Post 589: THE DEW DROP HALL - THE OLDEST SURVIVING VENUE

I have written about the Dew Drop Hall before. But it is such an important building in the history of traditional jazz that - for the benefit of newcomers - I think it is worth writing about again.

The Dew Drop Hall
April 2015

For me the ambition to see The Dew Drop Hall started when I read that Marla Dixon's Shotgun Jazz Band played there on 7th November, 2014. That was what prompted me to find out more about this important jazz venue. It must have been a great thrill for Marla and her team to play in this very spot, among the spirits of so many of the Greats who performed there one hundred years earlier.

So let me tell you about this truly legendary old building that is one of the most important venues in the history of traditional jazz. It's the oldest surviving building in the world in which jazz was played in the earliest years of its development; and traditional jazz is again being played there today. I'm referring to the The Dew Drop Dance and Social Hall, which is situated at 430 Lamarque Street in Old Mandeville, Louisiana.

A great thrill for me was finally setting foot in The Dew Drop Hall in April 2015, when I was in New Orleans for the French Quarter Festival.

The story of the Hall begins on 5 May 1885, when local African Americans created The Dew Drop Social and Benevolent Association - aiming to provide help to the sick and the needy.

The Association built the hall from cypress timber nine years later - and opened it in 1895. Its foundations were simple brick piers (a wise choice for flood protection at the time). The pier at the front on the left still bears the original inscription (now barely legible).

It commemorates the founding of the Dew Drop Social and Benevolent Society No. 2 of Mandeville on May 5th, 1885, and the construction of the building in 1895, along with the names of the building committee.

The walls were covered with weather-boards at the front, and batten on the sides and rear; and they were originally painted green. The carpenters created the large wooden double-door at the front gable end, and a smaller door on the right at the back. There was an open beam ceiling. It was essentially a one-room structure, available for meetings, celebrations, vaudeville, dances and so on. It became the centre of social life.

The dais (mainly used as a bandstand) at the far end was typical of the time - with a wooden banister front opening in two places for the steps. The original dais was small (the part behind the banister on the left) but it was later extended to what we see in the picture above. The hall was built without electricity - or plumbing - or even glass: the 'windows' were simply openings measuring 6 feet high by 4 feet wide. They were normally covered by wooden shutters. These windows must have helped keep the band and audience cool on humid evenings.

Lamarque Street is to this day a quiet sparsely-populated, leafy, narrow road.

But where exactly is it? Answer: about 35 miles north of The French Quarter in New Orleans. It's where I've put the red dot at the centre top of this Google Map, very close to the north shore of Lake Pontchartrain.

From the earliest days, musicians started to cross the lake by steamboat to play for Saturday night dances in the Hall.

There were three landing-places for the boats on the shoreline - from east to west the Camellia Landing (destroyed by fire in 1912), the St. Tammany Pier (destroyed by fire in 1926), and the Lewisburg Landing (at the Lewis Plantation). The bands brought plenty of fans with them: Mandeville was considered a fashionable resort. It had several bands playing in various venues, including pavilions, the hotels and local park.

Pretty well all the famous early jazz musicians played at The Dew Drop Hall. Buddy Petit, Bunk Johnson, Kid Ory, Tommy Ladnier, Louis Armstrong, Papa Celestin, Sam Morgan, Chester Zardis and George Lewis were among them. Local man Isidore Fritz - according to such witnesses as George Lewis one of the best jazz clarinet players of all time - was a regular there, leading The Independence Band, which was hugely popular. He had Tommy Ladnier on trumpet and Edmond Hall on clarinet. Isidore's two brothers also played. What a pity the band was never recorded (or even photographed, it seems). Fritz was unwilling to cross the Lake to play in New Orleans. Why? Because he was doing very nicely in Mandeville and also had a family building business there. Fritz died in 1940.

Lillian, the wife of banjo-player Buddy Manaday (of Buddy Petit's Band) later recalled that white people as well as black attended and they all got along well together. Petit's Band, by the way, played at many venues in the  region - including at Bogalusa, Pensacola and Moss Point.

By the 1920s and 1930s, the Hall was a major centre for jazz concerts. Wooden benches provided limited and basic seating for about 100 people.

