Year: 2024

From the Record Shelves #281- You Call It Madness – I have about five or six favorites among tenor sax players, and Don Byas (1912–1972) is one of them. He had big band experience from Lionel Hampton’s, Don Redman’s, Andy Kirk’s, and Count Basie’s great orchestras (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Record Shelves #280 – Weary Blues – I’m glad that I’m not a critic. Because in that case, I would have had to deal with the cover, the title of the LP, the choice of tunes, their relation to the blues, and so on. And I might also have gotten into the devastating critic’s habit of (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Studio #45 – I’m In the Mood for Love – I sing and play an old favorite that we have used for many years in small groups. It’s the kind of gig where the music may be somewhat in the background but still very important to create an atmosphere (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Record Shelves #279 – I’ll Be Seing You – For many years, there was a favorite music program on Swedish radio called Smoke Rings. The man behind it was Leif Anderson, and he, even if he may have protested himself, could easily be called an icon (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Studio #44 – In a Café on the Road to Calais – A tune that is almost forgotten catches my attention because there is a version by Noble Sissle and his Orchestra (rejected but saved) recorded in New York 1931 where Tommy Lanier and Sidney Bechet play short solos (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Record Shelves #278 After You’ve Gone – For a period when I was about fifteen, I listened to this every day. Same program every morning. My mother woke me up, and after I had been to the toilet and got dressed, she had the porridge ready. Most of the time, I had (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Studio #43 – It Had to Be You – Sometimes it can work well to slow down the tempo of a tune, especially if you want to think about the meaning of the words. So that’s what I did, and the words in this case are simple and nice. (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Studio #42 – Pardon Me Pretty – I thought that this tune deserved a more ambitious arrangement and an interpretation in the late 1920s style (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Studio #41 – Basin Street Blues – Sometimes it’s interesting to play and record a typical jam session tune. Not to try to prove how it should sound; that would be too pretentious and too much work. But more importantly, how it could sound if not everyone was stepping on (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Studio #40 – Out of Nowhere – Here’s another rendition of a beloved tune, inspired by the more or less classic versions that I’ve heard and, as always, by life itself (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Studio #39 – Sonny Boy – Al Jolson made a dramatic interpretation, and the dance bands played it normally. We used to play it with my arrangement for The Absalon Orchestra, but it fell out of the repertoire. I think that I was influenced by a critic who said (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Record Shelves #277 – You Can’t Be Mine – The year is 1930, and both the tune and the opening sound point forward in my mind. The tune, because it was recorded a few years later by Billie Holiday, and the sound, because the tune opens with a flute solo (…) read more and listenread more and listen