[Dixielandjazz] Play The Melody!

[jack wiard]

 Hello 'listers' .......Definately [please] play the lead straight at the beginning,if for no other reason to remind the other band members what they are playing on...Having played with Eric not  that long ago, I can vouch for the fact that he  does practice what he preach
.    Jack   Wiard  ...OZ                                                                                                                     From: eholroyd at optusnet.com.au
>  > 
> I read on the list jus recently that Louis' Armstrong's mentor - King 
> Oliver - had urged him in the 1920s to always play a good straight melody.
> 
> Many years later, in the 1970s in fact, when I was working with the late and 
> great Tom Baker to put together his Yerba Buena styled San Francisco Jazz 
> Band he urged me to do the same thing, for I was wont to stray from a 
> straight melody when playing lead horn at that time.
> 
> Tom told me that, in turn, he had been mentored by Dan Barrett on that very 
> subject and Dan had urged HIM to always play a good straight melody.
> 
> I largely stuck to that advice over the many years that I played jazz 
> trumpet, and was reminded very strongly of the advice when I attended a 
> recent jazz gig here in Sydney.
> 
> The band's front line was the regular reeds, trumpet and trombone, and I was 
> somewhat surprised that it often took me almost a full chorus to recognise 
> what was the new tune they had just started to play, for the trumpeter 
> played more of an improvised solo than a straight melody lead.
> 
> This happened on almost every tune they played, and I found it somewhat 
> irksome.
> 
> What do other listmates and bandleaders think about this subject?
> 
> Should the lead horn lay down a solid melody lead for the other front liners 
> to embroider, or should he/she do the improvised solo thing and let the 
> audience guess what tune they're playing?
> 
> Eric Holroyd
> Sydney, Australia 
> 
> 
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