But - how sad! - as fashions and customs changed, the young were no longer interested, the Dew Drop Association ceased to exist and the Hall was virtually abandoned in the mid-1940s. This state of affairs continued for about half a century.

What amazing luck that nobody knocked the building down! All the other similar dance halls of its era were demolished or changed hands and acquired new uses or (like The Sons and Daughters Hall - also in Mandeville, on Lake Shore Drive) burned down.

The overgrown plot was bought at auction in 1993 by Jacqueline 'Jinx' Vidrine. She might have been expected to demolish the building and erect a modern house there; but she was a jazz enthusiast and knew what she was doing. She cleared the plot and investigated the building. She even found an old upright piano inside.

Jacqueline dreamed of re-opening the Hall as a jazz venue or museum. After some years, she managed to get the local Parks Service interested. By 1999, a first concert was possible! Mayor Eddie Price and the Mandeville Council recognised the importance of the property and bought the plot of land from Jacqueline. She herself donated the Hall to the community. Funds had been raised, including donations from the English. 

There had been a plan to transport the Hall to a site in Louis Armstrong Park, New Orleans. But the Mayor of Mandeville was easily convinced that the Hall should stay where it was. In 2001 the Hall was placed on the National Register of Historic Places. The 'official' re-opening was on 5 May, 2002. In 2006, two members of the Mandeville City Council led a campaign to create The Friends of Dew Drop - a non-profit organisation. There had to be a little refurbishment (at a cost of about 25,000 dollars), but they ensured it was entirely sympathetic with the original design of the Hall. Here is how the Hall looked in Lamarque Street when I visited. Note the (inevitably moss-covered) tree in front of it.

Concerts featuring the best of local musicians are now put on fortnightly in the Spring and Autumn. There are string bands, jug bands and various similar groups as well as traditional jazz bands.

The band performing when I was there included the great Gregg Stafford and Michael White and the outstanding young bass player Tyler Thomson.

There was even a brolly parade.

Just inside the entrance door

I'm thrilled to say that 'Jinx' is still very much involved in helping with activities at the Hall. She was there and I had the honour of being introduced to her.

Jacqueline Vidrine -
the driving force in preserving the Hall

If you go to The Dew Drop, you have a choice between standing, or arriving early to secure one of those wooden seats, or (bringing your picnic chairs) listening from outside to the wonderful music drifting through the large open windows (three on each side). Good Louisiana food is usually on sale outside the Hall, as it was in the earliest days.

The Shotgun Jazz Band
performing there in 2014

By the way, you may care to watch a video I made about The Dew Drop:
CLICK HERE.
Three days after the Gregg Stafford concert, the great Tuba Skinny played at The Dew Drop Hall. A video showing one of the tunes they played can be seen by clicking on here.

And for a much more recent video of Tuba Skinny playing at the Hall, CLICK HERE. The tune is the wonderful Deep Bayou Moan, composed by Shaye Cohn.

You can sample an entire album (19 tunes) recorded in The Dew Drop Hall during a live concert on 18 March 2017 BY CLICKING HERE. 

========================
Just in case you may be interested to know which tunes were played when I was there for the Gregg Stafford concert in April 2015, the programme was:
SET ONE
Hindustan
We Shall Walk Through The Streets of the City
Bye Bye Blackbird
Redwing
Fidgety Feet
Careless Love
Golden Leaf Strut (final strain of 'Milneberg Joys')
SET TWO
Panama Rag
When You're Smiling
Burgundy Street Blues (Michael White feature)
You Always Hurt The One You Love
Blueberry Hill
SET THREE
Baby Won't You Please Come Home
Creole Love Call
Just a Little While To Stay Here
What a Friend We Have in Jesus
When The Saints Go Marching In

Long may The Dew Drop continue!

Post 552: BUNK JOHNSON AND THE 'BLUE BELLS GOODBYE' MYSTERY

Among the many tunes recorded by Bunk Johnson in the early 1940s, one of the favourites was Blue Bells Goodbye (available on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-nGE7W-R0A4). Its appeal is easy to understand, because, following its leisurely 16-bar Verse, the Chorus breaks into 2/4 time and offers a pleasant, simple 32-bar melody.

