and cowbell skills.
The video Nfamara was watching
– Ken McCarthy
Jazz on the Tube
P.S. Our unique programming is made possible by help from people like you. Learn how you can contribute to our efforts here: Support Jazz on the Tube
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My understanding is that this is Bobby’s first full scale production music video.
From an email I received from Bobby in response to a question about his music education in Cuba
“I never studied in any school of music.
All my education comes from other lives that I was living before.
Chucho and Emiliano gave me many tricks.
Arturo Sandoval plunged me deep into the world of the flugelhorn (trumpet too).
Armando Sequeira Romeu: double bass, drums, more chords on piano, and many standards like “Autumn in NY”, “Lullaby of Birdland” and many other tunes, but the more important to be inside in swing.
Pacolo, Tata Gúines and Changuito taught me about congas and the whole of percussion.
In the Musical Theater, Leo Brower and Tony Taño taught me about arranging, orchestration and many things about writing for symphonic formats, etc.”
Quite an education!
Great news!
You can now watch this video – and all Spanish language videos – with English subtitles. It’s free!
Click here for instructions on how to turn on English subtitles.
– Ken McCarthy
Jazz on the Tube
P.S. Our unique programming is made possible by help from people like you. Learn how you can contribute to our efforts here: Support Jazz on the Tube
Thanks.
Make sure you check out the video below.
You know the narrative…
“Jazz started in New Orleans and traveled to Chicago and Kansas City and New York.”
Historians are starting to come to a more sophisticated – and exciting – view of the music’s origins.
In this program we look at the unheralded role San Francisco played in the creation of jazz. In the second half of the 19th and early 20th century, San Francisco was the biggest and most dynamic city west of the Mississippi River and a place of dazzling diversity.
An international port, a vibrant Afro-American community, a prosperous place that supported a wide variety of live music venues and occasions – old San Francisco and the Bay Area had all the ingredients to be a hotbed for music creativity.
Three years after this was filmed, the first jazz sound recording was made in 1917. It’s pretty clear, here was something going on in San Francisco well before the heralded “Jazz Age” began.
Who’s the band in the film?
The best scholarly guess is Sid LeProtti’s So Different Jazz Band, San Fransisco. Sid LeProtti, piano; Adam “Slocum” Mitchell, clarinet, and Gerald Wells, flute. Probably shot outdoors.
What are they dancing?
A quadrille (a square dance) – but with a difference. How I wish I could hear this music!
(1952) RAW UNEDITED – Turk Murphy interviews San Francisco jazz pianist Sid LeProtti (born 1886) – with music
Other Jazz on the Tube podcasts that touch on the diverse origins of jazz
The huge contribution of Texans and Oklahomans to jazz
https://www.jazzonthetube.com/interview-with-dave-oliphant-about-texan-jazz/
Afro-American “barbershop” and jazz
https://www.jazzonthetube.com/vic-hobson-and-the-roots-of-louis-armstrongs-music/
A broader view of the origins of jazz
https://www.jazzonthetube.com/interview-with-professor-douglas-henry-danielslester-leaps-in-jazz-in-asia-and-more/
– Ken McCarthy
Jazz on the Tube
P.S. Our unique programming is made possible by help from people like you. Learn how you can contribute to our efforts here: Support Jazz on the Tube
Thanks.
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