[Dixielandjazz] What would Eddie Condon Say?

[Steve Barbone]

Bob Ringwald wrote: (polite snip)

>However, Steve Barbone wrote: (snip) Guys like Eddie Condon would have said no
>and reminded us that jazz in the 1920s/30s was popularly associated with
>Whiteman, Gershwin and Irving Berlin. and that the Bratislava Band was playing
>popular music.

>Bob then writes: To intimate that Eddie Condon would have said that the
>Bratislava Band was playing popular music is ridiculous.

Excuse me Bob, but didn't Tamas just say that Bratislava was playing the
music of Paul Whiteman and I quote him:

"First of all, let me tell you that I strongly think that they are playing
jazz. But I also think that the original recordings that they are mostly
copying (Goldkette, Whiteman etc.) are jazz."

And didn't Condon say that Whiteman was not playing jazz, but rather popular
music which the public associated with jazz and that in his (Condon's
opinion) Whiteman did not play jazz?

I don't think it is very difficult to connect the dots that; a) since Condon
thought Whiteman was not playing jazz but rather popular music, and b)
Bratislava is copying Whiteman, then c) Condon would have thought Bratislava
was not playing jazz, but was playing popular music.

Quit shooting at the messenger. :-) VBG

>Bob than quoted Steve again: (snip) Perhaps that kind of music in the "jazz
>age", as compared to the real jazz of the originators, (Oliver, Bolden,
>Armstrong, Bechet et al) is more like what Kenny G and his clones play today,
>compared to the real jazz of this and/or any other era?


>and then Bob went on to say: Unless I am badly mistaking Steve's meaning here,
>to say that the music played by the Bratislava Band to Jazz is like comparing
>Kenny G's music to real Jazz, is incomprehensible.

No doubt you would think that. But I think Kenny G is a great player of
Instrumental Popular Music. And that Bratislava is a great re-creator of
Paul Whiteman's Popular Music. I don't hear any "Harlem Hot Jazz", which is
how it was categorized by you, in either of them.

>I must be misunderstanding Steve's meaning.  If so, so are a lot of other
>List members, judging by the response both on and off list.

You may well be, since by the time it got to Tamas, the thread had gone from
Harlem Hot Jazz supposedly played by Bratislava to whether or not they are
playing jazz. And other people are entitled to their opinions. Want to
compare off list opinions to see whose list is bigger?

Cheers,
Steve Barbone