[Dixielandjazz] Fwd: Happy Birthday Jim Cullum Sr

Sat Jun 21 12:52:45 PDT 2014

I sure remember the Happy Jazz Band, live from The Landing on the River
Walk in San Antonio, just across the alley from the Alamo!  They had a half
hour broadcast on WOAI, then clear channel 50k watts Friday nights at 10 pm
or so, and I tried never to miss it.  That was even before the River Walk
was the River Walk!!  It started my life time love of good Dixieland, a
tough gig during Beatle-mania and all that followed.  Who knew back then
that an ugly guy who can't sing could be a rock star?

WOAI could be heard all over back then.  I had enlisted in the Navy Reserve
as a Radioman and recall listening to the Happy Jazz Band on a ship pulling
into New York harbor on a Friday evening.

 I was a high school tuba player in the early and mid-60s and figured once
I had made my fortune I could come back and play in the Happy Jazz Band.
That didn't work out completely.  The Happy Jazz Band isn't there any more,
nor is The Landing.  All that is left are the memories.

Thanks for prodding those memories!

Jim Allen
New Braunfels, TX

On Sat, Jun 21, 2014 at 2:30 PM, Marek Boym <marekboym at gmail.com> wrote:

> Hello,
> I wonder how many of you remember Jim Cullum Snr. and his Happy Jazz Band.
> Anyway, he would have been 100 on May 14.  Below is an article about him by
> his son, the cornetist Jim Cullum.
> Cheers
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: Riverwalk Jazz <info at riverwalkjazz.org>
> Date: 30 May 2014 20:14
> Subject: Re: Happy Birthday Jim Cullum Sr
> To: Marek Boym <marekboym at gmail.com>
>
>
> Yes feel free to share with whomever you like.
>
>
> On Fri, May 9, 2014 at 5:10 PM, Marek Boym <marekboym at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > May I forward this to the Dixieland Jazz Mailing List?
> > I've never heard your dad in person, but many a moon ago (I was in my
> 20's
> > then; I'm 73 now) I found a Jim Cullum LP in the USIS Library in
> Tel-Aviv,
> > and I became hooked!  Not that the Happy Jazz BAnd (boy, WAS it happy!)
> LPs
> > were easy to find, but I found another one later on.  And yes, it
> featured
> > a young looking cornet player identified as Jim Cullum Jr.
> > They don't seem to have been reissued on CD.
> > With kind regards,
> > Marek Boym,
> > Israel
> >
> >
> > On 10 May 2014 00:26, Riverwalk Jazz <info at riverwalkjazz.org> wrote:
> >
> >>
> >> [image: logo]
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> May 14th Jim Cullum Sr. turns 100!
> >>
> >> [image: Jim Cullum]
> >>  Visit the NEW social media pages:
> >>  Connect with us on FACEBOOK <http://www.facebook.com/jimcullumjazzband
> >
> >>  and TWITTER <https://twitter.com/jimcullumjazz>
> >> To view the band's updated calendar click here
> >> <http://jimcullum.com/schedule.html> "Earliest Memories" by: Jim Cullum
> >> Jr.
> >> My grandmother, Eloise Cullum of Dallas, was about as full of life as
> one
> >> could be, I suppose. Her spark reaches down through the generations.
> What a
> >> gal! During her busy life, she found time to raise six children. She was
> >> strong-willed, opinionated, and determined that her children would have
> the
> >> best of everything. She and my grandfather Ashley moved their brood to a
> >> farm on the outskirts of Dallas so their children could be raised in the
> >> country.
> >> Their obviously talented boys included Robert, James (my father), and
> >> Charles. As high school approached, each was given some sort of musical
> >> instrument. Bob, the oldest, played the saxophone. When time came for
> Jim
> >> to receive his instrument, my grandmother had been influenced by a music
> >> teacher or maybe an instrument salesman, and Jim was presented with a
> new
> >> Boehm system clarinet (the old Albert system was becoming obsolete).
> [image:
> >> jim sr.]She had heard the axiom, "If he starts on clarinet, it's easy to
> >> double on saxophone, but if he starts on saxophone, doubling will be
> >> difficult." So at Christmas 1926, young Jim, age 12, unwrapped a new
> >> clarinet and life was never the same. He spent hours facing a corner,
> >> practicing. (The corner acted as an acoustic chamber). Oh, he thought,
> what
> >> a sound! For the rest of his life, the woody clarinet sound was the
> >> greatest fun life offered.
> >> Jim played his clarinet with a passion through high school and college.
> >> Eventually, he began to play professionally.  Meanwhile, his energetic
> >> mother began a small-scale land development on the family farm in north
> >> Dallas. As her children married in close succession, she gave each a
> lot on
> >> which to build a house. Her one-block street was called Nash Street
> after
> >> son-in-law George Nash, and gradually neighbors began calling the area
> >> "Cullumville."
> >> Jim and his bride Conoly (my mother) became part of this happy scene. He
> >> began working as his father's apprentice in family wholesale grocery
> busine
> >> ss, and the clarinet got little use for several years.  This is where I
> >> came in. I have no recollection of World War II, but by war's end in
> 1945 I
> >> was four years old, and bits and pieces of memory of those years have
> >> survived. The Cullumville life was idyllic. My playmates were mostly
> >> cousins, and other neighbors often were aunts and uncles. My
> grandparents
> >> lived in the big house at one end of Nash Street. We children played
> freely
> >> up and down Nash, and most spectacular of all was the creek that bounded
> >> Cullumville on the north. We dammed it and created small spillways. Life
> >> was tree climbing, stickhorse riding, and other similar adventures.
> >> By this time, Jim Sr. had yielded to his lifetime desire to be a
> >> full-time professional jazz musician. He had gradually increased his
> >> musical activities, then in 1944 he resigned his position with the
> family
> >> business and was off and running. In 1945, he joined the Jack Teagarden
> >> band and left Dallas for the life of a traveling musician. Somewhere
> >> interwoven with these years, my memory flicks on as follows: it's deep
> in
> >> the middle of the night and a jam session is underway downstairs in our
> >> Cullumville living room. The music has awakened me and I climb out of
> bed
> >> in the pajamas that had the the feet built-in, and pad downstairs to the
> >> "party," where I am welcomed, especially by the women present. I
> snuggle on
> >> a comfortable lap as the music is mixed together with the talking,
> smoking,
> >> drinking, and laughing.
> >>  Story taken from Jim's blog at :
> http://www.jimcullum.com/blog2.html.Photo
> >> 1 - The band with Louis Armstrong 1965Photo 2 - Jim and Conoly Cullum
> >> 1946 See You Soon,  [image:
> >> /images/public/display/JimSignature_TransSM.jpg]
> >> Visit the NEW social media pages:
> >>  Connect with us on FACEBOOK <http://www.facebook.com/jimcullumjazzband
> >
> >> and TWITTER <https://twitter.com/jimcullumjazz>
> >> To view the band's updated calendar click here
> >> <http://jimcullum.com/schedule.html>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
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> >> clicking here
> >> <
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> >
> >>
> >
> >
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