The Potomac River Jazz Club

George A. Borgman had a lifelong association and appreciation for music, especially jazz and swing. In the late 1940s and early 1950s he played with several Swing bands. When he landed a government job in Washington, D.C. his love for jazz led him to seek out a venue for his interest.

In about early 1983 George A. Borgman who was living in Suitland, Maryland became a member of The Potomac River Jazz Club (PRJC)  when it was under the leadership of President Gary Wilkinson and Vice President Roy Hostetter. The group is still in existence.

The Potomac River Jazz Club was formed in 1971 the year Louis Armstrong died. It was created for the preservation of Traditional Jazz, Ragtime and the Blues which the organizers considered a unique American art form.

Members of this organization admired musicians like Jelly Roll Morton, Louis Armstrong, Bix Beiderbecke, Sidney Bechet, Jack Teagarden and many others. They also promoted the later revivalist Dixielanders such as Turk Murphy, Lu Watters and Bob Scobey.

The Jazz Club was one of the founders of the American Federation of Jazz Societies as well as being a founding member of the Cultural Alliance of Greater Washington.

Although membership is currently under a thousand it has members all across the United States and Canada. The group is mainly made up of members concentrated in the Washington, D.C. and Baltimore, Maryland area.

George permanently moved to Massachusetts in April of 1985, but continued his membership well into 1987.

While in Maryland George attended many of the club's events including the 1983 Easter Seals Dixieland Jubilee on February 19th where over 500 people were in attendance for a twelve hour dose of jazz from noon to midnight. Some of the bands in attendance were Fat Cat's Festival Jazzers, Southern Comfort, Bob Greene's New Orleans Quartet, and the Buck Creek JazzBand.

Then on June 19, 1983 George attended the Manassas Jazz Festival at the Ramada Inn in Alexandria, Virginia. The festival was presenting a benefit for pianist Dillwyn "Dill" Jones. The bands on show were Butterfield-Jones and the Jazz Connection, Buck Creek Jazz Band, Fat Cat's Festival Jazzers and the Princeton Bix Reunion Band. The musicians included drummer Johnny Blowers, trumpeter Billy Butterfield, cornetist Tommy Pletcher, Clarinetist Gary Gregg, pianist Rick Cordrey, and banjo players Jerry Addicott and Steve Jordan as well as numerous others.

Only about 150 people showed up for the five hour entertainment. By all accounts Butterfield's first set, with pianist John Eaton standing in for Dill Jones was winner. Later Butterfield and Tommy Pletcher played chase choruses. Singer Barbara Lea  accompanied the musicians for some tunes.

Manassas Jazz Festival Nov. 26, 1983 - "If I Could Be With You"

 

George was to enjoy many jazz performances, festivals and jazz picnics during his year working in Washington.

On September 15, 1984 he attended the 14th Annual PRJC Jazz Picnic at Blob's Park in Jessup, Maryland. The event went from 11:00 AM to 9:00 PM with Any Ol' Time Jazz Band starting off the festivities and ending with the Village Jazz Band. Some of the groups in-between consisted of the Royal Blue Orchestra; Federal Jazz Commission; Capital City Jazz Band; and the Ponchartrain Causeway New Orleans Jazz Band.

George's experiences as a member of the Potomac River Jazz Club and the opportunity to attend the numerous events where Traditional Jazz was one display prepared him for his future career as a jazz researcher, writer and reviewer.

Remembering Pianist Marie Marcus - by George A. Borgman

In the 1930s, Marie Marcus, then known by her maiden name of Marie Doherty, worked on a children's radio program that was broadcast nationally out of New York City. One of her jobs was to audition girls to play the part on the show of squeaky-voiced Betty Boop, of movie cartoon fame. since no one passed the audition, it was decided that Marie herself play Betty Boop, and she did it quite sucessfully.

She went on become a popular jazz pianist and singer at various clubs and cabarets in the Big Apple, including those owned and operated by such infamous characters as Frank Costello and Dutch Schultz, and she was alos acquainted with Legs Diamond and Bugsy Siegel (before he moved to the West Coast).

Fats Waller heard her sit in on piano at an after-hours chicken house in Harlem, he liked her playing, and whenever he was in New York, he called her up, and off and on for two years they got together at a practice studio and played stride together. As a result, Marie became quite a stride piano player. In addition, she worked on the road with Wild Bill Davison, and anyone on the bandstand with Wild Bill had to be a good player.

Like a fine wine, Marie Marcus seems to have improved with age and she was indeed the grand dame of jazz piano.

 

Here is a fine website where one can order her music on Compact Disc.

Jazz Performance Saturday - "Maple Leaf Rag" - Neville Dickie

On the first Saturday of the month piano performances are the focus. Since George A. Borgman was a friend of the British pianist Neville Dickie and since he will be performing in Massachusetts this month on the 12th, let's look at a video I took of Neville Dickie playing Maple Leaf Rag from a private performance he gave while giving a talk on the history of jazz piano in 2014.

 

Scott Joplin c. June 1903

Scott Joplin, most likely the greatest ragtime piano composer, wrote Maple Leaf Rag early in his career. It was copyrighted on September 8, 1899. It became a sensation and the model for most ragtime compositions afterwards. Over the next twenty years Joplin wrote about four dozen ragtime piano compositions. Although quotes of how many pieces of the sheet music sold may have been an exaggerated the Maple Leaf Rag still out sold every other musical piece that John Stark published and Joplin survived on the royalties from it until his death in 1917.