The tune achieved even wider popularity when it was taken up by revivalists, such as the bands of Ken Colyer and Papa Bue. The first version I came across (nearly sixty years ago) was the Ken Colyer recording, which you can listen to BY CLICKING HERE.

But where did this tune come from? Bunk claimed to have recalled it from his youth. But nobody could find any evidence of a  'Blue Bells Goodbye' before his recording.

Some fans who idolised him believed that Bunk himself had composed it. Others speculated that it could have been a march dating back to the American Civil War.

Well, here is the solution to the mystery. In 1905, Egbert Van Alstyne composed a tune called Bright Eyes Goodbye. Words were provided by Harry H. Williams.

Sure enough, it has the same melodies as Bunk's tune, and the same 32-bar up-tempo Chorus preceded by the leisurely 16-bar Verse.

Our jazz bands still go on playing it as Blue Bells Goodbye. Perhaps we ought to correct the mistake and begin calling it Bright Eyes Goodbye. But titles get changed in the evolution of jazz, so would it be better to leave it with Bunk's title?

We can excuse Bunk for getting the title slightly wrong. He probably had a much better memory of the tune than of its title.

Here's the original sheet music. You can see that it's the tune in question all right. The Verse is virtually identical to what Bunk plays. The Chorus is almost so, especially at the start, though he seems to have tweaked a few of the later notes. The probable reason for this is that Bunk was further confused by memories of a song called 'Blue Bell' (not 'Blue Bells Goodbye') that had been composed in 1904 by Theodore F. Morse, with lyrics by Edward Madden. Its structure is remarkably similar to that of 'Bright Eyes, Goodbye'.

My good friend Todd Brown has not only offered me his own analysis of this matter (see foot of this post). He has also recorded 'Blue Bell' on his guitar, and you can watch his performance on YouTube BY CLICKING HERE.

Here are Todd Brown's perceptive comments: My guess is that Bunk was conflating "Bright Eyes Goodbye" with another song, known as "Blue Bell" or "Goodbye My Blue Bell" (music by Theodore F. Morse, lyrics by Edward Madden.) Like "Bright Eyes," "Blue Bell" has a lyric that begins with a soldier bidding goodbye to his sweetheart and telling her not to cry; unlike "Bright Eyes," it ends sadly, as we learn in the second verse that the soldier has died in battle, so the two will never be reunited. Interestingly, "Blue Bell" was published in 1904, while "Bright Eyes" was published in 1905. This suggests to me that "Blue Bell" came first and "Bright Eyes" was a sort of "answer song" written in response to it. (Lyrically, the first verse of "Bright Eyes" is remarkably close to "Blue Bell," and the phrase "I'll return true as blue" may have been included in the chorus as a nod to the earlier song.) Bunk Johnson had probably heard both songs and got the titles a little mixed up.

Incidentally, these days "Blue Bell" seems to be best known from an instrumental version by the American guitarist Merle Travis; the title is often rendered, incorrectly, as "Blue Belle" or "Farewell My Blue Belle." I suspect that's because here in the States, most people assume that the setting is the American Civil War and that the title refers to the young lady as a blue (i.e., sad) "southern belle." Given the spelling on the sheet music, I think we are actually meant to assume that the soldier calls his sweetheart "Blue Bell" because her "eyes so blue" remind him of the flower known as a blue bell.

Post 550: MAY AUFDERHEIDE'S 'DUSTY RAG' - AND THE EVOLUTION OF TUNES

I have often made the point that some of the tunes played by our bands have been transformed since the original composer penned the piano manuscript many decades ago.

What often happened - especially with those tricky early rags - was that the bands distilled the melodies from the pieces and played them more simply. This was mainly because it is not possible on a cornet or trumpet to play the range of notes and the rapid leaping semi-quavers that a pianist's fingers could cover. Also, the rags often included three or four parts, sometimes with a change of key in the final part. But the jazz bands tended to drop at least one of these parts and might have no key change in their version.

The popular Dusty Rag is interesting to examine.

The first performance I heard of Dusty Rag was a recording made in a relaxed manner by Ken Colyer's Jazzmen in about 1959. It was an attractive jaunty piece of music.

