Pete Fountain * Standing Room Only * Coral Records (CRL 757474) * 1965

Side One

1. Muskrat Ramble
2. Memories Of You
3. Christopher Columbus
4. I Gotta Right To Sing The Blues
5. Struttin' With Some Barbecue

Side Two

1. Ramblin' Medley: a) Oh, Didn't He Ramble b) St. Louis Blues c) Comin' Round The Mountain d) Tiger Rag
2. Embraceable You 
3. When My Sugar Walks Down The Street
4. You Are My Sunshine

Pete Fountain, clarinet
Nick Fatool, drums 
Bob Havens, trombone
Eddie Miller, tenor sax 
Charley Teagarden, trumpet
Godfrey Hirsch, vibes
Earl Vuiovich, piano
Oliver Felix, bass

Recorded 'Live' at Pete Fountain's French Quarter Inn, New Orleans

With this octet, Pete Fountain broke the mold of his Coral small combo records by including Eddie Miller on tenor sax, Charley Teagarden on trumpet, and Bob Haven on trombone. Instead of emphasizing the intimate nightclub feel his earlier efforts had captured so successfully, Pete opens up as a leader on this one, giving leads to all of his wind players and driving the polyphony in a unique, clarinet-focused way. This is also the first Pete Fountain album to feature Nick Fatool on drums for the entire album. The result is a more street-beat oriented and at times more raucous live experience--very different from Pete's Place and At The Bateau Lounge. The arrangements are also a little more scripted, and not really reminiscent of his earlier work with Al Hirt or others from the 1950s, so listeners hoping for more of that should mitigate their expectations. 

Some notes:

'Muskrat Ramble' leads off with a bass/drums duo into, not usual for the tune, which is interesting. 

Eddie Miller takes a tenor sax lead on 'Memories of You.' His playing is solid, but not inspired. This is a tough tune for any clarinetist taking at the ballad tempo of  Benny Goodman, as it was so deeply associated with him, not only through the great sextet recordings,  but the fact that it was ingrained in pop culture as a leitmotif in The Benny Goodman Story. When Pete takes his chorus, he makes the homage clear.

Bob Havens' trombone takes the lead on both 'Christopher Columbus' (rarely performed outside of its more famous spot in Jimmy Mundy's 'Sing Sing Sing' arrangement for the Goodman band) and 'I've Got a Right to Sing the Blues.' Adding the diversity of voices, on side two, Charley Teagarden, trumpet player and brother of the more famous Jack Teagarden,  leads on 'Embraceable You.' Unfortunately, the playing, while nice and solid, is unexceptional and a seems a bit scripted. 

The climax of the album comes with Side Two's 'Ramblin' Medley'. I'm not a big fan of medleys, though they were quite popular at the time (Duke Ellington employed them regularly in his set lists during the 1960s as well). On this album, for once the medley is on side 2, and seems really well placed in the overall form of the album. Nick Fatool's street beat drumming is intense and pushes the whole thing beautifully.

I don't want to give the wrong impression: Pete's playing is excellent on this album, as it is for all of the live Coral albums of the late '50s through the '60s. Any fan of his virtuosic clarinet style will enjoy it, and the album has very interesting things about it, along with satisfying emotional climaxes. But for me, personally, the true golden era of those Coral nightclub albums comes to a close with Pete's Place. There is something special about the string of small combo, clarinet dominated albums from 1959-1965, and with Standing Room Only, I think we sense Pete's recording career in transition to other, larger ensemble projects.

Pete Fountain * Pete's Place * Coral Records (LVA 9228) * 1965

Oh, Lady Be Good (*)
Fascination Medley: 
       Fascination/Basin St Blues/Tin Roof Blues/Way Down Yonder in New Orleans
It's Just a Little While (To Stay Here)
That's A Plenty (*)

The Sheik of Araby (*)
The Preacher
(What Did I Do to Be So) Black & Blue
March to Peruna (*)

Pete Fountain * clarinet
Godfrey Hirsch * vibes
Earl Vuiovich * piano
Paul Guna * guitar/banjo
Oliver Felix * bass
(*)Nick Fatool * drums
Paul Edwards * drums

Recorded on the Saturday before Mardi Gras in February of 1964 at Pete Fountain's French Quarter Inn on the corner of Bourbon and St Anne Streets in New Orleans, and released in 1965, Pete's Place is both a continuation and the beginning of a new era in the clarinetist's development. In terms of continuity,  this album flows perfectly in the stream of 'golden era' Pete Fountain live recordings, following Pete Fountain Day (1959), At the Bateau Lounge (1960), and Live in Santa Monica (1961). The newness is subtle, but to Fountain aficionados noticeable: Pete's tempi aren't quite as burning, he's both more patient and inventive as a soloist on tunes like The Sheik of Araby, and most significantly, this is perhaps the first small combo album of the Coral era that substantially features Nick Fatool on drums rather than Jack Sperling. Sperling's flash and fire had been a major component of every previous small group album for Coral, and the body of work that Fountain and the virtuosic drummer built, stretching over eight or nine albums (depending on how you count them) rightfully takes its place in jazz history alongside other inspired duos such as Goodman & Krupa, or Brown & Roach. Pete & Jack's sympathetic musicality bordering on a type of telepathy was of that rare kind, surpassing normal ensemble brilliance. This album, without Sperling's presence, is immediately different in timbre and groove.

Having given credit where it is due, few drummers could have stepped in with the degree of success of Nick Fatool. Nick was a true jazz veteran by this point in his career, having recorded with Benny Goodman and Artie Shaw as early as the 1940s, making him possibly the only drummer to record with that triumvirate on classic small combo albums. Too often overlooked by jazz history, it's worth pointing out that Fatool provided the perfect pocket grooves for Artie Shaw's original Gramercy 5 recordings and the deep backbeats and streetbeats for Pete's Place. While not as flashy as some other drummers, Fatool was a musician's musician--making every ensemble better for his musical presence, subtlety, and unique 'cushion.'

Highlights of this album include Fatool's solo on 'Oh, Lady Be Good' and the interaction he has with Fountain on 'The Sheik of Araby.' It's telling to contrast Fatool's duo style with Sperling's on 'I've Found a New Baby' from Live At The Bateau Lounge a few years earlier: where Sperling was expert at building tension and driving Pete's fire, Nick encourages Pete to dig into the backbeat, hit harder and longer. Both end up lighting the crowd on fire.

The English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams once suggested to American composers that they not neglect the tunes of Stephen Foster. Such songs, he felt, bore the seeds of a great musical culture to be built. The last tune of this album demonstrates the time had come by 1965, with Pete and the band elevating Foster's 'She'll Be Coming Round the Mountain' to a joyous mini-epic of street beats, climaxes, and a coda to an album that jazz fans will want to return to for years.

This is yet another classic Pete Fountain album in need of reissuing.

  

Pete Fountain Autograph (Eric Seddon Collection)

Pete Fountain's Music from Dixie * Coral Records (CRL 757401) * 1963

Bye Bye Bill Bailey
I Wish I Could Shimmy Like My Sister Kate
High Society
(When It's) Darkness on the Delta
Song of the Wanderer (Where Shall I Go?)
Dixie Jubilee

Struttin' With Some Barbeque
Shine
Chlo-e (Song of the Swamp)
Milenberg Joys
When You're Smiling (The Whole World Smiles With You)
Hallelujah 

Pete Fountain * Clarinet
Charles Teagarden * Trumpet
Eddie Miller * Tenor Saxophone
Moe Schneider * Trombone
Bobby Gibbons * Guitar
Stan Wrightsman * Piano
Morty Corb * Bass
Jack Sperling * Drums


As a general rule, any album from the early 1960s that says "Coral" and "Pete Fountain" on the cover is worth listening to, over and over again. Pete Fountain's Music from Dixie is no exception, proof of which is that several cuts from this album have been re-released many times on 'Greatest Hits' albums.

