This is a
look at some New Orleans musicians (i.e. musicians born in or near
New Orleans or who moved to New Orleans at an early age and "learnt
their trade" in New Orleans) who, in the opinion of the writers,
have received less attention than they merit in recent years or
whose recording careers are obscure.
Our choice of musicians is open-ended. If we feel that a musician
merits more attention than he or she has hitherto received we will
try to put that right by including him or her in our list. We are
already working on a number of other musicians who will appear on
the list at intervals including a group of piano players. Our aim is
to make these players more accessible by listing all their
recordings whether or not they were issued. Unissued sessions have a
habit of turning up years after the event so, with one or two
exceptions, should never be written off. George Buck has acquired a
number of catalogues and is gradually issuing previously unissued
sessions or sessions unavailable for a long time from the likes of
Southland. We eagerly await his future offerings.
Some musicians on our list are still being researched by a number of
musical scholars (and ourselves!) so we do not claim that this is
the last word in many cases. We regard this as a co-operative
venture which embraces all those with a love of New Orleans music
and we welcome corrections/additions to the information presented
and suggestions as to musicians that might be added to the list.
We are indebted to those who have trodden this path before us -
people like Brian Rust, Dave Carey, W Bruyninckx, Tom Lord,
Christopher Hillman, Alan Barrel, John Chilton, Alyn Shipton, Paige
Van Vorst, Jempi de Donder and a whole host of others who have
researched the careers of individual musicians and published the
results of their research, often in specialist magazines such as
down beat, Footnote and New Orleans Music. It would be remiss of us
not to mention the Storyville Team whose contribution to the body of
knowledge of New Orleans music is immense.
Many of the recordings listed are available on microgroove and/or
CD. The chances of coming across an original 78rpm issue are remote
as these are mostly in the hands of collectors. Our approach is to
quote the matrix number and original 78rpm issue number in order to
precisely identify the recording in the case of recordings in the
78rpm era (roughly up to the early fifties) and wherever possible to
quote the numbers of CD and microgroove releases. LP and EP issues
are the most difficult to track down. Any help you can give in
listing issues will be much appreciated.