Scott Joplin’s “Euphonic Sounds” vs. Jelly Roll Morton’s “Freakish” - - Classical Aspirations vs. Modern Accommodation

 

Scott Joplin

Jelly Roll Morton

We celebrate both Scott Joplin and Jelly Roll Morton as American originals and classicists. Joplin (1867-1917), as the “King” of classical ragtime composers and Morton (1890-1941), as a progenitor of what has come to be considered early jazz, both as composer/arranger and (thankfully),  recorded performer.    

Joplin was a classicist in the most traditional and technical sense.   His piano writing adhered to European music theory practices in harmony, voice leading and compositional form.  (For example, there’s little difference between the highly, formulaic musical structure of Joplin rags and Sousa marches: AA/BB/A/CC/DD). 

The magnificent results of Joplin’s’ genius was his blending  of European classicism and African American derived folk melodies -  both inextricably bound to  a uniquely  subtle and sophisticated binary, ragtime syncopation.  (On occasion, there is even an early suggestion of blue-notes  - flatted 3rds, 5ths - but these are always supported by conventional harmonies or quickly resolved as non-harmonic tones).    

 “Euphonic’s Sounds” (1909),  comes from a particularly rich year of Joplin rag composition. It also coincides with the beginning of Joplin’s obsession to write his grand, ragtime opera, “Treemonisha".   By 1907, Joplin had moved to New York City in order to be in a more compatiblle cultural environment that might artistically and financially support a staging of “Treemonisha”.

All this is to say,   if you’re familiar with Joplin as the composer of “Maple Leaf Rag”, “Easy Winners” and “The Entertainer” – you may well be surprised by Euphonic Sounds' very ambitious and surprising composition.

Clearly, Euphonic Sounds is a rag. It adheres to Joplin’s (and generally), classical ragtime's consistent use of sequential  16-bar strains.  Certainly, its 4-bar intro and first theme sound fairly much like business as usual.

The second theme, however, is where the traditional ragtime wheels come off, and even the initiated may think they’re losing count.  Yes, there are plenty of two-bar repetitions as befitting Joplin’s 16-bar strains, but in “Euphonic Sounds”; they serve an entirely different purpose.

To illustrate this point, let’s look at the arch-typical second-strain of  Joplin’s 1908 rag, “Fig Leaf”.

Here, the 16 bars strain conforms to 2, clearly defined -8 bar segments, divided into 4-bar phrases with clear thematic reiteration:

2^nd Strain: “Fig Leaf”

----------- 16 bars ------------

1^st half:  4+4: 2nd half: 4+4)

 Conversely, and quite atypically, “Euphonic Sounds'” second strain creates a 16-bar, through-composed arc, whose melodic material evolves through several jarring modulations, reaching a highly romantic climax at bar 13:

Additionally, as Rudi Blesh and others have noted, there is a suspension of the traditional bass-note-chord construct, a hall mark of not only ragtime in general, but upcoming stride piano playing.  

Stride pianist, James P. Johnson (for one), cited “Euphonic Sounds” for its modernism.  But while mind reading should never pass for scholarship, was Joplin’s rebellious  2nd strain  in Euphonic Sounds  more focused on expanding his concept of ragtime into another form of classical music, or  even so-called, serious modern music?  

And what was Jelly Roll Morton thinking when he imposed the descending, parallel  voicings  of disorienting  dominant 9^th chords in 1929’s “Freakish”?  

Was Morton, on the cusp of being passe, thinking of cornetist, Bix Beiderbecke’s 1926 foray into impressionism called “In a Mist” (played quite well, actually, by Bix on piano)?  Or, was he simply  trying to say,  “Don’t tell me, I get this modern stuff!”  And if he did get it, he may well have signaled  he didn’t much care for it my calling his composition “Freakish”.

Don’t get me wrong.  I love “Freakish”, and thanks to the most excellent transcriptions of James Dapogny (in this case, transcribed from Morton’s 1938 Smithsonian recordings with Alan Lomax,  at a more relaxed,  “Don’t tell me, I get this swing-thing” tempo),  I very much enjoy playing it.

But was Morton trying to sound modern, or was he mocking it?   After all, Morton’s  “Freakish” conceit was about juxtaposing the dominant  9^th   chord sonorities with more and longer sections based on more like ragtime-like lyricism and harmonies.

But for Morton, "Freakish" was another tune of many in his club date and recording career. Joplin’s Euphonic Sounds  might have been a 16 bar cry for a different kind of recognition.

