Post 402: DIZZY

About three years ago, on YouTube, I first spotted Dizzy, playing with Yes Ma'am, the string band, and also deputising for Robin with Tuba Skinny. Immediately I could tell I was watching a young lady who was not only a great washboard player but also the world's most beautiful musician.

I wrote a Blog Post about her and noted from my sitemeter that it had thousands of readers in the weeks that followed.

When I travelled the 4,500 miles from my home to New Orleans for the French Quarter Festival in April 2015, I was disappointed that I did not come across Dizzy, though I heard later that she had been busking in the streets when I was there.

However, visiting again in April 2016, I bumped into the great video-maker codenamed RaoulDuke504 and he gave me a tip-off that the band Yes Ma'am was playing at that very moment in The French Market. I hurried over and sure enough there they were. They were brilliant - even better in person than in their many YouTube videos.

I introduced myself to Dizzy and had a lovely chat with her. As I had expected, she turned out to be a very articulate, good-humoured and warm-hearted person. An important piece of information she gave me was that she would be touring in Europe during the Summer of 2016. Arrangements were still vague. She did not know what the Band would be called or who the other musicians would be, though one of them was certainly Ryan Baer (a truly great player of the banjo and other instruments, and a former member of Tuba Skinny) and she knew they would be performing at some stage in Ghent, Belgium.

I told Dizzy I had once written a blog article, illustrated with photos, telling everyone she was the world's most beautiful musician, and I jokingly said I had no idea why so many thousands of readers had been attracted to that post. She replied, equally joking, that it must be because of my good writing!

This young lady has now been settled in New Orleans for several years. She plays sublimely and prolifically with a number of bands. Mostly, she is with Yes Ma'am. You can find plenty of their videos on YouTube.

If you think playing the washboard is easy, you are wrong. It takes some doing to maintain the strict tempo and to decorate properly the music being played by the rest of your group. You have to know the tunes really well, especially to be aware of 'breaks' and rhythmic changes. It's hard work on the fingers and wrists, too. You need a lot of energy.

Dizzy is a brilliant player of the washboard. My favourite video of her is this one. Click on to watch:

CLICK HERE.

Isn't Dizzy sensational (as well as beautiful)? Incidentally, that great song - Caffeine - was composed by the gentleman singing it - Aaron Gunn.

But if you would like to see Dizzy playing in a more conventional traditional jazz band, here's one of her in Mexico with Tuba Skinny. Watch out for her enjoying a solo chorus at 2 minutes 41 seconds: CLICK HERE.

And to see her playing a super solo (at 1 minute 45 seconds) with Tuba Skinny on Dallas Rag, CLICK HERE.

Since April 2015, Dizzy has frequently turned up in The Sluetown Strutters: Click here to view.

Dizzy has a Turkish background and speaks both English and Turkish fluently. As a child she had piano lessons and also started to play the saxophone. (She told me she is still playing the piano quite a lot.) She went on to be a high-flying graduate in English and American Literature and Creative Writing at New York University. Then in 2009 she chose to go to New Orleans to 'collect material' to write about. It seems she is still collecting it!

What she obviously did collect was washboards and she chose this happy if unconventional busking life-style. I made a video of her playing in Yes Ma'am on 7 April 2016 - the date when at last I met her. I hope you will watch it. To do so, CLICK HERE.

For a bit of fun from Dizzy's earliest days in New Orleans (showing she can sing well too!) click here.

On 10 June 2016, Dizzy took part in the first performance ever by the amazing all-female Shake 'Em Up Jazz Band that performed at The Dragon's Den in New Orleans (photo below courtesy of a New Orleans-based friend, who wishes to remain anonymous). What a group of stars! She went on to become a permanent member of the band, and played with them at The Umbria Jazz Festival in Italy during July 2017.

And in January 2017, Dizzy expanded her horizons till further. She took up full-scale drumming, with Max Bien-Kahn's band Max and the Martians.

Post 286: TUNES WITH SIMILAR CHORD PROGRESSIONS

Puttin' on the Style.
Enjoy Yourself.
It's the Royal Telephone.

Listening to Tuba Skinny performing Vine Street Drag (also known as Lonesome Drag), in this video (click on to watch), I noticed that the chord progression sounds remarkably similar (possibly identical) to that of I'm Looking for the Bully of the Town recorded in 1927 by The Memphis Jug Band. You can hear The Memphis Jug Band performance by clicking here.

Similarly, if you listen to Tuba Skinny performing the eight-bar tune Mississippi River Blues, you may agree with me that it has the same chord structure as the first eight bars of Lonesome Road:
CLICK HERE.
I wonder how many hundreds of cases there are (in addition to the obvious examples of 12-bar blues) where this occurs.

There are dozens of 32-bar tunes based on the same chord progression as Bill Bailey, Won't You Please Come Home. Similarly, there are several using the same chords as When the Saints Go Marching In.

