[Dixielandjazz] Bechet and Noone and Dodds

[ROBERT R. CALDER]

I remember Steve Voce has reported the element of the Bechet-Eddie Lambert conversation, "why do you play soprano these days to the exclusion of clarinet?" though for tender ears transposing from the original Bechet response beginning with an F, quoted by Mr. Lambert in person.  

I'm not sure there's a lot in Johnny Dodds or Jimmy Noone, or any other clarinetist when reaching the level Bechet could maintain beyond them all, which is not in Sidney's own playing.  Bluesy as Johnny Dodds, piping and joyous or soothingly lyrical like Jimmy Noone, as suited the music.  The Trixie title is one of a few ovely things Bechet recorded in the 1930s, "Blackstick" and the amazing two takes of gloriously crazy Billy Banks, with the almost trumpet-sounding responses to Bank's yodelling near the end.  

I've given up on thinking it would have been a good thing if Bechet had played lots of clarinet in his later years. 
Tell me, M. Bechet, why do you not play more an instrument you don't now feel particularly inclined to play?  
Another masterpiece on lines like Bechet's in the 1930s is Johnny Dodds's performance on "I'm Goin' Huntin'" with Louis Armstrong, Jimmy Blythe and I think Jimmy Bertrand.  I first heard that one on a (from a current perspective) early LP selection of jazz with washboard. Twenty years later I finally managed to hear the other title of the two from that date. I found it incredibly dull.  Masterpieces are rare things.
all the best!
Robert R. Calder