US$6.00 / CanC$ 7.50 Summer 2013
Valaida Snow “Forgotten Genius�
At Home with Thelonious Monk Modern Jazz at The Apollo Theatre
www.purejazzmagazine.com
African American Classical Music
Summer 2013 Volume 6 Number 4
Publisher / Editor & Chief Jo Ann Cheatham -Senior EditorFikisha Cumbo -EditorAgneta Ballesteros -Contributing WritersPlaythell G. Benjamin Dwight Brewster Jo Ann Cheatham David Greeves Delridge Hunter Williard Jenkins Robin D.G. Kelly Bret Primack GraphicsDirect Communications Technology Corp. -MarketingDanyelle Ballesteros -ConsultantsEunice Lewis Broome Jim Harrison Greer Smith Ed Stoute Randy Weston
Valaida Snow “Forgotten Genius” Page ........... 16
Features
Columns
At Home with Thelonious Monk
Poetry She Walks Beside Me . ....13
Modern Jazz at the Apollo Theatre This magazine was made possible with public funds from BAC the Brooklyn Arts Council and the Department of Cultural Affairs.
The Blues Project.
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It’s All About Jazz ....... ......15 ......... 9
Space is the Place .
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www.purejazzmagazine.com
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Jazz in Accra, Ghana ........ 24
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Pure Jazz is published quarterly with editorial and advertising headquarters in Brooklyn, NY. Tel/ 718.636.9671. All rights reserved. The authors and editors have taken care to ensure that all information in this issue is accurate. Nevertheless, the publisher disclaims any liability loss or damages incurred as a consequence directly or indirectly of the use and application of any contents.
With The Music In Mind Publisher’s Statement
Dear Supporters, Our cover story is Vilaida Snow, the Forgotten Jazz Genius trained to play 10 instruments at the professional level, she gained international fame on the trumpet and achieved legendary status as Queen of Trumpet and Song! Playthell Benjamin tells her story and the history of the times that gave us this genius. The Blues and its Beginnings! Where did it start? What does it say to us and about us? How did this indigenous genre develop? Delridge Hunter gives us the answers and explains how the blues bars shaped the music we listen to and reflect the lineage of human redemption. At Home with Thelonious Monk brings him and us to another revelation. Volumes of his music once lost were found and safely preserved by Monk. Turning those rare recordings into musical treasures was an audacious treat. Robin D.G. Kelly probes and finds out what it was like. You can be known by a lot of people in various circles, but when your are at home the people you know don’t take the time to even say Thank You. Does anyone know what it takes to be a writer? Better than that how much work it takes to receive a Lifetime Achievement Award. Bert Primack finds out from this year’s winner.
With jazz all around us we like to think the art form is universal. A trip to find it in another culture was an adventuresome journey. Dwight Brewster thought it would be easy to find jazz anywhere, but he faced unexpected challenges to find Jazz in Accra, Ghana! Modern Jazz at the Apollo in the 50s and 60s - “The Apollo where stars are born and legends are made.” How did the showplace get its start by Willard Jenkins. Space is the Place – Two great artists, The Queen, Dinah Washington, and the illustrious Mulgrew Miller are pillars of our legacy who left us all to soon. Be sure to visit their websites. Jazz Spotlight News gives our readers a chance to see the iconic Time Magazine cover of Thelonious Monk. Enjoy,
Jo Ann Cheatham Publisher
EVERY FRIDAY NIGHT! For the past 23 years!
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At Home with Thelonious Monk Today virtually all jazz critics and fans acknowledge Thelonious Monk as an unequivocal genius. Pianist and composer whose professional career stretched from the mid-1930 to 1976, Monk has always resisted easy categories. He helped transform modern jazz in the 1940s — a leader in the so-called “bebop revolution,” and yet shied away from bebop’s frenetic tempos or its proclivity for borrowing altered chord progressions from Tin Pan Alley songs. His way out ultramodern melodic lines and harmonies often proved treacherous even for virtuoso jazz artists, and yet he continued to incorporate elements from the old Harlem stride pianists of the 1920s and 1930s. A man and a few public words and a limited paper trail, what we know about Monk derive largely from recorded music or anecdotes of other musicians. From the first journalistic pieces to the more recent documentary films, he comes across as an eccentric and mad genius or a brilliant idiot savant or a mysterious diviner whose musical ideas are unknowable. As jazz critic Nat Hentoff observed in 1961, during the heyday of Monk’s popularity, he had become “a stock cartoon figure for writers of Sunday supplement pieces about exotica of jazz. Pictures of Monk in dark glasses and goatee would usually be captioned “Mad Monk” or ‘The High Priest of Bop.”
By Robin D.G. Kelly
I say, play your own way. Don’t play what the public wants? You play what you want and let the public pick up on what you’re doing? Even if it does take them fifteen, twenty years...
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More scholarly assessments try to delve into the logic of his music, often debating his piano skills while acknowledging his vast imagination. But neither extensive scholarship nor anecdotal evidence gives us much insight into his creative process—how Monk comes up with those startling off-kilter phrases that make you laugh or drop your jaw in amazement or those sublime melodies we know as “Crepuscule with Nellie” or “Monk’s Mood.” How exactly does he transform “Body and Soul” or “These Foolish Things” into his own musical language? Thanks to the recent discovery of Home Recordings of Monk, we are a lot closer to answering these questions. These recordings uncovered by Monk’s son drummer and bandleader Thelonious Monk, Jr., were made by his mother Mrs. Nellie Monk roughly between 1957 and 1963. They are part of a substantial cache of reel-to-reel tapes that include rare recording of Monk’s quartet at the Five Spot Café in 1957 and 1958; Birdland in 1963 and several live recordings from European tours. Fortunately all of these recordings are being released on the Monk family’s new label, Thelonious Records, available from www.monkzone.com. The home tapes are simply remarkable, not only because they de-mystify Monk’s creative process but they lay to rest any lingering claims about Monk’s lack of “technique” or his alleged “intuitive” and “child-like” approach to the piano. What we learn instead is that his distinctive sound is a product of unceasing discipline, practice and hard work. Whether he is reconstructing an old standard or working through his own originals, achieving the harmonic and rhythmic language we’ve come to recognize in Monk did not come easy to him. Indeed playing “straight” seemed easier for Monk than playing Monk. And despite his penchant for teaching his sidemen by ear, a few manuscripts in Monk’s hand provide compelling evidence that he tended to write down a great deal from his jagged arpeggios to intricate but spare chord voicings that critics have often considered as “natural” to Monk as everyday speech.
“Everything I play is different” Monk once explained, “Different melody, different harmony, different structure. Each piece is different from the other… (When the song tells a story, when it gets a certain sound, then it’s through …completed”) Achieving this story-telling quality wasn’t easy, even when Monk re-worked a standard. Perhaps the earliest of the recently discovered tapes consists of several takes of Ned Washington and George
Nellie & Thelonious
Bassman’s “I’m Getting Sentimental Over You,” a 1932 torch song well-known as the theme for Tommy Dorsey’s Orchestra. The tape must have been made between January and March of 1957, just before he took it into the studio for the first time and recorded it as a solo piece on April 16, 1957, for the Riverside label. The eighty-four minute tape provides a detailed record of how Monk painstakingly made “Sentimental” his own. The first take sounds as if he’s simply transposing in a suitable key; most versions are written in F but Monk preferred E flat. In five minutes he manages to merely get through one chorus of the melody stopping, starting, repeating three-or-four note phrases. As he wrestles with each measure, It becomes apparent that every note in his reinterpretation of the melody is carefully placed and probably written about at some point. The second take is also short played rubato (out of tempo), and begins like the last take in fits and starts. With each successive chorus, we hear more altera-
tions to the melody and increasingly dissonant harmonies. Toward the end of this take, Monk begins to integrate stride piano into the third chorus. The third take slightly over six minutes, is slow and plodding but in tempo. Monk improvises for the first time over a slow striding left hand. Here he has reached a comfort zone, singing solfeggio, making great intervallic leaps all over the keyboard and just plain enjoying himself. He never loses track of the melody to which he returns on the last chorus with a slight hesitation at the bridge. He ends with a cadenza which would become fairly common in future versions of the song, but then tags on a line quoting one of his original compositions, “Light Blue.” The successive takes add up to a little over an hour of continuous playing, an astounding exercise in discovery. He works through a wide range of improvised figures in a fairly systematic way, from descending arpeggios to a series repeated eight note runs down the keyboard. The deeper he gets into the song, the more audible his own singing becomes. It is especially fascinating to hear Monk regarded as a master of space and economy, leave so little space between notes and play continuously for so long. His purpose seems to be to hear many different possibilities so that he could decide how to construct a tight “edited” performance. And we can assume that these eightyfour minutes represent just a fraction of how much the Monk household had to endure listening to this one song during those early months of 1957.
