24-11-2019 ~ PREHiSTORiC:MiX ~ 33 pieces excavation finds from ancient sounds / before 1959

Bessie Smith

24-11-2019 ~ PREHiSTORiC:MiX ~ 33 pieces excavation finds from ancient sounds / before 1959   >>Bessie Smith, The Cotton Pickers, María Teresa Vera & Rafael Zequeira, King Oliver, Mamie Smith, Original Dixieland Jazz Band,  Marion Harris, Lucille Hegamin, Sidney Bechet, The Georgia Melodians. Banda Municipal, Felix Camarano, Quinteto Augusto, Louis Armstrong<<

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before 1959

One of the greatest female blues singers of all time, with a passionate voice and thundering delivery.
Bessie Smith
Careless Love Blues 3:28
Golden Rule Blues 3:06
Squeeze Me 2:53
from Squeeze Me (Original Recordings, 1925-1926)
The first major blues and jazz singer on record and one of the most powerful of all time, Bessie Smith rightly earned the title of "The Empress of the Blues." Even on her first records in 1923, her passionate voice overcame the primitive recording quality of the day and still communicates easily to today's listeners (which is not true of any other singer from that early period). At a time when the blues were in and most vocalists (particularly vaudevillians) were being dubbed "blues singers," Bessie Smith simply had no competition...

Cotton Pickers was the generic band name that Brunswick Records used on its small jazz band recordings made in 1922-1923, 1924-1925, and again in 1929. These were intended to compete with popular dance records issued on other labels by groups such as Ladd's Black Aces, Bailey's Lucky Seven, and the Memphis Five...
The Cotton Pickers
Hot lips (Henry Busse / Benny Davis / Henry Lange) 3:07
Runnin' wild (Arthur Gibbs / Joe Grey / Leo Wood) 3:10
Mama goes where papa goes (Milton Ager / Jack Yellen) 3_05
from The Cotton Pickers 1922-1925 (Jazz Archives No. 173)
Since the band was essentially a studio construct, the membership of the Cotton Pickers was fairly fluid, and Brunswick Records used the moniker to put out several sides of small combo dance music, usually blues foxtrots. The early incarnation of the band featured trumpeter Phil Napoleon and saxophonist Bennie Krueger, whose strong lines and polyphonic arrangements sounded black and Southern to northern audiences, and tunes such as "Way Down Yonder in New Orleans" (included here) were particularly popular. By 1924, the Cotton Pickers were almost an entirely different group, with only trombonist Miff Mole held over from the earlier lineup, and were fronted by Frank Trumbauer, whose style was less Dixie and more "cool" pop. More a brand than a band, the Cotton Pickers name allowed mainstream white jazzmen to play blacker and hotter and still keep their day jobs...

The grande dame of Cuban music, Maria Teresa Vera was not only the greatest female trova singer of all time, she was also one of the form's greatest singers, period. Vera became a professional musician and songwriter -- and a mightily popular one at that -- during the early 20th century, when such a career was virtually unheard of for a woman
María Teresa Vera & Rafael Zequeira
Mis Lamentos A Mi Guitarra 2:56
Rayos De Plata 3:28
from Mis Lamentos A Mi Guitarra (Original Cuban Recordings 1916 - 1924)
Her skill at singing trova -- a rural folk song style that predated the son dance craze -- helped lay the groundwork for the explosion of Cuban popular music in the '30s and '40s, and her fame as a trovadora lasted well after the style was eclipsed by other popular trends. Maria Teresa Vera was born in Guanajay, in the province of Pinar del Rio, on February 6, 1895. She began learning the guitar from Jose Diaz, and in 1911, at age 15, performed publicly in Havana at a tribute to Arquimedes Pous. Vera subsequently formed the first of several duos, a format she would favor throughout her career, with Rafael Zequeira; in addition to performing in Cuba, the two traveled to New York several times for recording sessions. Zequeira died in 1924, and after performing for a couple of years both solo and accompanied, Vera formed a new duo...