 

Neville Dickie was born on January 1, 1937 in Durham Co., England. He played in pubs, clubs and taverns for many years. He then began a long stint of BBC radio appearances which made him a household name. In 1969 he had a hit single The Robins Return and in 1975 his album Back To Boogie sold over a 100,000 copies.

 

Here's a small sampling of some of what George A. Borgman had to say about Dickie.

 

Neville Dickie is a world renowned stride and boogie-woogie pianist from Surrey, England. He is known worldwide in festival, concert and recording circles as a gentle giant of stride piano and also a giant among boogie piano players. His strong left hand provides a steady boogie ostinato while the right hand emits delightful melodic variations. 

 

George wrote an extensive article on Dickie for The Mississippi Rag and was also invited to write the liner notes for one of Dickie's CDs.

Upon George's death Dickie wrote, "My first meeting with George was when he interviewed me for the Mississippi Rag in 1998. He didn’t do anything by half, and thoroughly researched his subject. Proof of this was an 18 page booklet he wrote for one of my CDs. Earlier this year (2009) he told me he wasn’t in good health but he was determined he and Janet would be at the Sherborn in August to see my performance with Stan McDonald – that was the last time I saw him. George loved the dry English sense of humour and he laughed at many of the stories I told him. It was a privilege to know this wonderful man."
 

So now watch and listen to Neville Dickie speaking about and playing Scott Joplin's Maple Leaf Rag.

 

Here is information regarding Neville Dickie's
May 12, 2015 appearance
at the Bella Costa in Framingham!

Saturday Jazz Performance - "Birmingham Breakdown" - The Wolverine Jazz Band

George A. Borgman had a penchant for jazz musicians who played instruments that he played such as piano, saxophone and clarinet. One musician he had a special affinity for was Dr. John Clark the leader of the Wolverine Jazz Band.

 

George always wanted to write a story on Clark and his band, but because the Wolverines were always playing either on tour or in the studio, he never got a chance to interview Clark.

 

The Wolverines have recorded thirteen CDS their latest will be released in a shortly. In this performance of Birmingham Breakdown from the 2013 Hot Steamed Jazz Festival in Essex, Connecticut (which has sadly closed down), the band is comprised of John Clark clarinet and saxophone; Jeff Hughes is playing cornet; Tom Boates is on trombone; with Ross Petot tickling the ivories; Rick McWilliams is on tuba and Dave Didrickson is playing the drums.

 

Birmingham Breakdown is a Duke Ellington composition from1926.

   

 

Memories of a Jazz Journalist - Part Nine - Pete Salemi by George A. Borgman

Here is the ninth installment of a series of entries entitled Memories of A Jazz Journalist written by George A. Borgman.

Rhode Island trombonist Pete Salemi, was known for his keen humor and amusing anecdotes. When I interviewed him for a story in the December 1997 edition of the Mississippi Rag, I queried him for his birthplace. He said, "Corleone, in Sicily. I am the Godfather, but I need a godmother." He also described how he used to goose girls with his trombone slide when they danced near the bandstand.

At age ten, Joseph "Pete" Salemi played guitar with his father and two brothers in a mandolin-guitar group. In 1915, a year after arriving at Ellis Island, New York, he lost two fingers on his left hand in an accident at a paper box factory, so he decided to switch from Guitar to trombone and began years of trombone lessons.

Around 1918, Salemi witnessed a battle of the bands between the Original Memphis Five and the Original Dixieland Jazz Band at the Balconades Ballroom on Broadway. He began playing trombone in bands, and his first job with a Dixieland band was in 1919 or '20. He became a charter member of Local 802 of the American Federation of Musicians in August 1921, and by 1924 he was playing in small bands in Brooklyn and worked in the pit band at the Gaiety Theatre, a burlesque house.

Pete Salemi subsequently worked and recorded with Gene Kardo's 12-piece band, and he played in the pit band for Minsky's burlesque show at the Republic Theatre, 42nd Street, for such strippers as Gypsy Rose Lee and for comics Bud Abbott and Lou Costello. He was in bands at the Moroccan Village in Greenwich Village, Leon & Eddie's on 52nd Street, Billy Rose's Diamond Horseshoe, and the Arcadia Ballroom, and he worked with bands led by Eddie Duchin, Pancho (from Argentina), Vincent Lopez, Desi Arnez, Bob Crosby, Leo Reisman, Lester Lanin, Ted Lewis, Jimmy Durante, etc.; he played alongside Bobby Hackett and Bunny Berigan; he accompanied singers Sophie Tucker and Frank Sinatra; he was in the pit band for "Follow the Girls," starring Jackie Gleason; and he was in society bands that played for President Eisenhower's and President Kennedy's inaugural celebrations.

During his New York Years, Salemi turned down job offers from Guy Lombardo (he didn't like the band's style), Xavier Cugat (he didn't want to go on the road), and Glen Gray and the Casa Loma Orchestra (the pay was too low).

 



Album featuring Pete Salemi.