From the opening 'Bye Bye Bill Bailey' we know it's going to be a swinging time--the band sounds relaxed, comfortable, and ready to play. Fans of the raw energy of the old Pete Fountain/Al Hirt sides of the mid-1950s might wish this set wasn't mellower in comparison, but these twelve standards give us a different feel--instead of that youthful exuberance, we get the more polished, professional work the band was doing nightly at Pete Fountain's French Quarter Inn.

Charles Teagarden (brother of the more famous, trombone playing Jack) plays an excellent New Orleans style lead trumpet when called upon (as in 'High Society') but we've certainly moved to the model Pete was use for most of his career: a less boisterous trumpet, allowing his clarinet to take center stage. The same approach was used by Benny Goodman, Artie Shaw, and Edmond Hall in their small groups--trumpeters, even when they had the lead, were kept more mellow--often playing lead lines muted, or underlining melodies played by the clarinetists. Truth be told, Pete stayed closer to the earlier New Orleans model than most of the others--he really gives Charley the lead, without mute, while weaving his harmonies and countermelodies in true polyphonic style. In many ways Pete was unparalleled in this quintessentially New Orleans function of clarinetistry--his lines, whether closely harmonizing or in soaring obligato, were some of the finest and most diverse ever captured on recording. Because Pete has this extended band (a full New Orleans contingent), this album can alternate between intimate ballad material to uptempo street beats and swing--sometimes shifting back and forth between those poles in the same tunes.

'Darkness on the Delta' from this album is one of my favorite renditions for the beautiful interplay between Fountain and Stan Wrightsman's piano comping. Also for smaller combo, Pete's version of 'Shine' is a real treat, for the reason that so many of his Goodman quartet inspired covers are: he makes the tune his own, resisting the temptation of playing at break neck speed. Here, and many other places, Pete demonstrates a principle of importance to any jazz clarinetist: more phrasing, more character, and more attention to groove will yield a far better result than turning a tune into 'Jazz Kroepsch' with a polka beat (we've all heard that, haven't we?) Pete was sometimes criticized by clarinetist's with less competent technique for being 'too flashy' during his career, but reengaging his actual work shows otherwise -- he rarely took extreme tempos, more frequently crafting beautiful vibrant up tempo choruses.

Pete's version of 'Chlo-e' is of very different character than Goodman's lilting big band chart. The Fountain ensemble takes a full verse before the chorus, and plays in a deep, relaxed ballad manner. Really the diversity of moods on the album us exceptional, and an indication of why his nightclub shows were so successful.

'Struttin' with some Barbeque' for the full band is another highlight--one of Pete's earlier recordings of the classic Armstrong tune. 'Milenberg Joys' shows how well old standards can be updated--a listener would be forgiven for thinking it was a relatively new tune for 1963, and it sounds pretty well timeless even now. The whole album comes to a satisfying conclusion with 'Hallelujah', which is exactly what I want to say now that this music is available once again, in downloadable reissue.

Music from Dixie captures the mature Fountain ensemble and concept--a format he would maintain for a significant portion of his career. Some of the earlier Coral albums are notable for their sheer excitement and freshness. This one is more measured, but it's a solid, professional outing of interest that never lets the listener down.


 

Presenting Pete Fountain With Al Hirt * Bourbon Street * Coral Records (CRL 757389) * 1962

Side A

Farewell Blues (*)
St. James Infirmary
March of the Bob Cats (*)
March Through the Streets of Their City

Side B

At the Jazz Band Ball (*)
Blues on Bourbon Street (**)
Jazz Me Blues (*)
Lazy River

Pete Fountain, clarinet
Al Hirt, trumpet (*)
Eddie Miller, tenor sax (*)
Abe Lincoln, trombone (*)
Stan Wrightsman, piano
Bobby Gibbons, guitar

Morty Corb, bass
Ray Bauduc, drums (*)
Jack Sperling, drums 
Godfrey Hirsch, vibes (**)
Dave West, piano (**)
Lowell Miller,  bass (**)
Paul Guma, guitar (**)


Bourbon Street is the companion piece to another Coral record released in the same year of 1962: Pete Fountain & Al Hirt: The New Orleans Scene. It's laid out identically to The New Orleans Scene, alternating between a full New Orleans band featuring both Fountain and Hirt, and Pete's smaller night club gigging ensemble of the early '60s. It's interesting that Coral didn't release all the Al Hirt sides on one of the discs, and all of the smaller groups on another, as the small combo tunes seem to me clearly the stronger ones on The New Orleans Scene. The level of excellence on this Bourbon Street album is consistent, though, with the full Dixieland contingent swinging hard and well.

Highlights of this album include excellent versions of 'Farewell Blues' and 'At the Jazz Band Ball' -- warhorses from the repertoires of the New Orleans Rhythm Kings and the Original Dixieland Jass Band, too often covered by bands with an exaggerated nostalgia even in the late '50s and early '60s. Hirt and Fountain tear into them like they were written yesterday, with a freshness and that subtle insistence common to all great music--that sense that the performers have a need to play the music. Perhaps only Eddie Condon's bands played these numbers as well, though I'd give the nod to Hirt and Fountain, for the simple reason that Condon never recorded them with a clarinetist so strong as Pete.

Pete's small combo recording of 'St James Infirmary' is, to my mind, one of the finest versions of the tune recorded. The mood is thoroughly 'modern'...not meaning that the harmonies or melodic style were influenced by modern jazz, particularly, but that the sound and space is once again entirely without nostalgia--a mournful strength runs through Pete's classic solo, with the ensemble murmuring assent. This is one of those performances that ought to make all clarinetists pause and think about the repertoire for the clarinet, even in terms of classical music. How many composers could write such a perfect statement? Such a heartfelt movement of music? Pete carves his own musical path, with assurance and maturity here. To my mind, this music won't ever go out of style any more than Brahms will.

On Side B we're treated to a Fountain/Dant original, 'Blues on Bourbon Street', which incorporates wisps of 'The Saints' and seems an after hours gamble through the Quarter in the wee hours after closing time. 'Jazz Me Blues' reinforces the authority of the Hirt/Fountain band to interpret the earliest jazz tunes, and Pete continues his seemingly endless variations on Sidney Arodin's 'Lazy River.'

Leonard Feather's liner notes are of interest to musicology, highlighting what probably ought to be better understood--the importance of the two poles of jazz in mid-century--52nd Street and Bourbon Street.

This is an essential album.