New Orleans cornetist and band leader was an early jazz architect, and also famously hired a young horn player named Louis Armstrong. Joe "King" Oliver was one of the great New Orleans legends, an early giant whose legacy is only partly on records. In 1923, he led one of the classic New Orleans jazz bands, the last significant group to emphasize collective improvisation over solos, but ironically his second cornetist (Louis Armstrong) would soon permanently change jazz. And while Armstrong never tired of praising his idol, he actually sounded very little like Oliver; the King's influence was more deeply felt by Muggsy Spanier and Tommy Ladnier.
King Oliver
Just Gone (Bill Johnson / King Oliver) 2:41 (04-06-23)
Mandy Lee Blues (Marty Bloom / Walter Melrose) 2:12 (04-06-23)
Dippermouth Blues (King Oliver) 2:31 (04-06-23)
from King Oliver 1923
There are more than a handful of undiluted jazz records that predate King Oliver's sessions of 1923, but few had managed to put it together in a recording studio quite so powerfully or, as it turned out, so very influentially. These primordial artifacts, now digitally remastered and chronologically assembled, form a substantial chunk of the bedrock of early recorded jazz. They're also remarkably liberating if, for just a few minutes, you make yourself into a fly on the wall of the Gennett studios. Note that young Louis Armstrong had to pretty well stand outside of the room so that he wouldn't overpower the rest of the players. Johnny Dodds interacted wonderfully with the brass, weaving wreaths of wooded filigree around the exhortations of Honore Dutrey's deep-voiced trombone. Lil Hardin, when you can hear her, is quite the majestic pianist...

Among the first black singers to record the blues as a soloist, she was highly successful and lived extravagantly. Though technically not a blues performer, Mamie Smith notched her place in American music as the first black female singer to record a vocal blues.
Mamie Smith
Sweet Man O' Mine 3:15
Get Hot 3:04
Wabash Blues (Fred Meinken / Dave Ringle) 3:04
from Complete Recorded Works, Vol. 2 (1921-1922)
Volume two in the complete recordings of Mamie Smith as reissued by Document in 1995 follows her career as an Okeh recording artist from August 18, 1921 through early May of 1922. Although her groups were almost invariably billed as the Jazz Hounds, the band accompanying her on tracks 1-13 (listed as her Jazz Band) was really the Joseph Samuels Orchestra, a well-behaved but capably hot Caucasian unit that also recorded as the Synco Jazz Band and the Tampa Blue Jazz Band...

In the 1910s and 20s this legendary outfit brought emerging jazz music to the attention of millions.
Original Dixieland Jazz Band
Dixie Jass Band One Step 2:39
Tiger Rag 3:09
Fidgety Feet (War Cloud) 2:46
from Jazz Figures / Original Dixieland Jazz Band (1917-1921)
The first jazz group to ever record, Original Dixieland Jazz Band made history in 1917. They were not the first group to ever play jazz (Buddy Bolden had preceded them by 22 years!), nor was this White quintet necessarily the best band of the time, but during 1917-1923 (particularly in their earliest years) they did a great deal to popularize jazz. The musicians learned about jazz from their fellow New Orleans players (including King Oliver) but happened to get their big break first. In 1916, drummer Johnny Stein, cornetist Nick LaRocca, trombonist Eddie Edwards, pianist Henry Ragas, and clarinetist Alcide "Yellow" Nunez played together in Chicago. With Tony Sbarbaro replacing Stein and Larry Shields taking over for Nunez, the band was booked at Resenweber's restaurant in New York in early 1917... Although the cornetist's arrogant claims that ODJB had invented jazz are exaggerated and tinged with racism, Original Dixieland Jazz Band did make a strong contribution to early jazz (most groups that recorded during 1918-1921 emulated their style), helped supply the repertoire of many later Dixieland bands, and were an influence on Bix Beiderbecke and Red Nichols.

A hitmaker who was recording before the end of World War I, Marion Harris sang a Broadway version of the blues several years before it had cracked the commercial consciousness, near the end of the 1910s.
Marion Harris
Left All Alone Again Blues (Recorded April 1920) 3:01
I'm a Jazz Vampire (Recorded September 1920) 3:09
I'm Nobody's Baby (Recorded March 1921) 3:21
from Columbia 1 (1920's Jazz Vocals) [Recorded 1920-1921]
In that, she was a harbinger of the Jazz Age, although her hits dried up by the mid-'20s, and when she died in 1944 she had been long forgotten. Still, Harris was among the most popular singers of the '20s... Born in 1896, probably in Indiana, Harris made her first professional stop in Chicago, where she played vaudeville and accompanied silent pictures with her voice. Her singing made an impression on the famed dancer Vernon Castle, who enabled her entrance into the New York theater scene; she debuted in a 1915 Irving Berlin revue titled Stop! Look! Listen! and also performed with Florenz Ziegfeld's famous Follies.

