[Dixielandjazz] Vale Harry Harman

[Joe Bebco]

Re: Harry Harman

Hi Bill,
       I wish I could say I had more familiarity with Australian Jazz
history. Musical connections are something that interests me. I've
just finished a book that was mostly (page wise) about jazz in South
Africa.

Younger people getting into the music usually start from the beginning
and devote their learning to the 20s-30s period, and I was no
exception. Most straight jazz history that they will find relegates
the revivals to a sidebar (with the exception of British Trad for some
reason.)  The 40s revival section will start with Lu Watters and end
with Turk Murphy, the 70 years following being not particularly
studied by anyone under 50 unless they grew up in a jazz club with
parents involved. It is hard to come by a lot of that information
second hand.

Given my role with The Syncopated Times, (as the youngest writer by
several decades at 39) I'm giving myself a crash course in the recent
history with the hope of connecting the younger players who I follow
to the reality that they are standing on the shoulders of people who
have been continually reviving jazz for three generations. And that
their playing style builds on them rather than growing whole cloth
from original sources. Many do know it, and lots of bands have people
of mixed ages, but many others want to distance themselves from the
"Dixieland" generation while not being all that distinguishable.  I
know this is a very old conversation. My point is that there are
dozens of bands that I should be expected to know in case someone
mentions them, (as I learned with Soprano Summit) and I'm working on
it.

It has been much easier to find books related to the New Orleans based
revival artists from the 60s and later than comprehensive material
describing the bands filling festival stages from the 60s-00s, the
prime of many of our print readers. 40s-50s is not too much better.
I'm happy to take suggestions.

I know that Australia has an unusually strong traditional jazz scene
up to the present day, with bands of all ages. I get lots of hits on
the website from there and had intended to do a roundup of recent
albums at some point, or a band profile, but my to do list only gets
bigger and I'd rather find a local to submit a story. I'd love to have
a regular writer from the area.

As far as history in general, I'd wager most Americans wouldn't know
Australia was involved in World War II, let alone jazz, but that's our
education system.


Joe Bebco
Associate Editor
SyncopatedTimes.com (315) 507-5490
A monthly newspaper covering Hot Jazz, Ragtime, and Swing.

On Sat, Jan 5, 2019 at 3:34 PM Bill Haesler <bhaesler at bigpond.net.au> wrote:
>
>
> > Joe Bebco <joe.syncopatedtimes at gmail.com> wrote (in part) in reply to Marek Boym:
> > Obviously it was the UK Trad revival that brought the Sydney Jazz Club up to large attendance numbers but in 1953 I can see Australia as being slightly behind the curve, and that was before rock and other forms had taken off anywhere.
>
> Dear Joe and Marek,
> Wrong.
>
> > There must have already been some trad scene going for him to have been recruited to form a band in
> > 1948...
>
> There was.
> But, as we say here, "How long is a piece of string?"
> The simple answer is Graeme Bell, his brother Roger and their friends including Ade Monsbourgh, in the mid 1930s.
> And the worldwide early 1940s Jazz Revival, the Australian version of which ran parallel with the UK one.
> All too complex to summarise here at the moment, as I am working on an obituary for my dear mate Harry Harman for the Sydney Jazz Club's February Newsletter.
>
> > ...but I have no idea about discography. I would expect that he recorded but it wasn't mentioned in anything I read while getting the story together.
>
> DJML listmate Jack Mitchell started covering that subject with booklets in 1950 culminating in 1988 with his definitive 'Australian Jazz On Record. 1925-80', a comprehensive living discography of Australian jazz from 1925 to the present day. Available from Jack on CDRom.
> A listing of Harry Harman's recordings (taken from by Jack's AJOR) can be extracted from Tom Lord's current 'Jazz Discography'.
> Kind regards,
> Bill.
>
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