[Dixielandjazz] Authenticity Violin - No Fooling
D and R Hardie
darnhard at ozemail.com.au
Thu Apr 1 17:25:34 PDT 2010
Hello Graham,
I think I see where you are coming from. Rudi Blesh
and others completely distorted the role of the brass band in
relation to the beginnings of early jazz and Donald Marquis
concluded that street band music did not form a significant part of
Bolden’s musical development (p42 In Search of Buddy Bolden) see
also Exploring Early Jazz pp231 ff.
Bolden’s band was a dance orchestra or Tin band in
which the original string trio - Violin, Guitar, and Bass - was
supplemented with winds. They were called tin bands because they
sounded tinny by comparison with the larger brass bands.
I have the Lyttleton Calligraph recording and a video he
made in which he explained his approach. I was a fan of Humph’s early
work (50’s) but have serious reservations about the final product
of his BBC exercise. We have experimented with the clarinet lead as
late as last October. (I played the lead clarinet) but we defined the
role quite differently. Evidence suggests the melody was played low
down.
May be this is not the venue for a lengthy continued
discussion and I sympathise with your Ellington problems. The
research background to our approach is spelled out in some detail in
The Birth Of Jazz: Reviving the Music of the Bolden Era.
Perhaps you might get to our concert at Noosa in
September.
best wishes
Dan Hardie
On 01/04/2010, at 5:33 PM, Graham Martin wrote:
> Hi Dan,
>
> Basically I think we are of the same opinion. The throw-away line
> about the
> violin - I typed 'fiddle' first but thought better of it - was
> meant to
> point out to Richard that, just because the line-up was authentic, one
> should still be satisfied that the sound was plausible. All in all,
> I think
> you did a pretty good job with the role of the violin. I am not so
> convinced
> about the rest of the overall sound. It sounded much too close to the
> traditional jazz which I first heard in the late 1950s at the 51
> Club and
> then from the copyists playing so-called New Orleans Jazz.
>
> I do confess to a few preconceived ideas about how a Buddy Bolden
> band would
> have sounded. All the early jazz history makes many references to
> brass and
> marching bands and I think this influence would have been much more
> noticeable. As evidence for this, check out Kid Ory's ensemble
> trombone
> lines against the trombone parts in a Sousa march. Almost
> identical, and I
> somehow don't think that John Phillip copied 'the Kid'.
>
> I too was reminded of the 1986 Humphrey Lyttelton recreation band that
> Richard called "Here's one I made earlier 1986". (Hey Richard, stop
> stirring!) However, not the band in the video clip, which is not
> very good.
> I am talking about the recordings of the band sponsored by the BBC
> in that
> landmark documentary. You can hear these on Dave Radlauer's website:
>
> http://www.jazzhotbigstep.com/104.html
>
> Listen to the MP3 file which is called "Lyttelton 2A", at the
> 00:21:10 mark:
>
> http://www.jazzhotbigstep.com/24222.html
>
> I think that kind of sound as produced by Humph is much more likely
> for a
> Buddy Bolden band. But how would I know? And in the end none of this
> matters. If you can find an audience that likes the music you are
> playing,
> whatever the inspiration, more power to you. I like what you are
> doing, but
> then I like Geoff and Paul. A lot!
>
> Recreation bands? Gees, I'll tell you what! I have an Ellington
> Cotton Club
> style band rehearsing at present. If I had known in the beginning
> what I
> know now about the problems one runs into, I never would have
> started. But
> at least I can listen to the recorded history of this band and I
> have some
> fairly authentic transcriptions.
>
> Best,
>
> Grah
>
> Graham Martin
> REDLAND BAY
> Queensland AUSTRALIA
> E-Mail: grahmartin at bigpond.com
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: D and R Hardie [mailto:darnhard at ozemail.com.au]
> Sent: Wednesday, 31 March 2010 3:23 PM
> To: Graham Martin
> Cc: Dixieland Jazz Mailing List; richard.flecknell at ntlworld.com
> Subject: Re: [Dixielandjazz] Authenticity Violin - No Fooling
>
>
> Hi Graham
> Since all of the well known jazz orchestras of the early 1900's
> including that of Bolden had a violinist leader, it is surely no
> trickery to include a violinist when trying to build a model of the
> early jazz sound. Bolden had Tom Adams, Dee Dee Brooks and Alcide
> Frank and some others performing that role from time to time. The
> question is not whether to include the violin but how to establish
> the proper role for the instrument. Fortunately there are good
> descriptions of how it was done even in the Bolden band. Either we
> succeeded or failed.
> The question of the authenticity of the sound of the band is
> more complicated. How can you decide ? Do you have a preconceived
> idea of what it should be like? How could that be arrived at when
> there is no recorded evidence? Some people might think that the
> revivalist style of the 1940's is appropriate but there are too many
> difficulties with that. As you suggest, it might not be valid to
> expect to hear sounds like those of Bunk Johnson or Ken Colyer
> with trumpet, piano, banjo and slide trombone.
> All you can do is perform the correct repertoire with
> authentic instrumentation and following the performance practices
> described by those witnesses who heard early jazz.
> I find that the sound varies a lot from composition to
> composition. More like the revivalists on the blues less so with coon
> songs, spirituals and quadrilles and mazurkas. Someone criticized us
> for playing Maple Leaf Rag but there is evidence Bolden probably
> tried to do so and evidence that his contemporaries did too. I'm not
> even sure what the reason for criticism was - possibly that it was
> corny in 2010.
> I hope you will catch up with one of our concerts or DVD/
> CD's.
>
> best wishes
> Dan Hardie
> http://tinyurl.com/nqaup
>
> On 31/03/2010, at 11:57 AM, Graham Martin wrote:
>
>> Hi Richard,
>>
>> New Orleans style jazz, although I doubt that reality, is not rare in
>> Australian jazz. Geoff Bull gets around the scene with his own band
>> playing
>> the same kind of trumpet style as is in the clip, and Paul Furniss'
>> beautiful reed sounds are heard in all kinds of jazz settings.
>> There are
>> others claiming to play N.O. jazz but they are mostly in Melbourne,
>> it seems
>> to me. I would say the influences are definitely there in the
>> playing of
>> many Aussie musicians but most do not try to reproduce that band
>> sound these
>> days. I have some good Aussie mates who do not think New Orleans
>> traditional
>> jazz is alive and well in Australia, one who organised a tour down
>> here by
>> Sammy Rimington. He feels it would be difficult to find a band to
>> back Sammy
>> these days.
>>
>> Just out of interest, do you think that The Buddy Bolden Revival Band
>> recreates the earliest jazz sounds, or is it just another
>> traditional jazz
>> band after the likes of Ken Colyer? And how authentic was the
>> "Governor"
>> anyway? My apologies to my best mate, trumpet player Derek Winters,
>> back in
>> the U.K. who plays that style all the time and does is so well. To
>> me, the
>> style we call N.O. jazz has always been a bit of an anomaly and I
>> have no
>> idea what our American friends think it is.
>>
>> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PYxok6qb6M4
>>
>> http://www.kencolyertrust.org/
>>
>> Hey, adding a violin does not fool anybody.
>>
>> Best,
>>
>> Grah
>>
>> Graham Martin
>> REDLAND BAY
>> Queensland AUSTRALIA
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>>
>> Oz Folk,
>>
>> Pallet On The Floor ~ Buddy Bolden Revival Band
>>
>> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xU1NtCome1A
>>
>> New Orleans Style OzJazz ... Rare?
>>
>> Richard
>>
>>
>>
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>
>
>
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