Home » Jazz Articles » Sidney Bechet
Jazz Articles about Sidney Bechet
Jazz À La Creole: French Creole Music and the Birth of Jazz
by Richard J Salvucci
Jazz À La Creole: French Creole Music and the Birth of Jazz Caroline Vézina 236 Pages ISBN: #9781496842428 University Press of Mississippi 2022 The term “creole" is one of those protean things whose meaning hinges on the context in which it is used. At the very least, it tends to suggest some degree of acculturation or multiple ethnic influence, sometimes biologically, sometimes not. Whatever the case, it is a problematic word and ...
read moreDixieland Revival – A Sense of History (1939 - 1955)
by Russell Perry
In the 1940's, some twenty-five to thirty years into the history of recorded jazz, the sometimes violent reaction against the bebop revolution caused a hard look into the rear view and the jazz world focused on its own history. Many of the players who led the first jazz revolution were still alive, ready for prime time, and welcoming of another chance at center stage. The outside forces that led the small ensembles of bebop and R&B into prominence, also supported ...
read moreRunnin' Wild
by Mark Barnett
Getting Started If you're new to jazz, go to our Getting Into Jazz primer for some hints on how to listen. CD Capsule Two hot jazz legends melt the thermometer, pushing each other to produce the most inspired work of their careers. As the sportscasters say, “They came to play." Background “So these two alpha-male jazz musicians walk into a bar..." No, in this case they walked into a studio and made some outstanding (and oddly ...
read moreDo You Know What It Means to Miss New Orleans?
by Nathan Holaway
This article was originally published in September 2005. Do you know what it means to miss New Orleans? The Big Easy. The Crescent City. N'awlins. Some adore it, some despise it. In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans continues to be the testimonial travesty of the United States. With certain political officials claiming that jny: New Orleans is “not worth rebuilding, I would have to strongly object. Anyone who has ever enjoyed a beignet with ...
read moreOn Highway 61: Music, Race, and the Evolution of Cultural Freedom
by Dennis McNally
The following is an excerpt from the “Spirituals to Swing" chapter of On Highway 61: Music, Race, and the Evolution of Cultural Freedom by Dennis McNally (Counterpoint Press, Berkeley, 2014). Danny Barker, who in the 1930s was Cab Calloway's guitarist, told a particularly revealing story of working at the Nest Club, a Harlem after-hours joint. Business would be dead when the doorman buzzed three loud rings to indicate that they had prospects coming. The band would strike ...
read moreSidney Bechet & Mezz Mezzrow: The King Jazz Records Story
by Chris Mosey
Three decades before Norman Mailer in 1957 drew attention to the social phenomenon of the “white negro," Mezz Mezzrow claimed to be just that. To use his own terminology, he was “a voluntary negro." Actually an American Jew, he played clarinet in the 1930s and 40s, often, as here, alongside Sidney Bechet. He supplemented his meager earnings as a musician by supplying marijuana to fellow jazzmen, including--famously--Louis Armstrong. He sold so much that for a while a ...
read moreSidney Bechet: Sidney Bechet
by Andrew Velez
Sidney Bechet (1897-1959) is a legendary jazz figure whose range of instruments included soprano, tenor and bass saxophones, piano, bass, drums and, most famously, the clarinet. A true jazz star, Bechet's graceful playing and structural skill made him into the first significant jazz soloist, even before his fellow New Orleans native, Louis Armstrong. This collection is a mix of sides from sessions made for King Jazz in New York (1945) and Chicago (1947) with varying blues-oriented bands. ...
read more
Giveaway
Days remaining: 12