       

Pete Fountain & Al Hirt * The New Orleans Scene * Coral Records (CRL 57419) * 1962

Side A

Panama 
St Louis Blues (*)
All the Wrongs You've Done to Me
Lonesome Road (*)

Side B

I Used to Love You
I've Found a New Baby (*)
It's a Long Way to Tipperary
Might Like the Blues (*)

Pete Fountain * Clarinet
Al Hirt * Trumpet
Jack Delaney * Trombone
Roy Zimmerman * Piano
Joe Capraro * Bass
Arthur (Monk) Hazel * Drums

(*) Stan Wrightsman * Piano
(*) Bobby Gibbons * Guitar
(*) Morty Corb * Bass
(*) Jack Sperling * Drums


This was one of the first Pete Fountain albums I heard as a kid, and certainly my first exposure to Pete in a quartet setting. The quartet tracks are pretty much responsible for my addiction to the entire New Orleans tradition of clarinet--and I'm happy to say I've never completely gotten over them. The New Orleans Scene was also my first introduction to the repertoire presented--including 'St Louis Blues', which Pete plays in the key of F rather than the more standard key of G. Back in the dark days of the 1980s, before the internet, the only 'Real Book' out there was the pirated version, and most of the tunes were bop and early fusion. To my trad-oriented mind it was filled with numbers of very little interest, but because it was the standard gig book, I did my best with it. The only way a kid like me could really learn the tunes that Pete played was to transcribe them by ear and hope to run into a band of older players who knew them. As it turns out, that method is almost as old as jazz itself, and certainly an indispensable part of a jazz musician's learning process. I didn't know that then--just desperately felt the need to play this music (which, as it turns out, is also an indispensable part of being a jazz musician, so in retrospect I was following the right path).

Anyhow, I finally did run into that band of older players who knew 'St Louis Blues', getting my chance to sit in with them. That group was the Galvanized Jazz Band, and a quick internet search reveals this fine ensemble is still gigging regularly in Connecticut. To my ear, they were a real top notch Dixieland ensemble. I was about seventeen year old, and one of the older cornet players who used to play with them occasionally heard about me. He said I should get some experience playing 'out,' offering to take me the two hours or so of highway driving to get there. So we plunged onto the highway one Fall evening, in the type of relentless lashing rain that people from Connecticut know so well. The band was playing along Long Island Sound somewhere, at one of the many seafood bars--in retrospect as perfect setting you can get in the North for New Orleans style jazz. When I finally got my chance to call a tune, I figured I'd better call something I could rip on, to really impress the guys, and one of the only Real Book tunes I'd liked was John Coltrane's 'Mr. P.C.'

"Do you play any Trane?" I asked.

"No," was the annoyed response, and a couple of the band members rolled their eyes. My mind raced.

"How about St Louis Blues?"

"Now you're talking!"

I counted off and dug into the head--in the wrong key! I was playing Pete's version, rather than the standard! The guys were so good, though, we stopped and restarted--and they all transposed seamlessly behind me. The clarinetist for the band that night was very encouraging--I'll never forget our conversation about the music. Pete's recording of this came up--he probably realized it was from this album that I'd gotten the tune.

Some albums are so full of memories of time and place, so loaded with nostalgia, that they become impossible to separate from our lives. Or maybe we don't want to separate them--realizing that if we pull this album out to dissect it, our lives will start to fray too much in those spots. I'm that way with The New Orleans Scene--it was part of the sustaining soundtrack to my life as a teen, and a more or less constant companion afterwards. If I grudgingly attempt to look at it objectively for a moment, the numbers with Al Hirt and the larger ensemble never particularly grabbed my attention--though their version of 'Panama' is still the primordial template for the tune in my mind, from that first exposure. Honestly, there are other examples of Pete in a larger New Orleans ensemble setting that seem to have more spirit and verve (particularly earlier recordings from the mid 1950s). I'd also have to admit some of his other recordings of 'I've Found a New Baby' might even outstrip this brilliant studio recording--the live version on At the Bateau Lounge is certainly in the running. Still, these eight tunes are a very solid collection some of the great standards. Pete's playing on 'St. Louis Blues,' the aforementioned 'I've Found a New Baby,' and 'The Lonesome Road' were so powerful that they hooked me for life, and probably altered my trajectory from that of a New York kid wanting to play modern jazz and swing, to a clarinetist looking south towards New Orleans for my inspiration. 

So I recommend this short, patchwork album to everyone, with the caveat that I can't objectively listen to it. It's too much of an old friend. And for all you kids out there transcribing--by all means, get after Pete's playing as much as you can. But remember most bands play 'St Louis Blues' in G. 

   

Pete Fountain Mardi Gras Medallion
(Eric Seddon Collection)

Pete Fountain * Mr. New Orleans * Decca (DL7-5377) * 1963

Side A

South Rampart Street Parade
Put On Your Old Grey Bonnet
The Second Line
Basin Street Blues
The Darktown Strutters' Ball
Marching 'round The Mountain


Side B

Over The Waves
Careless Love
Walking Through New Orleans
Sugar Bowl Parade
Farewell Blues
Washington And Lee Swing



Pete Fountain * Clarinet

Godfrey Hirsch * Marching Drum
Jack Sperling * Snare, Cymbal, Foot Drum
Nick Fatool * Field Drum
Paul Barbarin * Vertical Bass Drum with Brass Rim Cymbal
Jackie Coon * Trumpet
Moe Schneider, Lou McCreary, Bill Schaefer, Dick Nash, Dick Noel * Trombones
George Roberts * Bass Trombone
Bobby Gibbons * Banjo
Phil Stephens * Tuba
Morty Corb * Bass

Directed by Bud Dant

This is an unusual album, but also quite enjoyable if the listener is open-minded. It seems an experiment in tone painting--an interpretation of New Orleans street beats and parade music by a fictional marching band. That might sound odd...and, well, the music is a bit odd in a way, but that's part of its interest and charm.

First and foremost, the orchestration is innovative. Fountain and Dant employed four drummers, who play simultaneously, on this record, including Godfrey Hirsch on a marching drum, though he was usually Pete's vibraphonist! Along with Hirsch are three more legendary drummers, all playing street beats together--Jack Sperling, Nick Fatool (who played with Benny Goodman and Artie Shaw before Pete), and New Orleans legend Paul Barbarin (whose credentials included stints with King Oliver, Sidney Bechet, Freddie Keppard, and Jimmie Noone!) The four of them create a fictional marching drum corps, generating grooves for the entire album--and while the parade that aurally suggests itself is fictional enough, the groove isn't! What these masters did with marching and field drums was pure soul.

The band is trombone heavy with arrangements tending to script the low brass, giving Pete's clarinet and Jackie Coon's trumpet room to work. Those expecting real polyphonic improvisation, like Pete's earlier recording of South Rampart Street Parade with the Village Scramblers, might be initially disappointed by the opening of this album. When I first heard this record as a teenager some thirty years ago, I had a hard time getting past the counted off feeling and block arrangement that shocked my system at the beginning. My advice, though? Please stick with it. This album has a ton of very interesting and evocative playing and writing. You just have to understand the concept, which is unique. I've said that Pete's 1959 album The Blues is symphonic in its pacing and musical material, carrying the listener through. Similarly, Mr. New Orleans is like a tone poem--part orchestrated, part improvised--to evoke a clarinetist's view of a Mardi Gras Parade.

These arrangements probably wouldn't work very easily in actual parade circumstances--the balance would be difficult. The clarinetist would have to be mic'd and probably on a float, and who knows how acoustics would be properly achieved. But they hang together as though almost through-composed, with a unity typical of Fountain/Dant projects from this era. It's worth pointing out the diversity arrangers and arrangements:

Don Bagley arranged 'South Rampart Street Parade.'

