[Dixielandjazz] Early Jazz Bands and musicians who read

[Steve Barbone]

jazzchops at isp.com

> For the person willing to do the research, I think the end result will
> yield more readers than non-readers among early jazz players. Granted,
> there certainly were non-readers,  (Remainder snipped for brevity)

Great post Chris. Very well researched. And you may be right.

Couple of points. When I referred to "Uptown Musicians" I meant the style,
not where the musicians lived. Uptown style is, to me, a relatively
unschooled sound, developed by unschooled players, with a heavy blues based
content. 

Downtown style is, to me, the schooled sound, again, not where the musicians
lived. Thus a guy like King Oliver would be a "Downtown" style musician.
Same for many you mention who lived Uptown. JRM's Hot Peppers, Ory's
Sunshine Orchestra, Clarence Williams Blue Five, and Louis Armstrong by
Hot5/7 time et al., are what I would call Downtown style N.O. musicians

Plus the Uptown routines are sometimes a bit disconnected. Like when Kid
Thomas Valentine called a tune, he would start to play it and the rest would
come in when they recognized it.

Uptown style musicians? Kid Valentine, Willie Humphries, Billie and De De
Pierce, The usual versions of Preservation Hall George Lewis, Bunk Johnson,
Jim Robinson, Louis Nelson at al.

The New Orleans revival (George Lewis et al) was, to me, the epitome of
Uptown style. As is Preservation Hall, though I think the current versions
all read these days.

No doubt some Uptowners could read and some couldn't. Either way they often
mixed up tunes. For example; Bunk Johnson's 1942 recording of "Blue Bells
Goodbye" seems to be a mixture of the 1905 "Bright Eyes (Goodbye)" and the
1904 "Blue Bell". Or the 1953 George Lewis version of "Ice Cream" where Joe
Watkins sings words totally unrelated to the sheet music. And many Uptowners
played "Weary Blues" under the title of "Shake It And Break It". (Not
anything like the real "Shake It An Break It" by Chila). Same confusion also
exists between "Panama", played by Uptowners under the wrong title of
"Panama Rag" and others.

The shame of it is that Uptown New Orleans style back in the 1920s was not
recorded anywhere near as prolifically as the Downtown style. Probably
because few were called to the major recording studios by Morton, Oliver,
Armstrong, Ory and others. But there is plenty of written and anecdotal
evidence around opining that many of these musicians were unschooled and
couldn't read.

On the other hand, your point about Hot Dance Bands is well taken. Just
about all of them were readers.

I also agree with you about LaRocca and would also say the Larry Shields was
able to read. When you listen to various takes of their records, they are
close to note for note sameness. I think they may have said they couldn't
read as a marketing ploy. I wonder why? Maybe because in 1917, the audience
thought authentic jazz was a gift to "non-reading" Black musicians.

Cheers,
Steve Barbone