Klarinet Archive - Posting 001227.txt from 2003/03

From: Bill Hausmann <bhausmann1@-----.net>
Subj: Re: [kl] Young Man With a Horn
Date: Sun, 30 Mar 2003 12:21:03 -0500

At 07:42 AM 3/30/2003 -0800, Dan Leeson wrote:
>...Finally, at a break, he (Bix) speaks to the lead trumpet player (who,
>as I remember, was played by the same actor who did Uncle Remus in Walt
>Disney's "Songs of the South"), and asks him, "How do you do that?,"
>meaning of course the secrets of improvising.
>
>The trumpet player says, "Son. You just gotta feel it, that's all."
>
>And instantaneously, Kirk Douglas gets the magic feeling and plays 23
>straight choruses of Royal Garden Blues.
>
>For years, that is what I thought was true about jazz and classical
>improvisation. I didn't do it well not because I was untrained, but
>because I didn't understand how "to feel it."
>
>Now that was a scene full of horsehockey!

Horsehockey, indeed! Especially given that it is well known that
Beiderbecke was a poor reader! In fact, the story is often told about how
he was giving a local amateur group a thrill by jamming with them one day
and they pulled out an arrangement transcribed directly from one of his
recordings, including a note-for-note transcription of his solo. Bix could
not play it!

Bill Hausmann

If you have to mic a saxophone, the rest of the band is TOO LOUD!

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