There are a fair number of jazz musicians who wrote autobiographies (often “as told to”) including Rex Stewart, Eddie Condon, Louis Armstrong, and Charles Mingus. Many musicians have written technique books and a few have active blogs. However, there are very few musicians who have written scholarly history books, built on extensive research. One might count Ted Gioia, Gunther Schuller, and Richard Sudhalter among the most notable of that group.
However, there is another musician with solid jazz credentials who has written a number of impressive books on jazz and compiled and annotated massive amounts of American music. He is Allen Lowe: saxophonist, composer and music historian. Although his name is not well known, his contribution is notable.
His books include:
1996: American Pop: From Minstrel to Mojo On Record 1893-1956, a look at the big picture of American popular music from the period of early pop and jazz to Elvis.
2000: That Devlin’ Tune: A Jazz History 1900-1950 which is a detailed look at the pre-history of jazz.
2005: Really the Blues? A Horizontal Chronicle of the Vertical Blues, 1893-1959, which covers nearly all blue styles of the American vernacular, from gospel quartets to show music, minstrelsy, country and hillbilly music, and jazz.
2007: God Didn’t Like It: Electric Hillbillies, Singing Preachers, and the Beginning of Rock and Roll, 1950-1970.
2019: “Turn Me Loose White Man” Or: Appropriating Culture: How to Listen to American Music 1900-1960, a two-volume set of books and a 30-CD set, looking at minstrelsy and the issue of white and black influences on the development of jazz and improvised music.
His musical career is documented in 17 recordings under his leadership. Fellow performers on these include: Ken Peplowski, Aaron Johnson, Lewis Porter, Anthony Braxton, Doc Cheatham, Randy Sandke, Joe Albany, Don Byron, Ken Peplowski, Percy France, Matthew Shipp, Julius Hemphill, Marc Ribot, Roswell Rudd, David Murray, Gary Bartz, Nels Cline, Ray Anderson, DJ Logic, Kalaparusha Maurice McIntyre, Michael Gregory Jackson, Ursula Oppens, Christopher Meeder, Lou Grassi, Rob Wallace, Noah Preminger, Kevin Ray, Ray Suhy, Rick Moody, Gerhard Graml, Ras Moshe, Jon-Erik Kellso, Dean Bowman, Roswell Rudd, Marc Ribot, Ray Suhy, Andy Stein, Kresten Osgood, Ray Anderson, and Hamiet Bluiett.
I recently had a Zoom conversation with Lowe and learned about his background and the rather circuitous path he took that eventually led to playing music and writing books.
Born in 1954, Lowe grew up in Queens, New York, then moved with his family to Massapequa, Long Island. His mother was a talented classical pianist and there were some jazz records in the house. His first instrument was the oboe, but after hearing records by Sonny Rollins and Eric Dolphy and meeting jazz musicians at music camp he switched to alto sax. He took some sax lessons in his school from Leo Ursini, which were the last lessons he ever took. He was in a band in high school that played standards and he and his posse would go in to New York clubs like Slug’s to hear jazz.
Lowe passed through several colleges, SUNY Binghamton, U. Michigan, play writing at Yale, ultimately getting a Library Science degree in 1982 from St. John’s University, Queens. All the while, music lurked in the background. He kept listening hard but didn’t think he had the talent to pursue music as a career. It wasn’t until he was about 30 that he started to seriously apply himself to playing.
While holding down day jobs, like processing claims for an insurance company, he started to gig around 1990. Writer Francis Davis named his CD At The Moment of Impact as a pick in the Village Voice and that really helped jump start his career.
He was meeting musicians and his name was getting around, but in 1996, for family reasons, Lowe moved to Portland, Maine, and his career as a gigging musician suffered. To say he was not welcomed by the local music scene would be to underestimate the neglect he says he experienced.
In 2019, he began a battle with cancer that resulted in a multiplicity of treatments and 20 operations. Despite that, and without any grants or institutional support, he continued writing, amassing early music and researching the roots of jazz.