In 1967, Pete Salemi and his wife, Josephine, moved to Rhode Island, where as a member of Local 198, AFofM, he worked with many bands, including, since about 1994, Wes Gough's Jazz Strollers at the Larchwood Inn in Wakefield. In 1995, he was with Jeff Hughes' Brahmin Bellhops on the CD "Who's She Jazzin' Now?" and later appeared with Lost in the Sauce at the Sherborn Inn, Sherborn, Mass. Salemi's last appearance with the Jazz Strollers was September 12, 2002. Three days later he celebrated his 100th birthday. He passed away in his sleep at a nursing home in Coventry, Rhode Island, on January 17, 2003.

At Salemi's wake, according to Hughes, four or five members of a motorcycle gang stood at Salemi's open coffin, and they were crying. They and Salemi belonged to the American Pooling Association, and they respected his expertise at eight-ball pool, which he still played at age 99. Salemi was buried on January 20th with his trombone in his coffin.

Salemi's wife died in 1995. He left a son Joseph A. Salemi of Cranston; a daughter -in-law, Jean Salemi of Coventry, with whom he had resided, and six grandchildren, eight great-grandchildren and four great-great-grandchildren. He was the father of the late John C. Salemi (d. 1993).

Pete, his music and his humorous stories will be missed by all who knew him.  

 

 

Pete Salemi is on trombone on this performance recorded in 1931.

The vocal is by Dick Robertson.

CHECK OUT PART TEN

15 Years & Counting - Marce Enright and New England Traditional Jazz Plus!

For fifteen long years Marce Enright has been a champion and promoter of the New England jazz scene. Her website  New England Traditional Jazz Plus has become a fixture here in New England where she lists all the major jazz events that are upcoming and gives detailed accounts of previous jam sessions, with illustrations of photographs, that she has taken herself, and videos where one can actually see and hear some of the music that has taken place.

 

Marce also puts out reviews and stories and links to various jazz oriented websites as well as mailing out an awesome newsletter with meticulous listings, addresses and contact information for just about every traditional jazz and swing event that will be playing in the New England area.

 

Last year some of the bands that she has publicized, and the fans of those bands, acknowledged her for her terrific and hard work over all the years. She was honored with a special gift at the Jazz Jamboree at the Sherborn Inn, in Sherborn, Massachusetts.

 

I recently saw Marce at a performance of the Wolverine Jazz Band led by John Clark which she was covering. She pointed out that April was Jazz Appreciation Month, which I had no idea and expressed an interest in finding some jazz enthusiasts to help her with collecting information for the performance listings. Anyone who loves jazz and who might be interested  in helping Marce out or anyone interested in ordering her mailed out newsletter can contact her here: marce@nejazz.com. 

Saturday Jazz Performance - Siberian Dixieland - "Sing, Sing, Sing (With A Swing)"

In this weeks Saturday Jazz Performance video we'll see and hear Sing, Sing, Sing (With A Swing) by Siberian Dixieland a group from Russia. They first formed when Ronald Reagan was still in the White House in 1988.

The group started becoming more active since 1991 and has been perofoming straight since then. They have traveled the world and have performed at jazz festivals in the United States, Finland, Estonia, Holland, Germany, even China among others.

 

 

Siberian Dixieland is currently comprised of Sergey Gershenovich, on trumpet; Igor Gulyj, on piano; Vadim Dobrjakov, on trombone; Vladimir Kirpichev, on drums; Ivan Krivtsov, plays both the banjo and guitar and, (of course) the balalaika; Denis Kostin, on tuba (but who also plays guitar) and finally Evgenie Golovanov, on saxophone. They have put out many CDs.

Sing, Sing Sing (With A Swing) was written by trumpeter Louis Prima in 1936 and recorded the same year. However Jimmy Dorsey and Fletcher Henderson also made early recordings of the tune. It didn't become a Swing classic however until Benny Goodman recorded Jimmy Mundy's arrangement of it on July 6, 1937. It further became legendary when it brought down the house on January 16, 1938 at Benny Goodman's Carnegie Hall Jazz Concert.

Here now is Siberian Dixieland's version of Sing, Sing, Sing (With A Swing) from February 18, 2009 in Novosibirsk.

FROM THE ARCHIVES - Berlin, 1962

Here is a picture of George A. Borgman before his jazz writing career with his two children Carole and Paul taken on the balcony of his home in West Berlin in 1962.

 

 

SEE THE PREVIOUS "FROM THE ARCHIVES!"

Saturday Jazz Performance - Max Keenlyside plays "Maple Leaf Rag"

This week for the Saturday Jazz Performance lets have a little fun! Since it is the first Saturday of the month I'm focusing on a jazz piano performance. Now, I've heard of two pianos being played together, but not by the same pianist!

This week Canadian Max Keenlyside performs Scott Joplin's Maple Leaf Rag, on two pianos at once.

Scott Joplin

Maple Leaf Rag was one of the great ragtime composer Scott Joplin's early works. It was copyrighted on September 8, 1899. It became a sensation and the model for most ragtime compositions afterwards. Over the nest twenty years Joplin wrote about four dozen ragtime piano compositions. The Maple Leaf Rag outsold every other musical piece that John Stark published and Joplin survived on the royalties from it until he died in 1917.

