[Dixielandjazz] Bechet

[ROBERT R. CALDER]

I was a member of the sometime Sidney Bechet society when it wound up rather a long time ago. 

Mal Collins was the man who had kept it going.
For "Bechet compositions" Johnny Chilton would be one man, since his book on Bechet was followed up by further researches into the origins of several works of genius (as in: talent borrows, genius steals). Of course I also think of Bob Wilber, and Evan Christopher.  

One certainly very Bechet thing to do is to find a recording of Vesti la Giubba from Leoncavallo's I Pagliacci -- sung by a big baritone -- and learn that. It was one of Bechet's feature numbers when he came to London as a very young man. A Bechet emulator should be able to deliver that with intensity as a showstopper adding variety to a programme. Puccin's E Lucevan le Stelle from Tosca ia nother one.  The harmonic foundations of turn of the last century Italian opera always strike me as an element in Bechet. A connection with the harmonies of early jazz.  The dynamics are also important.  Of course I am sure Bechet provided the foundation from which Louis Armstrong took off. 

Of course Benny Golson recorded the vocal part of the Tosca aria on tenor some years ago in Switzerland, seamlessly connected as coda to "I Remember Clifford" and no pastiche and no sort of Jazzin' the Classics. 

Neo-Bechet without late 19th century Italian opera is in danger of anaemia. 


Robert R. Calder