tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6853772569125614798.post684597321961142486..comments2024-03-28T16:42:36.533-07:00Comments on JazzProfiles: Balliett on Bix - "The Other Cheek"Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6853772569125614798.post-87004278689926296602023-01-20T12:43:58.683-08:002023-01-20T12:43:58.683-08:00The well-known homage of Bix by Louis Armstrong (&...The well-known homage of Bix by Louis Armstrong ("Ain't nobody played like him yet,") and other praise from Armstrong and the reports of the night they jammed together while both were playing with other bands in Chicago belie the suggestion that Armstrong had to "figure out a way to fit in with Bix." They were both great musicians who got each other's playing well and likely had no racial differences or difficulties to overcome to play with each other.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6853772569125614798.post-2077807516982813252019-03-10T14:01:24.341-07:002019-03-10T14:01:24.341-07:00Reading Balliett's comments on Bix was fascina...Reading Balliett's comments on Bix was fascinating. I remember "The Bix Beiderbecke Legend" compilation well and agree with most of what Balliett had to say about Bix, particularly how none of his many imitators (Black as well as white) captured his magic. At the same time the use of the term "Negro" to denote Black musicians dates the piece, and the idea that we don't have records of Bix at his best because the institutionalized racism of the time prevented him from recording with Black musicians just seems wrong to me. Bix seems to me to be the first major jazz musician who worked out a distinctively "white" form of jazz. Bix learned to play jazz from the records of the white Original Dixieland Jazz Band and therefore any Black elements in his playing came only second- or third-hand -- which explains the rhythmic stiffness Balliett correctly identifies as Bix's biggest weakness. With the possible exception of Rex Stewart, the Black musicians who understood where Bix was coming from and incorporated his lyricism into their styles -- from Lester Young to Miles Davis -- came after Bix's death. The one record Bix made with a Black musician, Bubber Miley (Hoagy Carmichael's "Rockin' Chair," from the same date as "Barnacle Bill, the Sailor") shows how little Bix and Miley had to say to each other; as I once pointed out on the Bixography Forum, they both spoke the jazz language but profoundly different dialects of it. (I'd make an exception for Louis Armstrong, whose own talents were so extensive and powerful he would have figured out a way to fit in with Bix if they could have recorded together.)mgconlanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09328563476025164608noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6853772569125614798.post-32191095525397789392019-03-10T08:35:35.982-07:002019-03-10T08:35:35.982-07:00My father was a magazine editor who took delight i...My father was a magazine editor who took delight in trying to find the exceedingly rare typographical error in the New Yorker magazine--the magazine's copy editors were just that good.<br /><br />So, I doubt that in the article's original version in the New Yorker had "Hoist" instead of "Holst." Although "Hoist the Planets" has a certain poetic quality about it.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6853772569125614798.post-81584066250900065672018-05-30T17:04:13.482-07:002018-05-30T17:04:13.482-07:00I was just looking for Balliett's later NYRB p...I was just looking for Balliett's later NYRB piece on Bix. Of course the 'pneumonia' was chronic while the Delirium Tremens seem to have actually killed him. And he seemed to have been doomed by alcohol well before he first recorded.<br /><br />And still, Bix's talent is breathtaking and the loss still shocking. With no romantic trappings, Bix deserves full respect and attention. While it's often noted how music apartheid kept Bix from his best contemporary colleagues (and perhaps the audience that could have appreciated him) his own quirky education and unreliability kept him out of the busy recording culture that Venuti/Lang, the young Dorseys, Red Nichols filled with hundreds of sides that ought to have included Bix.Polyphemushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11353247003149667295noreply@blogger.com