I remember when I was first getting into jazz and was in the gigantic Tower Records Store on Sunset Blvd, fingering through the endless rows of albums labeled “JAZZ”. This old timer comes up to me and says, “Do you know where jazz began?”, to which I answered “New Orleans, right?”.
“NO!” he pointedly replied. “That’s what everyone thinks; it started in Kansas City”
I had no idea who this guy was, but as the years have passed I have learned the wisdom of his observation.
Take this 3 cd, 77 song collection of pianist-vocalist-bandleader-first employer of Charlie Parker Jay McShann, running from the halcyon days of jazz to the birth of bebop and on to classic blues. It starts in 1941 with McShann’s hard swinging, 8 beat to the bar band with not only the roots of Count Basie’s Atomic rhythm team of Gene Ramey/b and Gus Johnson/dr, but some of the earliest solos by Charlie Parker, creator of bebop, are sublimely included. Not to mention, you’ve got blues shouter Walter Brown on things like “Confessin’ The Blues” and “Lonely Boy Blues” as well as classic KC swingers like “Moten Swing” and “Confessin’ The Blues”.
McShann himself is a master of the boogie woogie piano, hitting all 8 cylinders on “McShann’s Boogie Blues and “ Hootie Boogie”. From there, the prototypical blues shouter Jimmy Witherspoon joins with McShann for a pair made in blues heaven on “I Want A Little Girl” and “Have Your Ever Loved A Woman”. McShann shows he could jump the blues with hits like “Hot Biscuits” and “Buttermilk” ,while the Spoon and Hootie team up on “Skid Row Blues and Long About Dawn”, before Priscilla Bowman takes over the vocals on “My Darkest Night” and the hoot of “Hands Off”.
I always wonder what happened to that old coot who directed me to the 12th and Vine section of jazz, but I do think of him every time I hear that steady, relentless KC beat found in countless waves eminating from the town that Tom Pendergast built