A less known example of a parallel is the 32-bar Please Don't Talk About Me, for which you can use exactly the same chord progression as for Has Anybody Seen My Girl? (also known as Five Foot Two) and Who's That Knockin' At My Door? and also for Aaron Gunn's great song Caffeine. It seems to me that Postage Stomp has an almost similar sequence too.

And I'm fairly sure you can play Livin' in a Great Big Way and Christopher Columbus to the very same chord structure as I Got Rhythm.

Where Am I Gonna Live When I Get Home improbably uses the same chord progression as Just a Closer Walk With Thee!

Bei Mir Bist Du Schön seems to me to use the same chord progression as When I Get Low I Get High and Blue Drag and Root, Hog, or Die and Jubilesta.

And my friend Ralph Hunt, the banjo player, tells me that Pennies from Heaven has exactly the same chord structure as I Can't Give You Anything But Love, apart from just one chord, which is a 7th in one tune and a minor in the other - hardly a significant difference.

My Josephine (first recorded by Papa Oscar Celestin's Tuxedo Band in 1926) is virtually identical to Some of These Days (composed by Shelton Brooks in 1910) - not only in chord structure but even in its melody. My theory is that someone (Celestin himself, perhaps) wrote a lyric dedicated to Josephine - a fan of his band - and set it to the music of Some of These Days, with only the the most negligible of modifications to the tune and chord structure.

I also think that the two spirituals Precious Lord, Take my Hand and When I Move to the Sky, if played in the same key, would be found to have the same chord progression.

I Wish I Could Shimmy Like My Sister Kate seems to me to have the same chord sequence as Red Light Rag, Southern Shout and the Chorus of Heebie Jeebies and of Dallas Rag. But the alternating of dominant and tonic chords is a very familiar ploy in dozens of tunes.

You Can't Escape From Me (aka San Jacinto Stomp) uses the same chord sequence as The Cat's Got Kittens.

The chord sequences for Coquette, Yes, Sir, That's My Baby and I Want to Be Happy all seem pretty much the same to me.

Rip 'Em Up Joe is an example of a 16-bar tune that seems to have a familiar chord sequence: it is similar to that found in Crazy 'Bout You (recorded by The State Street Boys in 1935) and sundry other tunes.

The House of the Rising Sun sounds suspiciously similar to St. James Infirmary. My ear tells me they have the same chord progression and almost the same melody.

Improbably, the religious number Royal Telephone is remarkably similar to Enjoy Yourself, It's Later Than You Think and to the rocking tune Puttin' On The Style.

Listening again on YouTube to the wonderful Tuba Skinny playing How Do They Do It That Way?, I thought the chord sequence sounded identical to that of the 1925 popular song Ice Cream (Ice Cream, You Scream, Everybody Loves Ice Cream). They are both very fine songs. How Do They Do It That Way? is a song about which I know very little, though I believe it dates from 1929, when Victoria Spivey recorded it. It is probable that she also composed it. I can't prove the chord progressions are identical as I do not have copies of the printed music. They are fairly different styles of song (Ice Cream is also usually played more quickly than the other) but it's interesting that to my ear at least the same chord pattern works very well for both. Listen to Tuba Skinny by double-clicking here. Try humming Ice Cream during the vocal and see whether you agree with me.
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Luke Holladay has sent me this email:
I believe the chords for "Do Lord" are identical to "This Little Light of Mine" and "Battle Hymn of the Republic".

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As for 'modern' jazz, there have been many tunes based on the chord sequences of good old songs, I'm told. For example:
Grooving' High is based on the chord sequence of Whispering
Anthropology is based on the chord sequence of I Got Rhythm
Take the A Train is based on the chord sequence of Exactly Like You
Donna Lee is based on the chord sequence of Indiana
In a Mellow Tone is based on the chord sequence of Rose Room
Ornithology is based on the chord sequence of How High The Moon
Hackensack is based on the chord sequence of Lady Be Good
Koko is based on the chord sequence of Cherokee.

Post 69: YOU TUBE VIDEOS - SHORT AND JOYFUL

Today, let's have some fun.

Pick your three most joyful short YouTube videos.

Here are the rules.
(1) All three videos, added together, must run for no more than 10½ minutes (i.e. an average of 3½ minutes each). 

(2) The three videos have to be of three different musical groups.

Here are my choices:

NUMBER ONE
The best traditional jazz band in the world (from New Orleans but performing in Switzerland) plays a particularly thrilling tune. The excitement builds and builds!

CLICK HERE.

NUMBER TWO
Street buskers in Asheville, North Carolina. The composer himself sings the song and plays the fiddle. And the three charming ladies among the five musicians exude happiness.

CLICK HERE.

NUMBER THREE
Pure enjoyment! About fifteen New Orleans street musicians get together in a bar one evening to play and sing Round and Round, a fun song created by Charlie Nickerson and the Memphis Jug Band in 1930. I can't resist singing along.

CLICK HERE.

I'd be interested to hear of other people's choices.