Year: 2024

From the Record Shelves #158 – Someday You’ll Be Sorry – It must be decades since I’ve listened to this album, but way back then I did it a lot. As it happens most often when you listen to something with Louis Armstrong, your foot starts going up and down (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Record Shelves #157 – Sugar – In Eddie Condon’s book We Called It music (1947) it’s said, not by him but by his co-author Thomas Sugrue: “the white musicians that went to the Lincoln Gardens, the Sunset Café or the Nest knew that however (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Record Shelves #156 – A Lonely Co-Ed – The title number of the LP that starts and finishes the record in two different takes is of course impressive and tempting to chose, with its pyrotechnics with trumpets and trombones that make you think about (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Record Shelves #155 – The Basement Blues – While listening to this LP, I reflected about the magnificent photo on the cover. It’s said to have been taken in Paris 1929, but that doesn’t fit since I recognize Tommy Ladnier playing his trumpet there, and he was not (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Record Shelves #154 – Showboat Shuffle – About twenty years ago, I had the chance to go to Chicago and play with my band. In one of the places where we played, a rather unpretentious concert, I was told at the intermission that the band of King Oliver (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Record Shelves #153 – Be Bo Bo – Jack Purvis is a favorite of mine. He left relatively few recordings behind and had a short career. Still, his biography fills much space in the Who’s Who of Jazz. There are so many stories and rumors connected to (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Record Shelves #152 – Come On Mama – Thomas A. Dorsey, who got his nickname Georgia Tom by Paramount’s recording director Mayo Williams, wrote about two hundred blues songs between 1923 and 1932. After that, he became an important pioneer (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Record Shelves #151 – Mississippi Mud – On the LP cover, the uncredited commentary says: “Though Bix will be forever grieved, somebody else at least is playing his music.” And also: “Several of his written down compositions are regarded as classics (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Record Shelves #150 – The LP contains mostly early recordings where Cliff is alone with ukulele and a couple of good daring double entendre songs, but I have chosen a hit from 1930. It reminds me of Christmas. In Sweden, there is a strange tradition (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Record Shelves #149 – Shivery Stomp (Seger Ellis). Now I have managed to dig out the original piano version of this tune by Seger Ellis from my disorganized 78 rpm collection. Seger Ellis was a talented pianist and composer from Houston, Texas who somehow (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Record Shelves #148 – Shivery Stomp. On May 19, 1929, The Orchestra played at Metropolitan Opera House in New York, and a few days later they started on their trip to California to shoot the film King of Jazz by appearing in Philadelphia (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Record Shelves #147 – Sweet Suzanne. Here’s an example of a record that I can pull out of the shelves sometimes and enjoy a sweet melody without tapping my foot, looking up the personnel in a discography, and without the need to play it again (…) read more and listenread more and listen