[Dixielandjazz] C-melody saxophone film from 1925

Sat Apr 12 13:26:57 PDT 2008

I would like to thank you too for the clip.  In it you can hear the base 
drum.  The bass drum has been a pet project of mine for some time.  Modern 
drums just don't have the same sound.  They have a powerful pop whereas the 
old drums had more of a fluffy foomp and resonance that I think adds to a 
trad bands sound.  The heads were typically looser and they were much larger 
usually 30-36" which produced a deeper more resonant sound.  The old records 
just couldn't reproduce this sound and you just don't hear it.  Even large 
sounds would cause a much more modern 33rpm record with a light tracking 
stylus to jump.

Another difference is the lack of "ring".  I know that you wouldn't hear 
"ring" which in any case is different on a large skin headed bass vs. a 
smaller plastic headed drum.   Snares have a damper about 1-1 1/2" inside 
the head that usually is pressure adjustable which tries to removes that 
overtone.  Skin snare heads do not require that damper.  Drummers used 
dampers on old bass drums to reduce the resonance but it's a different thing 
from the "ring" of a modern bass drum although the solution is the same. 
Manufacturers have tried doing things like making double, oil filled heads 
to correct the problem along with damper schemes.  A lot of drummers resort 
to the tried and true pillow in the drum trick to fix it.  A modern, small, 
bass drum is just not capable of producing the sound that you need for early 
styles very well.   If you notice in the clip that the bass is at least a 36 
incher.

Movies used a different recording technique and at least in this clip you 
can hear the bass work.  I was really surprised at the bass rhythms that the 
drummer was playing later in the tune.  They are much more aggressive than I 
had ever heard and they move away from the basic four that you almost always 
hear in earlier music.  His use of the Bass drum as an accent was pretty 
neat.

The resonant bass drum sound is almost totally lacking in modern trad bands 
because I think that modern drummers have been taught or their concept is 
that this is a bad sound and their equipment reflects that view.  I have 
been after my drummer to loosen up the damper and use a softer beater on his 
pedal and move the bass out more forward.

If you listened to the clip, listen again for the bass drum work.  I think 
it's pretty interesting and something I haven't heard before.  I'm sure 
others from that time did these same things, I'm just saying it's new for me 
and in some ways sounds more "modern" and possibly ahead of the time.

I can only imagine what they sounded like live.  In this recording you can't 
hear the piano, banjo or snare drum.  I guess they are too covered up by the 
horns and lacking multiple microphones and mixing just didn't record very 
well if at all.
Larry
StL
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Marek Boym" <marekboym at gmail.com>
To: "Larry Walton" <larrys.bands at charter.net>
Cc: "Dixieland Jazz Mailing List" <dixielandjazz at ml.islandnet.com>
Sent: Thursday, April 10, 2008 5:08 PM
Subject: Re: [Dixielandjazz] C-melody saxophone film from 1925

> Hello Ulf,
> Thankk you for the link!  What a wonderful music.  I have the record
> of My Kinda Love, but this one is different.
> Being an old thechnophobe (I have been for years, even when I was
> younger),  I would have never found that site.  I'm forwarding it to a
> few friends.
> Cheers,
> Marek
>
> On 08/04/2008, Ulf Jagfors <ulf.jagfors at telia.com> wrote:
>> In 1925 Ben Bernie and his Orchestra shot three very early (probably
>> experimental) sound films of which this one, "Sweet Georgia Brown" 
>> contains
>> some jazz. The main soloist is Jack Pettis on C-melody saxophone..
>> Look at
>> http://www.dailymotion.com/relevance/search/CLASSIC%2BJAZZ%2BCLUB%2B/video/x178cp_ben-bernie-1925_music
>>
>> Bookmark the Dailymotion group CLASSIC JAZZ CLUB to see the entire
>> collection of hundreds of pre-1945 jazz films
>> http://www.dailymotion.com/relevance/search/CLASSIC%2BJAZZ%2BCLUB%2B/1
>>
>> Ulf Jagfors
>>
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