'Grey Bonnet' and 'Careless Love' were good old fashioned head arrangements. According to Leonard Feather's liner notes, 'Farewell Blues' was virtually a head arrangement, too, with a little prodding from Bud Dant, who also wrote the playbook for Godfrey Hirsch's original 'Sugar Bowl Parade', 'Walking Through New Orleans', and 'Marching Round the Mountain.'

Matty Matlock had the honor of arranging Barbarin's original 'The Second Line' (with Barbarin in the drum corps!), while also contributing charts for 'Washington and Lee Swing.'

Heinie Beau arranged 'Basin Street Blues', 'The Darktown Strutter's Ball', and 'Over the Waves'.

Pete's playing is excellent throughout. His sound is particularly mellow and full. Either the sound engineers or his set-up avoided most of the reediness that comes through on his more aggressive live album soloing of the same time period, so if you like the Pete Fountain sound that is smoothest and most mellow, this is an album you'll want to hear, even if it's also pretty loud and raucous from beginning to end. While every jazz studio recording tends to balance clarinet somewhat synthetically, this one does so more extremely in a sense--enabling Pete to play in a very relaxed manner over four pounding drummers and blazing trombones, while still being easily heard. 

Jackie Coon's trumpet playing is a real treat on this LP, especially on the beautiful classic 'Put on Your Old Grey Bonnet.' Coon evokes all the sweetness and love of the old couple in the song, celebrating their 50th Wedding Anniversary and taking a ride through the fields to revisit the place they first said their vows. His nuance and sound are a perfect match for Pete's, leaving us to wish we had more examples on record of the two collaborating.

For Pete Fountain fans, of great interest is to hear how he navigates these arrangements of standards, propelled by street beats rather than a drum set with a ride cymbal. I think they'll be happy with the results. He even manages to salvage a tune like 'Over the Waves' which has been played so badly by so many--Pete imbues it with charm and jauntiness, rather than saccharine vibrato.

Fountain and Dant were to collaborate on many concept albums as the years progressed--some of them truly great, some less successful. To me, this is one of the most successful, worthy of repeated listening as the years go by.

Pete Fountain Half/Fast Walking Club Mardi Gras Doubloon
(Eric Seddon Collection)

Pete Fountain At the Bateau Lounge * Coral Records (CRL 757314) * 1960

Side A

Deep River
My Melancholy Baby
I've Found a New Baby
Mack the Knife
Creole Gumbo
You Brought a New Kind of Love to Me

Side B

Londonderry Air
Nobody Knows the Trouble I've Seen
After You've Gone
Gin Mill Blues
Little Rock Getaway
Blue Lou

• Pete Fountain * Clarinet
• Merle Koch * Piano
• Don Bagley * Bass
• Jack Sperling * Drums
• 
  

Recorded Live at Dan's Bateau Lounge, Bourbon and Toulouse Streets

It's difficult to imagine any current musician releasing albums at the prolific rate of Pete Fountain in 1960. After the rapid succession of Pete Fountain's New Orleans, The Blues, and Pete Fountain Day, the clarinetist newly liberated from the world of Lawrence Welk and commercial music fired off his first small club live recording with Pete Fountain At The Bateau Lounge -- an astonishing fourth album in five months. Like the others in this series of Coral records, Pete is in top shape, partially because of the intense work schedule he was maintaining since returning to New Orleans. At the Bateau lounge he and the band were performing four shows a night, six nights a week, and the tightness of the ensemble show the value of that work.

Leading off the set is the traditional spiritual, 'Deep River', which had been recorded multiple times in the popular song adaptation version entitled 'Dear Old Southland' by Sidney Bechet. Contrasting Bechet's broad and heartfelt rhapsodizing, Pete ratchets up the tempo, sizzling with exuberance. While the choice of title was probably related to multiple factors, the symbolism serves to highlight the lyrics of the African-American spiritual: 

Deep river,
My home is over Jordan.
Deep river, Lord.
I want to cross over into campground.

Oh, don't you want to go,
To the Gospel feast;
That Promised Land,
Where all is peace?

The subject of homecoming--including ultimate spiritual homecoming--is therefore symbolically represented. And with Pete's crew, that means a pretty happening party.

This 'Melancholy Baby' is one of Pete's finest, and once again we hear why Pete's clarinet and Jack Sperling's drumming were so well matched. As usual when those two were in the same band, the rest of the group work around that central dialogue, Koch and Bagley gently murmuring responses.

'I've Found a New Baby', another stalwart Fountain show piece, is presented with polish, verve, and inspiration--the crowd appreciating everyone, and the intensity of the live date coming through. Sperling's drum solo, replete with double bass drums, is a high point, providing Pete with a launching pad for the ride out.

Aside from the standards on the album, we're treated to an original called "Creole Gumbo" credited to Fountain, Koch, and Bud Dant (arranger for many of Pete's big band, orchestral, and even small group numbers). It's a riff tune reminiscent in some ways of 'Struttin' With Some Bar-B-Cue' or any number of Benny Goodman sextet tunes like 'Seven Come Eleven' or 'Air Mail Special', but with a particularly Fountainesque flavor. The band obviously enjoys it, with Jack Sperling contributing a chorus of melodic drum soloing.

While I love all the cuts on this album, three from Side B stand out in particular to me. 'Londonderry Air' (Danny Boy) is the first--a medium uptempo version of the classic Irish Ballad, proving once again that anything lyrical is fit for the style of Fountain. The next is 'Nobody Knows the Trouble I've Seen.' Pete's take is intimate, reverent, but resolute. In the tradition of New Orleans clarinet that runs from Irving Fazola through Pete, there is a sweetness of sound he is able to get, matched by few others, while still retaining depth of statement. As a jazz clarinetist who in many ways specializes in Trad/NOLA style, I'm always less than impressed if the only means a player has to express depth is by becoming more extroverted. Contrasting  Pete with those whose style demands an overwrought approach is instructive: he has a far wider expressive palette, generated primarily from his tone, his attacks, and his phrasing. This is sometimes paradoxically lost on many modern jazz musicians and academics, but never on the public. And in fact, these things are perhaps even more important musical concerns for a professional than any amount of obscure harmonic analysis or rationalizing. 

'Gin Mill Blues' is my other favorite, simply because any time Pete plays a blues, I'll be listening.

This album is one of those that doesn't really transport the listener back in time, at least not me, simply because the music making sounds so valid today. It's perfect nightclub music--exuberant, relaxing, refined, intelligent, confiding, and heartfelt. Along with the others of this era that Pete cut, it's one of the finest live albums of jazz clarinet on record, perhaps the finest in a small club atmosphere. This band would outstrip most current jazz groups for professional nuance, emotion, and depth.

To my knowledge, as of this writing, while some of the tracks may have been remastered and released on compilation albums, I don't think it has ever been reissued as an entire album. My hope is that it will be soon, along with all of the early Coral masterpieces.

Autographed Portrait of Pete Fountain
(Eric Seddon Collection)

 

Pete Fountain's New Orleans * Coral Records (CRL 757282) * 1959

Side A 

While We Danced the Mardi Gras
A Closer Walk With Thee
When the Saints Go Marching In
When It's Sleepy Time Down South
Ol'  Man River
Cotton Fields

Side B

Sweethearts on Parade
Do You Know What it Means to Miss New Orleans
Basin Street Blues
Lazy River
Way Down Yonder in New Orleans
Tin Roof Blues

Pete Fountain * Clarinet
Stan Wrightsman * Piano
Morty Corb * Bass
Jack Sperling * Drums


Recorded in Los Angeles after leaving Lawrence Welk's show over artistic differences, Pete Fountain's New Orleans constitutes an opening statement of sorts, just prior to his return to the Crescent City. His first under a new deal with Coral records, this album lays down mature (for some even definitive) versions of twelve standards he was to reference and develop for the rest of his career. Unlike many of his early Coral albums--too often underappreciated classics in desperate need of reissue--this album has been continuously in print for nearly seventy years, the sound remaining remarkably fresh and timeless.

