POST 491: BELLAMINA - THE CARIBBEAN INFLUENCE ON TRADITIONAL JAZZ

A long time ago (in the 1920s) there was a white ship named Bellamina, based at Nassau in the Bahamas. It was used for smuggling spirits 200 miles across the sea to Florida. But the American Coast Guards intercepted it.

After the boat's release, it was taken to dry dock in Nassau - this time to be painted BLACK!

The Bahamians loved inventing songs about anything in the news; and so a great 16-bar simple rhythmic song soon appeared.

Bellamina, Bellamina!

Bellamina's in the harbour.

Bellamina, Bellamina!

Bellamina's in the harbour.

So put the Bellamina on the dock

And paint the Bellamina black, black!

Oh put the Bellamina on the dock

And paint the Bellamina black!

In fact, there were at least three more ships that had to be repainted in this way. They are all mentioned in the version of the song that you can listen to BY CLICKING HERE. At 2 minutes 47 seconds, Blind Blake (who was recording this in 1952) sings several verses, mentioning other ships too; and you can pick out the words very clearly.

That great benefactor of all jazz musicians - Lasse Collin - has provided us with the music. See:

http://cjam.lassecollin.se/

Put simply, the chord sequence is:

  I   |   I   |   I    |  V⁷

 V⁷ | V⁷ |  V⁷  |  I

  I   |  IV |  V⁷  |  I

  I   |  IV |  V⁷  |  I

Lasse was doubtless inspired to do this by Tuba Skinny, who in 2017 revived this fine old song, with Greg Sherman singing the vocal and the whole band showing what great jazz musicians can do with a simple theme: their performance of Bellamina lasts five and a half minutes.

As you can see, Lasse has put it in the key of Eb (as played by Tuba Skinny) and he has provided a lead-sheet in F for the benefit of Bb instrument players.

James Sterling kindly videoed the Tuba Skinny performance for us:

CLICK HERE TO VIEW.

James has pointed out to me that there is also a recording of this song by The Nassau String Band made on a field trip by John Lomax as long ago as 1935: CLICK TO HEAR IT.

There! With so much to help us we have no excuse for leaving this number out of our repertoire. It's a good one to play. It's catchy, extremely easy to improvise on; and it offers some rhythmic variety to our programme.

This is one of the many excellent 16-bar tunes available to traditional jazz bands. We should always have two or three of them in our programmes. Others include Up Jumped the Devil, Winin' Boy Blues, Satan Your Kingdom Must Come Down and Rip 'Em Up Joe.

Let's hear more bands playing Bellamina!

Post 426: THE BALKAN BRASS BAND INFLUENCE IN TRADITIONAL JAZZ

My American friend and frequent correspondent Phil is very keen on a band called The California Feetwarmers.

He has kept me informed about their Summer 2016 tour in the U.K., Germany and Switzerland. You can hear this band of very proficient musicians by clicking here, where they play slick arrangements of Aunt Hagar's Blues, San and Bill Bailey.

Phil tells me some of the players previously played as a 'Balkan brass band' and there is still a great influence of the disciplines of Balkan brass band music in their playing.

This set me thinking, because Balkan Brass Band Music is something about which I knew virtually nothing. So I spent a couple of hours reading about it. I discovered it seems to have arisen from the folk music mainly of Serbia, Macedonia and Bulgaria. Much of the music supports vigorous dancing. It has repetitive insistent melodies and very strong rhythms.

Picture a village square. We see a group of colourfully-dressed dancers in a circle, hands linked, dancing in a manner that involves fast-paced complicated foot movements while the upper bodies remain statuesque. They are accompanied by a sousaphone heavily stamping the first and third beats of the bars, an accordion playing rapid sequences of notes, a violin, trumpets and other horns, as well as sundry busy percussion instruments. The band plays with technical precision. The harmonies sound simple – largely involving the three main chords (but perhaps this is deceptive, since it seems likely also that they using some uncommon scales); and the melodies, mostly rapid, contain some acrobatic twists and turns. In some tunes, there are compound time signatures, notably 9/8 and 7/8.

A 'Balkan Brass Band' in New Orleans!

I learned that there are various song forms of which the two commonest are the Kolo and the Čoček. The Kolo is often a group dance as described above and sometimes in 9/8 rhythmic form. The Čoček may also be in 9/8 time.

To get an immediate feel for what Balkan brass band music at its brassiest sounds like, click here.

The Balkan influence has spread among some of the very best traditional jazz musicians of today. Think of Jenavieve Cooke. In her years of nomadic living, she picked up Balkan music at its source. In April 2016 she told me 'I'm a traditional Balkan music and dance freak!'

Years before she formed the famous Royal Street Winding Boys, Jenavieve founded in New Orleans a Balkan brass band called Backyard Belladonna.

And there's Ben Schenk (mainly playing clarinet), now in his 50s, who spent years evolving the kind of band that seemed just right for him. He ended up with The Panorama Jazz Band, which is quite capable of playing traditional jazz in familiar style, but also has in its programmes doses of influence from Balkan brass band music and Klezmer music, not to mention a considerable Caribbean element! Panorama has been a truly great band since Aurora Nealand (who, by the way, has toured in the Balkans) joined it. She - one of the world's greatest reed players - has a heart full of the joys of music of all cultures. She perfectly complements Ben's work. There are plenty of videos of the band on YouTube but I will mention this one, where you catch them in Big Band Mardi Gras format: CLICK HERE.

