The Guide to Classic Recorded Jazz (35 page)

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Authors: Tom Piazza

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BOOK: The Guide to Classic Recorded Jazz
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Page 126
But one could say that about many of the sides contained in
Volume 2
: "Big Butter and Egg Man," with its ecstatic lead playing, certainly "Wild Man Blues," on which Armstrong takes break after break of amazing invention and daring in a slow tempo, and "Weary Blues," with the most misleading title in jazz history, on which the excitement of a style at its peak jumps out of the speakers at you. "Potato Head Blues," ''Wild Man Blues," and "Weary Blues" are by the Hot Seven, which was the Hot Five augmented by tuba and drums (and recorded in the new electric process, which gave the music more presence). And don't miss Armstrong's startling deconstruction of the hackneyed Tin Pan Alley melody "Twelfth Street Rag."
Volume 3
contains "S.O.L. Blues," on which he constructs a burning blues solo from a series of phrases all beginning with the same high note. This set contains the first and best recording of the Armstrong standard "Struttin' with Some Barbecue" (with another stunning stop-time solo), the exuberant "Hotter than That," on which Armstrong scats a chorus in duet with Lonnie Johnson's guitar, and "Savoy Blues," a slower blues with a meditative trumpet solo. In addition,
Volume 3
has the first four sides Armstrong recorded with pianist Earl Hines, a pairing that would provide some of the most exciting moments in jazz. "Skip the Gutter" is especially good, featuring a series of breaks traded back and forth between Armstrong and Hines in an escalating test of rhythmic and harmonic wits.
Volume 4
is devoted entirely to that partnership. In Hines, Armstrong had found an instrumentalist who was a worthy match for him as an innovator and improviser. Hines played what was called trumpet-style piano, his right hand punching out adventuresome original melodies as opposed to the riffs that most pianists used. Hines's harmonic sense was very sophisticated, and he stimulated Armstrong to some truly inspired work. Probably the greatest side on this set is "West End Blues." Armstrong's opening cadenza, played solo and out of tempo, is a miracle of balance and invention.
Three other high points in a set full of high points are "Beau Koo Jack," an arrangement by Alex Hill full of tricky ensemble passages featuring a high-wire Armstrong solo studded with fantastic breaks, "Muggles" (a slang term for marijuana), on which Pops plays two choruses of smoldering blues under which he turns up the heat gradually and relentlessly, egged on by Hines's barrelhouse licks, and "Weather Bird Rag," a duet between Armstrong and Hines in which they hand the lead back and forth in a miniature symphony of breaks and improvised counterpoint.
The Hot Fives and Hot Sevens are matchless, but if you want more Armstrong from that period, he makes some guest appearances on
Johnny Dodds - South Side Chicago Jazz
(Decca/MCA MCAD-42326). Dodds was the clarinetist
 
Page 127
in the Hot Five (as well as in King Oliver's Creole Jazz Band) and a great blues player; he and Armstrong complemented each other well, Dodds providing a classic New Orleans clarinet embroidery around Armstrong's lead. On this set, Armstrong is subdued on "Easy Come, Easy Go Blues" and "The Blues Stampede," but he can be heard at length on the four sides by Johnny Dodds's Black Bottom Stompers, which include three tunes also recorded by the Hot Seven - "Weary Blues," "Wild Man Blues,'' and "Melancholy" - along with "New Orleans Stomp," which seems the best of the lot, perhaps because it doesn't suffer by comparison to a Hot Seven performance. This version of "Wild Man Blues" is quiet and almost conversational compared to the brooding Hot Seven version. An alternate take of it may be heard on
Louis Armstrong of New Orleans
(Decca/MCA MCAD-42328).
Laughin' Louie
The Armstrong-Hines sides were all recorded in 1928, and they marked a spectacular farewell, for Armstrong, to the small-group style of which they were a high water mark. Beginning in 1929, Armstrong would spend most of his time fronting one or another big band, playing arrangements designed to spotlight both his trumpet playing and his singing, which by now had grown to almost equal importance, and his repertoire would shift from jazz specialties and New Orleans tunes to the popular songs of the time. Some critics have suggested that the most important part of Armstrong's career came to an end when this shift occurred, but I strongly disagree. Armstrong's conception continued to grow in magnitude throughout his life; he seemed the kind of person who was made deeper and wiser, humanly and artistically, by his experience, and it came out in his music from all periods.
The series of big-band sides that he recorded for OKeh records from 1929 through 1932, which include some of his best recordings in this genre, are available in three volumes from Columbia in a continuation of the series begun with the Hot Fives.
Volume 5: Louis in New York
(Columbia CK 46148),
Volume 6: St. Louis Blues
(Columbia CK 46996), and
Volume 7: You're Drivin' Me Crazy
(Columbia CK 48828) are all worth having, to say the least.
Volume 5
contains classic versions of pop tunes like "Ain't Misbehavin'," "When You're Smiling," and two takes of a blazing "Some of These Days." The version with the vocal climaxes with a two-chorus Armstrong solo that starts in the lower register and climbs higher, building in intensity all the while. The solo is remarkable from a structural as well as an emotional standpoint; usually the progress of a solo that builds the way this one does, in this style, is to move from a close paraphrase of the melody to more and more extended variations that move farther from the melody. Here Armstrong's first chorus is a
 