terpiece. Following a romantic rubato opening filled with lush arpeggios, Monk flows easily into a slow stride tempo, emphasizing the melody throughout his improvisations. By 1960 “Sentimental” was fully incorporated into his regular repertoire, but by then it had metamorphasized from a romantic solo piano piece to a swinging medium tempo vehicle for his quartet. Monk played a lot of music that never made it to stage or disc. The tapes include a warm rendering of Mary Lou Williams’s arrangement of Gershwin’s “All God’s Chillun Got Rhythm” and a hilarious version of the old Christmas carol “Joy to the World,” in which Monk has a ball with his dissonant harmonies and odd countermelodies. And yet the care he took to reconstruct the song in his own language suggests that his recomposing of “Joy to the World” is no joke. Monk also liked to play certain classical pieces, the most common according to Mrs. Nellie Monk were by Rachmaninoff. (We also discovered among Monk’s possessions a fairly straight but dynamic homemade recording of Chopin’s “Polonaise in A Major, Op. 40”, but have yet to identify the pianist). Monk’s knowledge of and fondness for certain classical pieces challenges pianist Bill Evans’ claim written nearly four decades age, that Monk’s “unique and astoundingly pure music” can be explained by his lack of “exposure to the Western
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Most musicians close to Monk like pianists Barry Harris and Dr. Billy Taylor, recall how long he would practice a new piece, sometimes playing two hours or more in tempo. As his friend and fellow pianist, Mary Lou Williams, once recalled, “When Monk wrote a new song he customarily played it night and day for weeks unless you stopped him. That he said was the only way to find out if it was going to be any good. By the time Monk took “I’m Getting Sentimental Over You” into the studio on April 16, 1957, he was able to distill all of his hard work into a four-minute mas-
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classical music tradition or for that mat- everybody but you bring it down home ter comprehensive exposure to any music the way you feel it. I’ve never copied anyother than jazz one, though; just and American play music”. popular music.” The suggestion “Play” is a key word that the source of here. These tapes monk’s genius is reveal Monk’s love his naivete with of music, Mrs. Nelrespect to “claslie Monk’s delight sical” music is in listening to her as ridiculous as husband, and the claiming that his joy they both derive Monk and Dizzy exposure to Westfrom each other’s ern art music is company. Between the source of his uncanny sense of com- and during songs the recorder captures positional balance and form. The fact that snippets of a true love affair. Sometimes he could play Chopin, Rachmaninoff, they are joking with one another or simBach, or Debussy does not tell us much ply conversing about how to work the about how he composes or why he plays tape recorder; other times Mrs. Monk the way he does. sings along in perfect unison with the piano. Monk always dismissed attempts by critics and interviewers to prove his brilliance Her intimate involvement with her husby linking him with classical composers. band’s music is especially evident on one He was always consistent on this point: recording in which Monk is apparently he created his own music and hoped it teaching an unidentified pianist his comwould be understood on its own terms. position, “Introspection” a tricky melody In a 1971 interview, while revealing his filled with unusual rhythmic twists and familiarity with classical composers, he turns. Throughout each take, its Mrs. noted that their music had little influence Monk we hear leading with her voice, as on him. “But the jazz musicians impress any good piano teacher would. Clearly me,” he added, “Everyone is influenced by Monk had complete trust in her knowlCaribbean Jazz 2013 at its best. Download your copy today from ITunes or your favorite download service...
edge and opinions about music as well as her abilities to run the tape machine, even when she was just learning how to adjust the level. In the end these tapes are windows into more than Monk’s music. For me at least they confirmed my belief that deep down Thelonious Monk was really a romantic who loved those old songs for more than their harmonic features. I felt it profoundly at the end of a tender rendition of “Tea for Two” when he turn to Nellie and says in a surprised but gentle voice, “Were you recording that?” Robin D. G. Kelley Ph.D he is a professor at UCLA and the author of Thelonious Monk: “The Life and Times of an American Original”
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Modern Jazz At The Apollo! By: Willard Jenkins
When the Apollo Theatre opened the doors for its inaugural show on Friday, January 26, 1934, the trend setting variety bill included the great jazzman Benny Carter and his orchestra. The big band, or so-called “Swing Era” was in full flower and these swinging 17-piece behemoths, sparkplugs of the happy feet crowd at historic Harlem haunts like the Savoy Ballroom, soon found a welcoming home at the Apollo. Such great big bands as those of Duke Ellington, Chick Webb, Fletcher Henderson, Coleman Hawkins, Cab Calloway, Earl Hines, Benny Goodman, Lionel Hampton and others were a core element of the Apollo’s salad days in the 30s and 40s. They paved the way towards the Apollo accommodating the modern jazz combos of succeeding years. It was in those wonderful big bands that ignited the 125th street entertainment palace, that so many of the original vanguard of the modern jazz movement prepped. The early 40s proto-bebop Earl Hines Orchestra was a classic example. That band was a veritable prep school for modernists, including two of the pacesetters of the small group jazz also known as bebop, trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie and alto saxophonist Charlie “Yardbird” Parker. As writer Ted Fox recounts in his valuable book Showtime at the Apollo, “The Apollo led the way to exposing bebop to a larger audience. It was Frank Schiffman who first booked the experimental bop band of Earl Hines early in 1943 with Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, and (trumpeter) Little Benny Harris.” Significantly that Hines band featured the voices of Billy Eckstine and Sarah Vaughan, who also doubled as the band’s second pianist.
In ’44 when Eckstine formed his own band, one that took further steps into the modern era, he not only took Vaughan (who at 18 won the Apollo’s famed Amateur Night) with him, but Mr. B also opened up his trumpet section to Gillespie, Fats Navarro, and younger firebreathers like Kenny Dorham and Miles Davis. The saxophone section was equally prodigious, including Bird, Leo Parker, Gene Ammons, Dexter Gordon, and Lucky Thompson. The rhythm section included bassist Tommy Potter, drummer Art Blakey, and pianist John Malachi. Apollo Theatre impresario and major “domo” Frank Schiffman was no moldy fig, he was said to be quite supportive of the new, modern jazz sound. This new sound developed almost out of rebellion against the strictures of big band playing in favor of a sound that afforded freer flights of improvisation, plus more intricate rhythms and a broader harmonic universe. Although bebop grew out of the jazz atmosphere that encouraged social dancing, its various advancements limited dancing to this new music to only the most skilled terpsichorean hipsters. Ironically it was only natural that this music which seemingly required more of a listening commitment on the part of its audience, would find a place on the Apollo stage shows. It’s safe to say that some of the first modern jazz theatre performances took place on 125th Street. The two Harlem haunts which served as the most famous modern jazz laboratories were Minton’s Playhouse at 210 W. 118th St., and Monroe’s Uptown House at 198 W. 134th St., with the Apollo Pure Jazz Magazine - Page 9
roughly equidistant between them. At Minton’s the man later dubbed the “High Priest of Bebop”, pianist Thelonious Monk, held court at the nightly jam sessions with drummer Kenny “Klook” Clarke, trumpeter Joe Guy, and bassist Nick Fenton. Those sessions, conducted on the “down-low” beyond the prying eyes of musicians’ union officials who had banned jam sessions (though Minton’s had a leg up in part because its owner was an ex-union official), were particularly combustible on Monday nights. Bandleader Teddy Hill, the manager of Minton’s who controlled the music policy, hosted Monday night buffet dinners for Apollo performers on their night off. This savvy move ensured that the cream of the crop would show up on Mondays to jam, some of the club’s greatest sessions evolved from those buffets.