I discovered much more recently that Ken had kept very close to the version recorded by Bunk Johnson in 1942. Bunk's band had a stellar line-up:

Bunk Johnson - trumpet

George Lewis - clarinet

Albert Warner - trombone

Lawrence Marrero - banjo

Chester Zardis - bass

Walter Decou - piano

Edgar Mosley - drums

You can listen to Bunk's version on YouTube BY CLICKING HERE.

As you can hear, they play the piece entirely in the key of Eb. After a four-bar Introduction, there is a 16-bar first theme played twice through, and then a second theme (also 16 bars) played several times, always as full ensemble. The entire piece takes about three minutes and ends without a Coda. Here are the chords, as supplied to me by a banjo-playing friend.

You can hear Tuba Skinny in 2014 playing the piece quite briskly and without the four-bar Introduction (or a Coda) if you CLICK HERE. They make the tune last four minutes, with much soloing on Part B. 

More recently, I have seen the original sheet music. It was entirely in the key of C. It too began with a four-bar Introduction, not dissimilar to what the jazz bands play. And it too had a first theme of 16 bars, with a pattern very like the band version, and even including the attractive and distinctive diminished chord arpeggio in Bars 13 and 14. Then comes the second theme of 16 bars, which is very closely followed by Bunk and his imitators. Finally there is another theme of 32 bars, much in the spirit of the earlier themes. No jazz band, as far as I know, plays this third theme. Ever since Bunk, bands have decided that the first two themes give them enough to work on.

Dusty Rag was composed in 1908 by May Aufderheide of Indianapolis. This remarkable lady was only twenty years old at the time. Her proud, wealthy father set up a small music publishing business to sell her sheet music. Dusty Rag became very popular and she went on to compose many more pieces. One of them was Thriller Rag, which is also still played by our bands.

May Aufderheide lived to a good old age. She died in 1972. So she experienced the entire early evolution of jazz from Buddy Bolden until long after the death of Charlie Parker. Amazing to think she was still alive to hear The Beatles'  recordings of A Hard Day's Night and Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.

She lived through nearly three decades of my own life. How I wish I had had the chance to meet her and talk about those early days, and what she thought of Bunk Johnson's and Ken Colyer's versions of her music.

Here's May Aufderheide's composition. It was orginally called just Dusty, as you can see.

May Aufderheide

Post 430: 'BABY, I'D LOVE TO STEAL YOU' FROM BUNK JOHNSON TO TUBA SKINNY

Baby, I'd Love To Steal You is a lovely, simple 16-bar tune. So why are bands not playing it? Why have very few people even heard of it?

It's one of those tunes with an interesting and obscure history and it seems it has never been published in sheet music form.

Here's the story behind it.

The great composer, researcher and record producer Bill Russell (1905 - 1992) was the most important force in the revival of New Orleans jazz in the early 1940s. He founded his company, American Music Records, and set about finding and recording forgotten New Orleans performers. Among them was, of course, Bunk Johnson. Russell's recordings are still available on over 100 CDs.

In one of the recording sessions, Bunk tells him a story about pianist Tony Jackson composing Baby, I'd Love to Steal You in the back room of Dago Tony's club in Storyville. (This must have been about 1910.) Bunk goes on to play the tune on the piano.

Bunk's band probably played it at gigs but it was never sold to a music publisher.

Another great reviver of past glories, cornet-player Chris Tyle, picked up the tune from Bunk's piano version and arranged it for his Silver Leaf Jazz Band. They recorded it, together with nineteen other fine old tunes, on their CD The Smiler in 1993 (Stomp Off Records). In Chris Tyle's band at the time were such players as Lars Edegran, Tom Saunders, Tom Fischer and (on piano) Steve Pistorius. These players are still around and I am sure they remember this tune. So it is not surprising that Steve Pistorius included it in his own 2014 CD New Orleans Shuffle.

So the tune has been brought back to life yet again.

More recently, it has been taken up by a band led by Twerk Thomson and also by Tuba Skinny, who play it in the key of Eb, like Chris Tyle, and closely follow his arrangement:

CLICK HERE TO VIEW.

As a self-taught musician, I struggle when trying to write out tunes and chord sequences by ear. But here is the best I can do with Baby, I'd Love to Steal You. I have entered this in my Moleskine pocket music book. As you can see, I have put it in F rather than Eb, because that suits me better.

