[Dixielandjazz] Hines' broadcasts

Thu Jan 15 16:54:22 PST 2009

Hi Glen et al,

Thanks for the info, which confirms that just about everyone in North 
America could hear the Hines band on virtually a nightly basis. Whether the 
playing of Smeon and Howard had any impact on the pre-boppers or not is of 
course speculation, but now that I've prompted myself into thinking about it 
again, I'll need to re-read Ira Gitler's absorbing book Swing to Bop. It 
consists of excerpts from interviews with numerous musicians who were 
involved in that transition process and these have been expertly edited so 
that it reads as an unfolding chronology of the developments. It might sound 
a bit off-topic for DLML, but there's a lot of interesting stuff straight 
from the mouths of people like Milt Hinton, Budd Johnson, Gus Johnson, Al 
Cohn, Jay McShann etc.

Cheers,

Ken Mathieson
www.classicjazzorchestra.org.uk

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Glen Page" <gpage at dccnet.com>
To: "'Ken Mathieson'" <ken at kenmath.free-online.co.uk>
Cc: "'Dixieland Jazz Mailing List'" <dixielandjazz at ml.islandnet.com>
Sent: Thursday, January 15, 2009 6:53 PM
Subject: Hines' broadcasts

>
> Here is the promised followup to yesterday's post.
>
> Hines himself wrote in "The World Of Earl Hines"   "..We opened at the 
> Grand
> Terrace on my birthday, 28TH December 1928" This will help to give the 
> date
> of his broadcasting career some perspective when he addresses it some 
> pages
> on.
>
> Hines continues "We started broadcasting out of the Grand Terrace just 
> after
> the third year. We used to play on a small station they called the 
> Cadillac
> station."He goes on to make comments that indicate this to be a very
> informal and folksy program. The next paragraph tells us a little more.
>
> "This went on until larger stations were interested.NBC had two
> stations,WMAQ and WNER, and they had what they called a blue line and a 
> red
> line. The blue line went to New York and the red line from Chicago to
> California. So we would sign on in Chicago to New York at 11,play half an
> hour, sign off and then sign right back on the red line going to 
> California.
> This red line took in quite a bit of Canada,so when we toured Canada there
> was   as much enthusiasm.It got to the stage where we were broadcasting
> every night and people were waiting up to hear us. ......I think that we 
> had
> more air time than any other band in the U.S."
>
> I submit that the above answers both of your questions Ken. If you get a
> chance to have access to the book you will find a lot of information 
> written
> both directly by Hines and many or his esteemed sidemen.
>
> The chronology given at the back of the book also casts light on his
> activities as reported in the press at the time.Broadcasts on WEAF, New 
> York
> in 1931,also in'31 over WSBC from the GT. This detailed chronology covers
> just about all his musical activities from 1914 to Nov. 1975.I was 
> fortunate
> to be able to hear on a few occasions in the later 70s when he had a solo
> gig in a  hotel in Vancouver.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: dixielandjazz-bounces at ml.islandnet.com
> [mailto:dixielandjazz-bounces at ml.islandnet.com] On Behalf Of Ken Mathieson
> Sent: January 14, 2009 5:08 PM
> To: glen page
> Cc: Dixieland Jazz Mailing List
> Subject: [Dixielandjazz] Earl Hines Big Band (was Time Machine)
>
> Hi Folks,
>
> In Don's post on the Time Machine thread, he mentions the great Earl Hines
> band of the 1930s, which got me thinking. A number of years ago I gave a
> record recital at the Glasgow Jazz Record Society, a venerable club dating
> back to the early 1930s, when the only way for most people in the UK to 
> hear
> and learn about the classic American source material was by listening to
> records, which they did by getting together in clubs and listening to each
> other's discs.
>
> My topic was Lorenzo Tio Jr and his influence on jazz reed playing, and in
> my recital I followed the recording careers of his most illustrious 
> pupils,
> including Omer Simeon with Jelly and later with Hines. Also in that Hines
> band was Darnell Howard, who, according to Harold Dejan, had also studied
> with Tio in Chicago. Both men played alto and soprano as well as clarinet
> and it is interesting to hear how the Tio clarinet approach translated to
> alto. There were the long lines, the assured technical control, the 
> tasteful
> filigree ornamentation and, most notably, a time feel that was close to 
> even
> eighths and markedly different from the standard swing feel deriving from
> Armstrong's time feel. All of these characteristics got carried over into
> early bop and my questions to list members are:
>  1.. Did the Hines band play regular radio broadcasts from the Grand
> Terrace in the 1930s?
>  2.. Did these reach as far as Kansas City?
> It's interesting to speculate whether these broadcasts, (if they could be
> picked up in KC),  were routinely listened to by Kansas City musicians 
> and,
> if so, did Tio's influence extend into bop via Charlie Parker?
>
> Cheers,
>
> Ken Mathieson
> www.classicjazzorchestra.org.uk
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