oook blog

Reading Ingrid Monson's The African Diaspora

In the context of globalization and music, I happened on this book by the sometime cornetist of the Klezmer Conservatory Band. Some nice tidbits:

Mitchell's Jazz Kings recorded in the early 1920s in Paris (a bunch of .ram exampes available on the page). The site notes that

In the 1920s the Jazz Kings played a five year residency at the Casino de Paris. Mitchell had his own American restaurant called Mitchell's in Montmartre and helped Bricktop (Ada Smith-Ducongé) set up her first club, The Music Box in Paris...

Stephane Grappelli remembers that the first jazz tune he heard was Zez Confrey's "Stumblin' ", played by Mitchell's Jazz Kings... (Harris in Monson 2003:109)

Harris goes on to say:

Jazz has, throughout its history, held appeal for people from many different societies and from different places within society, including at its margins. It is rooted in --and is a manifestation of-- the human ability to redefine marginality as a "location of radical openness and possibility" (hooks 1990:153)... (Harris in Monson 2003:123)

Posted by oook at March 8, 2004 02:39 PM