SOTM April 2023: Saint Louis Blues

[ESJohn]

Hello everyone!
On a very lonely day in 1892, a 19 year old from Florence, Alabama found himself in Saint Louis, MO. He was at a very low point in his life. Sleeping on the cobblestones of the levy of the Mississippi River and wearing a jacket with no shirt under it, he would have had plenty of reasons to find his way back home. While there, he heard a woman lamenting the unfaithfulness of her man.
Those vivid memories stayed with him, and in the darkness of a long night in 1914, he penned The Saint Louis Blues. This man was William Christopher Handy, affectionately known today as W C Handy and as the Father of the Blues. This tune was only one of many tunes that he composed and published, but it is the one most associated with his name. I present this to you for your perusal.

St Louis Blues

Shared with Dropbox

www.dropbox.com

Many thanks to Nigel for granting me this opportunity. I hope you enjoy listening to and playing the music!

 

[Colin the Bear]

I think the first time I heard this was watching the Glen Miller Story. It's a great film score but has little to do with Glen Miller arrangements.

View: https://youtu.be/dmbflslh-js

 

[Colin the Bear]

I have no idea how they got there from here.

View: https://youtu.be/5Bo3f_9hLkQ

 

[ESJohn]

Here are a few renditions of the music:

W C Handy's Band (1922)

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gpp75gQ-T6Y



Bessie Smith (vocal) (1928)

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cwRbsULaQIo

This is my favorite. Louis Armstrong playing and Leonard Bernstein conducting for Mr. Handy in 1956. Watch to the end to see a very poignant reaction by the man that started it all.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ekZ6oUGC04k

 

[ESJohn]

I have no idea how they got there from here.

I think that is one of the most fascinating things about the tune. It has been played and arranged so many times throughout these past 100 plus years. I have seen tempos ranging from 60 to 160 with everything in between. It is open to so much interpretation and improvisation, but maybe that is how The Blues should be.

 

[ESJohn]

You may notice in the Dropbox, along with the backing track, that there are arrangements for saxophone, both tenor and alto, written by F. Henri Klickmann. There is even a C Melody arrangement (complete with piano accompaniment) that I could post here for anyone interested. Mr. Klickmann wrote several arrangements for the The Six Brown Brothers, a saxophone sextette that worked the vaudeville circuit and minstrel shows. It is said that that group popularized the saxophone in the USA.
Many thanks go out to Michael Worden and the Alfred Music Company for the research that they did to confirm that those arrangements are in the public domain.

 

[turf3]

Easy tune to have train wrecks, what with the three different parts and the Habanera beat on one part.

You better talk the road map out with the band when you call this one.

On the plus side, everyone knows it cold so it's a good jam tune - as long as you set the road map. Or have a real strong rhythm section player (piano or guitar) to drive the band from one part to the next.

 

[Colin the Bear]

A good drummer and a strong lead trumpet and I'll follow.
That Latin bit in the middle is a pain to march to.

 

[ESJohn]

Interesting comment, Turf!
Here is another twist on the tune. I am quoting directly from his autobiography, Father of the Blues (c. 1941):
Page 122
"When St. Louis Blues was written the tango was the vogue. I tricked the dancers by arranging a tango introduction, breaking abruptly then into a low-down blues."
Page 123
"A criticism leveled at the St. Louis Blues by the trombonist of our band was that it needed a vamp, a vamp in the prevailing manner, to allow more time for the singer."
"Never. Never!" I exploded.
" But the next day a pause mark was placed over the final note in the introduction in order to favor the singer with the required delay..."

 

[ESJohn]

Ian Boyter plays both tenor sax and clarinet in this one:

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bYFxbFo73Ks

 

[rhysonsax]

Great choice and I'm looking forward to hearing what people do with it.

Here is a wonderful live recording by the great Jimmy Witherspoon, a stellar rhythm section and the saxophone genius of Ben Webster and Gerry Mulligan. Mulligan doesn't solo on this one but he is a revelation with his bluesy playing elsewhere on the album.

View: https://youtu.be/OtnaZ4IyVFI


Maybe we'll get a vocal recording from @Colin the Bear or another singer ?

Rhys

 

[ESJohn]

Maybe we'll get a vocal recording from @Colin the Bear or another singer ?

Great recording! I think you have a request, Colin!

 

[wuffysax]

Thanks for the great title

I have also in my rich repertoire

here my version

View: https://youtu.be/fG4-WkcUyNI


hope you can listen to it

best greetings from the Black Forest, Germany

Wuffy

 

[ESJohn]

Love that interpretation, Wuffy! The blues just sang out through that horn!

 

[rhysonsax]

Here is the big band I play baritone with playing the Miller arrangement last year at the local beer festival. Not the best position for the camera and the saxophones are quite a long way from the microphone so the balance favours the brass.

View: https://youtu.be/WXyb7gZShRo?t=148


Rhys

 

[ESJohn]

Excellent, Rhysonsax! I know that version is played often by marching bands, but it is easy to picture couples on the dance floors of the 40's enjoying it! Thanks for posting!

 

[rhysonsax]

Excellent, Rhysonsax! I know that version is played often by marching bands, but it is easy to picture couples on the dance floors of the 40's enjoying it! Thanks for posting!

I can also picture inebriated drinkers swaying gently on their own.

We had a particularly enthusiastic response at last year's beer festival and are playing for them again later this month.

Rhys

 

[thomsax]

hope you can listen to it

I like it all. The music, video and the Kohlert tenor. It's one of the Kohlerts that is close to a Martin Committee. Soldered tone holes?

 

[wuffysax]

Thank You !

Yes, soldered tone holes

 

[mrpeebee]

I have an old version from January 2018 to share:

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YjmErsqAjEo