 

Travel Tips for New Orleans: Bring Cash

I only needed one weekend In New Orleans’ irresistible French Quarter to nearly spend $200.00 in small gratuities. Solo street musicians,  bands, jugglers, human statues (witness Bourbon Street’s hard-hatted construction worker, posing motionless on his ladder while holding a two-by-four over one shoulder for hours on end),  hip-hop dancers  and hucksters -  the last group offering   more in the way of desperation than talent – all had their hand-in for a hand-out   By the time Saturday night rolled around, when Sue, (my traveling companion), and I observed  a  roach  crawling across the very old bar at The Spotted Cat  on Frenchmen Street , I didn’t know whether to kill it -  or tip it.

But for me, New Orleans has always been about the music. And if the Dixieland revival of the 1940s began a touristy homogenization of the music created by King Oliver, Louis Armstrong and Jelly Roll Morton in the first few decades of the 20^th century, ultimately resulting in non-stop performances of “When The Saints Go Marching In” at Preservation Hall – and just about every place else in town - it’s still New Orleans. And I -  like others early jazz aficionados -  wouldn’t dream of not going.

The Hokum Highrollers

There are definitely two strata of musicians in New Orleans: those that are paid by salary or a percentage of the door cover (including headliners), and those that work exclusively for tips.

Of course, the street musicians, solely dependent on tips, are the most visible.  They dress in clothes of an indeterminate, but somehow indigenously convincing, bygone era.  Many groups bring along  their pet dogs who either sleep or wag  their tails in time to the music.  Adapted plastic water jugs and instrument cases are open for tips, with hand lettered cardboard signs requesting $1.00 per photograph.  Some try to imitate the virtues and limitations of the old New Orleans jazz and country-folk styles with varying degrees of success.  At worst, they seem creatively trapped by it.  At best, you can hear and feel - even from the very young players just past their teenage years - a genuine yearning to make it all new and relevant.
             

Thanks to the digital age and the internet, a few of the street bands offer up inexpensive CDs.  The polished and talented Hokum Highrollers, comprised of guitar, banjo, fiddle, string bass and trumpet can be viewed on www.facebook/thehokumhighrollers   For their street concerts, they offer up an old-time, swinging, string-band sound, replete with southern vocal twangs and kazoo.   Amanda Blake on trumpet (fighting off a cold when I saw here), employs an empty soda cup as a mute and tap dances; her metal taps (in addition to being entertaining), provide an inventive alternative to woodblocks or spoons.

These guys really nailed the string band sound of the early  30s.

 

While the Hokum Highrollers are attempting to brand themselves, many street musicians move back and forth between pick-up groups.  One afternoon I cited a country guitarist/singer in three different bands in the French Quarter.

If you want to weave in and out of a very inexpensive and rewarding club scene, however, Frenchmen Street  has  numerous restaurants bars and clubs – all noted for their music, accessibility - and some for a delectable seasoning of sleaze.
 

In just about any other city or town, The Spotted Cat is a bar that would have to be considered an old and unmitigated, mangy dive.  But somehow, on Frenchmen Street - with its joyously maintained and seedy authenticity (and a portrait of my man, Jelly Roll, above the bar), I found it down-right exotic.  For the price of a one-drink minimum, we were unexpectedly blown away by the Panorama Jazz Band.  Comprised (on this night), of clarinet, sax, trombone, sousaphone, accordion and drums, the ensemble brilliantly played inventive and tight arrangements of an eclectic series of jazz and Klezmer inflected tangos, waltzes, horas, and marches.  Once I heard this group, I had absolutely no desire to move on to other destinations.

The Panorama Jazz Band, at The Spotted Cat

But despite my experience over the last two days – and given the quality of their performance – I was still surprised when the sousaphone player, Jon Gross (recently nominated by Offbeat Magazine for “Best Tuba/Sousaphonist” in New Orleans, who’s maybe 5’7” tall), stepped off the stand in the middle of a tune, and waded through the customers, soliciting tips – still performing -  and without dropping a single note or beat.  Playing the horn’s valves with his right hand, he held the ubiquitous plastic gallon water bottle aloft with his left - secured by his three middle fingers - while managing to hold two different CDs between his thumb and index fingers.  Was I impressed?  Let’s just say I wasted no time in taking a CD and dropping a twenty into the plastic bottle.
  

In talking with the trombonist, I learned the band seldom played outside of New Orleans – which somehow, was just what I wanted to hear.  The Panorama Jazz Band rounded out the short stay beautifully.  My final musical, New Orleans tip-touch-point before heading back to Jersey.

This unknown clarinetist really wailed.

But wouldn’t you know it: as it turns out The Hokum Highrollers hail from Burlington, Vermont.

