Post 423: 'WORKING MAN BLUES'

In 1923 the 37-year-old cornet-playing band-leader Joe 'King' Oliver and his 25-year-old pianist Lil Hardin (who had a music diploma from Fisk University, Nashville, and who later became Mrs. Louis Armstrong) composed Working Man Blues - sometimes written as Workingman's Blues.

At the time, King Oliver's Creole Jazz Band had a residency at Lincoln Gardens, 459, East 31st Street, Chicago - not far from the Lake. (As far as I can tell, there is today a glass office block on the site.) The band made a recording of Working Man Blues for the Gennett label in Richmond, Indiana, on 3 October 1923. You may listen to it BY CLICKING HERE.

It's a really good piece for the repertoire of our bands and easy to master. 

As you see, there are just three short and simple sections. The first (A) is only a 12-bar blues, using a pretty riff. The second (B) is a 16-bar theme using The Four-Leaf Clover chord progression. (You can read about that progression BY CLICKING HERE.)

Section (B) is structured to include three opportunities for 2-bar breaks. Johnny Dodds makes the most of those in that 1923 recording.

The third 'theme' (C) involves free-style improvising over another 12-bar blues structure, but this time allowing a 'break' in bars 7 and 8. Oliver's band had the clarinet, cornet and trombone (Honoré Dutrey) respectively taking these breaks.

The tune is rounded off by a neat 2-bar CODA.

Some bands today, unlike Oliver himself, make more of Themes (A) and (B), staying on them for longer, or even dropping Theme (C) altogether.

Oliver chooses to devote the whole of the second half of the performance to three choruses of Theme (C).

He was constrained by the limited amount of time for which a 78 rpm record could play. Bands today are freed from such constraint and - with more choruses - tend to make the tune last much longer. However, as I have said elsewhere, a short performance can often be more effective than a longer one (especially if the musicians have nothing special to 'say'). For me, Oliver's original recorded version feels just right.

On the choice of key, some bands today play the piece in F. It sounds fine in that key and is perhaps for some musicians a little easier than Lil Hardin and Oliver's choice of Ab.

To watch a clear and reverential performance of Working Man Blues by a much later band (The Peruna Jazzmen) CLICK HERE.

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Post 133: 'WILLIE THE WEEPER' - THE 1920 JAZZ TUNE

On Tuba Skinny's CD called Owl Call Blues (released in August 2014), there is a recording of Willie the Weeper.

Willie the Weeper is a tune from 1920, attributed to Walter Melrose, Grant Rymal and Marty Bloom. However, it was remarkably similar to Willie the Peeper, composed in 1912 by Harry Armstrong, Billy Clark and James Coogan, so we may consider it as largely plagiarised. This point was established by the great music researcher and sheet music collector Audrey VanDyke. (For a comparison of the two tunes, CLICK HERE.)

It's a tune every band should be able to play because it always goes well and because it has a number of interesting ingredients.

It consists of two themes of 16 bars each. The first is in a minor key. The second is in the related major. As for structures, the first theme may be considered as an 8 + 8, whereas the second is an AABA  (four bars of each).  On top of these features that give it the variety to make it interesting, Willie The Weeper is simply a jolly good tune. Below it is in D minor and F, but it goes well in other keys too, especially G minor and Bb. You may choose - as many bands do - to add a 4-bar Introduction and to play Theme B first. Most bands treat Theme B as the 'Chorus' and improvise on this part, which uses the simple Sweet Sue Progression (Dominant 7th to Tonic) three times, with an interesting 'Middle Four'.

The tune was recorded very long ago by such bands as King Oliver's. But for a YouTube performance of the tune by a modern band with Theme B in Bb:

CLICK HERE.

And for a special treat (a Tuba Skinny version):

CLICK HERE
or CLICK HERE.

Post 99: 'GATEMOUTH'

Here's another easy but effective tune for your band to play - if you don't already have it.

Gatemouth was written in about 1926 by the pianist Lil Hardin (possibly in collaboration with her husband Louis Armstrong). It has two catchy themes. The first is a 16-bar, using the Sweet Sue Chord Progression, and allowing for breaks - if desired - on Bars 7 - 8. You can even have breaks right through a chorus of this theme, as The New Orleans Wanderers did in 1926 when they recorded it. You can hear their performance if you

CLICK HERE.

That first theme - by the way - is virtually identical to other good old standards, such as Do What Ory Say, Mamma's Baby Boy, Get It Right and the main theme of South.

The second theme is also 16 bars. Normally, bands play both themes a couple of times and use the first for solo improvisations.

You can hear Gatemouth played more recently by The Peruna Jazzmen.

CLICK HERE.

The tune certainly lends itself to a variety of New Orleans treatments, taking advantage of the opportunities to incorporate breaks and stop chords.

It is generally played in Eb: