Alexander's Jazz Time Band

Alexander's Jazz Time Band is an eleven-piece ensemble modeled on the "hot dance bands" of the 1920's and early 1930's. Our programs feature toe-tapping renditions of popular tunes and jazz compositions from the Roaring Twenties, all in authentic period arrangements.  

We have been delighting audiences in eastern and central Massachusetts since 2022 with our historically informed performances of well-known standards and forgotten gems. Most of the arrangements in our book have been specially edited to incorporate transcriptions of recorded solos by early jazz greats such as Buster Bailey, Coleman Hawkins, Miff Mole, Red Nichols, and Arthur Schutt. Additional solos are provided by AJTB musicians, many of whom are superb improvisers themselves. 

Our repertoire consists of stock arrangements. Simply put, a stock arrangement is a commercially published orchestration of a jazz or popular tune, somewhat flexible in form and instrumentation, and suitable for dancing. Most stock arrangements written between 1923 (give or take one year) and 1934 (ditto) were  published with parts for sixteen or more different instruments, but were designed to sound complete when played by a ten- or eleven-piece group consisting of: 3 saxes (2 alto, 1 tenor, all doubling on clarinet or soprano sax), 2 trumpets, trombone, violin (sometimes omitted), piano, banjo (or guitar), double bass (or tuba), and drums. This may be considered the standard lineup for a 1920's dance band, and it is essentially the instrumentation of AJTB (we typically perform with violin, guitar, and tuba, and we include vocals in about one out of every four pieces we play).

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