[Dixielandjazz] Spanish Influence

[John Gill]

 I was very interested in seeing the thread on the influence of Spanish Music on Jazz. I've always enjoyed hearing this influence in jazz records thru the years, and I've been involved in several bands that often utilized Spanish Rhythm in performances. The most notable of those bands was Turk Murphy's Jazz Band.   So several of my thoughts on comments from the thread. "Egyptian Fantasy" is often credited to Sidney Bechet and while Mr. Bechet did a bang up job of performing this number, it's not his tune. The original title is "Egyptia" and it was written by Abe Olman sometime prior to WW1. It was written as a 3 strain tune and Bechet chose not to utilize the 3rd strain in his adaption. I have heard or read it was in the repertoire of The Creole Band led by Bill Johnson. On a side note, several years ago I found a band arrangement of "Egyptia" that included a soprano saxophone solo. That is basically the whole tune written out as a melody or lead part for soprano sax. So I would guess Bechet must have heard or seen this arrangement in his early days and it stuck with him.   As far as the Spanish Tinge goes, I find it to be very pervasive in old jazz and with good reason. Spanish Music has always been very popular in the USA and you can find the melodic and rhythmic influences going back to the earliest ragtime and blues music. Some Spanish influenced hits over the years are,"Under The Bamboo Tree", "Mexicali Rose", and "South of The Border". All these tunes lend themselves to jazz performance very nicely.  We must not forget "Panama" which was originally written entirely in Spanish Rhythm, and it appears often in the compositions of W.C. Handy. A popular guitar tuning utilized in blues playing is the so called "Spanish Tuning" which is an open G tuning that facilitates the use of a bar in playing. Like the dobro playing in bluegrass music.   Another subject is a Mexican musician and composer named Juventino Rosas who went to New Orleans in the late 1880's or early 1890's and took that city by storm with a tune called "Sobre Las Olas" or as we know it "Over The Waves". While originally a waltz it has since become a New Orleans standard. Rosas was appearing with a group called The Mexican Band and they were such a big hit that they ended up staying over in New Orleans for several weeks. Some of the Mexican musicians stayed in New Orleans and intermarried with the Creoles and African Americans living there and went on to become big influences on the music there as teachers. Among these would be the Tio family of clarinet players. A very interesting series of articles was written about this Mexican Band and it's various influential musicians in the Tulane Jazz Archive newsletter several years ago.   In the 1880's there was a very popular style of Mexican music called Banda music, a brass based traditional Mexican music, that began to spread into the American southwest and gulf coast areas and this music probably had some influence on American musicians also. Banda music is still very popular today and many examples can be found on You Tube. Banda music is very much like the older New Orleans brass band music as exemplified by The Olympia Brass Band, and The Onward Brass Band. Check it out.   I don't know why the influences of Mexico do not get much credit in jazz history, I guess it just doesn't fit the narrative that the historians wish to promote. Anyway I tried in this post to be accurate in my statements but I'm talking off the top of my head based on my personal research when I lived in New Orleans. Whatever the case may be, to my ears there is a large Mexican/Spanish/Native American/West Indian/Puerto Rican/Caribbean influence in jazz music.RegardsJohn Gill