Listening to Traditional Jazz
in an Internet World
Classical jazz is not mainstream music, and hasn’t been since the end of the Big Band Era mid-1940s. It is a rare occasion when you find it on commercial radio or TV. That means that when we aren’t going to ATJS concerts and other venues to hear jazz performed live, we are listening to recordings.
Sources of jazz recordings have varied over the years. At one time you could go to a record store, such as The Record Bar, Sam Goody’s or Tower Records to see what they had in stock. Mail order houses have now become Internet vendors, but Amazon, GHB and Jazzology continue to furnish recorded jazz, although the format tends to be downloads or CDs rather than the old vinyl LP. You can also build your jazz CD collection by purchasing them from bands at ATJS concerts.
In recent years new sources of jazz have appeared. These allow you to sample an amazing library of historical and contemporary traditional jazz on your computer. A great site for music of all kinds is YouTube. For those who have never gone there, this is a website full of recordings and videos covering a very wide range of subjects. Music is well represented. Many historical jazz recordings have been posted.
Here is a suggested listening list. This will give you a good handle on early recorded jazz. Enter either the band name, the tune title or both into the Search box and good things should pop up.
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Bands |
Tunes to Sample |
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Louis Armstrong and his Hot Five/Seven |
Potato Head Blues; Once in a While |
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Barbecue Joe and his Hot Dogs |
Tar Paper Stomp (inspiration for In the Mood) |
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Bix Beiderbecke and his Gang |
Old Man River, Sorry, At the Jazz Band Ball |
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Bucktown Five (early Muggsy Spanier group) |
Buddy’s Habits, Mobile Blues, Really a Pain, Hot Mittens |
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California Ramblers Charleston, (great 20s jazz-oriented dance band) |
I Ain’t Got Nobody, Third Rail, Crazy |
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Chocolate Dandies |
Birmingham Breakdown |
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Coon-Sanders Nighthawks (early radio orchestra) |
Here Comes My Ball and Chain, Rhythm King, I Ain’t Got Nobody, Roodles |
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Jean Goldkette and his Orchestra |
Dinah, My Pretty Girl |
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Fletcher Henderson and his Orchestra |
Shanghai Shuffle (early Louis Armstrong solo), Down South Camp Meeting, Hop Off, Stockholm Stomp |
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Jelly Roll Morton and his Red Hot Peppers (perhaps the purest New Orleans Jazz ever recorded) |
Black Bottom Stomp, The Chant, Sidewalk Blues, Doctor Jazz, Steamboat Stomp, Shreveport Stomp, Kansas City Stomps, Grandpa’s Spells |
|
Phil Napoleon and his Orchestra |
Five Pennies |
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King Oliver and his Dixie Syncopators |
Deep Henderson, Wa Wa Wa |
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King Oliver and his
Orchestra |
Too Late, Edna, Mule Face Blues, Stingaree Blues |
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Quintet of the Hot Club of France (the first really good foreign jazz band) |
Ain’t Misbehavin’, Avalon, Lily Belle May June, Sweet Sue, I Saw Stars, Honeysuckle Rose |
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Red and Miff’s Stompers (stars Miff Mole, the first great jazz trombone soloist) |
Stampede, Alabama Stomp, Hurricane |
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Luis Russell and his Orchestra |
Saratoga Shout |
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Cecil Scott and his Bright Boys (the only four recordings they made) |
Lawd Lawd, In A Corner, Bright Boy Blues, Springfield Stomp
|
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Alphonse Trent and his Orchestra |
Nightmare, Saint James Infirmary Blues |
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Frank Trumbauer and his Orchestra (more Bix Beiderbecke recordings) |
Borneo, In a Mist |
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Joe Venuti and his Blue
Four/Six |
Mug of Ale, Hiawatha’s Lullaby, Raggin’ the Scale, Four String Joe, Sweet Lorraine |
|
Clarence Williams and his Orchestra |
Bimbo, Bottomland, Bozo, Shootin’ the Pistol, Midnight Stomp, Jingles, Shake Em Up |
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Wolverine Orchestra (first records by Bix Beiderbecke) |
Fidgety Feet, Jazz Me Blues, Riverboat Shuffle, Copenhagen, Tia Juana, Susie, Sensation, Royal Garden Blues, Oh Baby, Big Boy |
This is a sampling of early recorded jazz. Listeners accustomed to today’s high fidelity may find the recording quality a bit annoying until you get used to it. Early recordings were acoustical, and while the better ones are fairly clear, the range of frequencies is not recorded well. Electrical recording techniques came along in the mid-1920s, and while some of them sound harsh the fidelity is better. The best recordings of the era, generally those from Victor (the forerunner of RCA Victor) sound surprisingly lifelike. Try a 1926 cut from Jelly Roll Morton and his Red Hot Peppers.
One of the advantages of YouTube is that anyone with MP3s or a video camera can record and post items. This has resulted in some truly wretched material that should never see the light of day. However, one finds some very good jazz recordings, some of which have not been commercially released. As with much of the Internet you must sift through the chaff to find the jewels, but the jewels are there for you to find. Some are videos, some are recordings with slide shows, and others are recordings with a single slide.
Since many YouTube entries represent contemporary material, you can find many of the bands which play ATJS concerts or play in local clubs. You can listen to the Mission City Hot Rhythm Cats (the December ATJS band), Thrift Set Orchestra, Silver Creek Jazz Band, the East Side Dandies, the Swinging Strings, Giant City Jazz, the Jazz Pharaohs, White Ghost Shivers and the Chaparral Dixielanders. Recent ATJS special bands who are on YouTube include the Jim Cullum Jazz Band, Connie Jones and his Crescent City Jazz Band, Tim Laughlin and his New Orleans Jazz All-Stars and Ed Polcer.
Here are a few additional historical jazz recordings not listed above that you may wish to try on YouTube.
Happy listening! This is a drop in the proverbial jazz recordings bucket, but if you like one track by an artist, you can try a few others.
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Bands |
Tunes to Sample |
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Henry “Red” Allen |
Rosetta, Wild Man Blues |
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Coleman Hawkins |
Body and Soul |
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Pee Wee Russell |
If I Had You, Out of Nowhere |
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Ruby Braff |
When My Sugar Walks Down the Street |
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Here are some YouTube suggestions by
local jazz fan Roger Moon. |
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Bands or Artist |
Tunes to Sample |
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Adrian Rollini |
Davenport Blues |
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Andrews Sisters |
Rum and Coca-Cola |
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Annette Henshaw |
Loveable and Sweet |
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Artie Shaw |
Begin the Beguine |
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Bessie Smith |
Nobody Knows You When You’re Down and Out |
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Big Bill Broonzy |
Trouble in Mind |
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Bing Crosby |
Brother Can You Spare a Dime? |
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Bob Crosby and the Bobcats |
Big Noise From Winnetka |
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Bob Wills |
San Antonio Rose |
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Billie Holiday |
What a Little Moonlight Can Do |
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Bunk Johnson |
Panama |
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Cab Calloway |
Minnie the Moocher |
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Duke Ellington |
Mood Indigo |
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Fats Waller |
Honeysuckle Rose |
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Firehouse Five Plus Two |
Pagan Love Song, Blues My Naughty Sweetie Gives to Me |
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Henry Busse |
Hot Lips, Plenty of Money and You, Wang Wang Blues |
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Jack Teagarden |
Stars Fell on Alabama |
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Louis Armstrong |
Dippermouth Blues |
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Tommy Dorsey |
Song of India |
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Ukulele Ike (Cliff Edwards) |
I’ll See You in My Dreams |