His books have received positive reviews and are singular in that they can pass academic muster, but are written in clear, non-academic language. As a musician, he brings a level of understanding to the subject that rings true. He wants to present an alternative to the “great man” approach that dominates the history of the music. He acknowledges the singular contributions of Armstrong, Hawkins and company, but presents a “bottom up” approach that looks with fresh eyes at each musician’s contribution.
Lowe is honest in his assessments, which have sometimes brought him into conflict with others. He’s not afraid to give more credit to musicians whose contributions have been underrated, like Wilbur Sweatman, Al Bernard, or misunderstood, like the ODJB. He’s also not afraid to call out modern musicians like Christian Scott, Robert Glasper, and Rhiannon Giddens, who he thinks have distorted history.
Lowe thinks the simple story that is told of the blues begetting jazz is cliché and wrong and he purveys a more complex, alternative view of the music. He emphasizes the importance of early professional songwriting which created the repertoire and of minstrelsy, saying: “If you want to look at the origins of jazz, they are in instrumental styles and rhythmic approaches that are probably derived…through minstrelsy. And, there’s been a lot of really good scholarship proving that minstrelsy has real black sources.”
Lowe says: “People are very nervous about the disreputable origins of jazz… Jelly Roll Morton did make his living in brothels and sings all these dirty songs (on the Library Of Congress recordings)….We don’t know if the early use of the word jazz was sexualized, but even if it was, early musicians accepted some of that sexualization, they called the music jazz. If we really want to talk about respect for the legacy, the elders, they were proud of it being jazz and were aware of the social implications and they were not afraid of it….That’s one of the reasons that jazz has gotten so dull today.”
Lowe’s most recent project is Louis Armstrong’s America, a two-cd set with 69 tracks. I find it one of the most interesting collections of music I’ve ever heard. Lowe says: “It was pretty much a way to say what Armstrong means to me. I mean, he virtually invented American music. In terms of jazz and even rock and roll, they come out of things he recorded in the 1920s. He was a constant presence in American life, of feelings and generosity.”
The music is eclectic in the extreme, touching on many forms-stomps, marches, blues, ballads, jive, boogie-woogie, slow drags, even punk-all periods of American music that Armstrong lived through. The collection explores these with solos that may be free, partly free and some which stick to the tonality. “One of the things that I think makes our music interesting,” Lowe says, “is that I work in contemporary forms, but filtering it through really old African-American styles; not only, but white hillbilly styles as well.”
Lowe’s tenor sax tone is in the older, pre-Coltrane mode. I find it close to Bud Freeman’s. His playing is not virtuosic, but he plays very expressively and gets around chord changes in his own way. He says he could probably not pass a music course, but knows he can write complex music successfully. About choosing musicians to record with, Lowe says: “The key is to find musicians better than you. And I have.” Indeed, many of his collaborators are virtuosic players.
Lowe says: “African-American music and jazz is unusual because it works as both an art form and entertainment.” Louis Armstrong’s America exemplifies that, with a high level of improvisation and a lot of humor. Song titles include: “The Last Bebop Tune,” “Mr. Harney Turn Me Loose,” “Mr. Jenkins‘ Lonely Orphans Band,” and “Aaron Copland Has the Blues.” While Lowe’s music is a testament to the capacity for jazz to be serious and to also encompass humor, Lowe fears that his humor makes some grantors suspicious.
It’s somewhat disconcerting that someone with his credentials has to be concerned with establishing credibility. It may help that a documentary about Lowe is in process. With his typically mordant sense of humor, he plans to title it I Should Have Stayed Dead.
I’m happy to have the chance to introduce Syncopated Times readers to Allen Lowe’s music and to his writing. Both may challenge readers’ and listeners’ preconceptions, but that’s appropriate. After all, jazz is or should be, a music of surprises.
Steve Provizer is a brass player, arranger and writer. He has written about jazz for a number of print and online publications and has blogged for a number of years at: brilliantcornersabostonjazzblog.blogspot.com. He is also a proud member of the Screen Actors Guild.