Post 382: BUNK JOHNSON AND THE LIFEBOAT

Willie 'Bunk' Johnson was a legendary jazz trumpet player. He is believed to have been born in or after 1889; and he died in 1949. Bunk was a star in New Orleans during the early years of the Twentieth Century but later fell into obscurity, only to be re-discovered and encouraged to make recordings and give performances on tour during the years shortly before his death. So he was much involved in the revival of traditional New Orleans jazz in the 1940s.

Many of those tunes he recorded in the 1940s are still favourites with traditional jazz bands.

One of them that I decided to work out and learn is Lord, Let Me in the Lifeboat.

To my ear, it sounded like this. I have transcribed it - as I do with all the tunes I collect - into one of my mini filofaxes:

The tunes Bunk is believed to have recorded (supplied to me by a kind correspondent) are these:

2.19 Blues
827 Blues
Ace in the Hole
After You've Gone
Ain't Misbehavin'
Alabama Bound
Alexander's Ragtime Band 

Amour 

Arkansas Blues 

Baby I'd Love To Steal You 

Baby Please Come Home 

Ballin' The Jack 

Basin Street Blues 

Beautiful Doll 

Big Chief Battle Axe 

Blue As I Can Be 

Blue Bells Goodbye 

Blues In C 

Blues 

Bolden Medley 

Bolden's Style 

Boogie Woogie 

Bottle Up And Go 

Bucket's Got A Hole In It 

Bugle Boy March 

Bunk's Blues 

Bunk's Life Story 1,2,3 

Bye And Bye 

Careless Love (Blues) 

