In 2007 the late Big Bill Bisonnette issued, on his Jazz Crusade label, a CD he titled Slip Horn (JCCD 3119) as part of his “Rare Cuts Well Done” series, Slip Horn being Vol. II. As the title would indicate, the CD featured trombone players. When Upbeat Recordings acquired the Jazz Crusade label, Liz Biddle, Upbeat Recordings founder-director, continued to make its CDs available. When stock of Jazz Crusade CDs ran out, she would reissue an item under the Upbeat Recordings label, as is the case here, this CD being a reissue of JCCD 3119.
The trombone players in question are Kid Ory, Preston Jackson, and DePriest Wheeler. The first of these, Kid Ory (1886-1973), needs no introduction, nor do his sidemen, but the other two, Jackson and Wheeler, may not be as familiar to most readers of The Syncopated Times.
Preston Jackson (1902-1983) was a sideman with Louis Armstrong’s Orchestra in the early 1930s and later with Jimmie Noone, Roy Eldridge, and Johnny Dodds. He continued playing and recording until the 1970s with bands led by Lil Hardin Armstrong and Kid Thomas Valentine. From then until his passing, music became a part-time pursuit for him.
The last of the trio, DePriest Wheeler (1903-1998), played with a band initially called The Robinson Syncopaters (or in some places spelled Syncopators) until it was renamed The Cotton Club Orchestra when landing a gig at that New York club. After the band left the Cotton Club, it changed its name to The Missourians and was eventually to become known as the Cab Calloway Orchestra after singer Calloway took it over in 1930. Under Calloway, the band accompanied his vocals, seldom being featured on an instrumental. Wheeler remained with the Calloway band until 1940, leaving it to join the Navy Band. After discharge, he joined the 369th Armory Band, studied music for four years at the Hartnett Music School, and continued in music, composing various pieces.
The first nine tracks on this CD are by the Ory band. All of the tunes, except, perhaps, for “I’m with You Where You Are,” are standards. Some are heard infrequently, such as “Down in Jungle Town” and “Tuxedo Junction,” the latter more often found in the books of big swing bands such as Glenn Miller’s. This group has to be one of the best that Ory organized.
All of the members are in top form: Teddy Buckner on trumpet hits every note solidly, especially in the upper register where many others fall down or become very thin in tone; Joe Darensbourg is at ease in all registers; and the rhythm section is supportive and propelling, Minor Hall hitting driving back beats on many of the tracks, such as “Ball the Jack,” “After You’ve Gone,” and “I’ve Found a New Baby.” When Pud Brown replaces Darensbourg on clarinet and Lloyd Glenn replaces Buster Wilson on piano, there is no loss of momentum.
These nine tracks were undoubtedly recorded on acetate discs, either off the air or in the studio—unfortunately there is no information as to location(s) provided in the notes. [Since we are given all the personnel on each of the tracks on the disc, I am mystified by why there are not more broadcast(s) details available as to the places and dates, other than what little is included.] Given the inclusion of an announcer’s voice on the opening and closing of “The Bucket’s Got a Hole in It” track and at the close of “I’ve Found a New Baby,” I infer they were from a broadcast, hence probably done on acetate. If there is a flaw to be found in the Ory segment, it is a scratchiness on “Tuxedo Junction.” Such blemishes are often present on acetate recordings. To my ears it is only a slight imperfection, however, marring just a little what is otherwise an exciting interpretation of this well-known number.
Prior to hearing him here, I was unfamiliar with Preston Jackson, trombonist and leader on the next six tracks. I was likewise unfamiliar with his sidemen, but they meld together to create some very good jazz. Preston is smooth—no roughness, no “growls,” but deft handling of glisses and smears, of which he seems fond. For example, he opens “Trombone Man” with a gliss which he repeats at the end to lead into the coda. His solo on “Harmony Blues” opens with a punchy phrase and also includes the glisses he seemed to favor. His command of the horn is sure as, in addition to the glisses, his tonguing on both versions of “It’s Tite Jim” illustrates. The arrangement includes breaks during ensembles, interestingly harmonized, followed by a switch to staccato triplet breaks. These come off to perfection, even though the tempo of the piece is a brisk one. Of the two versions of this tune, which are much alike, I favor the first one, which is also taken just a tad faster than the second.