Max Keenlyside is a piano player and composer. He travels the world playing at festivals and has built up a reputation as an excellent performer and composer. In 2009 he represented Prince Edward Island in the National Artist’s Program and completed a thirty-five minute symphony for an orchestrain 2014.

Here he plays the Maple Leaf Rag just for fun on two pianos in 2014.

 

 

Here is a 2013 Keenlyside video performance where he plays more seriously demonstrating Stride piano by playing four tunes Snowy Morning Blues and Carolina Shout both composed by James P. Johnson and Keep Your Temper and Echoes of Spring by Willie "The Lion" Smith.

 



Piano Master Neville Dickie Returns to Massachusetts on May 12, 2015

Being the Yankee Jazz Beat I thought it appropriate to report on the return of British stride pianist extraordinaire Neville Dickie to Massachusetts. Since the closing of the Sherborn Inn to jazz last year, finding the right venue for Dickie to perform that actually had he proper piano requirements took a bit of searching. Fortunately, a place was found at the Bella Costa Ristorante in Framingham, Massachusetts where he will appear with some of his musician friends on May 12th at 7:00 PM.

Neville Dickie

 

Dickie has been visiting Massachusetts from Surrey, England for special appearances each year for about twenty years. He is considered a "National  Treasure" in Britain for his mastery of Boogie Woogie and Stride piano. He has made hundreds of appearances on BBC radio playing both solo and with his trio. He tours extensively across the US. and all over the world including Germany, France and Switzerland.

Accompanying Dickie on May 12th will be Stan McDonald, Jeff Hughes, Ross Petot and Steve Taddeo.

For reservations call Bella Costa Ristorante, 147 Cochituate Road, Framingham, MA, (508) 626-1726. 

Saturday Jazz Performance - "Down In Honky Tonky Town" - The Rent Party Revelers

Here is a great jazz performance from yesteryear! Yesteryear being November of 1992. The Rent Party Revelers is a group of musicians led by cornetist Tex Wyndham. The group is usually made up of musicians who happen to be available and their CDs have many different artists from one album to the next.

One thing that each of their albums are is lively and this 1992 performance of Chris Smith and Charles McCarron's Down in Honky Tonky Town filmed at the 13th Annual San Diego Thanksgiving Jazz Festival in San Diego, California, is a great example of the band in their prime.

The music for Down in Honky Tonky Town came out about 1916. It was written and composed by Charles McCarron and Chris Smith.

McCarron was born in 1891 and is considered a Tin Pan Alley composer. He was responsible for the lyrics on this tune. He died only a few years after it's release in 1919.

Chris Smith

Smith was a prolific black American composer. He was born in Charleston, South Carolina in 1879. Smith started out as a performer in medicine shows and moved into the minstrel shows and vaudeville. He worked closely with the star comedian, Bert Williams and would eventually move to New York perminently where he wrote music for such entertainers as Jimmy Durante and Fanny Brice.

 

His first piano rag to be published was Monkey Rag in 1911. Then he had a mega hit in 1913 with Ballin' the Jack in which Jim Burrus wrote the lyrics. Smith died on October 4, 1949 after having had a long career in composing some great American music which is still popular with jazz bands today.

In the following performance Tex Wyndham is on cornet, Ray Heitger is on clarinet, Jim Riley sings and is on banjo, while Noel Kaletsky plays sax, Dave Oswald plays the tuba, Roger Munnell is on trombone, with Ed Metz at the piano and Ted les Plantes on drums.

The Rent Party Revelers playing Down in Honky Tonky Town

 at the 13th Annual San Diego Thanksgiving Jazz Festival

in San Diego, California in November 1992.

Geoff Cole's Hot Five - Do What Ory Say CD Review by George A. Borgman

Geoff Cole's Hot Five is a hot quintet, no doubt about that, and each of the musicians, outstanding on his instrument, plays with feeling, dynamics and splendid technique.

 

They produce a wonderful blending of sounds. There is outstanding counterpoint between Geoff Cole's trombone - frequently emitting a very gutsy, robust sound - and Tony Pyke's clarinet with its wonderful tone.

 

The choice of tunes is exceptional and there is no attempt to sound like a New Orleans street band in a funeral parade. Cole plays plays a gutsy trombone and there are nice solos from Pyke's clarinet and pianist Pat Hawes on, "The White Cliff of Dover."

 

There is some very active counterpoint between Hawes piano, the clarinet and trombone on the swinging "Savoy Blues." The two best renditions are those of

"Savoy Blues" and Clarence William's "Sugar Blues" which, with its "wah-wah" trumpet has always been associated with Clyde McCoy, of course.

 

Cole's muted trombone takes the place of McCoy's trumpet, with very good effect. The clarinet takes the melody for awhile and Hawes' piano takes a great blusey chorus. The ensemble work on Carmen Lombardo's "Sweethearts On Parade" is first class.

 

Geoff Cole's Hot Five has produced an excellent recording. - George A. Borgman, IAJRC Journal

Savoy Blues - Recorded by Jazz Crusade Records, 7 May 1995 at Pizza Express, Maidstone, England. Personnel: Geoff Cole [trombone] Tony Pyke [clarinet] Pat Hawes [piano] John Rodber [string bass] Colin Miller [drums] Recording Engineer: Dave Bennett; Video: Jill Spencer.

