Jazz Poems

MOOD INDIGO

it hasn’t always been this way

ellington was not a street

robeson no mere memory

du bois walked up my father’s stairs

hummed some time over me

sleeping in the company of men

who changed the world

it wasn’t always like this

why ray barretto used to be a side-man

& dizzy’s hair was not always grey

i remember         i was there

i listened in the company of men politics as necessary as collards

music even in our dreams

our house was filled with all kinds of folks

our windows were not cement or steel

our doors opened like our daddy’s arms

held us safe & loved

children growing in the company of men

old southern men & young slick ones

sonny til was not a boy

the clovers no rag-tag orphans

our crooners/  we belonged to a whole world

nkrumah was no foreigner

virgil aikens was not the only fighter

it hasn’t always been this way

ellington was not a street

NTOZAKE SHANGE

from Jazz Poems ~ Selected and Edited by Kevin Young

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Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Charles Edward Smith was born on June 8, 1904 in Thomaston, Connecticut  He began to collect early hot jazz records in the 1920s and worked with William Russell, Eugene Williams, John Hammond, Hugues Panassié and Charles Delaunay in the Hot Record Society. It was from this society that  the jazz label HRS Records sprang in 1937 and with Steve Smith he was editor of the jazz magazine Hot Record Society Rag.

With essays in journals such as the Symposium, Daily Worker and Esquire, Charles was among the early jazz critics in the 1930s. Collaborating with Frederic Ramsey he published the book Jazzmen, and, with Wilder Hobson’s American Jazz Music, was one of America’s first jazz books. The latter book included articles on groups like the Austin High School Gang and interviews from early jazz musicians like Willie Cornish, Papa Jack Laine, Leon Roppolo and Nick LaRocca.

Smith and Ramsey argued that then-popular swing was rooted stylistically in blues and traditional jazz. In the course of the research on the book, the interviewed musicians mentioned the name Bunk Johnson again and again. This led to the then-forgotten trumpeter of New Orleans Jazz being rediscovered by Bill Russell in 1942.

With the 1942 Jazz Record Book, an attempt was made to generate a canon of important jazz records, which was later taken up by many other writers, including Marshall Stearns’s The Story of Jazz, Joachim-Ernst Berendt/Günther Huesmann’s jazz book , Barry Kernfeld’s Encyclopedia of Jazz, and Allen Lowe’s That Devilin’ Tune.

Smith also wrote for The New Republic, the magazine Jazz Information, and wrote a series of liner notes for Folkways Records that included Negro folk music, folk blues, early and modern jazz albums. He also wrote the accompaniment text for the LP edition of John Hammond’s Concert Series, From Spirituals to Swing – Carnegie Hall Concerts, 1938/39 on Vanguard Records.

In the opinion of the International Society of Jazz Research, Smith was one of the most important early serious jazz critics, alongside Hugues Panassié, Winthrop Sargeant, Wilder Hobson, Don Knowlton, and Aaron Copland. Jazz author, editor and critic Charles Edward Smith transitioned on December 16, 1970 in New York City.

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Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Kenn Smith was born Kenneth Lamont Smith on April 27, 1962 in Chicago, Illinois.

As a child of the 60s and Seventies living on the WestSide of his hometownhe first heard the sounds of Motown, Soul, Funk, Country, Jazz and Rock. His school was shows like Hee Haw and Midnight Special, his parents’ record collection, and a neighborhood filled with amateur and professional musicians.

When the family moved to the SouthSide in 1975, Smith began his guitar studies at age 13 with a visit to the local music store purchasing two Mel Bay books. Three years later the family moved to the western suburbs of Maywood, Illinois. At 16 he began classical guitar studies with guitarist Bruce Walters, and later continued studies at Jack Cecchini Studio.

While attending Proviso East High School, he played electric and classical guitar as well as timpani in the Proviso Township Orchestra, electric guitar and bass in the Proviso East High School jazz band, where he received the Louis Armstrong Award for Outstanding Jazz Improvisation during his senior year.

1982 saw Kenn beginning his career teaching guitar at Robinson’s Music Academy in Maywood, as well as performing with local funk and fusion bands. This he did while attending Columbia College of Chicago, studying music management and production. In 1987 he enrolled at the American Conservatory of Music where he studied jazz guitar and composition. In between those years of teaching, performing and study, he became an avid fan of progressive rock and fusion, developing skills as a guitarist, bassist and composer.

In 1986, he began his career as a freelance guitarist and bassist, performing on Chicago’s jazz, blues and rock scene. But it wasn’t till 1989 his professional career took off, working as a guitarist at the Chicago Cotton Club. It was here he later formed his first jazz trio and opened for jazz greats Shirley Horn, Stanley Turrentine, Freddy Cole, and Art Porter. As a jazz side man he played with other jazz greats, Jodie Christian, Guy Fricano, Johnny Frigo, Bobby Broom, Najee and many others.

He would go on tour with the Chi-Lites, start his own label Kenn Smith Music, has written, produced and recorded eight albums, as well as authored an instruction book for electric bass and numerous articles for online magazines such as Mel Bay Bass Sessions, and Bass Musician Magazine.

Guitarist, bassist, composer, educator and journalist Kenn Smith, who is well versed in many styles of music, continues to explore his music.

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GERALD HORNE: HISTORIAN, AUTHOR, EDUCATOR

Jazz and Justice: Racism and the Political Economy of the Music

Gerald Horne assembles a galvanic story depicting what may have been the era’s most virulent economic—and racist—exploitation, as jazz musicians battled organized crime, the Ku Klux Klan, and other variously malignant forces dominating the nightclub scene where jazz became known.

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Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Reuben Bloom was born April 24, 1902 in New York City, New York to Jewish parents. During the 1920s he wrote many novelty piano solos, recorded for the Aeolian Company’s Duo-Art reproducing piano system various titles including his Spring Fever. His first hit came in 1927 with Soliloquy; his last was Here’s to My Lady in 1952, which he wrote with Johnny Mercer. In 1928, he made a number of records with Joe Venuti’s Blue Four for OKeh, including five songs he sang, as well as played piano.

He formed and led a number of bands during his career, most notably Rube Bloom and His Bayou Boys, which recorded three records in 1930. The Bayou Boys consisted of Benny Goodman, Adrian Rollini, Tommy Dorsey, Mannie Klein and Frankie Trumbauer in the Sioux City Six.

His I Can’t Face the Music, Day In Day Out, Fools Rush In (Where Angels Fear To Tread) and Give Me The Simple Life has become a part of the Great American Songbook and jazz standards.

During his career, he worked with many well-known performers, including those mentioned above and Ruth Etting, Stan Kenton, Jimmy Dorsey and collaborated with a wide number of lyricists, such as Ted Koehler, and Mitchell Parish.

Pianist, arranger, bandleader, recording artist, vocalist, and author Rube Bloom published several books on piano method before he transitioned on March 30, 1976 in his home city.

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