Another strength of the Jackson tracks is found in the arrangements. “Houston Bound” opens with a rubato ensemble introduction from the ensemble with strong banjo tremolo behind, leading into a solid four-beat slow blues tempo. After the first vocal, the ensemble switches to a habanera rhythm before returning to the pronounced straight four-beat when the vocal resumes. Then in the coda, the rhythm goes into double time for four measures, doing this twice behind the vocal. The track ends with a tag and a banjo tremolo ritard. I should mention that the recording quality is not good on this track, being “fuzzy.” That flaw possibly accounts in part for the unintelligibility of the vocal; but the arrangement compensates for this deficiency.
And that brings us to the final five tracks by the Missourians, the band that Bissonnette claimed, in his original liner notes, to be his “favorite band of all time.” Of the personnel in this group—a “big band” as opposed to the other two “combos”—possibly the one individual most people will recognize is Sidney DeParis. This large group was taken over by Cab Calloway and thereafter most of the time served as supporting accompaniment for his vocals. That was rather unfortunate as the band deserved far more exposure on instrumentals than it got, but Calloway was extremely popular in his day and got the plaudits (and the gigs, I would guess).
Of these five tunes, all instrumentals sans Calloway, that close the CD, none could be classified as a “standard,” other, perhaps, than “Riverboat Shuffle,” forever associated with Bix Beiderbecke as well as its composer Hoagy Carmichael. (The other two who had a hand in the composition, Irving Mills and Dick Voynow, are most often unmentioned.) The arrangements are tight and the players have the technique to bring them off. None sounds ponderous, all having a jaunty, punchy feeling to them. This is enhanced by the use of the choke cymbal being struck at the closing of several tracks and even at the opening of one, “Original Two-Time Man.”
Further contributing to this lively character are the frequent, judiciously placed breaks in the arrangements, and the rhythm’s often switching to a charleston measure. “Snag ‘em Blues” nicely illustrates this quality. Heavy accents are given to the two and four beats of each bar. There is a banjo break where Charlie Stamps plays an ascending and then descending tremolo run! Breaks come often, and the banjo is prominent throughout. The tune ends with a charleston-like tag that segues into a banjo tremolo ritard. All this makes for a most entertaining track. The charleston is also to be heard in “Everybody Stomp” and “Riverboat Shuffle.”
The leader on trombone, DePriest Wheeler, is not featured a great deal in solos, but he can be heard clearly in “Riverboat Shuffle” where he engages in a kind of call/response with the rest of the brass section. The arrangement of the tune is magnificent, packed with interest as it features breaks throughout, along with the punchy feeling given by the muted brass staccato triplets. In addition there are many stops and breaks at auspicious moments as the band maintains the medium tempo with which it started the tune. After the brief crash on the splash cymbal with which the track concludes, a round of applause from the listener would not be inappropriate! Of the five Missourian tracks, my vote for “favorite” would go to this one. While I would not go as far as Bissonnette in an accolade, I must say that I thoroughly enjoyed the Missourians’ five tracks, a response most readers of The Syncopated Times will surely share.
This CD keeps available tracks by groups that would be difficult, if not impossible, to obtain elsewhere. It is one that belongs on the shelf of everyone who loves traditional jazz. Like all Upbeat CDs, it is available on the Upbeat Recordings web site www.upbeat.co.uk as well as online from Amazon.
Kid Ory, Preston Jackson, DePriest Wheeler
Great Jazz, Great Trombones: 1920s-1950s
featuring The Missourians
Upbeat URCD347
Born in Dundee, Scotland, Bert Thompson came to the U.S. in 1956. After a two-year stint playing drums with the 101 st Airborne Division Band and making a number of parachute drops, he returned to civilian life in San Francisco, matriculating at San Francisco State University where he earned a B.A. and an M.A. He went on to matriculate at University of Oregon, where he earned a D.A. and a Ph.D., all of his degrees in English. Now retired, he is a professor emeritus of English at City College of San Francisco. He is also a retired traditional jazz drummer, having played with a number of San Francisco Bay Area bands, including And That’s Jazz, Professor Plum’s Jazz, the Jelly Roll Jazz Band, Mission Gold Jazz Band, and the Zenith New Orleans Parade band; he also played with some further afield, including Gremoli (Long Beach, CA) and the Phoenix Jazzers (Vancouver, B.C.) Today he reviews traditional jazz CDs and writes occasional articles for several publications.