 

Suger Blues - Recorded by Jazz Crusade Records, 7 May 1995 at Pizza Express, Maidstone, England. Personnel: Geoff Cole [trombone] Tony Pyke [clarinet] Pat Hawes [piano] John Rodber [string bass] Colin Miller [drums] Recording Engineer: Dave Bennett; Video: Jill Spencer.

 

 

 

FROM THE ARCHIVES - 1993 Blue Horizon Jazz Band Promotional Card

Here is a publicity card from Stan McDonald's Blue Horizon Jazz Band from the Fall of 1993.

Stan McDonald and his band are still playing! They play the first Thursday of the month at the Caffe Primavera in Millis, Massachusetts.

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Saturday Jazz Performance - Terry Waldo Plays "12th Street Rag" and "Proctology"

Today for the Saturday Jazz Performance we have a two for one post! The first Saturday of the month is reserved for piano performances. Here we look at the much accomplished pianist Terry Waldo.

Terry Waldo was born in Ohio in 1944 and began studying classical piano at around the age of eight. He quickly changed direction and fell in love with jazz and ragtime.

He specializes in playing ragtime and early jazz, but he is also a composer, arranger and author. Waldo wrote the book This Is Ragtime and has  composed music for such productions as Storyville: The Naked Dance, Blackness: The Rise and Fall of Jack Johnson and The Tonight Show. He has recorded many CDs which are available at his website.

Here he performs at the piano in 2006. It's not known whether Proctology is a lament or a celebration, but, it is one of Waldo's  many compositions.





In this next video Waldo plays this classic piece 12th Street Rag in his own comic way!

12th Street Rag was written by Euday L. Bowman and published by the Jenkins Music Company in 1914.  It wasn't until 1919 that lyrics were added to the composition by James S. Sumner.

Over the years the tune has had many revivals and just about every jazz band imaginable has played it. 12th Street Rag is still popular to this day among jazz bands and fans alike.

So, without further ado... Terry Waldo in a performance from 2007...



Jazz Performance Saturday! - Doc Cheatham plays "Someday You'll Be Sorry"

Jazz Performance Saturday is here again. This Saturday will show a performance by Doc Cheatham and his band at the 1985 Chicago Jazz Festival as they play Someday You'll Be Sorry.

Someday You'll Be Sorry is a Louis Armstrong composition that became a jazz standard. Here Doc Cheatham plays with Bud Freeman's group at the Festival, although Freeman sat out. Doc plays trumpet and sings, while Stu Katz plays piano, Bobby Roberts is on guitar, John Bany is plucking the bass and Barrett Deems is playing drums. 

"Someday You'll Be Sorry" - 1985

Memories of a Jazz Journalist - Part Eight - Moshe Feldman by George A. Borgman

Here is a continuation of a series of entries that come from an article that George wrote in 2004 entitled Memories of A Jazz Journalist.

 

Pianist Moshe Feldman (Boston, MA), an immigrant from the Soviet Union, gave me the lowdown on the KGB's displeasure with Russian jazz musicians performing at the American Embassy in Moscow. Also, the players wanted to be paid in American beer instead of the worthless rubles.

Moshe Feldman known also by the moniker "Moishe from Russia" is a concert pianist and educator specializing in traditional jazz and Klezmer music. He often lectures and gives demonstrations on the early roots of jazz piano, and varying styles of piano playing techniques from the ragtime of  Scott Joplin, to Harlem Stride.

He continues to play with various jazz musicians including clarinetist Billy Novick. Watch him play Midnight in Moscow with The Last Minutemen in 2012!

 

CHECK OUT PART NINE

The End of An Era - The Sherborn Inn Shuts It's Doors To Trad Jazz

Sherborn Inn

On December 23, 2014 the last of Jazz at the Sherborn Inn in Sherborn, Massachusetts was celebrated with a free Jazz jamboree. The Sherborn Inn had been the home of many jazz bands in the area over a period of nineteen years.

 Craig Ball on clarinet!

The last performance at the Inn was made up of a mixture of musicians who had been playing at the Sherborn Inn with various bands over the years. Some of the performers included were Craig Ball, Frank Batchelor, John Clark, Dan Gabel, Gerry Gagnon, John Kafalas, Bob MacInnis, Dave MacMillan, Richard Malcolm, Mollie Malone, Stan McDonald, Ross Petot, Jeff Stout, and Steve Taddeo.

John Clark on clarinet!

Funnyman and jazz super fan Myron Idelson and jazz reporter Marcelle Enright  were awarded mementos for their loyalty to the Massachusetts jazz scene.

All in all, it was a rather melancholy affair. The place was packed, but because of this, the announcements and speeches of the various band leaders was drowned out by a drone of people not interested in hearing their words.

I myself, was prevented from taking any pictures near the end of the concert because two rude dancers, even though I was there in front of the band first with my camera raised, pushed past me two do their bizarre meanderings right in front of me as I was about to take a picture. 

Even though some great New England talent played, the large crowd and some rude people put a dampener on the evening.

Saturday Jazz Performance - "Everybody Loves My Baby" - Shirazz

This week we're focusing in on some Traditional Jazz from down under in the form of Shirazz a six piece Dixieland Band from Melbourne, Australia.

Here we see and hear Shirazz playing Everybody Loves My Baby in their own special way!

