|
Post by AlanB on Apr 9, 2014 6:05:46 GMT -5
I thought in the early days of this forum I posted this but as I can't locate it I guess it's a "senior" moment for me. Written in 1991 and much to add in the past couple of decades. Rather lengthy but try to bear with it. Attachments:POliver91.doc (85 KB)
|
|
|
Post by Admin on Apr 9, 2014 7:38:04 GMT -5
It was possibly one of those threads I accidentally deleted when doing my "imfamous" cleanup back a few months ago...I apologize profusely for my blunder.
I love that article Alan. The following made me wonder just who the singers might have been?
"...As a young teenager I was doing summer farm work in Suffolk as part of the "war effort" in 1942, and a U.S. air base was being constructed nearby. Black servicemen were "digging in," and I heard two of them on fatigues singing what were to me the strangest, most moving, and most thrilling songs I had ever heard; from that day on I was hooked on blues..."
|
|
|
Post by AlanB on Apr 9, 2014 8:08:31 GMT -5
Don't worry about it. There's a whole bunch more folk here than first time around. Paul's often been asked this and he doesn't know. Suffolk used to have a very active traditional music scene. www.mustrad.org.uk/
|
|
|
Post by carolinablues on Apr 18, 2015 9:40:06 GMT -5
Who, besides McGhee and Terry from the Piedmont visited Europe during the 60s?
|
|
|
Post by AlanB on Apr 19, 2015 6:12:14 GMT -5
Does Josh White qualify? Toured UK, Italy prolifically 1950-1952. Recorded a session in July 1950 for the BBC. Back in UK 1956
|
|
|
Post by AlanB on Apr 19, 2015 9:08:44 GMT -5
This is rather ancient but gives the basics, so as to speak!
The Blues Word Chapter 9: Bob Groom The Blues Revival, Studio Vista Blues Paperbacks, 1971 p. 88-91
The immense amount of information gathered by blues research of all kinds over the past twenty years has constituted a huge volume of published material, which is a tribute to the enthusiasm and thoroughness of blues-lovers. The proliferation of writing on the blues has kept everyone interested in the music well informed and constantly supplied with reading matter on the subject. In addition it has helped to spread the word about the music and bring it to the attention of the community at large. This dual function of communicating information and publicising the blues began in the jazz magazines in the early '40s, long before there was any sign of the separate blues literature that exists today.
As early as 1936 the English publication Rhythm On Record printed a photograph of Gus Cannon's Jug Stompers and listed their recordings. In the late 20s Abbe Niles and other commentators had written about blues 78s as they were released. There had been a number of books on blues and negro folk music (see the chapter 'Going Down South'). All these writings, however, existed in a vacuum, for the international blues audience did not yet exist and interest in serious study of the blues was minimal, and specialised at that. Most of the publicity for blues recordings was aimed at the 'race' market and much of it can best be described as patronising and rather infantile (notwithstanding its use today by some reissue companies to give their products 'period charm').
In the late '30s and early '40s a number of important jazz books were published, several of which referred to blues. In Shining Trumpets (I946) Rudi Blesh discussed black folk music recordings and described a number of blues, including Robert Johnson's Hellhound On My Trail. Hugues Panassie, pioneer French jazz enthusiast, wrote about blues singers in his The Real Jazz (I942) but displayed a somewhat distorted viewpoint, typical of many jazz writers then who viewed blues as the primitive forerunner of jazz, which had reached its peak with the female blues singers of the '20s and subsequently declined. (To quote Panassie: 'Though numerous other men, such as the late Robert Johnson, merit inclusion among the blues singers, all those I know are so inferior to the great women blues singers such as Bessie Smith, Ma Rainey or even Bessie Jackson that I see no point in discussing them.') Blues appreciation has made great strides since then and most jazz writers now display a much more informed and balanced attitude towards the blues.
In America, tentative blues criticism appeared in the short lived magazine Jazz Information. In Britain, in the '40s, Albert McCarthy (now editor of Jazz Monthly) and Max Jones (who has for many years written a blues column for the music weekly Melody Maker) were active in the research and publicising of blues. McCarthy co-operated with Dave Carey in compiling the valuable discography Jazz Directory, while Jones produced a Jazz Appreciation Society booklet on Leadbelly and a feature 'On Blues' for the I946 PL Yearbook of Jazz, amongst other writings on the subject. Iain Lang prepared a Workers' Music Association Booklet, Background Of The Blues, which served as a basis for his later book Jazz In Perspective (Heinemann).
In the '50s the gulf yawned wider between the genuine blues enthusiasts and those jazz writers who wanted to crystallise the blues in time at the expense of recognising the many wonderful blues singers still active. There was a dichotomy even within one writer's attitude; noted Belgian critic Yannick Bruynoghe, writing in Just Jazz (I956), described the Chicago blues scene of the time and mentioned many then unknown artists, and yet five years later his comments on certain blues singers in Jazz Era: The Forties (MacGibbon & Kee) showed a certain ignorance of developments in the blues field (as well as a distinct prejudice against some performers).
