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Kansas City Swing and Count Basie

Kansas City Swing and Count Basie. Kansas City. “commercial center and provincial capital” of “a self-sufficient and self-contained empire.” (Ross Russell) agricultural hub of an area one sixth of the continental United States.

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Kansas City Swing and Count Basie

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  1. Kansas City Swing and Count Basie

  2. Kansas City • “commercial center and provincial capital” of “a self-sufficient and self-contained empire.” (Ross Russell) • agricultural hub of an area one sixth of the continental United States. • Geographically removed from urban centers such as Chicago or New York.

  3. “Boss” Tom Pendergast • head of Kansas City’s political “machine.” • disregard for prohibition. • proliferation of nightclubs. • “Under Pendergast’s rule, a free-wheeling jazz thrived in Kansas City’s black neighborhood.” • “Black musicians didn’t escape racial prejudice. . . but they could always find work.” • Pendergast convicted of income tax evasion in 1939.

  4. Boogie-Woogie • blues piano style. • ostinato (relatively short, repeated) patterns in the bass. • sub-division of the beat (eighth notes) in the bass. • became popular among “mainstream” audiences in the 1930s.

  5. Territory Bands • lesser known regional bands. • played one-night engagements close to “headquarters.” • typically not recorded (recording not common in the Midwest). • the best often ended up in Kansas City. • examples include Blue Devils, Clouds of Joy, Benny Moten. • typically featured” head arrangements”.

  6. Head Arrangements • (loosely) arranged. • not written down. • based on “riffs:” • short melodies or melodic fragments. • repeated. • head arrangements were flexible. • more opportunities for improvised solos than notated arrangements.

  7. Jam Sessions • “After-hours” gatherings for musicians. • “The jam session was a Kansas City specialty, like crawdads and brain sandwiches. In the long and memorable history of such informal playing, there has been no city where the jam session was so popular and was engaged in with such enthusiasm and with such fierce competitive spirit by so many jazzmen and at so many locales as in Kansas City during the Pendergast years.” (Ross Russell) • “The idea of the jam session then wasn’t who could play better than somebody else – it was a matter of contributing something and of experimentation. Jam sessions were our fun, our outlet.” (Jo Jones)

  8. Jam Sessions (cont’d.) • competition (cutting sessions). • experimentation/education. • recreational.

  9. Count Basie • Initially learned piano from his mother, heavily influenced by Harlem stride pianists. • toured as pianist and music director. • stranded in KC in 1927, played silent film theatres. • Walter Page's Blue Devils (1929), Bennie Moten (1935). • One O'Clock Jump, Jumpin' at the Woodside, Taxi War Dance.

  10. Count Basie (cont’d) • disbanded group in 1950 for financial reasons, reformed in 1952. • toured Europe in 1954 and Japan in 1963, made recordings under his own name and with various singers (Sinatra). • Innovations: • Group sound organized around the rhythm section. • timekeeping in cymbals instead of bass and snare. • “walking bass.” • Freddie Green-style guitar. • Extremely sparse, "minimal" piano solo style.

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