Everybody Loves My Baby was written by Spencer Williams and Jack Palmer and was published in 1924. That year it immediately began it's long career as a recorded song being recorded by the likes of Aileen Stanley and the International Novelty Orchestra (9-19-24), Louis Armstrong with Clarence Williams' Blue Five (11-6-24) as well as Fletcher Henderson (11-24-24) and many others.

Shirazz at the Grampians Jazz Festival 2014

Check out their website HERE!

Here we have Aileen Stanley singing the tune with the International Novelty Orchestra.

A Tribute to the Original Crane River Jazz Band by the Ken Colyer Trust Jazz Band CD Review by George A. Borgman

The Ken Colyer Trust New Orleans Jazz Band performs on this recording in tribute to the Original Crane River Jazz Band which attempted to emulate the black New Orleans jazz sound. The band pays tribute to the Cranes and does not attempt to copy them, according to Big Bill Bissonnette's album notes.

 

This CD features great ensemble playing from the front line and interesting contrapuntal support for the solos and melodic leads. Hugh Crozier takes excellent piano solos and the rhythm section is very solid with Malcolm Hurrell playing fine rhythmic banjo, Terry Knight plucking very well the bass strings, and drummer Male Murphy does everything correctly, using all the accouterments of his drum set.

The tunes have been well selected. "Down in Jungle Town," the opener, from 1908, immediately presents the listener with various elements of the New Orleans sound with trombonist Dave Vickers doing his stuff from the beginning backed by the steady rhythm section.

 

In 1923, reedman Art Kassel (leader of Chicago "sweet" dance and stage bands) and drummer Vie Berton (manager of Bix Beiderbecke's Wolverines, beginning in 1924) wrote "Sobbin' Blues." Since then there were numerous recordings of it by such bands as King Oliver's Creole Jazz Band (Okeh label), the New Orleans Rhythm Kings (Gennett), Ted Lewis' (Columbia), Lew Brown's (Bluebird), Bunny Berigan's (Victor), and Artie Shaw and His Strings (Brunswick). On this rendition of "Sobbin' Blues," clarinetist Norman Field plays very good counterpoint behind the melodic line.

 

"Wolverine Blues" (1923) was written by Jelly Roll Morton along with, according to some sources, the brothers Benjamin F. and John C. Spikes. It was recorded by the New Orleans Rhythm Kings (Gennett 5102, 1923); by Morton, on solo piano (Gennett 5289, 1923-24) and by his Red Hot Peppers (Victor 21064, June 10, 1927); and by Larry Clinton and His Orchestra (Victor, 25863). Here, in a rendition that is more than seven minutes long, there is great stride piano during several choruses followed by some lively playing by the clarinet, Norman Thatcher's and Sonny Morris' trumpets and the trombone in wonderful togetherness.

 

In 1939, Morton copyrighted his "I Thought I Heard Buddy Bolden Say," also known as "Buddy Bolden Blues," and here it is performed wonderfully with a fine piano solo and some nice duet choruses from the trumpets. Another excellent trumpet duet is heard on "Pretty Baby," a Tin Pan Alley tune that was introduced to the public in 1915 through A World of Pleasure, a Broadway musical, and it was interpolated by Dolly Hackett in The Passing Show of 1916, also a stage musical. Subsequently, "Pretty Baby" was featured in a dozen motion pictures. And the group does very well on "Wabash Blues" which features a wonderful piano solo.

 

On this compact disc, the superb musical sounds, influenced by the Original Crane River Jazz Band, are those associated with old New Orleans. This CD is one of Jazz Crusade's better releases in recent years.   - George A. Borgman, IAJRC Journal

Tap Dancing Legend Bunny Briggs Dead at 92

Tap dancer extraordinaire Bunny Briggs died at the age of 92 in Las Vegas on November 15, 2014. 

"Bunny" Briggs was born Bernard in Harlem on February 26, 1922 on Lenox Avenue. His mother was Alma Briggs who in 1920 was living with her mother Abrialla and her brothers and sister. Briggs got his nickname "Bunny" from his grandmother. Every time she would come home from work he'd quickly scoot out of the room and get her slippers for her. 



Bill Robinson

Show business was in his family. His Aunt Gladys was a chorus girl who in 1925 was performing at the Lincoln Theatre. Brigg's mother took him to see her perform around this time. Upon seeing tap dancer Bill "Bojangles" Robinson, dance at the same theater he told his mother he wanted to be a dancer. "He started dancing and I just sat there in awe. At that time, I knew, what I was going to do." After this incident it was basically cast in stone that he was going to be a dancer.

After learning tap dancing from the streets of Harlem, by 1927 he was dancing with a children's group called Porkchops, Navy, Rice, and Beans. They would perform to tunes like Bugle Call Blues at ballrooms across New York City. 

Bunny Briggs tells the story best himself. "I started performing tap in the street. The record store used to put the "Amos n' Andy" show on the loudspeaker so people in the street could stop and listen to it. The owners would say, 'Bunny, as soon as 'Amos n' Andy' goes off, we'll put a record on and you start dancing.' And that's what I did. People would throw money at me and I'd take it home to my mother, which I was very happy to do. I was around 5 or 6." 

