Tuesday, August 22, 2006
Riverside History of Classic Jazz
Here it is, in all its' 5 disc and 18 pages of liner notes glory!
I'm gonna do this up as 5 separate archives, plus an archive of the liner notes in actual size...
I got this set years ago in Portland, Oregon, for the sum total of fifteen bucks... because the discs were about three steps from TRASHED! The binder has finally fallen apart, the sleeves are all ripping out at the bottom, there was even some white mold-like residue on one of the discs.
The set starts out with a "roots of jazz" type thing, going back to field recordings of African chants and Southern street vendors calling out their wares. It then goes to the early days at the turn of the 20th Century ragtime, early blues, and boogie-woogie, then develops from there, to examples of Chicago and New York, then goes on to the revival of 'hot jazz' in the late 1940s. Riverside released this in 1956, with remasters done by Reeves Sound Studios, and a discography by Orrin Kepnews.
In the discography pages, however, there are a BUNCH of hand-written corrections... so I wonder who had this set before I did... one GLARING error is on side 9, to be specific, the Muggsy Spanier track is labelled on the disc and in the discography as "Lonesone Road", when, in fact it is "Muskrat Ramble"! There are a couple of other personnel corrections in the notes as well, I'll leave you to figure out who and what...
Anyway, let us get the ball rolling...
Disc One ('Backgrounds' and 'Ragtime')
Disc Two ('The Blues' and 'New Orleans Style')
Disc Three ('Boogie Woogie' and 'South Side Chicago')
Disc Four ('Chicago Style' and 'Harlem')
Disc Five ('New York Style' and 'New Orleans Revival')
...and here is the link to the 18 pages of liner notes for you to read at your leisure. There are some good photos in there, as well...
You'll note that this collection is VERY heavily leaning towards the Dixieland-style, or "hot" jazz, as opposed to what jazz had already turned into (that being swing), and where it was going (bop, cool, and third-stage, to name a few styles). Whether it was a desire to chronicle the 'classic' period, or maybe an effort to help 'right the boat' as some saw it, it is not known... what I do know is this: this is a darn good compendium of where 'trad jazz' started and where it was going, even if it had, by 1956, crumpled itself into a niche that it would never really escape from.
...except for the many avid fans of Trad Jazz, of course :)
Sunday, April 16, 2006
Oh boy, what a great record!
I know, I know, I just did a posting, but I found some cool stuff in the batch of 78s that I have been working on....
I was going through the stack-that-has-no-Hawaiian-78s, encoding away, and found a disc that I wish I could get a clean transfer of for you... the recording is SO good... FOR AN ACOUSTIC RECORDING! I heard highs on the trumpet that made me weep, a clarity that would not be reached by the electrical recordings for some years, and a very hot pair of numbers as well! The band responsible for these sides-o-hotness was Ben Selvin's Orchestra, and the pressings were on Vocalion (the filigree-type label). "Sweet Child" opens up with a piercing horn statement, and then rolls on from there. Mr. Selvin sure knew how to knock 'em out. The vocal credit is not given, I'll have to do some looking to see if it is who I think it is... the vocalist almost has a Harold "Scrappy" Lambert feel to his voice, but then again, a lot of male singers did at that time. I'd place this one smack in the middle of 1920-1923, and the recordist has his notes very handy. My only woe is that this disc is so hammered that I can't give you a true feel for the quality of the recording. I heard it and my first thought was "This is an ACOUSTIC recording??"
The other side picks up from where "Sweet Child" left off and rollicks even merrier... "I Wish I Was In Peoria"... this side just plain STOMPS. It's a tune that will catch in your hook-memory and never let go after a few listens. I had to go very easy on the filtering to try and capture how GOOD the recording originally was, but as with the other side, the wear factor is pretty darn high. I can see why, though, as good as this tune is. Mr. Selvin: hats off to you!
Calming down just a touch now... fanning myself after those two rollickers...
I posted over on AudiOddities (see sidebar for link) a cut of theater organ music. As a keyboard player, anything with a good piano or organ recording is a must for me. Yes, I have 4 or 5 copies of Zez Confrey's "Kitten On The Keys" along with some of his other recorded works. Not wanting to get into a dissertation on the Joys of Ragtime (and Why Scott Joplin is not the Be-all and End-all of Ragtime Composers), let me just say that I enjoy all forms of keyboard music, from Biggs to Joplin to Waller to Shearing to Kenton to Tatum to Brubeck to Vince Guaraldi to Corea to Jarret to Keith Emerson to to to....... I think you get the idea. "There's A Rainbow 'Round My Shoulder" is an example of a singer (Ned Miller) being accompanied by a good player (Milton Charles) on a halfway decent Wurlitzer Theater Organ (in this case the organ at the WENR Radio Studios in Chicago, Illinois). The recording is on a Columbia Vita-Tonal electrical recording, and you do get a sense of how full and rich a theater organ can sound, even in this late 20s recording. Try THAT with a horn, Thomas Alva! This song was recorded by other, more conventional dance orchestras, but it still somewhat swings with the theater organ booming away.
The reverse to this side, "Sonny Boy", is kind of a quasi-Irish lament... but it still shows off the stylistic capabilities of Ned Miller, in that he can do the Irish Tenor thing as well as make an honest attempt at a hot dance number.