And think of Matt Schreiber. This fine accordion player and Balkan music specialist not only plays with Ben in the Panorama Jazz Band but also works in the specialist Mahala Trio (Balkan music in New Orleans). Try watching a video of him and his two colleagues by clicking here. It's not a brass band but it certainly gives novices such as myself a good insight into the nature of Balkan music.

And now we have The Wit's End Brass Band. They have produced a remarkable CD that you can find on Bandcamp.

The Wit's End Brass Band 2016.
It includes some familiar faces!

You must watch THIS VIDEO OF THEM. CLICK HERE TO VIEW.

I discovered there are very many 'Balkan Bands' all over the world, even in such unlikely places as England, Australia and the Netherlands. In the USA there are dozens of them, and Balkan Band Summer Camps are held on both the East and West Coasts. For a terrific Balkan SuperBand playing in our beloved Royal Street, New Orleans: CLICK HERE.

Balkan Brass Bands:
Above and Below

In spirit, instrumentation and rhythmic excitement, it seems to me this Balkan music has a lot in common with Klezmer music, which has also had a permeating influence on New Orleans jazz in the 21st Century. Add to these influences that of Caribbean calypso music – much associated in recent years with The Panorama Jazz Band and with Madeleine Reidy and later with The Rhythm Wizards in New Orleans and Wow! We observe some very interesting developments in the music we love.

Post 385: THE RHYTHM WIZARDS

Robin Rapuzzi is very proud of the work done in New Orleans by The Rhythm Wizards, one of the jazz bands in which he played.

Alas, the band was short-lived. It disbanded by 2017.

I can tell you this was a really good and interesting band, unusual because of its instrumentation and broad-minded repertoire. It is admirable that so many of the young musicians in New Orleans are introducing us to long-forgotten and unfamiliar tunes, including some with a Caribbean origin. This is so refreshing after all the Bourbon Street Parades and When The Saints and Bill Baileys that we constantly hear elsewhere.

The Rhythm Wizards were formed late in 2014, with Tomas Majcherski as leader. Some of the musicians had earlier played together in an experimental band called The 4.99 Five-Piece (a name based on fried chicken on sale in the market!); and some had played in Steamboat Calypso - the group led by Madeleine Reidy. Robin says they were very inspired by that group. In fact, Maddy was the singer on the first album The Rhythm Wizards produced.

Robin had great respect for the leadership provided by Tomas: he told me Tomas had 'done a ton of research for the group, especially when it comes to picking out the significant poly-rhythms that make Caribbean and jazz music so much fun to play'.

Robin kindly let me know The Rhythm Wizards intended to perform in Royal Street on 7 April 2016, while I was in town. So I made a point of being there.

Who were the members of the band? It's hard to give a definitive answer because the young New Orleans bands all seem to have a pool of players to draw upon. But the 'core' players seemed to be:

Tomas Majcherski : Clarinet and Reeds
Robin Rapuzzi : Drums and Washboard
Jon Ramm : Trombone
Max Bien-Kahn : Guitar
Todd Burdick : banjo and tuba
Peter Olynciw : upright bass
Coleman Akin : Violin
Zayd Sifri : auxiliary percussion
Others who played and recorded with them include:
Max Feldschuh : Vibraphone and Piano
Madeleine Reidy : vocals

You will notice that The Rhythm Wizards usually played without a trumpet and they had up to four musicians on stringed instruments. It was the clarinet that tended to lead on the melody. All these features helped to make this a refreshingly distinctive traditional jazz band.

On its website, the Band claimed to play 'Traditional Jazz and Pan-American Music from the Mississippi Delta to the Caribbean and beyond'. Such a repertoire also made it rather special.

Yes, The Rhythm Wizards could be found playing a popular standard such as Ice Cream, or St. Louis Blues, or an elegant Maple Leaf Rag, but in the same programme you were also likely to hear that rarely-played number St. Louis Tickle and the rhythmic Caribbean-style Petrol or the sweetly melodic waltz-tempo Tres Bemoles (meaning 'Three Flats' - and it is indeed in the key of Eb). Or you might catch them playing Black Rag, which sounded to me like Down Home Rag. (I found later that Down Home Rag was composed in 1911, but that Papa Celestin's Tuxedo Orchestra was the first to record it - in 1925 - under the title Black Rag. I wonder why. To avoid paying dues?)

As you may infer, the variety of rhythms to be heard in a performance justified their name as the 'Rhythm Wizards'.

One of their most popular numbers was The History of Man. Codallo's Top Hatters Orchestra of Trinidad recorded that tune in the 1930s, and The Rhythm Wizards were one of the few bands to be playing it in the 21st Century.

I made two videos of their performance in Royal Street on 7 April 2016. While filming, I slowly walked round the band, to get a good view of all of them in close-up. The result is that the sound quality is sometimes unbalanced but I hope the videos give a good idea of the kind of music the band plays and, incidentally, what busking is like for a musician on the streets of New Orleans.

In one of my videos, they are playing The Cotton-Picker's Drag.  This tune was created by a string band of the 1930s - The Grinnell Giggers. View The Rhythm Wizards playing it BY CLICKING HERE.

The other video shows them playing the old favourite Ice Cream: View it BY CLICKING HERE.