Luckey Roberts

He was quickly "discovered" by jazz pianist Luckey Roberts. Again Briggs tells how it was, "Next thing I knew, Luckey Roberts was in my house talking to my mother, and I was working with his orchestra, Luckey Roberts and his Society Entertainers. We went into houses of the blue bloods: the Astors, the Wanamakers, the Fords, the DuPonts. It was excellent. All I could smell was gardenias and champagne. They bought me toys, they sent my mother all kinds of gifts-the apartment filled up."

In August 1931 he was accompanying Roberts and his sextet on a weekend cruise of the, "French line steamship Paris, to Bermuda."

He was only seven years old when he appeared with Luckey Roberts at the Cocoanut Grove in Palm Beach, Florida where the local newspaper reported, "In addition to the regular cakewalk which never fails of high entertainment... there will be special features. "Lucky" Roberts... song composer from New York and Bunny Briggs a seven-year-old whose song-and-dance numbers created such unusual interest last Wednesday night will be included."

When he was around ten years old he took part in his first stage show at the Harlem Opera House with Cab Calloway, but things didn't go so well, "I had stage fright. The music played but I just froze. I didn't care." However, Briggs appeared, billed just as "Bunny," in the 1932 Steppin Fetchit film Slow Poke. 

Being a professional dancer as a child and dancing at one engagement after another could cause problems. New York's Gerry Society whose official name was the New York Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children forced Briggs to stop all his engagements and attend school.

His mother Alma must have been happy that he was no longer performing because she was never thrilled with her son being an entertainer. Charlie Barnet wrote that his, "mother didn't like show business and once told me that she would rather see her son running an elevator than doing what he was." Barnet also suggested that Briggs' mother had influence over him and stated that, "he had a strong mother-complex which I think eventually kept him from being a big star."

It was about 1940 when Bunny Briggs seems to have begun dancing again professionally. From this time on he would be dancing with some of the biggest Big Bands in the business; Count Basie, Earl Hines, Tommy Dorsey, Charlie Barnet and Duke Ellington.

Since he would improvise when he danced and wasn't working from a set routine, he could move from one band to another and easily adapt to their varying styles.

"I was always an improvisation dancer. I never danced to the same tune more than two or three times. My style is carefree. It’s carefree and hard, but I try to make it look easy.” He created a paddle-and-roll style of tapping, but he never bothered naming or labeling any of his specific steps and moves.

Briggs was performing in a Baltimore at a club in 1940 where he would dance on a table for part of his routine, when Charlie Barnet who was performing at the Royal Theatre, stopped by and saw him dance for the first time.

In his autobiography, Those Swinging Years, Barnet said he thought Briggs was, "one of the most talented performers I have ever seen. He was quite young... he really had it all. He was a sensational dancer, had a distinctive singing style and a great personality... He made several records with us and one in particular, East Side, West Side, was a big hit. It didn't matter whether we were at the Apollo or the Paramount, before a black or a white audience, Bunny broke up every show and was always a smash hit."

In early 1942 he worked a long stint at Small's Paradise a night club in Harlem. He would then sign up with Crane Management, run by Louise Crane, in June.

On August 13, 1942 Briggs began an eleven week run at New York's Kelly's Stable. On November 2nd he started at Club 666 in Detroit which was his second night club appearance outside of New York at that time.

During the 40s Briggs was being billed as the Prince Charming of Taps touring with several bands.

From November 10, 1945 until the closing show on June 29, 1946 he played Cicero in the Broadway musical comedy Are You With It?

Briggs was appearing with the Charlie Barnet and His Famous Orchestra in 1947 and in late 1948 he was touring with Boyd Raeburn and His Orchestra.

 

Oct. 1948 with Erskine Hawkins Band.

By the end of the 1940s Briggs began his numerous television appearances. On the December 12, 1948 he was on the Ed Sullivan Show making an appearance.

In the first half of 1949 Fox shot a Movietone short of the Charlie Barnet Orchestra with Bunny Briggs playing the Western Union delivery man. He did another stint on the Ed Sullivan show on October 30, 1949.

Briggs was featured dancing in the May 1950 Universal short film King Cole Trio & Benny Carter Orchestra. He was also featured on the television show Cavalcade of Bands at least once in the 50s.

On May 27, 1951 he made another appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show and a few years later on March 12, 1955 he was the guest dancer on the Jackie Gleason Show.

In early September 1956 Briggs appeared for a week with the Lloyd Price big band in Washington, D. C. With the help of Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker Briggs developed a style of tap dancing that worked well with bebop. At the 1960 Monterey Jazz Festival, Briggs danced with the Duke Ellington Orchestra. Soon he was being eluded to as, "Duke's dancer," because he worked with him so often.

1962 Newport Jazz Festival. Bunny on right.

By 1962 when he appeared with several other tap dancers at the Newport Jazz Festival the newspapers were billing tap as a "dying art." Around the same time he was a guest on the Tonight Show that August.

Duke Ellington asked Briggs to be the solo dancer for his David Danced Before the Lord number that had been featured in the 1961 film Paris Blues. It was to be part of Ellington's Concert of Sacred Music and would be performed in a church.

