Cootie Williams

When Cootie left Duke...

Cootie Williams was a very strong trumpet player. I remember times when you could hear him two blocks away from the Savoy Ballroom.

-Joe Newman

When I was a kid back in the mid1970s, while watching old movies from the 1930s and listening to the songs from Fred Astaire movies, I discovered the sound of jazz before I knew such music existed.

Whenever I watched a Marx Brothers movie, I looked forward to Harpo’s harp solos and Chico’s piano solos. While not jazz, they were an improvisational style I later discovered in jazz. Chico had so many good ones it’s difficult to pick one out, like this one from A Night at the Opera:

Chico was always fond of jazz and aspired to form his own orchestra. In 1942, with the help of the great Chicago drummer and bandleader Ben Pollack, he established the Chico Marx Orchestra, which debuted at the Oriental Theater in Chicago:

Focusing mainly on stage shows, Chico’s orchestra released two records on The Hit Record label. Here’s one of them, Sweet Eloise recorded in New York City in March 1942:

His orchestra consisted of a 16-man band and a vocal group. The lineup changed sporadically, but in the fall of 1942, Chicagoan Mel Tormé joined the group as a singer and vocal arranger. The orchestra also included the great West Coast Jazz guitarist Barney Kessel.

The Hit Record label was one of a couple of short-lived labels founded by Eli Oberstein, a recording supervisor at Victor Records. As it turns out, after he left Duke Ellington’s Orchestra, trumpeter Cootie Williams recorded on Oberstein’s Hit Records.

This week on that Big River called Jazz, we’ll explore the world of Cootie Williams after he left the Duke Ellington band.

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On November 6, 1940, Duke Ellington’s star trumpet player signed a one-year contract with Benny Goodman. The next day, Williams recorded with Goodman’s legendary sextet, which included George Auld on tenor, Count Basie on piano, Charlie Christian on guitar, Art Bernstein on bass, and Harry Jaeger on drums.

Their first of four tracks was Wholly Cats:

Here’s how they sounded in the studio and dig Charlie Christian on guitar:

Six days later, Goodman took his new big band back to the studio to cut their first sides, Williams and George Auld’s first recording with the Goodman orchestra. Surprisingly, Goodman’s arranger the great Fletcher Henderson sits down at the piano for his composition Henderson Stomp:

From the same session, I also like Nobody with Hellen Forrest on vocals - with the nice “Minneapolis has St. Paul” reference:

On January 15, 1941, the Benny Goodman Sextet recorded On The Alamo, one of the all-time classics with Basie’s wonderful piano and nice Williams solo:

As his full year with Goodman was about to end, Williams decided not to renew his contract and left the band at the end of October.

In 1941, he formed his own orchestra, which over the years employed Bud Powell, Eddie "Lockjaw" Davis, Eddie “Cleanhead” Vinson, and even for a short time Charlie Parker.

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Before we get into Williams’ recordings for Hit Record, it’s time for a quick side journey that’s perhaps off-topic, but you never know what’s down the backwaters of that Big River called Jazz unless you explore them a little.

Eli Oberstein is credited for launching the 35-cent Bluebird label, a subsidiary of RCA Victor that became a big success during the Depression. He also developed the Mexican-American market for RCA, overseeing Bluebird sessions in makeshift Texas hotel-room studios. One of his most popular artists was Narciso Martinez.

Born in Reynosa, Mexico in 1911, Martinez was raised in La Paloma, Texas. In 1928, he learned how to play the one-row diatonic accordion from the local German and Czech families around Bishop, Texas. He founded a specific type of Tejano music called "conjunto" and was given the nickname El Huracan del Valle (The Hurricane of the Valley). In the early 1930s, he began a successful collaboration with bajo sexto player Santiago Almeida. Here they are together:

In 1936, local merchant Enrique Valentin heard them and persuaded them to go to San Antonio to meet Eli Oberstein, the recording director for the Bluebird. Their first record – La Chicharronera (The Crackling) – was released later that year and became a big hit. Soon, they were the most popular and well-known dance band in South Texas.

