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Monthly Archives: February 2018

In Memory and In Hope

26 Monday Feb 2018

Posted by JazzCookie in blues, jazz

≈ 6 Comments

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Billie Holiday, blessings, Blood Sweat and Tears, guns, money and power, Parkland High School

It’s been a long week, JazzBabies, with a lot going on around the country.  The thing at the top of my personal list of things to think about has been the blossoming Children’s Crusade coming out of the Florida high school tragedy and the blowback the students have received from various groups and politicians in answer to their stand on gun control.

This is not a site for politics, but it’s damned hard to ignore them in these fraught days. Still, we’re a place for jazz, so after some thought it occurred to me to post Billie Holiday’s anthem to independence, to taking a stand, and in this case, to the blessings on those who do.

While I love Billie’s own version of “God Bless the Child,” I’m choosing tonight to give you this terrific rendition from Blood, Sweat and Tears whose jazz/rock sounds of the late 60s and early 70s gave many of us some hope of better days and times as we continued to struggle with an earlier battle – the Vietnam War.  No music, including jazz, exists outside its time and place.

As in other times, we’re caught in a cultural context at the moment where money and power are at the leading edge.  And as someone once said, “If money talks, why doesn’t it ever say anything good.”  Well, sometimes it does, but at the moment, I’m hard put to hear what that is.

Still the students from the Parkland high school are standing up, speaking out and not knuckling under to the voices of money and power.  This song is dedicated to those kids and in memory of the ones whose voices were stilled. Viva, sweet and well-spoken youth!

Blessings, JazzBabies, blessings.

 

Stan Getz and the Many Shades of Jazz

17 Saturday Feb 2018

Posted by JazzCookie in blues, composing, Cool jazz, jazz, show tunes

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Connie Kay, Herb Ellis, Higher and Higher, J.J. Johnson, melancholy, Oscar Peterson, Ray Brown, Rodgers and Hart, Stan Getz, standards

Jazz bounces, JazzBabies, and it swings.  It don’t mean a thing and all that.  Jazz can wail and burn down the house when a good jam gets going.  But jazz can also reach right into your chest and pull out your heart in the hands of musicians like Stan Getz, and this is one of the tunes that will do that.

Rodgers and Hart wrote more than their share of the great tunes from the American songbook, tunes that started on a Broadway stage and ended up in the cozy little jazz clubs on one street or another in one city or small town or another.  “It Never Entered My Mind” debuted in a 1940 Rodgers and Hart musical, Higher and Higher and has become a standard. 

Here it is live with a primo 1957 line-up of talent: Getz, Oscar Peterson, Ray Brown, Herb Ellis, Connie Kay & J.J. Johnson from the album Body and Soul.  The melancholy mournfulness of this sweetly sad tune of lost love won’t chase your blues away but it might remind you that you’re in good company.

We’ve all been there and once in a while, in the face of such a heartfelt loss, permission’s granted to feel sorry for yourself (as long as you don’t make it a habit).

Ciao,
JazzCookie

 

Laissez les bon temps rouler!

13 Tuesday Feb 2018

Posted by JazzCookie in blues, composing, jazz, traditional

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

beignets, chicory coffee, Gumbo Nouveau, Mardi Gras, New Orleans, Nicholas Payton

And here we are, JazzBabies, at the Mardi Gras. Fat Tuesday is the wrap-up day for Mardi Gras week, followed by the quieter and more pensive Ash Wednesday.  After all that carousing on Tuesday night – all night – quiet and pensive is a happy way to nurse whatever’s hanging on or hanging over from the big celebration.

And here with just the right quiet sound is a New Orleans musician – born and bred, educated and loved, in the city of his birth.  Nicholas Payton is a trumpeter, composer, traveler, writer, distinguished lecturer – you name it, this man’s done it.  From his second album, Gumbo Nouveau, recorded in his early 20s, is “Way Down Yonder in New Orleans” but not like you’ve heard it before.

Settle back, JazzBabies, with a cup of chicory coffee and a beignet for this one.  Watch out for the powdered sugar!

 

Bob James Takes You to the Mardi Gras

10 Saturday Feb 2018

Posted by JazzCookie in blues, jazz

≈ 6 Comments

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beads, Big Easy, bob james, dancing, Mama, Mardi Gras, Paul Simon

Well, here we are, JazzBabies, just days away from Mardi Gras with its nearly nonstop celebration of jazz, the Big Easy, parades, costumes, and a lot of other things we don’t need to write about here.

All you need are your Mardi Gras beads and your dancing shoes to celebrate in style.  So if you haven’t made your travel plans yet, now’s the time.  Somebody out there is just beggin’ for you to “Take Me to the Mardi Gras”! Please, please, please, please, please.

This is a Paul Simon tune, written and released in 1973, but the Bob James recording hit most of the jazz outlets when he included it on his 1975 Two album along with some other great tunes.

It’s a little funky, JazzBabies, and not straight ahead by any stretch, but it’s a good one, and I’ve always liked this particular album.  If it’s not what you usually enjoy remember what Mama used to say:  “Just go ahead and try it – one bite won’t kill you.”

Ciao,

JazzCookie

 

A Birthday, A Dance Party, and a Heavenly Hope

04 Sunday Feb 2018

Posted by JazzCookie in blues, jazz, pop, swing

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

birthday, boogie woogie, dancing, jitterbug, Mom, swing

 

February 4th is my Mom’s birthday, JazzBabies.  She would be 98 today and most likely not be dancing. Sadly, she was plagued with illness and didn’t make it to 50, but oh, she did love to dance when she was a young thing. And she taught me to dance when I was a young thing, too.

Part of my history of jazz is watching my parents do the jitterbug when I was a kid, and yes, they could do most of the steps you’ll see here including that upside-down-over-the-shoulder-who-cares-if-my-panties-show bit.  Lordy, it’s great to be young and in such great shape!

In honor of her birthday, I bring you this jazz medley/collage of jitterbug, swing, boogie woogie, with kids of all ages dancing for the fun of it.  If your ear is good, you’ll recognize many of the tunes, and as you’ll see by the different dress styles, swing dancing didn’t stop in the 1940s or even the 1950s.

I hope it’s not all harps in heaven – let there be swing…  And let my Mom and Dad be cutting the celestial rug!

Happy birthday, Mom

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