Page 128
pensive, completely original chorus in the lower and middle registers; the second is more or less an upper-register reading of the melody, yet Armstrong invests it with so much drama and tension purely by his phrasing that it has more excitement than the first.
Volume 6
includes "Dallas Blues," "Blue, Turning Grey over You," ''Tiger Rag," and a gorgeous "Body and Soul." "Dear Old Southland" is a haunting duet with pianist Buck Washington. "I'm in the Market for You" is a neglected but excellent pop tune which Armstrong does wonderfully by, but the stand-out on this set is "I'm a Ding Dong Daddy from Dumas," a jive song that Pops grills to a crisp at the end with four choruses of electrifying trumpet playing, each chorus building on the previous one and including an incredible break. No collection is complete without a copy, somewhere, of "Ding Dong Daddy."
The greatest of the three volumes, however, is probably
Volume 7
, which consists of some of the best of Armstrong's 1930-1932 masterpieces. None of these stands higher than the versions of "Stardust," on which Armstrong makes completely different variations on the melody in his spectacular vocal and trumpet solos. "Sweethearts on Parade," too, contains one of Armstrong's towering statements, the closing trumpet solo a lesson in the management of aesthetic tension and its release. The set also boasts gems like "The Lonesome Road," in which he becomes "Reverend Satchelmouth" and conducts a small church service, complete with testimonials from his band members, all over a mellow, walking tempo with throbbing saxophone harmony in the background, "I Got Rhythm," on which he introduces the band members one by one for short solos and then bats cleanup, and a spectacular up-tempo version of "Chinatown, My Chinatown," on which he leads into his trumpet solo by saying, "Well I'm ready, I'm ready, so help me, I'm ready ..." He wasn't lying, either.
You can really hear, in this set, how at-home Armstrong was with an audience, even if it was just the hypothetical audience sitting in front of their Victrolas in their living rooms. He addresses the listener in terms that exude well-being and controlled excitement and a sense of life's humor and mystery. He's also very funny.
The set also includes a number of ballad performances on good popular tunes such as "All of Me," "Home," and "Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea," and another Armstrong masterpiece in "Blue Again," a rarely done but fine pop tune; Armstrong takes a cadenza at the beginning of this tune that is almost as rhythmically daring as his opening cadenza on "West End Blues."
Two other sets -
Stardust
(Portrait RK 44093) and
Louis and the Big Bands
(Swing/DRG CDXP 8450) - consist of tracks included on the three Columbia sets and are worth picking up if you can't find the Columbias.
 