The tune selection was, for the time, a mix of old and new. Songs like 'Ol' Man River' and 'While We Danced the Mardi Gras', while already firmly established, were still relatively recent additions to the repertoire. The others were venerable New Orleans songs and hymns of diverse backgrounds and associations. 'When It's Sleepy Time Down South' was Louis Armstrong's theme song for many years,  'A Closer Walk With Thee' was deeply associated with George Lewis, becoming synonymous with Pete as a result of this album, and from there a legacy to all jazz clarinetists (those interested can even hear my version on our live album).  'Tin Roof Blues' will always be linked to many New Orleans clarinetists, but most especially with Leon Roppolo; likewise 'Way Down Yonder in New Orleans' with Jimmie Noone. 'Lazy River' is a tune from the all but forgotten New Orleans clarinetist, Sidney Arodin. Significantly absent are regular numbers from Pete's repertoire associated with clarinetists outside of New Orleans--no 'Avalon', 'After You've Gone', 'Shine', or others which might bring Benny Goodman to mind, for example. In short, this album, so unified in concept and delivery, is a tour through a master clarinetist's view of New Orleans.

For Pete personally, the album was seminal:

The first album was a milestone. [...] Back to that first recording session. It was beautiful. The simplicity and ease of not having to worry about what somebody else thought of every note was fantastic. I was on my own and I could play what I felt like playing.(Fountain 158)

The tunes were worked out in studio--'head arrangements' decided upon mostly by the musicians, though producer Bud Dant contributed some into and outro music. The Dant-Fountain collaboration was to prove fruitful for many years to come, both in small and large group settings, over the course of many discs.

Though I haven't bothered to look into the album's commercial success, as of the publication of Pete's autobiography in 1972, Pete Fountain's New Orleans had gone multi-platinum and, having been reissued in every available format since, has undoubtedly continued to sell. Part of the reason for this must be the timeless quality of the playing. The players aren't self consciously trad in approach--this isn't New Orleans revival style of any era. Instead, it's a creative fusion of New Orleans, swing, and west coast cool that seems to have a permanent place in American musical aesthetic. In fact, it's far less dated sounding than many 'classic' modern albums of the same era--a tribute to the musicians and recording engineers.

Those who are students or fans of Pete Fountain's playing will undoubtedly know other versions of every tune, perhaps even preferring different takes. Maybe the unbridled creativity of Pete's playing of 'Tin Roof Blues' live in Santa Monica two years later strikes some listeners as his best, or various versions of 'The Saints.' In many ways, though, this album was the blueprint for all subsequent performances. Here, with simplicity, beauty and significant flashes of that fire he was known for, Pete gave a unified vision of his own style. It reminds me of another album from the same era: Sonny Rollins's Saxophone Colossus. Both albums are summas of a sort, while simultaneously a fresh start--pivot chords in both men's careers. The albums have a perfection of balance that seem to pull the listener through--once started, you can't help but listen to the entire thing, in one refreshing session. Both were to be expanded upon for decades afterwardss, and both utilized that remarkably balanced ensemble, the jazz quartet.

This is Pete's love letter to New Orleans--the one where he told them to leave the light on for him, cuz he was coming home. The music shines as brightly today as it did in 1959.



Further reading:

Fountain, Pete and Neely, Bill. A Closer Walk: The Pete Fountain Story. Regnery: Chicago (1972). 


     

Autograph inscription in a copy of Pete Fountain's 1972 Autobiography,
A Closer Walk: The Pete Fountain Story. (Eric Seddon Collection) 

Pete Fountain Day * Coral Records (CRL 57313) * October 23, 1959

Recorded Live in New Orleans Municipal Auditorium October 23rd (or 26th or 29th) 1959

Side A

I Got Rhythm

Ja-Da

China Boy (Go Sleep)

Avalon

Shine

Side B

Tiger Rag

Don't Be That Way

Poor Butterfly

Someday Sweetheart

'S Wonderful

Pete Fountain * clarinet

Godfrey Hirsch * vibes

Merle Koch * piano

Don Bagley * bass

Jack Sperling * drums

The first of a series of live recordings from Pete Fountain's Coral Records period, this album is unique. It documents and celebrates the return of Pete Fountain to New Orleans after his year of national success on the Lawrence Welk show in Los Angeles. Although he was to speak with gratitude of Welk for the rest of his career, for the exposure and the break, Pete never liked working for the show. The cameras and pressure made him a nervous wreck, he didn't get enough playing time for real jazz, and he was stifled creatively by Welk. In his own words, he "finally cracked" after the 1958 holiday special, when Welk called his jazz phrasing of Silver Bells "sacrilegious." Pete pointed out it wasn't even a religious song, but was further chastised for messing with Welk's arrangement. This was the final straw: realizing he wasn't happy playing Welk's music, and that he was homesick for New Orleans, he took the risk of quitting. The gigging scene was bleak in the Crescent City, especially for a top paid performer with a national audience and young family to provide for, but when Welk asked him what he would do in New Orleans, Fountain answered, "I don't know. But I'm going back home even if I have to play for strippers as Faz did." (Fountain, 155-56).

Shortly after this became public knowledge, Charles "Bud" Dant, an A&R man for Coral Records stepped in and offered Pete a contract. A five year deal was inked that became the foundation for some of Pete's most important albums, including Pete Fountain Day, which was not the first they did (that was the studio album Pete Fountain's New Orleans, followed quickly by The Blues, which featured Big Band arrangements by Dant--both of which were recorded in Los Angeles before his return). Pete Fountain Day, however, was perhaps the most symbolically significant.

Pete Fountain Day LP (Eric Seddon Collection)

Pete quickly lined up a steady gig at the Bateau Lounge in the French Quarter after his return, moved the family to Annunciation Street (Fountain, 165), and was content to ply his trade. In a rare moment of exposure and a appreciation for a jazz musician, however, New Orleans Mayor Vic Schiro had something more in mind--an idea that might tie Fountain's return to a tourist marketing scheme for the city. He declared October 23, 1959 "Pete Fountain Day" and offered a concert at New Orleans Municipal Auditorium. [Note regarding the actual date of "Pete Fountain Day": Pete's autobiography lists it as October 23rd. The liner notes to the Coral album, however, mention it twice--once as October 26th, the other October 29th!]

"I will never forget that day," Pete was to write in his autobiography, years later. "It was the highest honor I have ever received." (Fountain 165-66).
  
Coral Records decided to record it and release a live album. The result, aside from its significance historically to the history of jazz in general and the New Orleans scene specifically, is one of the finest live albums any jazz clarinetist has produced.

The liner notes to the album, mostly written by Sim Meyers (then Amusements Editor and Music Critic for the New Orleans Times-Picayune), with a summary on the back by Burt Korall, (then Co-Editor of The Jazz Word), stress the sweep of New Orleans musical history, from the opening of the first resident opera company in America there in 1796 through the years of slavery, Civil War, emancipation, the distressed economic and social condition of freed African Americans and the birth of jazz, all the way up to 1959. The notes suggest that Pete's concert represented a final consummation of high culture, symbolized by the opera house, and native culture, symbolized by jazz. Other historians have presented other narratives, and perhaps don't view Pete Fountain Day with the same level of significance, but it's worth noting that for many this was a truly symbolic day in the history of music.

