[Dixielandjazz] Small Band Swing or Dixieland?

[Marek Boym]

> "A 1937 pick-up group led by Teddy Wilson . . . recorded "I've Found a New
> Baby" with Buck Clayton, Buster Bailey, and Lester Young as the horns. It
> was heard and discussed as 'small band swing'. When two years later Bud
> Freeman's Summa Cum Laude Orchestra with Max Kaminsky, Pee Wee Russell, and
> Brad Gowans in the front line recorded the same number in much the same
> style, it was 'dixieland'."


As the French say, "vive la petite difference!"

I know both performances, have cherished them for ages, but even after
all these years can hear the difference.  Not so much the same style.
Plus, all the musicians in Freeman's band had been known Dixieland
players before the swing era.
>
> "The two performances, similar in structure and feel, draw on ensemble
> polylinearity and band riffing . . . As Bud put it many years later, 'You
> can't say to a jazz performer, whose talent is worth anything, that he plays
> avant=garde, or dixieland, or that he is a modern or even a proponent of the
> Chicago style. A substantial musician will say, 'I just play'."  END QUOTE.


That certainly is true.  And I don't care whether it is "small band
swing" or "Dixieland," as long as it's good.  Moreover, musicians of
both are quite compatible.  As to avant-garde, don't forget that it
often is "the refuge of the untalented" (I wish I had invented the
phrase).
>
> I agree with that view, or as Condon put it, "We called it music". Having
> seen Condon respond to fans at his joint when buttonholed about his supposed
> "Chicago Style" band, with various put downs about how he was from Indiana
> and lived in NYC most of his life, I can appreciate the humorous sincerity
> of that view.

He also said that there might be room for big bands, preferably where
he was not.


>
> 50 Years ago I played a gig with guest artist Roy Eldridge while with
> Southampton Dixie Racing and Clambake Society Jazz Band. A couple of older
> fans came up to him and after complimenting him said. "Roy, we didn't know
> you played Dixieland" His response with a little smile was "Thank you, but
> I've been playing Dixieland all my life."


Great quote, which you have already brough up a few times.  However,
even his Dixieland band recordings for Verve were not quite what one
might expect; however, good they were.
Cheers,

> www.myspace.com/barbonestreetjazzband
>
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