Woodwinds: Sing, Sing, Sing

Benny Goodman: Sing, Sing, Sing
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My last couple of postings haven’t been all that popular with the readership. I’m not sure why an instrumental cello cover of a King Crimson song, or a difficult Velvet Underground song featuring a droning viola might not be all that attractive…..So to try to pander to the readers and rack up views, I’m going to write about a 12 minute jazz song that was performed in 1938. I suspect that it will blow up the Internet! 

When the great clarinetist and bandleader Benny Goodman considered playing a concert at New York’s Carnegie Hall in the late 1930s, jazz had never been performed there. Initially concerned that jazz would not go over well at the bastion of classical music propriety, it was only after his movie, Hollywood Hotel, was a hit, that Goodman decided to go for it, and canceled recording dates to rehearse inside the venerable venue. Goodman’s initial concerns about financial success proved unfounded, when the 2760 seats sold out weeks in advance—the best seats cost $2.75, but third balcony and standing room seats cost 85 cents (depending on the website, $2.75 then is worth somewhere between $30 and $55 today, which is not bad, considering that if you wanted to go to Carnegie Hall next February to see Jon Batiste, the tickets range from $46-$65—but if you wanted to see Michael Feinstein, it would set you back between $83-$100). 

Goodman’s orchestra was racially mixed, which was also groundbreaking for its time, and many writers have remarked that this concert was the point at which jazz became respectable (although some might consider that a bad thing, I guess). 

In addition to performances by Goodman’s small groups and big band, there was a jam session that included members of the Count Basie and Duke Ellington orchestras. But the finale was what Goodman considered a “killer-diller” designed to get the patrons up and dancing—the Louis Prima penned “Sing, Sing, Sing.” As a brief aside, my introduction to this great song was when my high school band director, Mr. Sitts, had us play a marching band arrangement of the song at halftime of a football game. What I most remember about that was that I was playing bass drum, and had to keep a steady beat with one hand, while playing another rhythm with my other hand, which to this day, I remember being difficult. But Clarkstown North had a pretty strong marching band back in those days, so we did what we had to do. 

The song begins with drumming from the great Gene Krupa, who had zero problems playing independent rhythms with both hands and feet, and eventually, pretty much everyone gets a solo, with Goodman’s appearing to ascend above the clarinet’s range. The song brought the audience to its feet, with some dancing in the aisles, not something that happened during the classical performances at Carnegie Hall. 

The concert was recorded onto acetates as well as on aluminum transcription discs, but were not released contemporaneously because Goodman was distracted by other projects, and because of the use of musicians from various bands, there were difficult contractual issues to resolve. The aluminum discs, which were of higher quality, were filed away by CBS and forgotten. In 1950, Goodman’s niece, who had taken over his apartment, found the degraded acetate, and through difficult work, much of it was restored, and similarly difficult legal work cleared the music for release in 1950, becoming one of the first 33 1/3 records to sell over a million copies. Phil Schaap, who passed away on Tuesday, found a second set of acetates and worked to improve the quality, and the album was re-released in 1985. In 1998, a CD version was released based on the aluminum masters, improving the sound quality again, and there have been various CD releases and remasters since.

Right: Night Time is the Right Time

Ray Charles: Night Time is the Right Time

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Aretha Franklin: Night Time is the Right Time

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Rufus Thomas and Carla Thomas: Night Time is the Right Time

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Count Basie and Big Joe Turner: Night Time is the Right Time

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R&B, the musical genre, bears no resemblance today to its origin as Rhythm and Blues. In particular, all traces of actual blues have been scrubbed out of today’s R&B. But it was not always this way, and Night Time is the Right Time is a perfect song to make the point. The earliest recorded version of the song was a midtempo blues by Roosevelt Sykes in 1937. From there, many other blues artists of the day recorded their versions, with varying lyrics and moods. Nappy Brown added the background singers, and chose the lyrics we know now in 1957. But it was Ray Charles the following year who created the version that has become the starting point for any subsequent versions. Normally, when you perform the song, you are covering Ray Charles in some way, at that is certainly the case with all of the versions I have chosen. Charles sped up Nappy Brown’s version, giving the song the feel it has now.