Let's shift some gears now... I love the Hawaiian Steel guitar. That's a given. I also love performers that don't give a poop about their critics. Sure, you can have great steel players like Sol Hoopii and Mr. Ferrera, but this player was accused once of having "absolutely no musical taste, whatsoever." BAH! Roy Smeck has more taste in his little fingernail than all of his detractors, I think so anyways... I only wish that he had recorded on a label that had decent shellac quality! I do know that others that get Roy Smeck 78s have a dreadful time remastering them, because they are mostly very worn because of being played to near-death. Combine that with Brunswick's use of cruddy shellac on their Melotone subsidiary label, and you get headaches during the restoration process. Anyway, here we have Roy Smeck's Vitaphone Trio performing "The Waltz You Saved For Me", and it illustrates the headache factor perfectly... great recording of a guitar trio (and I do not know who does the vocal here either), on absolutely horrid shellac, played to near death. Sigh. But, there's a good college try in the restoration... the reverse side, "By The River Ste. Marie" came out much much better, however... again, uncredited vocal and Roy doing the zany things he did on the steel guitar, but it is all quite quite tasteful. He's got to be right up there with Sol (Hoopii) and Sol (K. Bright) and Frank Ferrera and Felix Mendelsohn for acumen in playing the instrument...
I've got more things to get posted for you, but I just HAD to get the Ben Selvin sides up tonight. I think you'll see why.
Right-click on the link to download the tunes, you know the drill :)
Until next time,
the Impaler
I was going through the stack-that-has-no-Hawaiian-78s, encoding away, and found a disc that I wish I could get a clean transfer of for you... the recording is SO good... FOR AN ACOUSTIC RECORDING! I heard highs on the trumpet that made me weep, a clarity that would not be reached by the electrical recordings for some years, and a very hot pair of numbers as well! The band responsible for these sides-o-hotness was Ben Selvin's Orchestra, and the pressings were on Vocalion (the filigree-type label). "Sweet Child" opens up with a piercing horn statement, and then rolls on from there. Mr. Selvin sure knew how to knock 'em out. The vocal credit is not given, I'll have to do some looking to see if it is who I think it is... the vocalist almost has a Harold "Scrappy" Lambert feel to his voice, but then again, a lot of male singers did at that time. I'd place this one smack in the middle of 1920-1923, and the recordist has his notes very handy. My only woe is that this disc is so hammered that I can't give you a true feel for the quality of the recording. I heard it and my first thought was "This is an ACOUSTIC recording??"
The other side picks up from where "Sweet Child" left off and rollicks even merrier... "I Wish I Was In Peoria"... this side just plain STOMPS. It's a tune that will catch in your hook-memory and never let go after a few listens. I had to go very easy on the filtering to try and capture how GOOD the recording originally was, but as with the other side, the wear factor is pretty darn high. I can see why, though, as good as this tune is. Mr. Selvin: hats off to you!
Calming down just a touch now... fanning myself after those two rollickers...
I posted over on AudiOddities (see sidebar for link) a cut of theater organ music. As a keyboard player, anything with a good piano or organ recording is a must for me. Yes, I have 4 or 5 copies of Zez Confrey's "Kitten On The Keys" along with some of his other recorded works. Not wanting to get into a dissertation on the Joys of Ragtime (and Why Scott Joplin is not the Be-all and End-all of Ragtime Composers), let me just say that I enjoy all forms of keyboard music, from Biggs to Joplin to Waller to Shearing to Kenton to Tatum to Brubeck to Vince Guaraldi to Corea to Jarret to Keith Emerson to to to....... I think you get the idea. "There's A Rainbow 'Round My Shoulder" is an example of a singer (Ned Miller) being accompanied by a good player (Milton Charles) on a halfway decent Wurlitzer Theater Organ (in this case the organ at the WENR Radio Studios in Chicago, Illinois). The recording is on a Columbia Vita-Tonal electrical recording, and you do get a sense of how full and rich a theater organ can sound, even in this late 20s recording. Try THAT with a horn, Thomas Alva! This song was recorded by other, more conventional dance orchestras, but it still somewhat swings with the theater organ booming away.
The reverse to this side, "Sonny Boy", is kind of a quasi-Irish lament... but it still shows off the stylistic capabilities of Ned Miller, in that he can do the Irish Tenor thing as well as make an honest attempt at a hot dance number.
Let's shift some gears now... I love the Hawaiian Steel guitar. That's a given. I also love performers that don't give a poop about their critics. Sure, you can have great steel players like Sol Hoopii and Mr. Ferrera, but this player was accused once of having "absolutely no musical taste, whatsoever." BAH! Roy Smeck has more taste in his little fingernail than all of his detractors, I think so anyways... I only wish that he had recorded on a label that had decent shellac quality! I do know that others that get Roy Smeck 78s have a dreadful time remastering them, because they are mostly very worn because of being played to near-death. Combine that with Brunswick's use of cruddy shellac on their Melotone subsidiary label, and you get headaches during the restoration process. Anyway, here we have Roy Smeck's Vitaphone Trio performing "The Waltz You Saved For Me", and it illustrates the headache factor perfectly... great recording of a guitar trio (and I do not know who does the vocal here either), on absolutely horrid shellac, played to near death. Sigh. But, there's a good college try in the restoration... the reverse side, "By The River Ste. Marie" came out much much better, however... again, uncredited vocal and Roy doing the zany things he did on the steel guitar, but it is all quite quite tasteful. He's got to be right up there with Sol (Hoopii) and Sol (K. Bright) and Frank Ferrera and Felix Mendelsohn for acumen in playing the instrument...
I've got more things to get posted for you, but I just HAD to get the Ben Selvin sides up tonight. I think you'll see why.
Right-click on the link to download the tunes, you know the drill :)
Until next time,
the Impaler
