[Dixielandjazz] In search of a non-tragic jazz hero

[Gary Lawrence Murphy]

Benny Carter is an excellent subject, yes; and speaking of ex-pats in
Paris, Sidney Bechet too might make a good subject.  we might even include
the bit about the firearms offence ;)

On Wed, Dec 10, 2014 at 5:05 AM, Bert <mister_bertje at hotmail.com> wrote:

> If I might make a suggestion:
> Benny Carter seems to have been a very decent person and pretty succesfull
> swingband leader/arranger/player of woodwinds and brass.
> - A great arrangement was his sax chorus on Charleston Is The Best dance
> After All, 1928
> - Some of his compositions have easy melodies, When Lights Are Low, Blue
> In My Heart, so might be usefull in educational purposes.
> - He was leading succesfull racially mixed bands in Europe allready in the
> mid thirties.  (Before Goodman did, who usually gets lots of credit)
> - He reached a very high age. Always very much respected.
> - Did not drink. Did not chase the girls.
> I spoke to a old woman once, Mrs Muller. Her parents rented rooms in the
> Hague in the '30's. Benny Carter lived at their place, so the woman became
> friendly with him at the time. She assured me that Benny always was a
> perfect gentleman. Not drinking, not smoking and touring decently together
> with his wife. :-)
> She also told me that Benny decided that since he was living in Holland,
> he needed a bike, and he took her to the shop to choose a good one. So she
> was very proud to have been sitting on the back of a bike brandnew owned by
> Benny Carter!
> He also made some fantastic recordings with Coleman Hawkins and Django
> Reinhardt.
> And later he also wrote music for films.
>
> Just a thought,
> Kind regards,
> Bert Brandsma
>
> > Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2014 21:44:32 -0500
> > From: garym at teledyn.com
> > Subject: Re: [Dixielandjazz] In search of a non-tragic jazz hero
> > CC: dixielandjazz at ml.islandnet.com
> > To: mister_bertje at hotmail.com
> >
> > thanks for all the tips; I may now have a few ideas to do a few more
> > years of shows and I will be hunting up that Creole Trombone book (esp
> > since Ory is our trombonist's fave too)
> >
> > my hope and *dream* is to attract enough kids who will take music
> > seriously enough to (a) get an instrument (b) practice and (c) nag
> > their parents sufficient to let them join our band that I can count on
> > them to be at every show ( 'c' is a surprisingly difficult step) so I
> > can put together even a 3214 lineup that would be the *minimum*
> > hot-jazz swing band a la Lunceford or Goodman or Dorsey etc -- I have
> > heaps of charts for such an ensemble, my trouble is the mrs has
> > declared a moratorium on us having more kids of our own (which is fair
> > since we're both well over 50) and other folks kids have progressively
> > more trouble with parts a b and then c :(
> >
> > but I keep hoping!
> >
> > On 12/9/14, Charles Suhor <csuhor at zebra.net> wrote:
> > > Going back to your criteria below, it seems that you're looking to get
> > > (a) the most educational mileage (vis a vis the history of jazz)
> > > (b) a good story (some drama in it) that
> > > (c) doesn't have basic negativity or a bad role model (alcoholism),
> > > (d) with accessible charts for the live band to play as
> "illustrations."
> > >
> > > Louis was perfect for this, but a lot of great players don't fill the
> bill
> > > well for one or more of the criteria. As an educator, I'd be focused
> on (a)
> > > as a starting point. Since you've done Louis, maybe swing era figures
> like
> > > the Dorsey Brothers, Glenn Miller, Goodman, or Duke Ellington would
> meet all
> > > the standards. An interesting question--thanks for posting.
> > >
> > > Charlie
> > >
> > > On Dec 9, 2014, at 2:24 PM, Gary Lawrence Murphy wrote:
> > >
> > >> just to be clear, we're not *telling* them about jazz music, we
> > >> *demonstrate* the music by playing it for them -- it is a musical
> > >> show, so what we need to do is to bring together 15 or so tunes that
> > >> can be strung together to tell the story.
> > >>
> > >> would be very hard to do a Bria Skolberg with myself cast in the lead
> > >> role -- even youngsters can only suspend belief so far before it snaps
> > >> ;)
> > >>
> > >> The Dorsey Brothers or even to build a show around Nat Shilkret or
> > >> Goldman's band is maybe a workable idea, it binds together what was
> > >> happening in the pre-war Chicago that is then channelled into the
> > >> swing era by the youngsters in the band!
> > >
> > >
> >
> >
> > --
> > *Teledyn Addendum: teledyn blogspot ca*
> > *eso: **EighthStreetOrchestra blogspot ca*
> >
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*Teledyn Addendum: teledyn blogspot ca*
*eso: **EighthStreetOrchestra blogspot ca*