Aretha Franklin takes the song and turns it into a piano blues, but her vocal line reveals her roots in gospel. It is a combination that has real power. Rufus Thomas and Carla Thomas showcase the state of Rhythm and Blues in 1964 with their version, and show how the song can work as a duet. Finally, in 1974, there is this wonderful take by Count Basie and Big Joe Turner. Basie and Turner go way back. They often worked together during the big band era, with a full band behind them. But, in 1974, such artists who were even still around were working with much smaller groups. Basie and Turner did not fight that here. The album this is from featured a four piece horn section, but they are not heard on this track. Instead, Basie and Turner offer a stripped down version that takes the song back to its blues roots.

Big Bands: The Pogues

Big Bands—small facts: I am related to Guy Lombardo. Mr. New Year’s Eve and his Royal Canadians. Lombardo, among other musical accomplishments, broadcast for 48 consecutive years on New Year’s Eve, over radio and television, from Time’s Square, NYC.  In this video clip, you can practically smell the martinis and cigarette smoke of “New York’s High Society.”  In 1976, this whole scene—Times Square, the Waldorf Astoria, the cookie cutter, pre-Kenny Gee Kenny Gee horn drone, elevator soundtrack hip sounds must have already come across as poorly chosen nostalgia--what with the Rolling Stones having already peaked, disco being in full, jumpsuit swing, Elvis nearly dead and punk already taking root just a few blocks south in the Bowery…Revel in this--your dead relatives will smile down on you from heaven. 

The Royal Canadians?—not my favorite, despite the familial connections. I feel ashamed to have devoted a paragraph of copy to it…Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Glenn Miller, Benny Goodman. Those are the names to come to mind when I think of “big band”, but then, I’m hardly a scholar of the Big Band era, so I’m just listing what anyone could. The idea of big band conjures up more image—smart suits, martinis and classy dames with great gams—but the sound itself eludes modern sensibility. Yeah, when Swingers came out there was a bit of a revival, but swing big band sounds just don’t really add up to much unless you’re a student of the era…sadly, as should be discernible here, I am not…

I do love that sound, though: orchestrated swinging, sharp, cracking drums, big rhythm, every musical angel sharpened and snapped into shape by horns horns horns, twirling, snappy punctuations and exclamations of melody. One of my favorites is Louis Prima, he of the Pennies from Heaven” and “Angelina & Zooma, Zooma” fame…you know, the songs that get played in Mafia movies, or by your stupid friends when they have you over for pasta and meatballs...

That’s about all I know concerning Big Band. I have intentions to dig deeper into that era, but I always get distracted. When you reflect on the genres and movements and eras that are said to define one epoch or another, it’s hard to choose where to devote your listening energy. The beauty of music, however, is that the interested listener will literally never run out of avenues to explore. Next time I have a martini, perhaps the urge to strike out into the wide, wide world of the swinging Big Band sound will strike and lead me to something new. Until then, I have my “Rat Pack Christmas” CD, which I pull out out once a year….

But, this month’s theme is about big bands, not Big Bands.

Often times, big bands, like Arcade Fire, or the Polyphonic Spree, strike me as too big. A whole lot of sound comes out of what should be something much more cohesive and tightened up. Don’t get me wrong: big sound is fantastic, but I suppose I look to my rock music to be a little tighter and well-knit—knife edged and snapping, rather than sprawling— than the sound that comes out of large ensembles. I always feel a band like Arcade Fire, and similar artists, are trying to fit too much sound into a four minute song, as opposed to larger, horn-based ensembles that work to widen their soundscape and project a sound that is meant to be heard big and loud and unwieldy. Rock and roll can be chaotic, too, but it seems to work better with a variation of instruments, thus creating a sound with multi-textures. Multi-textures that add up to something cohesive, not something trying to achieve bombast without a reason.

So, I would say my favorite big band would have to be The Pogues. Upwards of eight members, blending traditional, “old-fashioned” instruments with modern, sounds and songs with a sometimes punked-up sensibility, the Pogues did big, roaring sound and rise and crescendo rock better than anyone. 

It’s hard to choose what to write about the band—what’s worth saying, and what’ not, has been committed to print a million times over, such is the devotion, revulsion and general amazement the band generates, in spite or despite of lead singer Shane MacGowan’s status as the drunkest man on the planet. The Pogues do Irish rebel music better than anyone—they also do Celtic rock, poetry, big band bombast, poetic conciseness, and drinking songs better, too. Live, they are a raucous act, and despite slowing down due to age and a history of shenanigans involving alcohol, and even more—despite the fact that they are pretty subdued when standing up there, delivering classics and traditional Irish folk songs—the audience at  a Pogues show carries the day. If you get a chance to see them in their now-rare touring schedule, do so, but watch out for flying shot glasses.