Briggs who had earlier in his life contemplated being a Catholic priest was a very religious man and hesitated to accept Ellington's offer in the fear that tap dancing in a church could prove sacrilegious. "When I first heard the song, I thought it was pretty, but I didn't want to dance to it in the church. Because in the church you can't go for laughs, you can't go for applause." But after praying for guidance he decided to do it. "I prayed to God. I asked God to give me the routine." Later, he wasn't even aware of what he actually danced. "A haze came over me, and I wasn't drunk. I was together."

The performance premiered at Grace Cathedral in San Francisco on September 16, 1965. This concert was filmed and has been highly praised.

Briggs continued dancing to the piece over the next several years with Ellington's Orchestra. He performed it on the Ed Sullivan Show in 1966 and later that year at the Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church for the New York premiere the day after Christmas. Again he performed it on December 2, 1967 at Constitution Hall in Washington, D. C. and once more at the  Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York City on January 19, 1968. Later other tap dancers would perform to this number including Baby Laurence, Buster Brown and Rich Rahn.

In the 1970s he continued touring and made more appearances on the Tonight Show, Apollo Uptown and Monk's Time as well as performing on cruise ships. Saxophonist Houston Person invited Briggs to dance on his recording of the Jerry Jeff Walker tune Mr. Bojangles for his album Broken Windows, Empty Hallways in 1972. 

 

Starting with the 1979 documentary No Maps on My Taps, Bunny Briggs' television appearances picked up and he had a career Renaissance. Tap dancing made a reasurgence in the 80s. Bunny Briggs and many of his fellow tap dancers were touring and making appearances more and more.

On television in 1980 he was seen in Uptown: A Tribute to the Apollo Theatre. He performed in Sweet Saturday Night in Europe and then worked on the Broadway production, My One and Only in 1983.

Briggs toured Europe with The Hoofers which included Briggs and the tap dancers Lon Chaney, Chuck Green, Jimmy Slyde, and Sandman Sims. He then appeared in Motown Returns to the Apollo, a two hour NBC Special in May of 1985. He was included in the 1986 video compilation, Doctor Duck's Super Secret All-Purpose Sauce. He also acted in the television movie Mike's Talent Show which aired in 1987.

1989 was a big year for Briggs starting on January 26th 1989 he played a hoofer in the popular Broadway musical Black and Blue for which he was nominated for a Tony Award in 1989. He appeared in the Gregory Hines movie Tap where he does a great job singing the Dorothy Fields-Jimmy McHugh song On the Sunny Side of the Street. He further appeared in Tap Dancers in America the same year which aired on PBS' Great Performances.

On January 20, 1991, Black and Blue played its final performance. A few months later, on May 3rd the film A Rage in Harlem was released in which his wife, the former harpist, Olivette Miller Briggs acted in.

Oklahoma City University honored Briggs with an an honorary doctorate of Performing Arts in 2002.

His wife Olivette died on April 27, 2003. Three years later, in 2006, he was inducted in the Tap Dance Hall of Fame.

Bunny Briggs died in Las Vegas, Nevada, where he had lived for many years on Saturday, November 15, 2014.

Here is a great page that I encourage people to check out!

Bunny Briggs Tap Master and Vocalist

and

The New York Times Bunny Briggs Obituary

and

Services set for legendary tap dancer Bunny Briggs

Saturday Jazz Performance - "Lovesick Blues" - Tuba Skinny

There was nothing that George A. Borgman loved more than young people playing Traditional and Old Time Jazz. Tuba Skinny is a perfect example of this.

The group is a blues and jazz band based out of New Orleans that was formed in 2009. They are known for their street performances and have played all over the world. They specialize in recreating the music of the 20s and 30s but also play more modern tunes as well as their own creations.

 

In this video performance filmed on Royal Street, in New Orleans on April 22, 2010 we hear singer Erika Lewis sing Lovesick Blues.

 

Lovesick Blues was originally published as I've Got the Lovesick Blues in 1922. It was written by Cliff Friend and Irving Mills for the musical Oh! Ernest where Anna Chandler first performed it. It appears to have been first recorded by Jack Shea for Vocalion in the Summer of 1922.

 

It became a fairly popular tune to record over the years but became a hit for Country artist Hank Williams in 1949. In fact, Erika Lewis incorporates the yodeling that both Emmet Miller used in the 20s and Hank Williams used in the 40s.

 

 

In this performance we have a seven member band made up of Shaye Cohn, from Boston, on cornet, Todd Burdick on tuba and Kiowa Wells on guitar. Burdick and Wells, I believe are credited with starting the group. Also, in this video are Robin Rapuzzi on washboard, Barnabus Jones on trombone and finally the clarinet player might be John Doyle.

 

A great article online that sums up the band and its history can be found HERE!

FROM THE ARCHIVES: "Eager Pupils Swamp School's Musical Staff"

This entry highlights George Allan Borgman's time in the 1950s as a music teacher. In this article, "Eager Pupils Swamp School's Musical Staff," from the September 20, 1956 edition of the Nevada State Journal based out of Reno. George, named as Allan, is mentioned suggesting that there just weren't enough instruments to go around for all the students who wanted to join the Lovelock Elementary School band.

 

In his early music career George taught music and band in a few states. He worked as music director in Lovelock for a couple of years. It was in Lovelock that he met his future wife Janet Ferroli, an elementary school teacher from New England.

 

 

CHECK OUT THE LAST "FROM THE ARCHIVES!"