Interestingly, in 1976, Martínez was featured in Chulas Fronteras, the Strachwitz-produced documentary film about Texas-Mexican music by Les Blank and Ry Cooder. You can read more about this here:

Conjunto Tejano

Here’s what they sounded like:

In 1937 at another San Antonio session, Martinez would record four songs that would also be marketed to Louisiana under a different name.

To enter the Cajun music market in Louisiana, Oberstein re-issued the songs on the Bluebird Cajun 2000 series and gave Martinez the name "Louisiana Pete." Here is Ma Fiancee, actually the re-issue of his earlier Bluebird release Muchacha Bonita (B-3048):

Besides the accordion itself, none of the "Louisiana Pete" songs resemble Cajun music; however, it does give us some insight into Oberstein’s wheeling and dealing.

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After Cootie Williams left Goodman’s band and before he recorded with Oberstein’s Hit Records, Williams led historically important recordings with both one of the least-known and most promising big swing bands and a powerful brass septet that rocked the rafters at the Savoy Ballroom in Harlem. Unfortunately, the Petrillo recording ban and the WWII draft hampered their progress.

However, on April 1, 1942, the Williams sextet cut the first recording of Thelonious Monk and Kenny Clarke’s Epistrophy, on this occasion titled Fly Right:

This was recorded for Columbia Records but never released on 78rpm. Although there are test pressing on 78rpm, it would be released later during the LP era.

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In 1942, Oberstein founded the Hit Record label, a cheaply produced label that retailed for 50 cents in dime stores and Firestone service stations. However, there was controversy surrounding the label, speculating that Oberstein continued to release new material during the recording ban in 1942-43. Oberstein contended that he acquired recordings from Mexico, but evidence exists that selections were recorded in clandestine hotel-room sessions involving non-union musicians. In 1945, probably swamped with legal problems, he sold his studios, pressing plant, and masters for more than half a million dollars to the Majestic radio company.

Whatever the circumstances during its short life, the Hit Record label made many successful records. For example, on January 4, 1944, Bud Powell made his recording debut with Williams and His Sextette on Hit Record. What a great band. I like this track from that session:

Here’s the classic Do Some War Work, Baby with Williams on vocals:

Interestingly, Sun Ra may have liked this one too, as his Ankhnation recorded in 1960 and released in 1965 on Sun Ra’s Fate In A Pleasant Mood album sounds very similar. That is Phil Cohran (I wrote about Cohran here) playing the trumpet solo here:

On August 22, 1944, Williams’ Orchestra recorded for the first time another Monk composition 'Round Midnight (note Williams is also credited for the tune):

This record sounds slightly different from the more popular Dizzy Gillespie Sextet version recorded in 1946.

Williams’ stay with Hit Record was short and ended after that August 1944 session. The following year, on January 12, 1945, Cootie Williams’ Orchestra played an interesting show for Armed Forces Radio Servies. That night Williams’ orchestra included Charlie Parker, who joined the band for a few months.

That night the MC introduced them: "From the Savoy Ballroom, Lexington Avenue and 140th Street in New York City, One Night Stand brings you America's number one trumpet man, Cootie Williams and his orchestra. Let's get to movin', you solid cats. Roll 'em, Cootie...."

Here’s one more for the road. Although Williams performed Echoes of Harlem so many times with Ellington’s orchestra, I like this 1944 version with Williams’ and his sextet:

In 1962, Williams finally rejoined Ellington and stayed with the orchestra until 1974, after Ellington's death. Williams would be the last surviving member of the Ellington Orchestra of the 1920s. He died in New York City on September 15, 1985. He was 74 years old.

Next week, on that Big River called Jazz, we’ll dig in our paddles to explore the world of saxophonist Joe Farrell.

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Until then, keep on walking….