Jazz
Bunk Johnson - Group Member, Trumpet
Abbie Williams - Drums, Group Member
Albert Warner - Group Member, Trombone
Alcide Pavageau - Bass
Austin Young - Bass, Group Member, String Bass
Chester Zardis - Bass, Group Member, String Bass
Edgar Mosely - Drums, Group Member
Edgar Mosley - Drums
Ernest Rogers - Drums, Group Member
George Lewis - Clarinet, Group Member
J.C. Higginbotham - Group Member, Trombone
James P. Johnson - Group Member, Piano
James P. Johnson & his Orchestra - Piano
Jim Robinson - Group Member, Trombone
Joseph "Slow Drag" Pauageau - Group Member, String Bass
Laurence Marrero - Banjo, Group Member
Louis Armstrong - Group Member, Trumpet
Paul Barbarin - Drums, Group Member
Richard Alexis - Bass, Group Member, String Bass
Sidney Bechet - Clarinet, Group Member, Sax (Soprano)
Walter Decou - Group Member, Piano
* Alan Taylor - Digital Remastering
* Alma Johanna Koenig - Arranger
* Alyn Shipton - Liner Notes
* Gary Atkinson - Producer
* Kevin Witt - Graphic Design
* Spencer Williams - Arranger
* W.C. Handy - Arranger
This CD is the first installment in Document Records' Bunk Johnson in Chronological Order series. Taken from four different New Orleans dates, the tracks start with two rehearsal takes from Johnson's first recording session on June 11th, 1942. Recorded in a piano storeroom at a local music shop, these two tracks feature the lineup of Jim Robinson on trombone, George Lewis on clarinet, Walter Decou on piano, Lawrence Marrero on banjo, Austin Young on bass, and Ernest Rogers on drums. Fourteen takes from an autumn 1942 session follow, featuring many of the same players, with the addition of Albert Warner on trombone and Chester Zardis on bass. Four tracks are included from a 1945 recording date that include Abby Williams on drums. The final (clipped) track, "Basin Street Blues," features Johnson with Louis Armstrong's legendary Jazz Foundation Six taken from a 1945 concert radio broadcast. Although short, it's Bunk and Satchmo's only known recording together. As with the rest of Document's Bunk Johnson series, this collection chronicles the music of an American New Orleans jazz pioneer. It testifies to the commitment of 1940s aficionados to capture the art of Johnson and other survivors of one of the earliest jazz generations.
---Jeff Schwachter, All Music Guide
Bunk Johnson
Active Decades: '10s, '20s, '30s and '40s
Born: Dec 27, 1889 in New Orleans, LA
Died: Jul 07, 1949 in New Orleans, LA
Genre: Jazz
Styles: Dixieland, Classic Jazz, New Orleans Jazz, New Orleans Brass Bands
Due to the difference of opinion between his followers (who claimed he was a brilliant stylist) and his detractors (who felt that his playing was worthless), Bunk Johnson was a controversial figure in the mid-'40s, when he made a most unlikely comeback. The truth is somewhere in between.
Bunk Johnson, who tended to exaggerate, claimed that he was born in 1879 and that he played with Buddy Bolden in New Orleans, but it was discovered that he was actually a decade younger. He did have a pretty tone and, although not an influence on Louis Armstrong (as he often stated), he was a major player in New Orleans starting around 1910 when he joined the Eagle Band. Johnson was active in the South until the early '30s, but did not record during that era. Discovered in the latter part of the decade by Bill Russell and Fred Ramsey, he was profiled in the 1939 book -Jazzmen. A collection was taken up to get Johnson new teeth and a horn. In 1942, he privately recorded in New Orleans, and the next year he was in San Francisco playing with the wartime edition of the Yerba Buena Jazz Band. An alcoholic, Johnson's playing tended to be erratic, and when Sidney Bechet recruited him for a band in 1945, he essentially drank himself out of the group. In 1946, Bunk Johnson led a group that included the nucleus of the ensemble George Lewis would make famous a few years later, but Johnson disliked the playing of the primitive New Orleans musicians. He was more comfortable the following year heading a unit filled with skilled swing players, and his final album (Columbia's The Last Testament of a Great Jazzman) was one of his best recordings. In 1948, the trumpeter (who was only 59 but seemed much older) returned to Louisiana and retired. Many of Bunk Johnson's better recordings have been reissued on CD by Good Time Jazz and American Music.
---Scott Yanow, All Music Guide |