Three PhD Dissertations on Jazz - I Won’t Write.

As I concluded my graduate work toward  my MA in music composition at CUNY (including my thesis piece, a two-movement, atonal string quartet), there was the immediate, somewhat knee-jerk assumption I would move right along into the PhD program in composition.

I didn’t - and since then, the earth has cooled considerably. Now, if I were to pursue a PhD, I’m fairly certain it would be in jazz studies.  But as the years roll on, even that seems unlikely.  Consequently, I’m prepared to throw open for consideration - and surreptitious appropriation - three subjects for possible dissertations.

Coleman Hawkins

1. Coleman Hawkins- and His History of Jazz

When Ken Burns made his milestone documentary “Jazz” (2000), he used both Louie Armstrong (1901–1971) and Duke Ellington (1899-1974) as referential, connecting threads to help ground his story’s chronology and construct. After all, both Armstrong and Ellington were there at the beginning of Jazz’s luminous second generation of players and composer/arrangers (the first generation - Buddy Bolden, etc. - being extremely under represented by recordings – if at all).  Both Armstrong and Ellington lived well into the period of avante guarde and free jazz.  Their deaths, in fact, came at a time when a good deal of jazz had settled into a comfortable and more commercial homogenization of late swing and be-pop.

Armstrong, by virtue of his historic longevity, tremendous commercial output, and highly affable and accessible media personality, provides a strong emotional tie-in for Burns’ 19 hour opus. As an innovator, however, no one would argue that Armstrong continued to evolve past the mid 1930s.  Ellington did evolve, however. As a composer, he continued to grow harmonically, rhythmically and structurally.

So, it is more with Ellington in mind that aligning the study of jazz with the ongoing and cutting edge development of a seminal performer, such as tenor sax giant, Coleman Hawkins, strikes me as compelling idea and a justification to take yet another, but hopefully, different PoV for an in-depth study of jazz (By the way, if you can find a like performer that would qualify for a similar study – I’d love to know about it). 

Coleman’s discography begins in 1921 as a 17 year old sideman for blues “Queen”, Mamie Smith and her “Jazz Hounds”.  Listen to the down and dirty, polyphonic instrumental ensemble on “Crazy Blues”- and then compare that to Coleman’s tenor sax solo (not to mention the rest of the very well, and tightly arranged, Fletcher Henderson Orchestra) in the 1924 recording of “Sugar Foot Stomp”.  Now, imagine the same instrumentalist playing with Django Reinhardt, Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Thelonius Monk and Max Roach - to mention just several great and innovative musicians. 

But before you explore those recordings, listen again (and how lucky for you if it’s the first time), to Hawk’s 1939 recording of “Body and Soul”.  This, in my estimation, would be the centerpiece, the “golden mean” of this suggested dissertation.  As well as the place and time that Hawkins became an undisputed leader in the world of jazz.

2. The Evolution of  Swing in Jazz Ensembles & Rhythm Section – 1917- 1955

The late Lance Hayward - the blind and gifted jazz pianist from Bermuda - used to play solo at the Village Corner on Bleeker Street in Greenwich Village back in the 1970s and 80s.  Given there was no cover charge, inexpensive brews, and Lance’s very long sets, it was an irresistible opportunity to hear really fine jazz piano.  During breaks, Lance was accessible and available for conversation – no matter how pretentious or silly. 

Once (during one of my deeper moments), I asked, “How do you define jazz?” 

“The only thing I know”, said Lance, rather modestly, while snapping his fingers, “is that you feel the beat on two and four.  Jazz is on two and four.”  (If you’re unsure what this means, watch video of Sinatra snapping his fingers along to Nelson Riddle arrangements).

The "Original Dixieland Jazz Band" as they appeared in 1917. (Note the size of the bass drum).

But Lance’s definition would exclude most everything from the earliest days of jazz recording (arguably beginning in 1917 with the “Original Dixieland Jazz Band”) through mid-period swing (into the late 1930s) and a lot of Latin feels that are essentially 8/8.  Of course, this is where it becomes interesting.

The general notion of swing is that it has become standardized.  Having written more instrumental theater arrangements then I’d care to admit, I’ve been asked consistently over the years if a particular arrangement, or passage, is “swung”.  If I say “swing it” - amazingly - everybody seems to have a great sense of the same, if generic interpretation.  In fact, the majority of performers would assert exactly how a writer should represent swing through actual notation.  (With no automated notation available, I’ll describe what everyone probably expects: If, by example,  a line is comprised of ten “swinging” eight notes, the “swing” conversion would be notated by five triplets; the first sound ((within each triplet)), being represented by a quarter-note,  and the second sound by an eight note).