Interior Liner Notes to Pete Fountain Day (Eric Seddon Collection)

Our understanding of history is always growing, always changing as we learn more and, hopefully, as we grow in honesty about ourselves. While knowing other perspectives, I personally found these notes heartening, and gladly add them to the record of important opinions concerning the history of jazz. But all of that aside, what makes this album essential beyond its historical context, nearly seven decades later, are the exceptional performances of the repertoire. 

I won't go into depth on the individual tracks, except to say that this version of "China Boy (Go Sleep)", has been reissued on various compilation discs over the years, and for good reason. It might be the greatest version of the tune recorded by a clarinetist, or anyone for that matter--and I say that with the classic takes of Benny Goodman, Sidney Bechet, and many others squarely in mind. The rapport between Pete and Jack Sperling on drums, particularly, borders on telepathic, and solidifies the two as a tandem to be considered along the lines of Goodman & Krupa, or Artie Shaw & Buddy Rich. All of the other cuts are vintage Pete Fountain, with top notch Coral recording sound. To my knowledge, as of this writing, the album has not been fully remastered, nor has it been reissued. Why, I'm not sure: there are various internet rumors, which I won't bother with here. My advice is to buy one of the LP copies still floating around the internet. Its importance and brilliance are worth the effort.   

Looking back at that moment in 1959, it's perhaps worth noting that not many jazz musicians, if any, have made the decision to return as Pete Fountain did. He continued making TV appearances, most notably on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, entirely to promotional purposes--to keep audience interest in his New Orleans nightclub. Pete still hated being on TV, and it always made him a nervous wreck to do these spots. Yet partially because of them, he remains a solitary figure in the history of the music: one who hit it so big that he was for a brief period synonymous with "jazz" to a large portion of the American public, yet who returned to New Orleans permanently.    

Back Cover: Pete Fountain Day LP (Eric Seddon Collection)

Further reading:

Fountain, Pete and Neely, Bill. A Closer Walk: The Pete Fountain Story. Regnery: Chicago (1972).

Doreen Ketchens with the Louisiana Philharmonic * Just a Closer Walk with Thee

Doreen 'The Clarinet Queen' Ketchens is one of the true standard bearers for NOLA clarinet in my generation. She's taken the tradition from the masters before her and added her distinct voice and soul. I know folks who were worried the tradition would cease to be living after the last generation or so, but the vitality Doreen brings is undeniable, and the new angles she illuminates on the repertoire are uniquely fresh, undeniably pointing to continued fertile ground.  

Doreen and I are both alums of the Hartt School, and even shared a clarinet professor, though we never met (she left just shortly before I arrived), and both of us struck out on unique paths. I've long been inspired by her trailblazing and insistence on this profound music, though. 

Brava! Long live the Clarinet Queen!

Sidney Bechet & Albert Nicholas with Jelly Roll Morton * September 14, 1939 * Bluebird * NYC

Oh, Didn't He Ramble
High Society
I Thought I Heard Buddy Bolden Say
Winin' Boy Blues

Stanley De Paris, trumpet
Claude Jones, trombone, speech
Albert Nicholas, clarinet
Sidney Bechet, soprano saxophone
Happy Cauldwell, tenor saxophone
Jelly Roll Morton,  piano
Laurence Lucie, guitar
Wellman Braud, bass
Zutty Singleton, drums


Sidney Bechet plus Jelly Roll Morton equals a winning equation, no matter how you calculate it, and no matter how much tension there may have been in the studio at the time. These four tracks from September 14, 1939 serve as a quick proof. Opening up with a quote from "Flee as a Bird" for a solemn preamble, then the mock-solemn intonation...

Ashes to ashes, 
dust to dust,
if the women don't get ya
the liquor must...

...the band bursts into "Oh Didn't He Ramble", confidently swinging with a unanimous groove, each voice knowing exactly where to place himself. Bechet's soprano is comfortable, diving and singing, Stanley De Paris's trumpet well balanced (though apparently he and Bechet were not happy to find each other on the same date), and Albert Nicholas played the right supporting role along with the rest of the band before they break off for a dirge fade out.

The version of "High Society" they cut that day is of interest mostly for the rarity of hearing both Bechet (on soprano) and Albert Nicholas (on clarinet) play the "test solo." I'll let others come to their own conclusions as to who won this duel, but I think Albert delivers it more confidently and cleanly. His swagger for the last choruses of the tune seem to indicate pride in the accomplishment, and I can't help but wonder what Bechet thought of the resulting disc (it obviously didn't hurt his relationship with Nicholas, who he was to record with again, with great results).

The soprano soloing on "I Thought I heard Buddy Bolden Say" and "Winin' Boy Blues" are vintage Bechet and we are left, once again, wondering what would have happened if the association between Morton and the great soloist could have continued longer. But it wasn't to happen. Bechet had begun an engagement in Fonda, in upstate New York along the Mohawk River, and wasn't to make the return to New York City for the next session (Chilton, 123).

Just as so many of Jelly Roll's recordings sound like vignettes, so Bechet's time in the recording studio with him was just another vignette in the life of a great soloist. He would have one more recording session in 1939 as a sideman with The Haitian Orchestra, then turn his sites to leading his own band again. Perhaps the frustrations in the studio during 1939 made him realize it was time to take matters into his own hands as a leader, but whatever the impetus, 1940 would be a banner year for Bechet's legacy, and this date with Jelly Roll just a harbinger of things to come.

Further Reading:

Chilton, John. Sidney Bechet: The Wizard of Jazz. OUP, 1987.

Zammarchi, Fabrice. "Sidney Bechet". Notes to Sidney Bechet: The Complete American Masters, 1931-1953. Universal Music Classics & Jazz, France, 2011.

Sidney Bechet and the Port of Harlem Seven * June 8, 1939 * Blue Note Records * NYC

Blues for Tommy Ladnier
Summertime
Pounding Heart Blues

Frankie Newton, trumpet
J. C.  Higgenbotham, trombone
Sidney Bechet, soprano sax & clarinet
Meade Lux Lewis, piano
Teddy Bunn, guitar
Johnny Williams, bass
Sid Catlett, drums

On June 4, 1939, Sidney Bechet's collaborator Tommy Ladnier died suddenly of a heart attack at the age of 39. Like Bechet, Ladnier was a Louisiana native, against the playing of "commercial" music, known to leave better paying gigs to play the music he loved, and was attracted to the more colorblind European scene. The French critic and jazz impressario, Hugues Panassié, when on a mission to record real jazz in the United States, made a point of hunting him down in Newburgh, New York to arrange a recording session with Sidney Bechet the year before. Four days after Ladnier's death, Bechet went into the studio and cut the very first of the Blue Note records which have become such a significant part of his legacy. The Port of Harlem Seven would only have this one recording session together, but it was to be meaningful.

The first tune cut on the session was, appropriately, "Blues for Tommy Ladnier." Frankie Newton's trumpet is mellow and balanced, his solo reflectively sympathetic without becoming sentimental. Bechet too, offers his eulogy, with each band member commenting in turn before bursting into an out chorus. It's then that Newton finally allows some high notes to sound and Bechet's soprano shouts back in concurrence. The feeling isn't so much of a dirge, but of a warm, heartfelt glimpse into their appreciation of the man who had just left them.