A classic blues singer from the 1920's, Lucille Hegamin survived long enough to be recorded again in the 1960's. She sang in a church choir and locally before touring at age 15 with the Leonard Harper Revue.
Lucille Hegamin
The Jazz Me Blues 2:36
High Brown Blues 2:48
Mississippi Blues 3:12
from Jazz Figures / Lucille Hegamin, (1920 - 1922), Volume 1
She was married to pianist Bill Hegamin from 1914-23. After performing in Seattle for a long period, Hegamin became one of the first blues singers to record... She toured with her Blue Flame Syncopators and later on led the Dixie Daisies. In addition to performing at clubs, Hegamin appeared in several Broadway shows in the 1920's...

A major figure in early jazz, outstanding clarinettist, only soprano saxophonist of consequence for decades, made melodically rich and emotional music.
Sidney Bechet
Wild Cat Blues 3:01
Blind Man Blues 3:11
Achin' Hearted Blues 2:58
from In Chronology - 1923
Sidney Bechet was the first important jazz soloist on records in history (beating Louis Armstrong by a few months). A brilliant soprano saxophonist and clarinetist with a wide vibrato that listeners either loved or hated, Bechet's style did not evolve much through the years but he never lost his enthusiasm or creativity. A master at both individual and collective improvisation within the genre of New Orleans jazz, Bechet was such a dominant player that trumpeters found it very difficult to play with him. Bechet wanted to play lead and it was up to the other horns to stay out of his way.

By the mid-'20s, the Edison phonograph record company had long since abandoned its founder's curmudgeonly policy regarding jazzy entertainment, and the label's catalog was peppered with titles by Mal Hallett, Joe Herlihy, B.A. Rolfe, Frank Winegar, the Piccadilly Players, Oreste & His Queensland Orchestra, and the Georgia Melodians, a sturdy little Southern unit that left about 27 titles for posterity.
The Georgia Melodians
Wop Blues 4:02
Savannah (The Georgianna Blues) 3:40
Red Hot Mamma 3:47
from Wop Blues (The Complete Edison Recordings - New York 1924)
During its three-year existence, the band's lineup included trumpeter Mickey Bloom; cornetist Red Nichols; trombonists George Troupe, Herb Winfield, Charlie Butterfield, Al Philburn, and Abe Lincoln; an unidentified tuba handler; banjoist Elmer "Merry" Morris; pianist Oscar Young (who in 1911 had come to New York from Ohio with vaudevillian Ted Lewis); and drummer Carl Gerrold. Though really led by Hutchins and Intelhouse, the band operated under the nominal leadership of violinist Charles Boulanger...

Banda Municipal - La budinera 2:51
Felix Camarano - Germaine 3:02
Quinteto Augusto - Un petit programa 3:20
from The History of Tango - Anthology of Vintage Recordings (1908 - 1925), Volume 2
Argentine tango
Argentine tango is a musical genre and accompanying social dance originating at the end of the 19th century in the suburbs of Buenos Aires [1] and Montevideo. It typically has a 2
4 or 4 4 rhythmic time signature, and two or three parts repeating in patterns such as ABAB or ABCAC. Its lyrics are marked by nostalgia, sadness, and laments for lost love.

The most important and influential musician in jazz history, and one of the leading singers and entertainers from the 1920s through the '50s.
Louis Armstrong 
My Heart (Lil Armstrong) 2:32
Gut Bucket Blues (Louis Armstrong) 3:05
You're Next (Louis Armstrong) 3:41
from The Legend 1925-1926
...cornetist Louis Armstrong's first recordings as leader of his own band, beginning in November of 1925 and covering almost exactly one year of vigorously creative activity as the OKeh record label's hottest act. In addition to Lil Hardin's skills as composer, pianist, arranger, and professional advisor, Armstrong was fortunate to have in his little group rock-solid trombonist Kid Ory and clarinetist Johnny Dodds...  Also included are four Vocalion sides from May of 1926 by the Hot Five -- billed as Lil's Hot Shots -- and two featuring Armstrong with Erskine Tate's Vendome Orchestra. Tate's high-stepping group only managed to record four titles, two in 1923 with Freddie Keppard and the two sizzling stomps issued here. With master percussionist Jimmy Bertrand hitting the cymbals with all his might, the two frantic Tate sides contrast wonderfully with the more compact, intimate sound of Louis Armstrong's Hot Five.