We see this convention all the time in bluesy pop-music and theater scores.  An alternative to the pesky triplet notation would be changing the beat unit to a dotted quarter and the meter to 12/8.  What most of us prefer, however, is writing straight 8^th notes and simply indicating “Swing!”   

And yet, the earliest recorded jazz (1917-1930) defies this application of conventional swing. Listening to the earliest ensembles, we hear swing expressed as a feel somewhere between syncopated march-time and a more relaxed triplet feel; oft times occurring in the same recording, and represented by different players. A great example of this occurs in any number of Armstrong’s solos from his Hot Five and Hot Seven recordings (1925-1929). Listening to Armstrong’s double-time passages (clearly nascent versions of Lance Hayward’s two-and-four swing), one can’t help be struck by the jarring juxtaposition his sense of swing evokes when compared to the older style of his colleagues.

But since I’m not writing this dissertation, here are a few thoughts for exploration regarding the evolution of the jazz rhythm section and its advancement toward the modern sense of swing:

1. The supplantation of tuba by string bass.
2. The abandonment of the woodblock
3. The abandonment of the banjo
4. The creation and expanded use of the high-hat
5. The development of the ride cymbal
6. The introduction of the Count Bassie ‘comp’ style

Of course, if your goal is not to write this dissertation, but to recreate the sound and integrity of early jazz ensembles, ignore a. (Jelly Roll Morton and his Red Hot Peppers re-creationists, excepted), and b and c.

3. How the Invention of Sound Recording Impacted the Development of  Early Jazz 

My third possible subject for a jazz dissertation is undoubtedly the most difficult to execute and substantiate, clearly (or perhaps because there’s lack of clarity), the most theoretically convoluted, and – for the aspiring scholar and musicologist – the most risky and dangerous.  In other words, it’s potentially the most worthy of the three.

Putting aside cinema (which organically grew with, and was inextricably bound to the invention and ongoing development of film as a medium), has anyone ever attempted to link the development of an art form with a particular mechanical media in such a holistic manner? 

Surely the early recording process must have had a developmental impact on an art form increasingly based on improvisation?

The germ of this idea actually began when listening to a 1906 acoustic recording of Mimi’s aria from Puccini’s La Boheme, Si, mi chiamano Mimi . At one point I realized I was hearing an echo of Mimi’s aria in the orchestra played by a flute, instead of its usual representation on harp, as orchestrated by Puccini. This had everything to do with the technology of the one, or two horn, acoustical recording process unable to capture the delicacy of the plucked harp. Needless to say, technology caught up with the finer points of Puccini’s instrumental and vocal requirements, as it did with all preexisting and subsequent orchestral, band, choral, and chamber music. I don’t know whether this type of practical substitution annoyed Puccini, or if he even cared about his music being recorded. I’m certain, however, it did not impede his creativity or thwart his development as a composer. Neither did it ultimately misrepresent his intentions. Any music student of 1906 could review Puccini’s instrumentation in his score, or find a performance that faithfully realized the composer’s intentions.

But in 1906 sound recording was in its nascency. And so was jazz. Arguably, they grew up together. Further, unlike classical music, jazz was an aural phenomena; its players a mix of educated music readers and “head” musicians. Stock arrangements existed, but were loosely interpreted with actual performances containing worked out, or improvised two-bar breaks and freely expressed rhythmic and melodic tune variations.

Without the written scores, which only suggested improvisation amd the use of blues, aspiring jazz players learned by hearing it live or listening to recordings.

If we assume the conductor and sound engineer accommodated the limitations of the recording process by swapping out a harp for a flute in the 1906 La Boheme aria, what might the impact have been to the earliest jazz recordings, and in-turn, how did the perception formed through those recordings impact jazz’s development?  In other words, what degree of musical compromise are we experiencing in this early collaboration between musician and engineer?

Here’s a short list of examples citing how technical limitations impacted recorded, early jazz performances:

• 1. Recordings tended to run under 3 minutes
• 2. Drummers tended to favor woodblocks, which were audibly much brighter than snares and tom-toms and cymbals.
• 3. Tracks weren’t mixed – players were mixed. (e.g., the classic tale regarding Louis Armstrong being told to stand 10 feet behind his first recording ensemble, “King Oliver’s Creole Jazz Band”, because of the power of his sound).
• 4. In general, recording could be decently or poorly mixed through the positioning of players. Poorly mixed recordings were particularly injurious to the polyphony of early jazz.
• 5. The state of recording actually made piano-rolls a viable alternative into the mid 1920s.

In conclusion - -any takers?