Ever the iconoclast, apparently Thelonious Monk brought a different vision to 125th Street. According to Fox in Showtime at the Apollo, “…when the continually inventive pianist and one of the jazz world’s great eccentrics played the Apollo in the late fifties he wore a pink sequined necktie his one concession to the demands of show business.” Experiencing Monk onstage at the Apollo amidst comics and dancers must’ve been quite the vision. Accessing Frank Schiffman’s meticulous 5 X 8 typed artist ratings index cards in the Smithsonian collection reveals the following Monk notation: “3/13/59 Very exciting jazz group.” Later that year… “6/5/59 Not nearly as good as first time. No box office.” The following year Thelonious’ new band apparently righted the ship… “7/22/60 With quintet… very well received.”
As Dizzy Gillespie remarked in his memoirs, To Be or Not to Bop, “On Monday nights we used to have a ball. Everybody from the Apollo on Monday nights was a guest at Minton’s, the whole band. We had a big jam session. There was always some food there for you. I was with the [big] bands at the time, and I would come in and out of town. When I was in the city, we were appearing at the Apollo… After the last show we’d go to Minton’s and sit and listen to some of the guys play.” Gillespie met his wife Lorraine at the Apollo, where she was a dancer in the chorus line.
The Apollo in the late 1930’s
Dizzy Gillespie, who unlike so many of his bop cohorts still had a lingering taste for the big band format, brought his pioneering bebop orchestra into the Apollo on several occasions, most notably in January, 1947 and for two stints in 1949. Performances from these gigs were captured for the film “Jivin’ in Bebop.” Charlie Parker’s dream was his series of “Bird with Strings” sessions, which
for him were efforts at engaging the classical atmosphere he relished. The week of August 17, 1950 Parker’s peerless alto sax bathed in strings onstage at the Apollo, which was also a live radio broadcast. The record shows however, that these Parker efforts on the “legit” side came up short of the ever demanding Apollo audience expectations and were met with a lukewarm response.
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As the forties evolved into the fifties and sixties jazz made further stylistic advancements; those developments were more frequently featured on the stage of the Apollo than bebop, particularly in the early ‘60s. By this time bebop had evolved into post or hard bop, a sound characterized by more extended lines imbued with bluesy qualities that were labeled as ‘funky’ or ‘soul jazz’ as the next generation of jazz musicians expanded on the examples of Monk, Gillespie, Parker and their cohorts. Concurrently, particularly in the late 1950s and early 1960s rhythm & blues, an Apollo staple, began giving way to its natural progression, what came to be labeled ‘soul music.’ As a result the Schiffmans opened up their shows to more jazz attractions. The more song oriented, and the “bluesiest” of the hard boppers who had that sanctified Amatuar Night at the Apollo
sound were the most frequent modern “jazz- organist Jimmy McGriff, Flip Wilson, and ers” then booked into the Apollo: Horace Oscar Peterson. Silver, Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers, Can“Symphony nonball Adderley, Sid’s Afro Jazz” Jimmy Smith and brought Art the like. Popular Blakey (with guest white jazz artists Montego Joe), 3 of the day also dancers, Arthur found a welcome Prysock, Mongo Apollo stage, inSantamaria, Edcluding Dave Brdie Palmieri, and ubeck, Stan Getz, Flip Wilson to Buddy Rich, and the theatre. One Maynard Fergunotes a common son. The singers thread through were an essential all of these jazzelement of these laden shows the shows, particupresence of at larly to balance least one singer out the more inand usually a conovative types, median as well. like Miles Davis, Singers in particMonk, and John ular were includColtrane. Aced because Schiffcording to Lionel man, despite his Hampton: “I saw support of and Coltrane play appreciation of the Apollo one modern jazz, altime. The place The Apollo Today ways felt that his was packed when shows needed at he went in there. When he left, there wasn’t but a handful of least one singer to ensure box office success. people in there. He was playing his piece One of the great singers who came to prom“My Favorite Things” [his 1960 hit record- inence in the 1960s was Nancy Wilson. Her ing] and he played that piece for about half longtime manager John Levy, former bassan hour.” Reflecting the fact that this was ist and pioneering African American artists’ a period when the Apollo opened up to personal manager, produced several shows various radio deejay-produced extravagan- at the Apollo with the Schiffmans’ blessings. zas, on the jazz side such radio show hosts “I had a great working relationship with the as Symphony Sid (“the all night, all frantic Schiffmans, both Bobby and the old man one”) and Mort Fega brought shows to the [Frank],” Levy, 97 years young and sharp as a tack at publication time, exclaimed during Harlem stage. a recent conversation. On March 30, 1962 Symphony Sid hosted a power-packed line-up featuring John Col- The week of March 6, 1964 the Apollo trane, Herbie Mann, Betty Carter, Jimmy hosted “John Levy presents Free Sounds of Smith, Barry Harris, and Oscar Brown Jr. ‘64”, featuring Nancy Wilson, Cannonball And it was the Apollo stage that engaged Adderley, Ramsey Lewis, and comic Slappy Sid’s growing taste in Latin sounds as well; White. A high point of the show came when witness his June 22,1962 show featuring Nancy sang her big hit of the day, “Guess Tito Puente, Thelonious Monk, Mongo San- Who I Saw Today,” and as she sang the big tamaria, Arthur Prysock, the Tommy Ray finish – “…I saw YOU…” she gestured stage Steel Band, and dancers. Such a show was left and the spotlight shone on a big white clearly in keeping with the Apollo policy of chair with Oscar Brown Jr. sitting with his mixing genres, as with another 1962 show back to the audience, whereupon Brown mixing Horace Silver, Aretha Franklin, rose from his chair to the audience’s delight, “sonero” Tito Rodriguez, (comic) Timmie intoning the signature line from one of his Rogers, Nigerian drummer Olatunji, and hits “… But I was cool!” Unlike jazz festiHerbie Mann with this Schiffman notation: val shows of today, these shows were not a matter of one full set following another. Ac“may keep [this show] 10 days…” cording to John Levy the entire cast would The week of September 6, 1963 Mort Fega come on together to open the show, the hosted Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers (“Co- duration of which was typically 90 minutes; operative and probably the finest jazz group “…one act introduced the other act,” says in the country,” according to Frank Schiff- Levy. Then in typical Apollo tradition… 30 man’s rating card, “individually & collec- minute break… do it all over again. Showtively – but worn a bit thin in this house time at the Apollo on a jazz tip. “We got a attraction-wise”), singer Teri Thornton, great response, we sold the houses out…
and I made money,” Levy concluded. Willard Jenkins is a Jazz Journalist his blog is www.openskyjazz.com
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The Blues And It’s Beginings
Robert Johnson
The problem with the spiritual origin of blues is which spirituals are the writers referring to? The spirituals of the Africans in bondage in the United States or the Negro Spirituals, the new genre created by the arrangers of the new Negro faction born after slavery was ended? If it is the spirituals of old, then we must say that all African music applied the same pentatonic tone to their music regardless of lyrics used. What is being stated here, regardless of the message, was Africans did not distinguish one form from the next? Thus whether it was a “church” song or a song of the secular world, the minor tone with the 2/4 beat and syncopation was applied. The minor tones applied made no separate change of tones or scales applied to one or the other. Whether in Ethiopia, Congo, Mali, Texas or Mississippi, the same minor tones were sung with emphasis on delivery. Lyrics told the audience what the song was about and delivery expressed how the song would be rendered. Now for the Negro Spirituals! The Negro Spirituals are in fact the old “Jubilee” songs sang in the African communities of the United States to inform the community when someone was about to make an escape from a particular location that evening. By the way, “Jubilee” is a code word for freedom. Being sophisticated, Africans knew not to use the word freedom for their adventure from terror. Therefore the word “Jubilee” was substituted in order to keep the wolves off the burnt meat the Southern Europeans cooked as barbeque to satisfy their attempts to deny a particular African from escaping the terror of bondage. Being ashamed of the tone and syncopation of the southern rural Africans delivery in music and having exposure to the European coral songbook the northern trained musicians thought they would civilize the primitive African songbook by rendering the “Jubilee” songs as “Negro Spirituals”. I do not know if they were afraid to call the songs Jubilee Songs, the name they were originally Pure Jazz Magazine - Page 12
