[Dixielandjazz] Jimmie Lunceford reviewed

[Robert Ringwald]

Swing's Forgotten King
by Marc Myers
Wall Street Journal, July 20, 2011
On June 4, only about two-dozen people gathered in a gazebo in Fulton, Miss., to
celebrate the unveiling of a roadside Mississippi Blues Trail marker dedicated to
Jimmie Lunceford. Born just outside of town on June 6, 1902, Lunceford led one of
the most spectacular dance bands of the Depression. As a new boxed set from Mosaic
Records illustrates, Lunceford's orchestra helped popularize swing through throbbing
syncopation, daredevil tempos and instrumental precision.
When the band took the stage in the 1930s, ballroom audiences often were torn between
dancing and watching. Arrangements had saxophone, trumpet and trombone sections seemingly
conversing with one another, while musicians in these sections performed choreographed
routines -- twirling trumpets in unison or extending trombone slides in formations
that just missed each other.
The Lunceford Orchestra had 22 hits in all, including the No. 1 "Rhythm Is Our Business"
(1935), and it was the first black band to play New York's mainstream Paramount Theater
and tour white colleges. Glenn Miller once said of the band: "Duke [Ellington] is
great, [Count] Basie remarkable, but Lunceford tops them both."
Yet today, Lunceford and his recordings are largely forgotten -- victims of the cultural
demarcation known as World War II. While most major bandleaders of the late '30s
kept their names alive by continuing to record decades after the war, Lunceford's
orchestra went into decline after 1944 and fizzled soon after his death, listed as
a heart attack but more likely the result of racially motivated food poisoning in
Seattle in July, 1947.
Now Mosaic has released a remarkable seven-CD box, "The Complete Jimmie Lunceford
Decca Sessions," featuring material recorded between 1934 and 1945. The 146 remastered
tracks not only chronicle the band's role in swing's emergence but also illuminate
why so many black and white bands envied Lunceford's orchestra.
Though the Mosaic box does not cover Lunceford's entire output during these years
-- he recorded for Columbia's Vocalion label in 1939 and 1940 -- the Decca recordings
showcase the evolving skills of the band's arrangers. This group included trumpeter
Sy Oliver, alto saxophonist Willie Smith, pianist Eddie Wilcox, trombonist Eddie
Durham and trumpeter Gerald Wilson.
"The band could swing anything the arrangers came up with -- and a lot of it was
tricky stuff, even at slower tempos," said Mr. Wilson, 92, who is believed to be
the last surviving member of Lunceford's prewar band.
As a teen, Lunceford moved with his family to Denver, and in high school studied
with bandleader Paul Whiteman's father. After graduating from Fisk University, Lunceford
taught music at Manassas High School in Memphis, Tenn., forming the Chickasaw Syncopators,
an 11-piece student band, in 1927.
The band's popularity grew as it toured, and its personnel shifted and expanded,
with Lunceford changing the band's name to the Jimmie Lunceford Orchestra. In New
York in 1933, the band was booked into Harlem's Cotton Club and soon signed with
Decca before going out on a four-month tour, billed as the "Harlem Express."
As evidenced by the Mosaic box, Lunceford's arrangers as early as 1934 began to ease
off the frantic beat popular at the time, creating a more relaxed tempo that emphasized
the second and fourth beats rather than all four. This loping style would soon become
known as swing.
Records from 1935 like Smith's arrangement of "Runnin' Wild," Oliver's "Four or Five
Times" and "Babs," and Wilcox's "Thunder" show the band's early swing bent, while
"I Can't Escape from You," "Harlem Shout" and "My Last Affair" in 1936 are evidence
of how swing progressed in the band's hands.
Perhaps the beginning of the end for Lunceford was the departure in mid-1939 of Oliver,
whose strutting arrangements had solidified the band's sound and reputation. Oliver
was eager to escape Lunceford's grueling road schedule, but money also was an issue.
Lunceford had been paying Oliver only between $2.50 and $5 per arrangement.
Fortunately for Oliver, Tommy Dorsey was competing hard with Benny Goodman, who had
hired swing arranger Fletcher Henderson. Unaware of Oliver's low pay scale, Dorsey
impulsively told Oliver that he'd pay him "$5,000 more than whatever Lunceford gave
you last year." Oliver quickly said, "Sold!"
Oliver's replacement was Mr. Wilson. A trumpeter and arranger, Mr. Wilson added a
more urgent and surging sound on songs like "Hi Spook" (written as a theme for a
Seattle radio show), "Blues in the Night" and "Strictly Instrumental."
Mr. Wilson had long dreamed of playing in Lunceford's band. "Whenever Lunceford performed
in Detroit when I was a kid, I'd push backstage to talk to the musicians," he said.
"It got so that Sy Oliver put a chair next to him on stage and asked me to come up
and sit and watch what was going on."
In 1939, Mr. Wilson received a telegram from Lunceford asking him to join the orchestra.
When Mr. Wilson arrived in New York, he went directly from the train station to Lunceford's
tailor. "I had to get measured for seven different band uniforms," he said. "Each
one had a different significance for the seven 90-minute shows the band played most
weekends."
Mr. Wilson's most famous composition and arrangement for Lunceford was "Yard Dog
Mazurka." "There was a young white kid who wrote for Lunceford named Roger Segure,"
Mr. Wilson said. "One evening I was over at his house in New York. I had started
an arrangement on 'Stompin' at the Savoy' and wanted Roger to hear it. After I played
it on the piano, Roger said, 'Wow, that's some introduction. What are you going to
do with it?'"
Segure suggested Mr. Wilson repeat the first eight bars and add a bridge. Grateful,
Mr. Wilson gave Segure half the composer credit.
The growly riff that Mr. Wilson created was so catchy that trumpeter Ray Wetzel of
Stan Kenton's band lifted it in 1945 for his own "Intermission Riff," which became
a signature hit for Kenton. "When I first heard 'Intermission Riff,' I felt really
bad," Mr. Wilson said. "My first thought was to sue. But I had a lawyer friend who
told me that the copyright laws allowed Wetzel to do it because he only used a piece
of the entire song."
In August 1942, Mr. Wilson received his draft letter and gave notice. "After I left
for the service along with Snooky Young, Willie Smith and others, Lunceford hired
great replacements for us," Mr. Wilson said. "But the old flavor wasn't there. The
music had changed."
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Mr. Myers writes daily about jazz, soul, rock and R&B at JazzWax.com.


--Bob Ringwald
www.ringwald.com
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