A group of nice songs. Not a speck of jazz, and not at all appropriate for lindy hop. Fairly heavy on the vocals and emoting. So much emoting, in fact, I almost feel uncomfortable listing these songs. But then I listen to them, and I feel better.
Caramel – Suzanne Vega – Nine Objects Of Desire – 1996 – 2:53
Chip Away The Stone – Hot Club Of Cowtown – Ghost Train – 2002 – 3:17
Tell Me Again – Ron Sexsmith – Blue Boy – 2001 – 2:37
The Littlest Birds – The Be Good Tanyas – Blue Horse – 2000 – 4:07
Railroad Bill – Crooked Still – Shaken By A Low Sound – 2006 – 2:19
Coffee’s Cold/Tater Patch – Uncle Earl – Going to the Western Slope – 254 – 2004 3:08
Clifton’s Two Step – Clifton Chenier – Louisiana Blues & Zydeco [Bonus Track] – 193 – 1965 – 3:11
Down On Penny’s Farm – Natalie Merchant – The House Carpenter’s Daughter – 2003 – 3:44
I Don’t Want Your Millions, Mister – Barbara Dane – I Hate the Capitalist System – 137 – 3:34
Bury Me Under The Weeping Willow – Natalie Merchant – The House Carpenter’s Daughter – 2003 – 3:22
I know I don’t have to say it, but I will: there’s no jazz without the blues.
An extremely awesome performance by some extremely awesome blues musicians:
Helen Humes : vocal
Sonny Terry : harmonica
Brownie ‘Kazoo’ McGhee : vocal, guitar
Willie Dixon : vocal, bass
T-Bone Walker : vocal, guitar
Memphis Slim : vocal, piano
Jump Jackson : drums
I really like this clip. I might even have considered leaving my man for Willie Dixon : “you know, if it’s good to me, must be good to you.” Yowzers.
The call and response stuff within the band feels like partner dancing to me.
The bit of dancing at the end is neat, and I really like the type design (the original white stuff, not the shitty bit someone’s put over the top).
..I’ve included this clip not just because I _love_ it, but because this festival was important for bringing American blues to Europe, where it influenced people like the Stones, Eric Clapton, etc.
Jimmy Giuffre Three playing ‘the River and the Train’ over the opening credits of ‘Jazz On A Summer’s Day’, which was filmed at the Newport Jazz Festival.
I overuse this song, but I love it. Love it. Nothing danceable here at all. The film, of course is excellent stuff, and the history of the Newport Jazz Festival is pretty interesting. There’s been some cool stuff written about the festival’s valorising of ‘traditional’ jazz and swing (at the expense of modern stuff).
Slim’s Jam Slim Gaillard and his Orchestra (Bam Brown, Zutty Singleton, Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, Jack McVea) The Legends of Savoy, Vol. 2 110 1945 3:17
The Stuff’s Out [it jumped just a minute ago] Skeets Tolbert and his Gentlemen of Swing (Carl Smith, Lem Johnson, Fred Jefferson, Al Hall, Hubert Pettaway) Skeets Tolbert 1931-1940 153 1939 3:24
Hey! Stop Kissin’ My Sister Fats Waller and His Rhythm (John Hamilton, Gene Sedric, Al Casey, Cedric Wallace, Slick Jones) Last Years (1940-1943) (Disc 1) 191 1940 2:48
Murder In The Moonlight Red McKenzie and his Rhythm Kings (Eddie Farley, Mike Riley, Slats Young, Conrad Lanoue, Eddie Condon, George Yorke, Johnny Powell) Classic Sessions 1927-49 (Volume 2) 193 1935 2:55
It Ain’t Right Stuff Smith and his Onyx Club Boys (Jonah Jones, Jame Sherman, Cozy Cole, Bobby Bennett, Mack Walker) Stuff Smith: Complete Jazz Series 1936 – 1939 196 1936 2:42
I’ve Got To Be A Rug Cutter Duke Ellington and His Famous Orchestra The Complete 1932-1940 Brunswick, Columbia And Master Recordings Of Duke Ellington And His Famous Orchestra (disc 06) 236 1937 2:35
Indiana Mound City Blue Blowers (Bunny Berigan, Eddie Miller, Gil Bowers, Nappy Lamare, Harry Goodman, Ray Bauduc, Red McKenzi) Classic Sessions 1927-49 (Volume 1) 230 1935 2:54
I Lost My Girl From Memphis Jimmie Noone’s Apex Club Orchestra (Eddie Pollack, Zinky Cohn, Wilbur Gorham, Bill Newton, Johnny Wells, Georgia White) Jimmie Noone: The Complete Recordings, Vol.2 CD 3 280 1930 2:28
Organ Grinder Blues Clarence Williams and his Orchestra (Ed Allen, Cecil Scott, James P. Johnson, Floyd Casey, Eva Taylor, Clarence Todd) Complete Jazz Series 1934 104 1934 3:11
Let’s Sow A Wild Oat Jimmie Noone’s Apex Club Orchestra (Joe Poston, Alex Hill, Junie Cobb, Bill Newton, Johnny Wells, George Mitchell, Fayette Williams) The Jimmie Noone Collection 185 1928 3:03
Then You’re Drunk Jimmie Noone Trio (Gideon Honore, Henry Forte, Ed Thompson vcl) Jimmie Noone 1934 – 1940 140 1940 2:59
I knew I had to start with Slim Gaillard, but I wasn’t sure where. Slim and Slam are so obvious. But I really like this nice, slow song with lots of talking. Slim does his usual shtick, but you also get to hear the rest of the band mucking about.