By: Delridge Hunter composed as, or if they thought that it was more commercially viable to revise them as Negro Spirituals because the European audiences would find that name more suitable to their taste. These new arrangements were now based on the European construct of music dynamic. This manner of rendering coral music was now sung primarily by Black college students who sang a’cappella in the European mode at gatherings staged to raise funds for the southern Black college’s development fund. Began by the Fisk University Choir, these renderings became a new genre separate and apart from the old pentatonic or minor tone songs delivered by its original singers. Now back to the discussion on the blues. Blues as we know it came from W.C. Handy. His scale was D flat harmonic minor = D flat E flat F flat G flat A flat B C D flat. That scale evolved into an infinite number of scales that coincidentally turns out to be played in some African community this moment. In its original form, Europeans called blues, “Devil’s music” while Africans called it “Devil songs”. Was Devil songs Devils music? In the mid to late 19th Century, the 2/4 signatures was the common representation of the manner in which a blues song was sung. It did not have to meet the Handy standard to be called blues because the lyric poet as a social commentator already employed the minor tones that are heard in jazz today. If one reads Paul Lawrence Dunbar’s Ebonics poetry that are titled, “Blue”, “Lament”, “Dirge” or some other like name will see that he has already begun to catalogue the music as it is presented. After Handy, came the Memphis Blues. The old overlapped and informed the new. It still does, but to a lesser degree. The author traces what we call blues today to Ethiopia. In its transferable form, the pentatonic scale became the easiest way to travel this music that became so popular in the United States. How did this music, called “the blues”, become so dominant as
a musical form in the United States? Just taking music departments out of New York City Public Schools during the 1970’s C. E. taking the drums (inclusive) out of hands of African drummers, left a vacuum for lesser sounding instruments to be heard. The string instruments became the instruments that immediately moved to the front line. The fiddle and banjo dominated the scene until the guitar took over for the lyric poets; the secular singers and religious singers employed the banjo or guitar with their compositions. It was when they got the groove on that the real blues was heard. Every body would “cut up” when that happened. The good performers could carry on a “shindig” until every body got home, and then they would “show out”. This is when the inventions took hold as each experimented with doing something unusual. If it worked it caught on. Innovation and experimentation became part and parcel. Delridge L. Hunter, Ph.D. is a Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies Medgar Evers College Author, The Lyric Poet a blues continuum
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She Walks Beside Me Like Jazz She walks beside me like jazz Played by a combo of old black Me after the joint has closed Like their eyes remembering times gone by She walks beside me like jazz Coming over the backyard fence Early Sunday morning waking Softly melding with the warmth of her so near She walks beside me like jazz Our minds riffing together In lonely sax wails searching For each other and finding On the wind a place for our sounds She walks beside me like jazz Vibrations on the eardrum Pounding rhythms in perfect harmony Soothing and ordering life’s chaos She walks besides me and I walk beside her Ain’t jazz grand
littlke s s i “Thok pac lb o e pi c w a an of the can lop erto Ri rom Pu spora f e diaeminin .” a f wpoint v ie “In this book you will find a breath of characters who reside inside the wisdom of Aponte’s ingenuity.” .....Tato Laviera
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It’s All About Jazz By: Bret Primack The Jazz Journalists Association recently presented Tri-C JazzFest Artistic Director Willard Jenkins with the 2013 JJA Lifetime Achievement Award in Jazz Journalism. With that in mind, Bret Primack put a few questions to him about jazz journalism and how he came to advocate for the music. You just got an award from the Jazz Journalists Association. Does the press do a good job of representing jazz to new audiences? I think the press does a substandard job of representing jazz period. And here I’m speaking of press outlets, not those many learned and earnest jazz writers who strive for bylines and yearn to cover this music more broadly than publications or editors enable them to. All too often writers have a tendency to shoot over the heads of their potential readers in an effort at patting themselves on the back for their supposed acumen and “insider” knowledge of what I refer to as the science of music. I’m not advocating outright cheerleading or dumbing down of one’s prose, just a sense of mindfulness that those who read your reportage may need non-technical elements, real storytelling to draw them into the fold of interest. How long have you had your blog and what prompted you to start it?
ent with an amazing vocal range, but a young woman of uncommon grace and maturity for one so young, so I wrote a piece about her efforts at our festival coupled with the release of her first stateside album “Woman Child.” As artistic director of the Tri-C JazzFest, you get to dream big every year about what artists to bring into town. How do you approach the challenge? First of all, working for Tri-C JazzFest has been a blessing, as has my other jazz presenting work. That work has enabled me to bring artists to our stages that I firmly believe our audience needs to hear, must hear, deserves to be exposed to. My task is to keep an open mind to what’s out here and not be closed to my own personal proclivities; to have a sense of what’s good for our audiences and venues and what makes sense to bring to Cleveland; also be on the listen for what might challenge our Cleveland audience. Throughout the year I keep a fluid document full of ideas that come to mind throughout the year while listening to new releases, meeting and interviewing artists, broadcasting the music, and just experiencing the music. Tell us about your father’s record collection and how it influenced your ear.
Like most of my peers, I listened to the music I’ve had my blog The Independent Ear for of the day growing up, and for my time that about seven years now. I was prompted to was Motown, Stax, James Brown, etc., whatstart it purely to have a creative outlet to ex- ever they were playing on WAMO or WABQ. press some of the issues and elements of this However, my dad’s record collection was a music that I find missing in the mainstream constant source of what I’ll call alternative jazz prints. I use it as an outlet to write what inspiration, as was Cleveland’s last full-time I choose to write, without publication-im- jazz radio station, WCUY. So I was exposed posed restrictions. I like dealing with issues, to the Duke Ellingtons, Count Basies, Sarah like the plight of African Vaughans, Ella Fitzgeralds, Americans writing about Cannonball Adderleys, jazz that I dealt with over Jimmy Smiths, Miles Davis the course of months unand the like from an early der the heading of “Ain’t age. My dad was also a bit But a Few of Us.” Or perof an early adapter in the haps it’s talking with an stereo revolution where the exceptional and undermark of good taste became publicized artist like the your home sound system. I pianist Sumi Tonooka remember Christmas 1961 and her latest composiwatching my father astion project. At our Tri-C semble a new home sound JazzFest last April, I came system and being fasciaway even more impressed nated by the process, and than I already was with later how good the music the exciting young vocalsuddenly sounded not only ist Cecile McLorin Salvant. the Temptations, Smokey I checked her out during Robinson and Isley Broththe festival, found her not ers I’d slip on the turntable, Willard Jenkins only to be an unusual talbut also the great jazz artists
he was always spinning. My appreciation for music and collecting records increased exponentially when I got to college at Kent State and I became known as a voracious record collector someone who wouldn’t hesitate to commandeer a friend’s car to make the drive to Cleveland to the old Record Rendezvous to scarf up the strange new album Miles Davis had just released called “Bitches Brew.” On campus I became the guy who introduced new music to my friends because I was the guy who took chances and experimented with what might be unknown to others. So not only might that mean the latest Miles, but I’d also be the first on campus to introduce new groups like Earth, Wind & Fire to my circle. Record collecting became sort of my social niche. And that all stemmed from my father’s early influence. What advice do you have for people who think of jazz as intimidating? Where should they start?, I’d say people should simply start with trying to listen to a variety of sounds and artists and determine their own listening pleasure. Maybe a good place to start would be the Smithsonian’s comprehensive recorded survey of the music. When encountering a jazz performance, listen to the interaction between musicians, check how they subtly communicate with each other, and know that behind this mysterious element known as improvisation is some measure of a blueprint; these musicians aren’t just going onstage and playing random notes or improvising in the purest sense of the word. They go equipped with certain mores and sensibilities that in the best of all worlds has them attuned to their fellow musicians to create a cohesive, pleasant, stimulating experience for the audience. Who’s the long-gone jazz artist you’d most like to have met? That’s a tough one because I could say Duke Ellington, Charlie Parker, Thelonious Monk, Mary Lou Williams. But ultimately I think that would have to be Louis Armstrong. Bret Primack “uses Facebook too.”
