From the Record Shelves #216 - ’Taint So, Honey, ’Taint SoFrom the Record Shelves #216 – ’Taint So, Honey, ’Taint So – It was raining like mad, but I was out on my bike. I had a very important business to take care of, which was buying a record. When I came to Leif Anderson he opened the door wearing his bathrobe. Leif was (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Record Shelves #212 - SundayFrom the Record Shelves #212 – Sunday – The Vintage series made compilations of tunes from special years on some albums. I bought them as they came out in chronological reverse order, starting in 1928 and finish with 1926 which is the album that (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Record Shelves #202 - Rose of Washington SquareFrom the Record Shelves #202 – Rose of Washington Square – Milt Gabler had a record shop since 1926 in Manhattan, across the street from the Commodore Hotel. In the thirties, he sold mostly reissues of the jazz classics from the 1920s, and one day he said to (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Record Shelves #193 - GypsyFrom the Record Shelves #193 – Gypsy – There was a time—it seems long ago now—when all the early recordings of jazz were not available. Originals were hard to come by, and the reissues were not plentiful. It was an exciting age in which (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Record Shelves #190 - Strut Miss LizzieFrom the Record Shelves #190 – Strut Miss Lizzie – On the back of the sleeve of this LP that I bought secondhand there are the autographs of Tony Parenti and Max Kaminsky, and they also wrote the date, October 20, 1968. I have no idea where they played that day (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Record Shelves #171 - Fidgety FeetFrom the Record Shelves #171 – Fidgety Feet – On this day a hundred years ago, on February 18, 1924, Bix Beiderbecke made his first record. His sound as it came out of a cornet and his musical ideas still fascinate people all over the world, and it is (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Record Shelves #170 - The Co-EdFrom the Record Shelves #170 – The Co-Ed – It’s interesting to reflect over how quickly the musicians and the bands influenced each other within the fast developing early jazz idiom. Here we have a group from New Orleans that under the name Crescent City Jazzers (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Record Shelves #157 - SugarFrom 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 #151 - Mississippi MudFrom 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 #148 - Shivery StompFrom 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 #133 - CandlelightsFrom the Record Shelves #133 – Candlelights. I have listened many times to this record with, and it’s special. I probably found it at a sale for a low price. The music is recorded in 1953 and the album was originally called Syncopated Chamber Music (…) read more and listenread more and listen

From the Record Shelves #119 - Ostrich WalkFrom the Record Shelves #119 – Ostrich Walk. Bix Beiderbecke never forgot the tunes that turned him on to jazz. It was after World War I that his brother returned with some records, among them the newly released ones by Original Dixieland Jazz Band. When he got (…) read more and listenread more and listen