I'm not an old style music swing guy at all. I found this accidentally looking for something cheesy for a home movie soundtrack. But it's not cheesy. It's GREAT music. It's all you think the great swing music might be. The "In Hi-Fi" thing is significant. I've now done some Goodman trawling and a lot of his stuff has terrible sound quality - flat and muffled. This sparkles. Start with "I Would Do Anything For you." If you like that, you'll love it all.
Drums are the alpha and the omega of music. "In the beginning there was rhythm!" wailed Ari Up of the Slits with theological conviction. Beats figure as prominently in contemporary music - at least since the invention of disco - as they did to our cave-dwelling ancestors. But is anything in the world more boring than a drum solo? Generally acknowledged as having originated with Gene Krupa on Benny Goodman's 1936 recording of "Sing, Sing,… more »
When the Roots signed on as Jimmy Fallon's Late Night house band, there was a curious catch: NBC wouldn't be paying for the rights to any music, not even the band's own. Consequently. the Roots had to compose dozens of new pieces for on-air use. The upside: those pieces needed only be long enough to play the show in and out of commercials, or to accompany guests from the wings to the desk. Everything old becomes… more »