Carry Me Back To Old Virginny 

Chloe 

Clarinet Marmalade 

Coquette 

Darktown Strutters' Ball 

Days Beyond Recall 

Dear Old Southland 

Didn't He Ramble 

Dippermouth Blues 

Do Right Baby 

Do You Ever Think Of Me 

Does Jesus Care 

Don't Fence Me In 

Down By The Riverside 

Down In Jungle Town 

Dusty Rag 

Embraceable You 

Feetwarmers Stomp 

Fidgety Feet 

Franklin Street Blues 

Funeral Parade 

God's Amazing Grace 

Golden Leaf Strut 

Good Morning Blues 

Goodnight Ladies 

Happy Birthday To You 

Heartaches 

High Society 

Hilarity Rag 

Honey Gal 

How Long Blues 

I Ain't Gonna Give Nobody 

I Ain't Got Nobody 

I Can't Escape From You 

I Can't Give You Anything But Love 

I Don't Want To Walk Without You Baby 

I Found A New Baby 

I Know That You Know 

I Love My Baby 

I Never Knew 

I Travel With Jesus 

I'll Take You Home Again Kathleen 

I'm Alabamy Bound 

I'm Confessing 

I'm Making Believe 

I'm So Glad I'm Brownskin 

I've Got Everything 

In The Gloaming 

Indiana 

Ja Da 

Jazz Me Blues 

Just A Closer Walk With Thee 

Just A Little While To Say Here 

Kat's Got Kittens
Kinklets 

Lady Be Good 

Listen To Me 

Little Coquette 

Long Blues 

Lonesome Road 

Lord Let Me In The Lifeboat 

Lord You're Been Good To Me 

Lowdown Blues 

Make Me A Pallet On The Floor 

Mama's Gone Goodbye 

Maple Leaf Rag 

Margie 

Maria Elena 

Marie 

Maryland, My Maryland 

Memphis Blues 

Midnight Blues 

Milneberg Joys 

Moose March 

Muskrat Ramble 

My Life Will Be Sweeter Someday 

My Old Grey Bonnet 

My Old Kentucky Home 

Nearer My God To Thee 

Never No Lament 

New Iberia Blues 

Nobody's Fault But Mine 

Noon's Blues 

Of All The Wrongs 

Ole Miss 

One Sweet Letter From You 

Ory's Creole Trombone 

Out Of Nowhere 

Over In The Gloryland 

Pacific Street Blues 

Pagan Love Song 

Pallet On The Floor 

Panama 

Peg O'My Heart 

Perdido Street Stomp 

Pete Lala and Dago Tony's Tonks 

Pistol Packin' Mama 

Please Don't Talk About Me When I'm Gone 

Plenty To Do 

Poor Butterfly 

Porto Rico 

Precious Love 

Riverside Blues 

Royal Garden Blues 

Runnin' Wild 

San Jacinto Stomp 

See See Rider 

Shake It And Break It 

Shine 

Sidewalk Blues 

Sister Kate 

Swanee River 

Sleepy Time Down South 

Slow Drag's Boogie Woogie 

Snag It 

Sobbin' Blues 

Some Of These Days 

Someday Sweetheart 

Sometimes I'm Happy 

Sometimes My Burden 

South 

Spicy Advice 

St. Louis Blues 

Star Dust 

Storyville Blues 

Streets Of The City 

Sugar Foot Stomp 

Summertime 

Swanee River 

Sweet Georgia Brown 

Sweet Lorraine 

Tell Me Baby 

Tell Me Your Dreams 

Temptation Rag 

That Teasin' Rag 

The Entertainer 

The Girls Go Crazy 

The Lord Will Make A Way Somehow 

The Minstrel Man 

The Sheik Of Araby 

The Waltz You Saved For Me 

The World Is Waiting For The Sunrise 

There's Yes Yes In Your Eyes 

Those Drafting Blues 

Thriller Rag 

Tiger Rag 

Till We Meet Again 

Tishomingo Blues 

Tony Jackson 

Twelfth Street Rag 

Two Jim Blues 

Ugly Child 

Up In Sidney's Flat 

Walking The Dog 

Wang Wang Blues 

Weary Blues 

When I Leave The World Behind 

When I Move To The Sky 

When The Moon Comes Over The Mountains 

When The Saints 

When You And I Were Young, Maggie 

When You Wore A Tulip 

Where Could I Go But To The Lord 

Where The River Shannon Flows 

Whispering 

Willie The Weeper 

Yaaka Hula, Hickey Dula 

Yellow Gal 

Yes Lord, I'm Crippled 

Yes Yes In Your Eyes 

You Always Hurt The One You Love

You Are My Sunshine 

You Got To See Mama Every Night 

You're Driving Me Crazy 

Post 357: TUBA SKINNY AND 'HILARITY RAG' BY JAMES SCOTT

While I was in New Orleans during April 2016, I had the good fortune to be in Royal Street when Tuba Skinny were busking. Their programme included Hilarity Rag. Apparently this was a tune they had only just learned and they were giving their first public performance of it. I managed to film it. You can see and hear the piece by clicking on here.

But where does Hilarity Rag come from? The answer is that it was composed in 1910 - an early piano rag by James Scott (who also composed such classics Climax Rag, Ophelia Rag and Grace and Beauty).

You can hear the original piano rag (and see the sheet music - with sincere thanks to the video-maker codenamed RagtimeDorianHenry) by clicking on here.

Like so many of those early piano rags, it had to be 'simplified' and adapted quite a bit to make it playable as a full-band piece. Bunk Johnson obviously liked it and played it with his bands. Fortunately, at the end of his revived career, he was recorded in New York, playing his version. You can hear that by clicking on here. Sounds quite a bit different from the piano piece, doesn't it?

Other bands before Tuba Skinny have taken it up from there. For example, there's a lovely clear performance by an English band with the late Norman Thatcher on trumpet. You can watch it by clicking on here. (I remember Norman Thatcher as one of the rare musicians who also had Scott's Grace and Beauty in his repertoire in the 1980s.)

And now we have the young band Tuba Skinny in New Orleans playing Hilarity Rag. Their version also closely follows the Bunk Johnson reinterpretation of Scott's original.

I must mention that they also added to their repertoire in April 2016 tunes called Frog Hop and Frog-i-More Rag. Unfortunately I did not video them playing these tunes. But I noted that RaoulDuke504 did so in the weeks that followed. For his video of them playing Frog Hop, CLICK HERE.  And for Frog-i-More Rag, CLICK HERE.

Clifford Hayes composed Frog Hop in 1929 and recorded it with his Louisville Stompers. You can hear that original performance by clicking on here.

Tuba Skinny's version, that I heard at the dba in New Olreans on 8 April 2016, was modelled very closely on this - including the sustained link notes at the ends of choruses.

Frog-i-More Rag is, of course, a much better known piece - in the repertoire of most bands. It was composed by Jelly Roll Morton in 1918.