McKenzie and Condon's Chicagoans was an American jazz band from Chicago, led by banjo player Eddie Condon and sponsored by singer and comb player Red McKenzie. Their four recordings in December 1927 were important influences on early Chicago style jazz. [1]
The group got together in 1962 for a reunion, to record the album Chicago and All That Jazz. Pee Wee Russell replaced Frank Teschemacher, who had died in 1932, on the clarinet, and Bob Haggart filled in for the retired bassist Jim Lanigan. Trombonist Jack Teagarden joined the group for the sessions. [2] [3]
Date | Title | Writer | Notes |
---|---|---|---|
1927-12-08 | "China Boy" | Phil Boutelje, Dick Winfree | |
1927-12-08 | "Sugar" | Milton Ager, Frank Crum, Red Nichols, Jack Yellen | Not to be confused with Maceo Pinkard's "Sugar" (1927) |
1927-12-16 | "Liza" | Eddie Condon, Red McKenzie, Aaron Rubin | Not to be confused with George Gershwin's "Liza (All the Clouds'll Roll Away)" |
1927-12-16 | "Nobody's Sweetheart" | Ernie Erdman, Gus Kahn, Billy Meyers, Elmer Schoebel | Also known as "You're Nobody's Sweetheart Now" |
Eddie Lang was an American musician who is credited as the father of jazz guitar. During the 1920s, he gave the guitar a prominence it previously lacked as a solo instrument, as part of a band or orchestra, and as accompaniment for vocalists. He recorded duets with guitarists Lonnie Johnson and Carl Kress and jazz violinist Joe Venuti, and played rhythm guitar in the Paul Whiteman Orchestra and was the favoured accompanist of Bing Crosby.
McKinney's Cotton Pickers were an American jazz band, founded in Detroit, Michigan, United States in 1926, and led by William McKinney, who expanded his Synco Septet to ten players. Cuba Austin took over for McKinney on drums, with the latter becoming the band's manager. Between 1927 and 1931, they were one of the most popular African American bands. Many of their records for Victor were bestsellers.
Albert Edwin Condon was an American jazz banjoist, guitarist, and bandleader. A leading figure in Chicago jazz, he also played piano and sang. He also owned a self-named night club in New York City.
Frank Teschemacher was an American jazz clarinetist and alto-saxophonist, associated with the "Austin High" gang.
Charles Ellsworth "Pee Wee" Russell was an American jazz musician. Early in his career he played clarinet and saxophones, but he eventually focused solely on clarinet.
Lawrence "Bud" Freeman was an American jazz musician, bandleader, and composer, known mainly for playing tenor saxophone, but also the clarinet.
Robert Sage Wilber was an American jazz clarinetist, saxophonist, and band leader. Although his scope covers a wide range of jazz, Wilber was a dedicated advocate of classic styles, working throughout his career to present traditional jazz pieces in a contemporary manner. He played with many distinguished jazz leaders in the 1950s and 1960s, including Bobby Hackett, Benny Goodman, Sidney Bechet, Jack Teagarden and Eddie Condon. In the late 1960s, he was an original member of the World's Greatest Jazz Band, and in the early 70s of Soprano Summit, a band which gained wide attention. In the late 1970s, he formed the Bechet Legacy Band.
James Dugald "Jimmy" McPartland was an American cornetist. He worked with Eddie Condon, Art Hodes, Gene Krupa, Benny Goodman, Jack Teagarden, and Tommy Dorsey, often leading his own bands. He was married to pianist Marian McPartland.
Edmond Hall was an American jazz clarinetist and bandleader. Over his career, Hall worked extensively with many leading performers as both a sideman and bandleader and is possibly best known for the 1941 chamber jazz song "Profoundly Blue".
Michael Joseph O'Sullivan was an American jazz pianist.
Max Kaminsky was an American jazz trumpeter and bandleader.
The Austin High School Gang was the name given to a group of young, white musicians from the West Side of Chicago, who all attended Austin High School during the early 1920s. They rose to prominence as pioneers of the Chicago Style in the 1920s, which was modeled on a hurried version of New Orleans Jazz.
The Mound City Blue Blowers were an American novelty jazz ensemble, formed in St. Louis, Missouri, United States. It was co-founded by Red McKenzie and Jack Bland and performed from 1923 to 1936.
Jim Lanigan was an American jazz bassist and tubist.
Joe Licari is an American jazz clarinetist.
"There'll Be Some Changes Made" ("Changes") is a popular song by Benton Overstreet (composer) and Billy Higgins (lyricist). Published in 1921, the song has flourished in several genres, particularly jazz. The song has endured for as many years as a jazz standard. According to the online The Jazz Discography, "Changes" had been recorded 404 times as of May 2018. The song and its record debut were revolutionary, in that the songwriters (Overstreet and Higgins, the original copyright publisher, Harry Herbert Pace, the vocalist to first record it, the owners of Black Swan, the opera singer for whom the label was named, and the musicians on the recording led by Fletcher Henderson, were all African American. The production is identified by historians as a notable part of the Harlem Renaissance.
Dixieland jazz, also referred to as traditional jazz, hot jazz, or simply Dixieland, is a style of jazz based on the music that developed in New Orleans at the start of the 20th century. The 1917 recordings by the Original Dixieland Jass Band fostered awareness of this new style of music.
This is a timeline documenting events of Jazz in the year 1922.
The Smithsonian Collection of Classic Jazz is a six-LP box set released in 1973 by the Smithsonian Institution. Compiled by jazz critic, scholar, and historian Martin Williams, the album included tracks from over a dozen record labels spanning several decades and genres of American jazz, from ragtime and big band to post-bop and free jazz.
The Chicago Rhythm Kings was the name under which the recordings of several different jazz ensembles were issued. The earliest of these was a jazz octet consisting of vocalist Red McKenzie, cornetist Muggsy Spanier, saxophonist Frank Teschemacher, guitarist Eddie Condon, clarinetist Mezz Mezzrow, pianist Joe Sullivan, drummer Gene Krupa, and bassist and tubist Jim Lanigan. This group, who also recorded under the name the Jungle Kings, released a 1928 record for Brunswick Records as the Chicago Rhythm Kings performing Benton Overstreet's "There'll Be Some Changes Made" and Jack Palmer and Spencer Williams's "I Found a New Baby".