So much has been written about Bechet's recording of "Summertime" that there is little to add. It's impossible to praise this moment in jazz history too much. Here is Bechet at zenith, his five heartbreaking choruses taking us deeper and deeper into a southern sunset, and probing the themes associated with the song: birth, death, resurrection, suffering, redemption. It's one of a handful of the most important recordings of the twentieth century, a meditation that unites thought, feeling, meaning, and soul as one.

The last of that day's recorded triptych was "Pounding Heart Blues", a traditional tune perhaps hinting, too, at Ladnier's death. The mood is solemn, respectful, reflective, bringing to a close this important moment in recorded history.

Tommy Ladnier playing was so soulful, he was nicknamed "The Praying Cornet" during his lifetime. On this session, Bechet would leave us one of his most heartfelt performances, bookended with emotionally solemn, yet warm hearted remembrances.

The Port of Harlem Seven were never to record under that name again, but they made their permanent mark on jazz history that day.

Sidney Bechet with Tommy Ladnier & His Orchestra * November 28, 1938 * New York City * Bluebird Records

Ja-Da
Really The Blues
When You and I Were Young, Maggie
Weary Blues

Tommy Ladnier, trumpet
Sidney Bechet, soprano sax & clarinet
Mezz Mezzrow, clarinet & tenor sax
Cliff Jackson, piano
Teddy Bunn, guitar
Elmer James, bass
Manzie Johnson, drums


Just a few weeks after his recording debut as a bandleader, Sidney Bechet returned to the studio with his old friend, Louisiana born trumpeter Tommy Ladnier, to cut some sides for RCA Bluebird label.

According to John Chilton (pg 119) this band was hand picked by Hughes Panassié , the French impressario and critic, who wanted to record top notch American jazz musicians. He hunted down Tommy Ladnier, who was then gigging halfway up the Hudson River in Newburgh, New York. Sidney Bechet had to be given permission to record with the group by Irving Mills, and only on the condition he wouldn't be billed as the leader. The resulting records were worth the humility, as they are some of the finest trad jazz sides ever cut.  

The enthusiasm is there right from the beginning of "Ja-Da." Cliff Jackson's left hand is strong hinting at the boogie woogie craze about to blow, and the band seems comfortable and happy to be together throughout the first choruses. Bechet embellishes the head on soprano saxophone, but takes his solo chorus on clarinet. There is an important lesson here for historians and others who would try to understand Bechet's musical mind, and a potential misconception to correct. I can't remember where I  first read the rumor that Sidney Bechet had abandoned clarinet for the soprano saxophone rather early on, and that he took the clarinet out in later life only because trumpet players like Wild Bill Davison or Bunk Johnson didn't think the soprano appropriate for a traditional New Orleans style front line. I'm not sure about Bunk or Wild Bill's opinions, but whatever they were, and however Bechet might have focused on soprano in the later years of his career, there is a tremendous amount of clarinet and soprano doubling that he does all throughout the '20s, '30s and '40s. Working with trumpet players as diverse as Charlie Shavers, Tommy Ladnier, Louis Armstrong, Mugsy Spanier, and even as a bandleader himself without a trumpet, Bechet routinely recorded clarinet numbers or switched off within the same tune. So for a significant part of his career, the clarinet remained a nearly equal voice with soprano sax, independent of the band in question. Because of that, I think it's probably safe to say the appearance of clarinet on any sides was most likely a decision made by Bechet himself rather than anyone else. Besides, does anyone think the psychology of Sidney Bechet was typically acquiescent to the demands of the trumpet players he worked with? He wasn't known for being obsequious.  

To get back to the recordings, though, "Really the Blues" is a classic blues drag written by Mezz Mezzrow, the feisty clarinetist whose later autobiography (bearing the same name of the tune) was to make an early case against commercialism and big band era arrangements while forcefully arguing in favor of black musicians and bands. On the head of this tune, as the two clarinetists are playing together, it's Mezz who takes the lead line, but when the solos come, we hear Bechet's soprano sax tell the story, delivering vintage soul, the band murmuring assents throughout. The tune itself is excellent, and as one of the first collaborations between Mezz and Bechet, it is important historically.

"When You and I Were Young, Maggie" is a light, toe tapping number featuring Ladnier's trumpet lead, a competent chorus by Mezzrow on tenor, and some ebullient clarinet work by Bechet to round out the cut.

The last track from this session, "Weary Blues" is one of the best known in Bechet's clarinet catalog. From the outset, Sidney's musical voice is dominant throughout, with Mezzrow shadowing in harmony, and Ladnier holding the mellow line as usual. Bechet's clarinet solo opens with growling zest, then gets to wailing with expertly controlled pitch bends--each idea unfolding naturally. The whole session had the relaxed, joyous feel of musicians who understood each other and wanted to work together.  

Stylistically, though one could glean this from any number of recordings by Bechet prior to this, these are excellent examples of Bechet's unique soloing style, which was so much more than variations on a theme. His use of rhythm, meter, playing over the bar, linking his phrases organically rather than through pattern repetition, tend to be underappreciated, generally speaking, by many in the jazz education field. The music, so far beyond conventional analysis, isn't easily taught because it was so connected to Bechet's individual soul. But if our goal is lyricism and originality, if a player wants to learn how to please and surprise an audience simultaneously and consistently throughout a solo performance, recordings like these will always be a template and guide.


Further reading:

Sidney Bechet: The Wizard of Jazz. John Chilton, OUP, NY (1987)

November 6, 1938 * Sidney Bechet's First Recording Session as a Bandleader

What a Dream
Hold Tight
Jungle Drums
Chant in the Night

Sidney Bechet, soprano sax & clarinet
Ernie Caceres, baritone sax
Dave Bowman,  piano
Leonard Ware, guitar
Henry Turner, bass
Zutty Singleton, drums
Eddie Robinson & Willie Spottswood, vocals

November 6, 1938, New York City


At the spry age of 41, Sidney Bechet finally had the opportunity to record as a band leader. It had been a long six years since his last collaborative session with Tommy Ladnier and their New Orleans Feetwarmers--a session which produced several classic sides. This one would be different in many ways.

Eschewing the standard instrumentation (which is, anyhow, not so standard as some jazz histories would have us believe), the somewhat misleadingly named Sidney Bechet and His Orchestra was actually a sextet consisting of Bechet on clarinet and soprano sax, Ernie Caceres on baritone sax, Dave Bowman on piano, Leonard Ware on guitar, Henry Turner on bass, Zutty Singleton on drums, and a pair of vocalists (Eddie Robinson and Willie Spottswood, 'The Two Fishmongers') featured on "Hold Tight."

The band recorded four tunes that day, all of them originals. Three of them, "What a Dream", "Chant in the Night" and "Jungle Drums", were composed by Bechet. The vocal number "Hold Tight" was composed by Robinson, Spottswood, Ware, Jerry Brandow, and Lenny Kent.

