Bix Beiderbecke - Jass Me Blues (1927-8)

Yes! More delightful music from a time when people were so poor that they were too poor to be poor.

Bix Beiderbecke is another early jazz musician that was not known very much in the public but he was highly admired by his fellow musicians. As far as trumpet/cornet rivals go, the only person who was on par with him was Louis Armstrong. It's a real pity that Bix died so early (in '31) because he would most definitely influence modern music in a much larger scope if he only had the time. Sadly alcohol and other various factors made him die young. But, for our consolation he left us a bit of his music behind so that we may grasp a bit of his great playing.

I might sound pompous but that's probably because he's one of my favorite players so I tend to get very subjective about him. In any case the compilation that I'm sharing is (as the title suggests) a bunch of  songs he recorded in his "late"career. At those times ragtime (or hot jazz) was starting to settle down for a more orchestrated and organized way of playing - swing so what you get here is an interesting middle ground between the two types of jazz. Musically speaking this means that songs are much more relaxed, they swing but they still have some great improvised solos which makes this record so great. You'll notice a lot things that are way ahead of their times, especially the sax solos which often hint to the bebop way of playing. They are all instrumentals so we can fully enjoy the wondrous playing of a person that just had so little luck. So sit back and enjoy the swing.

Download.