Bret Primack is a music journalist best known as Jazz the Video Guy and continues to get the hottest stories in jazz
Pure Jazz Historic Moment
Branford Marsalis Pure Jazz Magazine - Page 15
Vilaida Snow Forgotten Genius! By: Playthell G. Benjamin
In her memoir about the world of American show business doing the golden age of Hollywood, the famous actress Maureen O’Hara said the producers were always looking for performers who were “triple threats,” meaning they could sing, dance and act. However she forgot to mention the fact that the performer also had to be white. This is the only logical explanation as to why Valaida Snow was not the greatest star of the era, for she was a triple threat and more. None of the white stars of the Hollywood musical extravaganzas could match her talent. In his book “The World of Earl Hines,” one of a series of books by the indefatigable British Jazz historian Stanley Dance, in which Jazz musicians tell us in their own words about their life and work, there are some poignant descriptions of Valaida Snow told by the great pianist and bandleader Earl “Fatha” Hines. One of the greatest figures of twentieth century American music, a major innovator on the piano, and a seminal figure in the development of the modern complex AfroAmerican instrumental art music popularly known as “Jazz,” Hines performed in every type of venue imaginable. Thus he
is as reliable an eyewitness as we are likely to find; an unimpeachable source. “Valaida was very versatile and very musical” Hines recalls. “She could sing, dance and produce a show. She could play trumpet, violin and piano…She had all the physical attractions one could want in a girl, and she made a heck of an impression. All this came out after she had begun working at the Sunset, and I thought she was the greatest girl I had ever seen.” Hines went on to describe her performance, “In her act she had seven different pairs of shoes set out front, and she’d do a dance in each of them – soft shoes, adagio shoes, tap shoes, Dutch clogs, and I don’t know what else, but last of all Russian boots.” Hines went on to tell us, “She’d do a chorus in each, and on the tap number she tapped just like Bojangles.” Now, that’s a hell of a claim, since Bill “Bojangles” Robinson was unquestionably the greatest tap dancer in the world at the time…and arguably is the most influential figure in the history of tap dancing. All of the great masters in the complex Afro-American art of rhythm tap dancing whose complex rhythms influenced some of the greatest drummers
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in the jazz tradition, as Professor Jacqui black performance venues was common Malone ably documents in her seminal fare and is mentioned in virtually every text “Steppin on the Blues” pay hom- account of the period. In a fascinating age to Bojangles as the patron saint of reflection on the 1890’s contained in his their art, includclassic ing the peerless memoir Sammy Davis Jr. of blacks And since Earl in New Hines played for Y o r k Bojangles many C i t y , times often as “Black his sole accomM a n paniment since h a t t a n”, “Bo” didn’t reJames ally like to use We l d o n drummers beJohnson cause they often describes interfered with the rich the complicatc re at ive ed rhythms he milieu was tapping out at the One of the many recordings by Ms. Snow Hines had an inM a r timate knowledge of Robinson’s art. shall Hotel – a black owned hotel and nightclub located in the “Tenderloin Hence when he compared Valaida’s District” on the West side of Manhatperformance to Bojangles, this was no tan in the 50’s. This area was also picayune matter, it was nothing less known as “Black Bohemia” because so than a sensational compliment. And many Afro-American artists resided he is not the only one who was aston- there. Performers of all kind stayed at ished by her dancing skills. “Louis the Marshall, especially musicians, and Armstrong had a fit when he saw her,” they performed in the club. Hence Hines tells us. ‘Boy I never saw any- Johnson tells us that white performers thing that great’ he told me. She broke were always in the audience “looking up the house every time.” Hines said. for Negro stuff ” to incorporate in their However Louie Armstrong grew up in acts. the flourishing show business world of New Orleans and had worked in Chi- So thorough was the wholesale pillage cago, and New York, not to mention of Afro-America’s cultural storehouse the countless performances he had by white performers seeking material played in every section of the country; for their blackface “coon shows,” that so he had seen plenty! the great Afro-American vaudevillian team, Bert Williams and George WalkHines had witnessed all the major acts er, billed their act “Too Real Coons,” in American show business strut their when they got together in San Franstuff white and black but since most cisco during 1893. Although they were of the biggest white acts were employ- on the other side of the continent they ing Afro-American cultural forms as encountered the same situation as that the basic ingredients of their act, once described by Johnson in New York. you saw the black acts you had seen A great poet, lyricist, librettist, lawthe state of the art. This had been true yer, and diplomat who would become since the end of the 19th century, but the first black Executive Secretary of even before that, ever since the rise of the NAACP, Johnson was no ordinary blackfaced minstrelsy performed by witness. An early twentieth century white Americans in burnt cork during American renaissance man, Johnson, the 1840’s and becoming the most pop- in collaboration with his composer ular form of theatrical performance brother J. Rosamond Johnson and Bob throughout the balance of the 1800s, Cole, a gifted tunesmith and choreogbut minstrelsy was mostly parody of rapher, wrote a series of musical revues black culture. that contributed to the formation of the Broadway musical, and were also By the turn of the century, with the among the principal creators of the rise of Ragtime music and the Cake American popular song with hits like Walk, Afro-American music and dance “Under The Bamboo Tree” and patrireigned supreme. That’s why the pres- otic songs such as “Rally Round The ence of famous white performers at Flag Boys.” As a savvy lawyer as well Pure Jazz Magazine - Page 18
as a creative artist, it is not surprising that James Weldon was also a founder of ASCAP (American Society of Composers Authors and Publishers) one of the principal agencys that protects the royalty rights of musicians today. And the evidence of Johnson’s charge of white cultural pilfering is everywhere. From Paul Whiteman being acclaimed the “King of Jazz” in the 1920’s, to Benny Goodman being promoted as “The King Of Swing”, in the 1940’s, to Elvis Pressley being declared the “King of Rock and Roll” in the 1950’s and 60’s, to John Travolta and the Bee Gee’s becoming the “Kings of Disco,” to Slim Shady being dubbed the “Master Poet of Hip Hop”. What all of these acts have in common is that they built acts based on Afro-American cultural ingredients, yet they made more money than the black creators because of institutionalized racism which throughout the 19th century and most of the twentieth century, barred black acts from performing in many of the most lucrative venues. This allowed white performers to get away with performing mediocre versions of Afro-American acts to all white audience that had never seen the real thing… and get fabulously rich and famous doing it. This fact does much to explain why the most talented female performer of the period is a forgotten figure in the history of American performing arts. Although she was a big star in her time in the black community, she never received her just recognition in the world of American show business at large. And she is still denied her proper place in the American cultural pantheon, due to a general ignorance of the role of race in shaping American popular culture abetted by cultural and gender chauvinism practiced by EuroAmericans males and men in general. Hence Valaida suffered from a double whammy: racism and sexism. When we consider the fact that Valaida Snow was as good a singer as a dancer, plus a virtuoso on several instruments that have nothing in common – string, brass and keyboard – she was arguably not only the greatest woman performer in American show business…but the greatest performer of her time, male or female. Her versatility was astounding. Earl Hines tells us: “After the Sunset