If you can’t see them live, listen and revel in the broad majesty of If Should Fall From Grace With God and Peace and Love, albums so steeped in their own legends as to come forth from your speakers like blessed streams of whiskey and holy water. MacGowan is a feeble-tongued, master poet; the band themselves has made some of the finest, most beautiful melodies and stomping sing-alongs ever recorded. They are past their prime, long past, Philip chevron has passed away, MacGowan is giving Keith Richards a run on the designation of most bafflingly still-alive human being.  Yet, the music they made—that string of albums they made from 1984 to 1990 will never be equaled in terms of instrumental brilliance, lyrical beauty and musical bravado. “If I Should Fall From Grace With God” will go down as classical poetry at some point; “Misty Morning Albert Bridge” is the song you should fall in love to…I could keep going, but, you should just start listening… The Pogues are special, blessed by the gods of music, and when I get to heaven (fingers crossed), this is the band I want playing me through the gates.

Here is their 30^th Anniversary show from Paris

It’s not every song, but it’s pretty f#*king great.  At 38:50, Lullaby of London? Yeah…that’s all you need…pure grace.

Royal: Duke Ellington and Count Basie

Duke Ellington and Count Basie : Battle Royal
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In a way, I kind of wish that I had been able to do the transition post from “Offensive” to “Royal” because I find the concept of royalty to be offensive. As the great political thinker Dennis the Peasant pointed out, “Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government. Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony.” On the other hand, YouTube explainer CGP Grey makes a good case that the British monarchy, at least, is a net benefit to Britain (although not everyone agrees).

But I have to say that the fawning over the British royals and their stupid hats is annoying. Even a constitutional monarch like (former) King Juan Carlos of Spain, who did much to help the country recover from the Franco dictatorship, abdicated a few months ago, after a corruption scandal relating to his daughter and son-in-law’s business dealings, and the reports that the King had been on a lavish elephant hunting safari during the country’s fiscal crisis.

So, as far as I’m concerned, the less attention paid to these generally undeserving winners of the genetic lottery, the better. As I see it, my country was built on a categorical rejection of hereditary nobility, yet maybe we have "highness envy," because so many people seem irrationally fascinated by them. (I make an exception, though, for former King Zog of Albania, because he sounds like a character from Star Trek).

But Royal it is, and I knew that I wasn’t going to write about someone who received their status because “some watery tart threw a sword” at one of their ancestors, or something similar. Instead, I thought of two men who received their exalted status by virtue of their musical genius, Edward Kennedy “Duke” Ellington, and William James “Count” Basie.

Now, I don’t know a hell of a lot about jazz, although I like to listen to it. I learned about rock music sort of organically, by buying records, listening to the radio and reading about it. Jazz, though, is something I really only started to dip a toe into during college and after, and never got the bug to learn much of the details. Because there are just too many details. But, of course, I knew about Duke Ellington and Count Basie. And, when I decided to write about them for this theme, I wondered whether they ever played together. Google is a beautiful thing, and when I put their names in to a search, I discovered in 0.46 seconds that, in fact, they actually did one album together, First Time! The Count Meets The Duke, and (a few minutes later) that it was a pretty well received album.

Apparently it took some serious planning to get Ellington, Basie and their entire orchestras together for a session, but it happened on July 6-7, 1961, at the 30th Street Studio in New York. As one article noted, the sessions included “requisite breaks for recreational liberties,” which is a phrase so delightful it is worth stealing. Under the English tradition, Dukes outrank Earls (the equivalent of Counts), and Ellington was one of Basie’s idols, but the album is nevertheless democratically split down the middle—an equal number of each band’s classics, Duke’s orchestra is in the right channel and Basie’s is on the left, and in most cases the leaders each took piano solos (although Basie refused to play on Ellington's signature song, “Take the A Train,” so instead the composer, Billy Strayhorn, was the second pianist). Where that leaves the “Duke of Earl,” is unresolved here.

Our featured song, “Battle Royal,” opens the album. It was originally written by Ellington for the movie Paris Blues, which featured Paul Newman, Sidney Poitier, Joanne Woodward and Diahann Carroll, who could be considered acting royalty. In the film, the song represents a “Battle Royal,” when the band led by Newman and Poitier is challenged by a band led by Louis Armstrong, uncrowned jazz nobility himself, playing a character named Wild Man Moore. The Ellington/Basie version featured above starts off somewhat more restrained than the exuberant film version, but rapidly turns into a battle between the two orchestras and their soloists that is both intense and thrilling.