Stuff’s Out. I like thinking about dancing in inappropriate clothing when I listen to this song. You know, shirts that ride up, necklines that plunge a little low, brassieres that don’t quite do the job. Tolbert might not have been being as kind as me, but I like the idea of a lady jiggling her bits with delight.
“Swine! To the pigpen!” Fats is another obvious choice. But this is the best intro ever.
‘Murder in the Moonlight’ isn’t exactly a funny song, but I like singing it because it’s cheesy and makes me laugh: “I’ve been killed with kindness; it’s love in the first degree.”
‘It Ain’t Right’ isn’t really a funny song either, but I really like the timing on the vocals “mama, I’m talk-in”. It’s really clever, and my response to cleverness when I’m dancing is usually to shout out with inappropriate laughter.
The opening few bars of this song make me laugh and laugh and laugh. Dave exclaimed “Child!” at about the sixty-fifth playing.
Someone playing the comb just makes me laugh. I love the melody of ‘Indiana’ – I love singing it loudly and dramatically. Also, the Mound City Blue Blowers are just funny.
I love Jimmie Noone more than anything. More. Than. Anything. I had about ten of his songs on this list, but had to cut it down. This one doesn’t have the funniest lyrics, but like ‘Murder in the Moonlight’ and ‘Indiana’, it has a fun riff that’s cool to sing and sounds excellently dramatic.
When Clarence Williams tells you to “wrap your lips around that clarinet and get good and low”, you do as you’re told. More talking, more fun. “Yeah boy, don’t you pull off your shoes in here.”
More Jimmie Noone. Singing about sowing a wild oat.
I really liked Ed Thompson’s scraggly vocal singing about knowing when you’re drunk.
Am I nuts? Why, yes, I probably am. Ryan Swift has drawn my attention to the fact that it’s Jazz Appreciation Month over at the Smithsonian. So I’m going to see if I can come up with a different song or artist every day of this month. I struggled with the Women’s History Month thing (though in a good way – stretch and learn!), so I might need your help. I’ll try to make it women musicians, but that might be difficult. Also, as Loggins says – “why not just list all the people who inspire you? Do they have to be all women?”
Because men can be inspiring too. :D
I’m going to start with a song I overtweet, overlink, overuse. Billie Holiday doing ‘Fine and Mellow’ with some of her friends, live on telly in 1957.
I know very little about Pearl Primus, but I’ve been fascinated by this photo since I found it on the Google Life photo collection (you can see more photos here.
She’s not a ‘jazz dancer’ in the strictest sense – she probably fits a little more comfortably into the concert dance or even ballet basket. But she was very much an activist, with a passion for African and African American dance, and she was definitely active as a dancer, performer and choreographer during the 1930s and 40s.
I did a bit of googling and came up with very few actual videos of her dancing on youtube, but I did find this little doco about her that only fuelled my interest:
Then I found this video of her dancing, which isn’t too great – you can’t really see what she’s doing, and I’m not sure it really does her work justice.
NB that first photo is from a series called ‘Jam Session’ by Gjon Mili in the Life Magazine collection on google, which features many other amazing pics.
Gjon Mili is interesting because he directed ‘Blues for Greasy’ jam session film which starred:
Harry ‘Sweets’ Edison: trumpet
Lester Young: Tenor Sax
Flip Phillips: Tenor Sax
Bill Harris: Trombone
Hank Jones: Piano
Ray Brown: Bass
Buddy Rich: Drums
Ella Fitzgerald: Vocals
Mili worked with Norman Granz on this film, and Granz owned the Verve record label as well as organising the Jazz At The Philarmonic concerts and being hardcore anti-segregation.
Look, just to be clear, the posts about getting your rags, emotions, feminist rage, fucking over the patriarchy, food and badass cooking are the heart of this blog. That means that every post about DJing or dancing or any of that other ‘objective’ ‘rational’ stuff is actually a post about vaginas or fighting the power or being a badassmotherfucker crocheter.