closed she went on the road and was in ethnicities who loved great music was in character. “I always remember too, several big shows. The last time I saw drawn to the spot…. just as they had how she used to sing “Brother, Can You here before she came back to Chicago been draw to the music and posh am- Spare A Dime”, she would come out again, she was with Nobel Sissle and bience of the “Cabaret Du Champion,” all raggedy and wearing an old cap on Eubie Blake in a show called “Rhap- the fabulous Chicago nightclub owned her head. During the Depression she sody In Black.” They had about thirty by Jack Johnson, the first black heavy- would break people up with that song.” musicians and she conducted the whole weight champion of the world, a genband in the eration Anyone who has listened carefully first part of earlier. to Yip Harbrough’s clever, biting and the show. Hines had an intimate knowledge of Robinson’s cynical lyrics cannot fail to recognize Then she T h e its sharp critique of the callous greed had her art. Hence when he compared Valaida’s per- g r e a t of the plutocrats. And the insightful own spot, m u s i c observer can readily discern a class and after formance to Bojangles, this was no picayune also at- consciousness in the perspectives of that she tracted Capone and Hines the gangster and did a num- matter: it was nothing less than a sensational Al Ca- the artist. It seems clear that both were ber with p o n e poor boys struggling to survive and compliment. the Berry and his thrive in a country with a rich ruthless B rot h g a n g , chauvinistic WASP ruling class, who ers.” Musicians like Sissle and Blake, who secretly took control of the club. held lower class Italians in slightly less and dancers such as the Berry Broth- Big Al loved the band and “Fatha” contempt than Afro-Americans, the ers, were among the best in American Hines paints an intriguing portrait of best way they could. show business. The fact that Valaida his relationship with the famous Italian was performing with them is further gangster. “Along with so many of the And like jazz fans of all backgrounds, evidence of her multi-talented genius. bad traits people said Al Capone had, Capone dug Hine’s band. As it turns he had some good traits too. He used out, Valaida was not just a great perNobel Sissle and Eubie Blake were great to run a restaurant twenty four hours a former at the Grand Terrace, but she songwriters who penned hit songs, at day where poor people could get free quickly rose to producer of the show, a time when the music business was meals, and he took over real estate where which required her to bend both the in transition from an industry largely these same poor people could move in gangsters and macho male musicians based on the sale of sheet music to one and live. He used to come by the club to her will. And she manipulated them based on record sales. And many of at night, and if I met him at the door he as skillfully as she manipulated the keys their most popular tunes originated might put his hand up and straighten of her trumpet. in Broadway musicals they wrote. For my handkerchief, and there would be instance the tune “I’m Just Wild about a hundred dollar bill. Or he might give After spending the summer months Harry” was introduced in their hit me a handshake and put a twenty dol- on tour with Valaida Snow, Earl Hines Broadway musical “Shufflin’ Along” lar bill in my hand.” From Hine’s de- was captivated by her talent and beauty in 1922, and became so popular that it scriptions here, damned if Big Al don’t and marveled at her polymorphic guise was adopted as Harry Truman’s cam- s o u n d once they were paign song in his run for the presiden- like Robin back at the Grand cy almost thirty years later. And the Hood. Terrace. “When Berry Brothers was one of the premier we came back,” tap dance acts. Insofar as show busi- This is the Hinds recalls, ness was concerned, Valaida was “mov- world that “they were having in high cotton” as the old folks used Va l a i d a ing trouble with to say when I was a boy in Florida. S n o w producers and dientered rectors. ‘Valaida,’ Although Valaida Snow was excluded when she Fox said ‘do you from exhibiting her talents in many took the know anything venues because of her beautiful tan skin gig at the about producby people suffering from “White it is” a G r a n d ing?’ ‘sure’ she bizarre malady that makes white people Te r r a c e . said. ‘I can put believe that the earth and all its bounty And she the show on for belongs exclusively to them, there was was a you.’ ” I guess Ed a large black audience and she worked s m a s h ! Fox, the owner all the time entertaining them on the F a t h a of record, had “TOBA Circuit.” Again Earl Hines Hines tells seen enough of Ms. Snow in performance informs us, “When the show finished, us, “I can’t her versatility Ed Fox got in touch with her and had remember who was headlining, but she to suspect that she might be capable her come to the Grand Terrace.” This came next after a great dance couple of doing anything in show business. was a premier nightclub in Chicago, a from Cuba. She was what we call an in- So Fox took a chance. “After all,” says fabulous place that catered to an Afro- génue then, in front of the chorus. She Hines, “she could dance and she could American audience, but Earl “Fatha” sang “The Very Thought Of You”, and sing and she knew what to do. She put Hines’ orchestra was the house band that kind of thing.” Hines was also im- that show together herself. She saved and therefore people of all races and pressed by her ability to deliver a song him an awful lot of money, too, bePure Jazz Magazine - Page 19
cause whenever a new show went on, there had to be a lot of new arrangements for it. She was so talented she picked out numbers from the bands book that could be used, memorized them, and hummed or scatted them to the chorus. Then when we came in, the rehearsals were very short because the girls already knew the band’s routines. “Bubbling Over” was one of the numbers she produced. Beer and wine had come back after prohibition, and that was the inspiration for the song. She always knew what she wanted and nobody could fool her.” In reading Hine’s reminiscences about Valaida, one should remember that these extravagant accolades are coming from great artists working at the apex of show business.
might well have been fighting over her. After all, aside from being beautiful and could sing and dance, she was so good as a trumpet soloist her nickname was “Little Louie” because she had a big sound like Louis Armstrong – the father of jazz trumpet, who called her “the world’s second best trumpet player.”
Although for most of her career Valaida performed in black nightclubs and theaters like New York’s Apollo, Chicago’s Regal, the Howard in Washington and the Earl Theater in Philly on the so-called “Chittlin’ Circuit,” she also appeared in Broadway shows, like “Chocolate Dandies,” written by Sissle and Blake, where she was also required Another of the powerful recordings by Ms. Snow to act. And like many great Afro-American performing before the disco replaced the dance hall artists, Josephine Baker topping the list bands with recorded music. It was a Despite living in a country whose rul- period when there were more famous as the toast of Paris she was a sensation ing ideology was white supremacy, en- instrumentalists than singers. Hence in Europe as an instrumentalist and in during constant insults intended to en- you had to be sharp on your axe or you musical theater. force the myth of white superiority, and would be cut from the band in the Darbarred from displaying her genius in winian world of the Jazz orchestra. A tragic event occurred in her life durthe major entertainment emporiums of ing the early forties that shattered Vaher native land, Valaida was neverthe- The great William “Count” Basie de- laida’s career. While concertizing with less a star in her world “behind the veil” scribes the cut throat competition her all-female orchestra in Denmark, as Dr. Dubois described the segregated among musicians for chairs in the great she was arrested by the Nazi’s on morworld of black America, and she lived bands of the era in his autobiography als and drug charges and sent to Westlike one. “She had a Mercedes and a “Good Morning Blues,” written in col- er-Faengle, concentration camp for chauffeur,” says Hines, “and she used to laboration with Albert Murray, a bril- two years during 1940-42. Incredibly, send him to pick me up and take me liant writer and jazz critic who danced Valaida was the victim of the motion home… She used to dress luxuriously to those bands in his youth. To illus- of history; she was caught up in the and look very, very glamorous. She trate the point Basie tells a story about swirl of world events. As a black female was just a beautiful and exceptionally being slightly late to the bandstand and jazz musician who appeared to be battalented woman.” hearing another guy playing his butt off ting from both sides of the plate, liked in his piano seat. He didn’t have to lis- getting high and playing around with As an instrumentalist Valaida Snow ten long to recognize that his goose was white girls; she was viewed as a menace was top shelf, a bonafide member of the cooked; he went right over to the club by the NAZI Gestapo who were murJazz virtuosi that shaped the art during owner and asked for a job as a valet, derous thugs entrusted with enforcing the first half of the twentieth century. parking the cars of the guests. the objectives of the Third Reich. And Indeed her virtuosity was seemingly for blond Aryan women the Nazi obpreordained. Born into a family of Thus in assessing Valaida Snow’s musi- jective for them was to produce Aryan musicians in Chattanooga, Tennes- cianship it is enough to know that dur- warriors to serve the Thousand Year see in 1903, she showed an early talent ing her career she played with Fletch- Reich. for music. Hence aside from the three er Henderson, Count Basie and Earl instruments she was playing when Hines, and along with Blanche Callo- It appears that Valaida was oblivious to Earl Hines met her – piano, violin and way – whose pioneering career I shall the political situation she was in. Altrumpet her mother taught her to play examine in a future essay was the first though it is hard to imagine how that the cello, mandolin, banjo, harp, accor- woman to conduct a male orchestra, to could be so, the great Afro-American dion, clarinet and saxophone. She was recognize her outsize talent as a musi- novelist John A. Williams imagined it a gifted musician indeed. Her broad cian. She was so admired by her fellow in marvelous detail in “Clifford’s Blues” knowledge of music propelled her to musicians she was featured as a soloist see my review under the “Book Rethe top ranks of instrumental perform- with major white bands on occasion. view” section his gripping and insighters during a golden age of show busi- Had it not been for the racial taboos ful novel about a gay black American ness before television, when people and gender discrimination of Ameri- jazz instrumentalist and singer who went out to see live performances, and can society at the time, those bands gets arrested on morals charges drugs Pure Jazz Magazine - Page 20