Jazzbook I955 (Cassell) gives a good idea of the slant in blues writing at that time. It included articles by Alexis Korner ('Ragtime, Ringshouts and Hollers'), Albert McCarthy ('Rhythm and Blues') and Frederic Ramsey Jr. (on Sonny Terry), as well as Big Bill Broonzy's 'Blues In 1890'. Just Jazz 3, edited by Sinclair Traill and Gerald Lascelles and published by Four Square in I959, included 'The Blues: A Study In Ambiguity' by Ernest Borneman and the timely 'Gold In The Junkyards' by Tony Standish. The latter article drew attention to the neglect of many jazz and blues artists and made a plea for this to be rectified, before it was too late. It was in part answered over the next few years as the blues revival gathered impetus.
Informed writing was also to be found in the jazz magazines of the period. Jazz Journal carried, as it still does, a blues page by Derrick Stewart-Baxter, whose 'Blues on Record', which commenced in August I958, was a valuable alphabetical guide to available releases; the paper also printed blues articles by writers like Panassie, Graham Boatfield, Tony Standish and Stanley Dance. Throughout the '50s, both Jazz Journal and Jazz Monthly devoted space to discographical research into the blues. Jazz Monthly regularly featured valuable blues articles, and in the late '50s and early '60s Paul Oliver contributed his important monthly 'Screening The Blues' column, which dealt with both discographical and biographical research and served as a forum for discussion of blues topics. Oliver also wrote features for Music Mirror, in the mid-'50s, and later for Jazz News and Jazz Review. At this time James Asman, who co-edited the Jazz Appreciation Society booklets in the '40s and contributed 'Blues Galore' a survey of blues by artists like Texas Alexander, Leroy Carr and Buddy Moss - to the May/June I946 booklet, was reviewing blues records, such as the Riverside/London 10" LP series, in the pop weekly Record Mirror.
Jazzbeat, which was published at the time of the R&B boom in Britain - the first issue appeared in January 1964 - and edited by Pat Richards, had regular blues coverage by Oliver, Chris Roby and others. Roby also contributed to the American publication Rhythm and Blues, which in the mid' 60s, under the editorship of Jim Delehant, laid greater emphasis on genuine blues than it had before. Unfortunately, this did not go down well with the black audience at whom the publication was principally aimed, since they wished to read about current R&B stars; and the magazine was eventually withdrawn from circulation. In the United States, a number of jazz magazines had given coverage to blues for many years, notably Jazz Report, which was first published, in St Louis, by Bob Koester, who later briefly ran a duplicated Blues News from his Chicago record mart. The editorship passed to Paul Affeldt (who still runs it) in 1960. In the early '60s this magazine gave a great deal of coverage to blues and for a time carried a supplement entitled 'Blues Report' which was compiled by Chris Strachwitz. In 1964 it was combined for a time with Music Memories of Birmingham, Alabama, a now defunct publication which included Alabama blues research and articles on pianist Robert McCoy, who was discovered by editor Pat Cather and recorded for the latter's Vulkan label. Throughout the '60s, the internationally published American bi-weekly jazz magazine Down Beat regularly carried a blues column by assistant editor Pete Welding and sometimes feature articles on blues singers. Record Research, published by Leonard Kunstadt and Bob Colton in New York, included regular blues items through the '60S, some of them contributed by Sam Charters. Its companion magazine Blues Research has been published on an occasional basis since I959 and contains post-war label listings and discographical research, compiled by Anthony Rotante and Paul Sheatsley.
The first blues periodical in Europe (and probably in the world) was R & B Panorama, published by Serge Tonneau in Brussells. Kurt Mohr contributed a great deal of valuable discographical research to this publication. The first comprehensive all blues magazine to be published in English was Blues Unlimited, edited by Simon A. Napier and Mike Leadbitter at Bexhill-on-sea, England, and originally published as the Journal of The Blues Appreciation Society. Blues Unlimited commenced publication in May 1963.
|
|
|
Post by carolinablues on Apr 19, 2015 12:15:11 GMT -5
Thanks AlanB for that enlightening info. It just made me realize how important Jazz was in bringing the blues to the forefront. Interesting turn of events, to have the offspring pay tribute to the roots.
|
|
|
Post by AlanB on Apr 20, 2015 1:05:54 GMT -5
Of those mentioned I still have complete sets of Jazz Journal, Jazz Monthly, Jazz Beat and Blues Unlimited. As to the books mentioned w-e-l- - l see the attached but please refrain from passing it around outside of this forum. Thanks. Attachments:BalfourBookList.pdf (274.16 KB)
|
|
|
Post by JamesP on Apr 20, 2015 6:47:06 GMT -5
Does Josh White qualify? Toured UK, Italy prolifically 1950-1952. Recorded a session in July 1950 for the BBC. Back in UK 1956 Josh White definitely was a Piedmont blues artist.
|
|