In his biography of Sidney Bechet, John Chilton suggests this session, while bold, is one of Bechet's weaker one, suffering from lack of rehearsal and less than stellar song material (pg 111-112). I couldn't disagree more, and wish this band hand recorded twenty more sides of the same quality. While Caceres isn't balanced, volume-wise in the recording with Bechet (which might just have been an honest difference between the bari player and the muscular sound of Bechet, accurately captured) the timbre and counterpoint the two create is exciting, intriguing, and unique. Chilton wanted a more standard type of climax to the tunes, and perhaps wishes for more melodic content on a number like "Jungle Drums", but here, perhaps, we have the difference between brass criticism and woodwind writing (Chilton himself, who passed away last year, was a trumpet player). A careful review of combo jazz tunes by clarinetists reveals a predisposition for motivic, linear melodies, repetitious in an almost  minimalist fashion. "Seven Come Eleven", "AC/DC Current", "Benny's Bugle" by Benny Goodman; "When the Quail Come Back to San Quentin", "Summit Ridge Drive", "Dr. Livingston, I Presume" by Artie Shaw; and "Jungle Drums" by Sidney Bechet are all cut from a similar cloth.  It's perhaps not a coincidence that John Adams, one of the more revered minimalist composers of the last forty years, was a clarinetist.

That aside "What a Dream" is a beautiful tune, and Bechet's soprano soloing matches it. His clarinet on "Hold Tight" is vintage, excellent, and you can't go wrong with his playing on the other tunes. As with so many of Bechet's early projects (including the first incarnation of The New Orleans Feetwarmers and the Clarence Williams Blue 5), we are left simultaneously wishing we had more, and grateful for what he left us.

Further reading:

Sidney Bechet: The Wizard of Jazz. John Chilton, OUP, NY (1987)

Sidney Bechet * May 26, 1938 * with Trixie Smith and Grant & Wilson * Decca

May 26, 1938 was unique in Sidney Bechet's career: on this day he recorded ten tunes, all of them entirely on the clarinet. Maybe his soprano sax was in the shop, maybe he forgot it, or maybe he simply didn't feel like playing it that day, but whatever the reason, his clarinet chops were ready to go. One thing we can say without reservation: the sides he cut on May 26, 1938 in Decca's New York studios with singer Trixie Smith document some of his finest clarinet work.

What can I say about his playing on "Freight Train Blues"? It's an anthology of his greatest clarinet techniques, and he is so well miked that we really, finally, get a sense of his total sound quality. Trixie Smith is laid back as a singer, but a perfectly cool partner to Bechet's heat. The rest of the band includes Charlie Shavers on trumpet, Sammy Price on piano, Teddy Bunn on guitar, Richard Fullbright on bass, and O'Neill Spencer on drums. On "Trixie's Blues" the band gets the perfect soft bumping groove, and imprompu head riffs are woven and embellished by Bechet and Shavers throughouot. Bechet's clarinet is really in astonishing form for this date, and he delivers as close to a definitive performance as we could hope for on "My Daddy Rocks Me With One Steady Roll" (Parts 1 & 2). In his sound we can hear everything--from his warmest pumpkin bread chalumeau to muscular, biting altissimo. The interplay between Bechet and the muted Shavers is a type of contrapuntal perfection: they seem ideally suited for this sort of vocalist-fronted combo. Trixie is at her best when she's singing a blues; the more popular tunes like "Jack, I'm Mellow" or "My Unusual Man" are less convincing, and she falls a bit into vaudeville style. But the masterful blues sides by this band more than make up for anything else.

Later that day, the same backing band recorded with Coot Grant & Sox Wilson, a girl/boy vocal duo with more vaudeville pretensions, and a considerable step down from the musical quality of the Trixie Smith recordings. Bechet's clarinetistry is good and solid; once again the Decca recording engineers capture him exceptionally well, but these are comparatively forgettable sides. By the last tune of the day, "Blue Monday on Sugar Hill", Bechet seems to have run out of inspiration, delivering a competent but very common solo by his standards. Still, on the whole, this was a remarkable day in Bechet's recorded output, especially from the standpoint of the clarinet. Fans of Sidney Bechet are going to want to hear them.


[ Note: My review is based upon the remastered versions found in the Universal boxed set. I can't vouch for other transfers...]

Sidney Bechet and the New Orleans Feetwarmers * 1932

Sweetie Dear (Jordan/Cook)
I Want You Tonight (Bechet/Maxey)
I've Found a New Baby (Williams/Palmer)
Lay Your Racket (Bechet/Maxey)
Maple Lead Rag (Joplin)
Shag (Bechet)

Sidney Bechet * clarinet, soprano saxophone
Tommy Ladnier * trumpet
Teddy Nixon * trombone
Hank Duncan * piano
Wilson Myers * bass, vocals on "I Want You Tonight" and "Shag"
Morris Morand * drums 
Billy Maxey * vocal on "Lay Your Racket"

In 1932, Sidney Bechet and Tommy Ladnier declared fleeting independence from commercial music, broke free from Noble Sissle's orchestra, and on September 15, recorded six of the finest sides of their careers. The New Orleans reed man and Louisiana trumpet player had met, oddly enough, in Moscow in 1926 while touring through the Soviet Union, and had recorded with Sissle's group just prior to their own small combo formation. They named the group the New Orleans Feetwarmers, and though the vogue for small ensemble hot jazz was quickly fading, these sides shout like a cry of freedom, remaining among Bechet's crowning achievements.

The New Orleans Feetwarmers weren't just a studio organization, but a gigging band, playing around White Plains, NY, and in Jersey City while they built up repertoire. The night before these historic recordings were made, the sextet opened New York's Savoy Ballroom, billed as "Ladnier and Bechet's New Orleans Feetwarmers."

Bechet gets composition credits on half the numbers. His clarinet soloing is unusual and aggressive on "Sweetie Dear"--a study in his shocking brilliance. He's soulfully bluesy on "I Want You Tonight", but nothing can prepare anyone for his soprano sax tour de force on "I've Found a New Baby." From his masterful use of delay, seemingly stepping in and out of time over the barlines, to his fast triplet figures, jazz just doesn't get better than this. He pivots from lyrical and dazzling within split seconds, diving and soaring at will. Anyone who believes New Orleans style jazz is somehow less advanced than more self-consciously intellectual and modernist styles needs to check this out. The Soprano Sax virtuosity continues on his own "Lay Your Racket" and, especially "Maple Leaf Rag", which is up there with "I've Found a New Baby" as an unsurpassably brilliant interpretation of the tune. Throughout these recordings, his use of trills on both clarinet and soprano sax is exciting and unique, worthy of study for all musicians hoping to expand their ideas.

For as brilliant as they sounded, the New Orleans Feetwarmers weren't long for this world. The tastes in New York had already shifted, and Hot Jazz was becoming increasingly unfashionable as the sweet music crooners began taking over the gigging scene. The great depression was taking it's toll and most nightclubs couldn't afford hiring a five or six piece band on a regular basis, opting instead for a pianist alone (Chilton 90). It would be another couple of years before Benny Goodman's band could bring back a hotter style, albeit primarily in the form of a big band.

If the Feetwarmers had overarching societal problems contributing to their demise, there were also internal problems. Bechet and Ladnier quarrelled over leadership and billing, and at one point after a gig, drummer Morris Morand  got into a fight with Bechet, even threatening to kill him (Chilton, 95). Bechet, as usual, moved on quickly to join Willie "The Lion" Smith at Pod's and Jerry's Club, and the Feetwarmers were no more. In the end, they left us one brilliant session, consisting of six tunes, among which are two or three that will never be topped. For that we can all be grateful.    



Recommended reading:

Chilton, John. Sidney Bechet: The Wizard of Jazz. OUP (New York). 1987