and homosexuality and sentenced to imprisonment in a concentration camp. Williams uses this story to explore the entire question of sex, race and culture in Nazi Germany. It is such a finely told tale that I would recommend it to anybody who would like to experience vicariously what Valaida’s experience might have been like. Clifford, whose story is the raison d’etre of this finely realized novel, was having such a great time in Weimar Berlin where cocaine could be purchased from the newspaper vendors, gay nightclubs flourished, and his black complexion only enhanced the attractiveness of his talent. Cliff was the toast of the gay scene in Berlin and everybody wanted a piece of his dark meat. Hence when he saw those crazy guys in brown shirts running around the place harassing Jews he was just glad that for once it wasn’t black people getting the shaft and went about his business. It wasn’t until he was nabbed by the Nazi’s that he really notice how much things had changed for a gay black musician playing inferior “jungle music” in Germany. This tale bears such an uncanny resemblance to Valaida’s story that I am compelled to wonder if that’s where John A. Williams got the idea. Like Clifford, I’d bet Valaida was equally clueless about the political situation in Denmark at the time – since this had been one of the most sexually and racially liberal countries in the world before the Nazi invasion. It is the ultimate irony that in liberal Denmark Valaida should encounter, and be victimized by, a master race theory the Nazi’s imported from the US a consequence of Adolph Hitler becoming obsessed with the racial theories proffered by American Eugenicist Madison Grant, in his racist tome “The Passing of The Great Race.” At some point she must have recognized the similarity between the Nazi attitudes toward Jews and the attitude of the white south toward her own people. That’s why she, and millions of other Afro-Americans, fled the south.
a group called “The Honey Drippers,” who were pioneers in a new music that would soon sweep the world: Rhythm & Blues. On May 30, 1956, while in New York City, Valaida finally danced and joined the musical Gods. Playthell Benjamin is an award winning journalist, his blog is: http://commentariesonthetimes. wordpress.com/
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Valaida’s experience in the Nazi concentration camp wrecked her physically and psychologically; she was never the same performer again. Already in middle age, she was unable to fully retrieve her artistic prowess, although she continued to perform in various venues until the 1950’s, when she toured with Pure Jazz Magazine - Page 21
It seems as if surfing over the internet looking for websites for people to review could be something to just be doing. I guess it could feel a lot like playing around but actually it is an important thing for our own personal information, given the history that Jazz has to contribute. In this issue I have chosen two artists to give you another perspective of this awesome music.
Where the Music & the Universe Meet
By JoAnn Cheatham Blues”, which made Billboard’s “Harlem Hit Parade” She stayed with Hampton’s band until the Keynote label folded.
Dinah Washington Dinah Washington was an African-American singer and jazz vocalist who has been cited as “the most popular black female recording artist of the ‘50s”. She gave herself the title of “Queen of the Blues”. Born in Alabama she moved to Chicago and became a gospel singer. She won an amateur contest at Chicago›s Regal Theater where she sang “I Can’t Face the Music”. At the age of 15, she began performing in clubs like Dave’s Rhumboogie and the Downbeat Room. She was playing at the Three Deuces, a jazz club, when a friend took her to hear Billie Holiday at the Garrick Stage Bar. Owner, Joe Sherman was so impressed with her singing of “I Understand”, that he hired her. During her year at the Garrick - she sang upstairs while Holiday performed in the downstairs room she acquired the name Dinah Washington by which she became known. She credits Joe Sherman with suggesting the change in her name because Lionel Hampton was coming to town. Hampton brought her an offer, and Washington worked as his female band vocalist. She made her recording debut for Keynote in December with “Evil Gal Blues”, and its follow-up, “Salty Papa Pure Jazz Magazine - Page 22
Dinah signed with Mercury Records as a solo singer. Her first record was “Ain›t Misbehavin›” which started a long string of successes. Both “Am I Asking Too Much” and “Baby Get Lost” reached Number 1 on the R&B chart, and her version of “I Wanna Be Loved” crossed over to reach Number 22 on the US pop chart. Her hit recordings included blues, standards, novelties, pop covers, and even a version of Hank Williams’ “Cold, Cold Heart”. She is an inductee in the Alabama Jazz Hall of Fame, and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. At the same time as her biggest popular success, she also recorded sessions with leading jazz musicians, including Clifford Brown and Clark Terry on the album “Dinah Jams “. Her first top ten pop hit, “What a Diff›rence a Day Makes” made Number 4 on the US pop chart. She followed it up with a version of Nat “King” Cole’s “Unforgettable”, and then two highly successful duets with Brook Benton, “Baby (You’ve Got What It Takes)” and “A Rockin’ Good Way (To Mess Around and Fall in Love)”. Her last big hit was “September in the Rain“. Critics accused her of selling out her art to commerce and bad taste. But her principal sin apparently, was to cultivate a distinctive vocal style that was at home in all kinds of music, whether it was R&B, blues, jazz, or middle of the road pop. Hers was a gritty, salty, high-pitched voice, marked by absolute clarity of diction and clipped, bluesy phrasing...known for singing torch songs. Dinah hired a male backing trio called the Allegros, consisting of Jimmy Thomas, Earl Edwards and Jimmy Sigler. A Variety writer praised their vocals as “effective choruses”. Washington›s achievements included appearances at the Newport Jazz Festival, and the International Jazz Festival in Wash-
ington D.C. along with gigs at Birdland in New York and performances with Count Basie and Duke Ellington. She performed at the London Palladium, with Queen Elizabeth sitting in a box. She told the audience: “There is but one Heaven, one Hell, one Queen, and your Elizabeth is an imposter.” Washington was married seven times. Her husbands were: John Young, George Jenkins, Robert Grayson, Walter Buchanan, Eddie Chamblee, Rafael Campos and pro-football player Dick “Night Train” Lane. She had two sons; George Kenneth Jenkins and Robert Grayson. Dinah was an outspoken unapologetic liberal Democrat. She once said, “I am who I am and I know what I know. I’m a Democrat plain and simple, always have been. I’d never vote for a Republican because in my opinion they don’t have what it takes to run any kind of private or public office. That’s all.” Dinah Washington Sings http://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=_iMXs9ELfcs Dinah Washington - All of Me (Live) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v= 43oNeoK90p8
Mulgrew Miller
When you hear the name Mulgrew Miller all you think about is the wonderful tunes he and his great group Wingspan provided to the jazz community. Pure Jazz readers go back to a two-part story that appeared in Pure Jazz 2009. We were sorry to hear that he recently joined our musical ancestors. Miller had a childhood filled with early musical experiences; he mostly played gospel music in his church, R&B and blues at dances. He became interested in jazz piano and established a trio in high school. He admitted that they did not really know what they were doing and were merely “approaching jazz”. Miller was said to have set his mind on becoming a jazz pianist after seeing Oscar Peterson on television. He went on to record more than 500 albums during his career.
