Jelly Roll Morton

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Total Tracks: 99   Total Length: 311:45

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John Morthland

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John Morthland has been writing about music since the days of electronically rechanneled stereo and duophonic sound. His name has darkened the mastheads of Roll...more »

04.22.11
Jelly Roll Morton, Jelly Roll Morton
2001 | Label: JSP Records / The Orchard

Morton was something of a bohemian rebel, fleeing his bourgeois Creole family to play in the Storyville bordellos, then roaming the country before settling in Chicago in 1922. There, he staked his claim as jazz's first composer, soon forming the Red Hot Peppers (mostly New Orleans Creoles) to play his ingenious African-American hybrid music, which had apparently gelled well before he first recorded. Songs like "Black Bottom Stomp" and "Grandpa's Spells" were bold, mature ensemble compositions enhanced by equally daring soloing. He was likewise an inspired pianist ("Smoke House Blues"), and on "Original Jelly Roll Blues" he introduces what he called the "Spanish tinge" to New Orleans music.

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They Say All Music Guide

JSP’s five-CD set devoted to Jelly Roll Morton contains all of his Victor recordings cut between September 1926 and October 1930. The sound quality is excellent and complete discographical information is provided along with insightful liner notes. Alternate takes are presented on separate discs so as to avoid redundancy. This creates doppelgängers, as it were, of most of the sessions involving larger ensembles. Jelly Roll Morton is heard as a solo pianist and as leader of his trios, Red Hot Peppers, and orchestra. The only shortcoming is the absence of eight titles recorded for Victor’s Bluebird imprint in 1939 by Morton’s New Orleans Jazzmen. Had the producers of this otherwise excellent compilation opted for these classic latter-day Jellies instead of obsessing over every single alternate take from the earlier sessions, this would be a serious contender for the “best and most affordable Jelly Roll Morton set” award. As it stands, JSP’s hefty anthology is a great way to obtain most of Morton’s major work on CD at relatively little cost. The very best way to study this artist is to start at the beginning of his discography using the Classics Chronological Series and then move forward. After hearing these canonic classic jazz recordings as presented by JSP, some folks will indeed want to zoom in for close-ups and study every recorded episode in this primal jazzman’s life and works. – arwulf arwulf

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