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Later in 1932, Armstrong began a series of large-band recordings for the Victor company which haven't received the same kind of critical attention as the OKeh sides. They deserve it, even though some of the material is inferior to the fine pop tunes he did for OKeh.
Laughin' Louie
(RCA/Bluebird 9759-2-RB) is a document of this Victor period and an indispensable Armstrong item. A couple of the best things, however - "Hobo, You Can't Ride This Train" and "Laughin' Louie" - are presented in alternate takes that are somewhat inferior to the classics that had been available for years. It is wonderful to have new versions of these tunes but not at the expense of the old ones; the effect is like going to the Louvre and seeing a preliminary study for the
Mona Lisa
hanging in place of the original.
That being said, the music here is fantastic and is presented in great sound quality as well. The trumpet solo at the end of "I've Got a Right to Sing the Blues" is still one of Armstrong's grandest statements; he floats above the tempo, singing on his horn with a relaxation and absolute control that have never had any peer. His theme statement on "Hustlin' and Bustlin' for Baby" is a sharp paraphrase of the tune, and "Some Sweet Day" contains one of his most exuberant vocals, a swinging and exquisitely phrased set of variations on the melody.
Also remarkable is Armstrong's wordless vocal on "Basin Street Blues," as well as his thrilling trumpet solo on the same tune, but every track has moments that make you shake your head in wonder. Two more that have to be mentioned are the alternate takes of "Hobo, You Can't Ride This Train" and "Laughin' Louie." "Hobo" is a minor pop tune that Armstrong brings alive with his spoken introduction, exhortations to the band, and fabulous trumpet solo. "Laughin' Louie'' is a unique performance in which the guys in the band heckle Pops good-naturedly, and there's a lot of laughter and high spirits - as well as two haunting unaccompanied solos by Armstrong. For good measure, make sure you check out "Sweet Sue," with its chorus of "viper's language" sung by tenor saxophonist Budd Johnson. A viper in the slang of the day was a marijuana smoker; the viper's language is a tricky kind of pig Latin that Johnson executes with great aplomb, after which the tempo goes way up and Pops deep-fries a chorus.
Swing that Music
After the Victor sides were made, Armstrong stayed out of the recording studio for a while, except for a handful of sides in Europe, including the unearthly "Song of the Vipers," unavailable at present. When he started recording again, it was for Decca. His Decca years found him in almost every playing situation imaginable, from straight-ahead big-band concertos for trumpet and voice, to
 
Page 130
guest appearances with the Mills Brothers vocal group, to records with Hawaiian bands.
The best single collection of Decca material is probably
Heart Full of Rhythm
(GRP/Decca GRD-620), which includes one fabulous Armstrong performance after another on tunes like "Lyin' to Myself," "Ev'ntide," "Jubilee," and "The Skeleton in the Closet." The set contains two versions of his signature tune, "Swing That Music,'' a virtuoso performance featuring Armstrong almost all the way, singing and playing and ending with a series of high notes calculated to bring an audience to its feet. The set also includes "I've Got a Heart Full of Rhythm," on which Armstrong's solo consists only of a subtle rephrasing of the melody so that it carries the same kind of power as his out chorus on the OKeh "Some of These Days."
An excellent set is
Louis Armstrong of New Orleans
(Decca/MCA MCAD-42328), which contains a wide spectrum of material recorded between 1926 and 1950, focusing on Armstrong's continuing treatment of songs associated with the New Orleans repertoire. It includes two Hot Five performances from 1926 under the group name Lil's Hot Shots (Armstrong's wife at the time, the former Lillian Hardin, had been the pianist with King Oliver's band and subsequently with the Hot Five) and a 1940 small-band session on which Armstrong was once again matched with New Orleans clarinetist and soprano saxophonist Sidney Bechet, which produced some fine music but not the epochal results one might expect.
Some of the best music in the set comes on the six big-band versions of such Armstrong classics as "Mahogany Hall Stomp" (on which New Orleans bassist Pops Foster does some slap-bass playing behind the ensemble), "Struttin' with Some Barbecue" (with another daring opening cadenza by Pops, as well as a glorious pair of out-chorus variations), and "West End Blues." A standout is the 1940 "Wolverine Blues," on which drummer Big Sid Catlett really boots the big band of Luis Russell. An especially interesting performance for those who have listened to the King Oliver Creole Jazz Band sides is "Dippermouth Blues," where Armstrong is backed by the Jimmy Dorsey orchestra on a medium-tempo re-creation of the Oliver version that really captures the feel of the original - no small achievement with a big band. (Drummer Ray McKinley even plays woodblocks à la Baby Dodds on the opening choruses.)
All Stars
Louis Armstrong of New Orleans
(Decca/MCA MCAD-42328) also contains three 1950 tunes by the group that, with a number of personnel changes, Armstrong would perform and travel with for the rest of his life. The three tunes, "My

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