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The dazzling technique of Mulgrew made the piano sometimes sound as if it was about to burst the stays of the tightly harmonized, straight-swinging bebop style in which he worked. Miller never steamrolled the musicians around him. He was also a composer and leader of quiet distinction – whether alone, or with his favorite trio Wingspan. Throughout his life Miller was awarded many degrees. He was awarded the Honorary Degree of Doctor of Performing Arts at Lafayette College. He spent the last years of his life in Easton, Pennsylvania where he was the Director of Jazz Studies at William Paterson University and the Artist in Residence at Lafayette College. He earned his place as one of the music’s talented keyboardists. We, the fans, will keep his music alive by playing his brilliant music.
“Golden Fingers: An Interview with Jazz Piano Legend Mulgrew Miller” http://youtu.be/mALbVTMlkpY
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Jazz in Accra, Ghana By Dwight Brewster Once, or if you’re lucky, maybe twice in your lifetime you get an opportunity to visit Africa. My chance came about because a good friend Wil Crosby from Chi-town was travelling to Accra and reminded me that I made a promise to accompany him this time. After all Big Wil had asked me for almost 10 years, so I realized I had made that statement and I was bound to stand by it. However, I needed an underlying reason that would provide the motivation to spend the bucks for a roundtrip ticket, lodging and other expenses. After serious thought and a long conversation with the publisher of Pure Jazz Magazine, I decided to make my mission: to seek out the best Jazz club in Accra, Ghana and meet the musicians who played there. If I needed motivation I knew I had it then. Once the decision was made to go, I had to throw myself into the moment and start getting ready for the trip. Packing, passport, visa, luggage, etc… If you’ve travelled out of the USA you know what I’m talking about. If you haven’t it’s something you might want to experience at least once in your life. The flight was 12 hours long but comfortable. However, I was really anticipating getting off that plane; after all it was still a 12 hour flight! When we finally landed what I wasn’t expecting (even though I should have remembered from my research) was the massive heat in Accra. It was well after sundown when we landed and the temperature was still into the 90’s. I knew right then and there that tomorrow would be a WTF moment! Entering Ghana from New York City the temperature was a 40 degree difference. I had to get out of some of my clothing right away... After a short wait at the airport we were picked up by our sponsor, Shamsi. He drove us to what would be my home for the next 28 days. I got into my shorts and put a tee shirt on as fast as I could--- I was sweating Pure Jazz Magazine - Page 24
like a racehorse after a quick workout and I had just arrived. Shamsi said it would take a few days to get used to the heat, ‘just remember to drink plenty of water to remain hydrated”.
the locals speaking two area dialects Tre’ and Housa as well as some English. Getting information about “where’s the Jazz?” wasn’t flying without an interpreter, so back to the drawing board...
“So Mr. Dwight”, Shamsi asked, “what do you wish to accomplish during your time in Accra?” “I want to find the Jazz club(s) and the musicians who play there,” I said. I produced a copy of Pure Jazz Magazine to show I had something to base my Jazz knowledge on. The response that I got surprised me. Shamsi said, “my wife Vanessa can help you find where the Jazz music is when she comes back from her trip.” I thought, with a guide who really knew the lay of the land, I might have a better chance to accomplish my task.
Finally I got a break during a taxicab ride; the driver overheard my conversation and asked “do you know about + 233?” Plus 233? Since this is the telephone country code for Ghana at first I didn’t quite understand what he meant. He went on to say “+233 Jazz Club/Bar is THE Jazz club in Accra and they have a six day live Jazz program going on.” That meant musicians who were accomplished and available to perform were usually on tap to play there! I wanted to meet those musicians, to see what they were listening to and what their motivations were to play Jazz. When I got to my Accra home I asked about Club +233 and could we go there. Members of the household mentioned that the wife would be home shortly. I couldn’t wait to tell Vanessa what I discovered. When I mentioned it she replied, “you went there your first night for dinner!” As I didn’t go inside the first night (we had dinner outside) and the band wasn’t playing Jazz (it was R&B night), I never knew. The club was walking distance from the house!
However until she returned and since English is spoken widely across Ghana I thought this task would be a piece of cake and I would approach it like I was on the east coast. First I started with the local newspapers, no Jazz there. I spent the next few days watching television, Hi Life, Gospel, Hip Hop plus tons of African music from Senegal to South Africa-- all on television but no Jazz. I even saw a couple of NBA games and tons of football (soccer) but still no Jazz. We visited a few of the more western style restaurants and asked “where’s the Jazz?” Response --- nothing! Out and about with the people I observed
Sr. Young and his band performming at +233
Revisiting Club +233 I took a good look this time. It’s a double level venue so when you first approach through the front gate you see a building with plenty of glass. Walking up to the club from the parking lot you reach a set of stairs (I didn’t see any elevators while in Ghana) you see a majestic building. As I topped the stairs there is a large restaurant with a massive glass system that gives a full view of the stage. This time there is a Jazz band performing. I realized I’d have to make this place a second home to get the information I needed. The next afternoon a very accomplished artist stopped by the house with a few of his portraits, he had heard about me
and knew the family, so an introduction 9PM start time but once they got started was in order. Joseph said he had heard that they were outstanding. I found out that I was interested in meeting jazz musicians. they had been rehearsing two times a week He said he knew one of the best groups in for months! Any group of competent mutown and they were performing at +233 the sicians will sound great with that schedule. next Friday and would I be interested in Suddenly over the PA, “introducing from meeting with them? Joseph and the key- New York Dwight Brewster, we’re going to board player in the band, Nana, were room- ask him to play a few tunes with us.” ‘Killer mates so he had an inside contact and could Joe’, ‘Stolen Moments’, ‘Bye Ya’, ‘Oye Como hook it up with no problem. Joseph said Va’, and a 6/8 Blues (in F). Not a bad night for a ‘Mother Land’ they rehearse often and visitor who was just one was scheduled for At the rehearsal I met looking to report on tomorrow did I want “Sir Young” and his Band: Jazz in Accra. to go? This was an Sir Young/Guitar/Scat Vocals excellent example of Nana Emanuel/Keyboards +233 is a great venue an “ahha moment” for which would be right me and since this was Machel Ado/Drums at home in Brooklyn on my agenda, I had to Charles Dankor/Bass NYC. I would recomagree. mend it for travelers to WTF it’s 6:30am! It wasn’t long before I un- Accra, Ghana. With live entertainment six derstood why so early --- it gets really hot (6) days a week, having acts like: Sandra here, so everything starts early. When we Evergreen, The Saxophone Player (yes that arrived after about a 45 minute drive to the was his name), plus Sir Young as well as other side of town we pulled up to a large many others passing through provide great compound surrounded by a brick wall. My Jazz at this venue, it’s a must see. driver/guide for the day knocked on the gate and after a few minutes it swung open to reveal a courtyard with a gigantic tree. I saw right away it was going to be a rehearsal under that tree. Practicing outside early in the morning while the temperature was manageable was smart. When I arrived Nana, (Boakye Agyeman Emmanuel) the keyboard player, was setting up everything! Drums, amps, PA, plus mic stands. These guys had great equipment so their sound was very good, just as good as most groups who practice their Jazz trade here in the states.
Sir Young and the Band
By 9AM they were ready to go and they quickly knocked out five tunes for me. Their musical sound was great too; Sir Young is a fantastic guitarist, a student of Wes Montgomery and George Benson, so he had that sound down cold. When they found out I was a musician also Sir Young asked would I play a tune with them; “sure,” I said ... two hours and ten tunes later Friday night’s gig was on.
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Dwight Brewster is an Afro American Jazz musician and the host of The World of Jazz
I arrived early because I wanted to get something to eat... The menu wasn’t large but the grilled chicken and chips I had for diner was very good. Nana arrived first and as usual started his setup thing. No need to work too hard this time because most of the setup was already at the club. The rest of the band arrived a little late for their Pure Jazz Magazine - Page 25
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Chick Webb drumming at the Savoy Ballroom in Harlem, New York
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