Silver Creek Jazz Band Concert - September 16, 2007
By Dan Augustine
Sunday afternoon the new Silver Creek Jazz Band led by Dave Stoddard proved that you don't have to play the same songs every other band plays to enterain an audience. There are hundreds of lesser-played songs that deserve to be heard, while there are other songs that probably need to go on the back-burner for a while because they are played so often. The Silver Creek Jazz Band demonstrated a proof of this notion by playing three sets of traditional jazz on September 16, 2007, at the Capital City Comedy Club in Austin, as hosted by the Austin Traditional Jazz Society.
But first, before exploring this topic further, let's introduce the band, which is led by ATJS Vice-President Dave Stoddard and is less than six months old, although he and the other members of the band have decades of performances in central Texas. In fact, a careful analysis of the band's personnel reveals that three of them (Dave Stoddard, Larmon Maddox, and Jon Doyle) also played in the ATJS All-Stars Band in June of 2007 (albeit with different instruments in two cases).
Dave plays the valve trombone and does the announcing for the band, including interesting tidbits about each song's composer and history. Also a tuba player, he's been playing traditional jazz for over 30 years, including many bands from North Carolina up to Washington DC, Delaware, and eastern Pennsylvania, and also plays in symphony orchestras and concert and polka bands.
On cornet is Larmon Maddox, who has been playing traditional jazz in central Texas for many years with a number of bands, including Chuck Reiley's Alamo City Jazz Band, the Old Waterloo Jazz Band, and Tommy Griffith's New Orleans Jazz Band of Austin.
Jon Doyle has been playing clarinet and tenor saxophone for several years in bands in central Texas, including the ATJS All-Stars, Aunt Ruby's Sweet Jazz Babies, the Jazz Pharoahs, and many others.
Sammy Epstein just recently moved to Austin from Portland, Oregon, and plays the tenor sax. In Portland he played in a number of jazz bands (such as Mirage and The Midnight Serenaders) and recorded with Rebecca Kilgore. He also led the Mazel Tov Orchestra, which specializes in klezmer and Israeli music. He plays tenor sax, clarinet, alto sax, and bass clarinet.
Ed Hayes plays the resonator guitar, plays in a number of local bands, and leads his own band, Aunt Ruby's Sweet Jazz Babies, which plays at The Tree House Italian Grill and other Austin venues.
Bob Alexius plays string bass in a number of bands in the central Texas area, and has been doing so for decades. Originally from New Orleans, Bob has played in the Memphis Symphony Orchestra and bands such as Stan Kenton, Buddy Morrow, Les Elgart, Jerry Lee Lewis, and even one gig with Elvis Presley. He also has a Ph.D. and 1993 retired from the Texas Education Agency and worked aboard the Delta Queen steamboat. He also plays tuba with the Austin Banjo Club and at banjo festivals.
Rob Schmidt plays drums in a number of local big bands (some with Bob Alexius), and together they lay down a rock-solid beat.
Getting back to the selection of songs by the Silver Creek Jazz Band, we notice that not many of the songs are frequently played "old standards" in the dixieland or traditional jazz repertory. In fact, one enterprising ATJS reviewer (aw, shucks) made a list of all the songs played in the last two years by all the bands at ATJS concerts (180 different songs), counting the number of occurrences of each song. The most repeated tune was "Tin Roof Blues" (played six times), followed by five playings each for "Bill Bailey", "I Want a Little Girl", "I've Found a New Baby", "Royal Garden Blues", "Saints", and "That's a-Plenty". Songs played four times were "Bourbon Street Parade", "Georgia", "Indiana", "Some of These Days", "Tishomingo Blues", and "What a Wonderful World". Songs played three times were "Big Butter and Egg Man", "Bye Bye Blackbird", "Darktown Strutters Ball", "Dippermouth Blues", "Do You Know What It Means to Miss New Orleans", "Exactly Like You", "It Had to Be You", "Milenberg Joys", "Sheik of Araby", "St. Louis Blues", "Sunny Side of the Street", "Sweet Georgia Brown", and "Washington and Lee Swing".
Now those are all fine songs, and there is good reason for playing them (both the audience and the bands like them). However, too much of anything tends to cloy, so the songs chosen by the Silver Creek Jazz Band are a refreshing change. Only four of the songs they performed were played twice in the preceding two years: "All by Myself", "Breeze", "Down in Honky Tonk Town", and "Hindustan". (It is true that one of the songs, called "The Mailman", is more commonly known as "Bye Bye Blackbird", but Dave Stoddard's vocal of it had lyrics quite different from the standard ones.) NONE of the other songs they played was played in the past two years.
The concert started off with a rousing rendition of "Hindustan", in a nice bright tempo, featuring an excellent solo by Jon Doyle on clarinet. Solos by each of the other instrumentalists followed. The next tune was the seldom-heard "Olga" by Joe 'King' Oliver and Dave Nelson from 1930, and it is a prime example of good songs heard far too infrequently. Other songs in the first set were "I'm Gonna Sit Right Down and Write Myself a Letter", "Rose Room" (with a fine solo by Sammy Epstein), and "All by Myself" (with a vocal by Dave Stoddard). The lead-off of "I'm Coming, Virginia" featured Jon Doyle's clarinet in the chalumeau register, the lowest notes where the timbre is rich and dark. Ed Hayes then sang his own dark and low vocal, and the song ended with Larmon Maddox's forceful cornet with the whole ensemble. After Dave Stoddard introduced the band members, the set ended with another rarely heard gem, "Susie", in a bright two-beat tempo.
President of ATJS Tom Straus and Secretary-Treasurer Malcolm Rodman then took the floor to make some important announcements about the concerts in the coming season and to name the current ATJS Board's members. They mentioned that ATJS is also looking for some extra volunteers to join the Board, as we could use some help from any members (or even non-members) who have some time to work with us on various matters, expecially in the area of maintaining our ATJS website, as our current webmaster Jim Ivy has had to resign to devote time to his business. So if you know (or you know someone who knows) web-programming, please get in touch with any member of the Board.
The second set began with "Down in Honky Tonk Town" and continued with an great tune that really ought to be played more often, "Pete Kelly's Blues" (from the eponymous movie), with another nice tenor-sax solo by Sammy Epstein. Bob Alexius played a nice string-bass solo in "You're Driving Me Crazy", which also featured an Ed Hayes vocal. Ed also explored the nether regions of the bass voice in a vocal in "That Old Feeling". Then Dave Stoddard explained that the next song, "The Mailman", might be more familiar under the title of "Bye Bye Blackbird", with which it shared the melody, harmony, and rhythm, but the lyrics were completely different. Larmon Maddox and Jon Doyle alternated sections of solos in "I'm Confessin'", and the set ended with another great old tune, "Varsity Drag". Throughout all the sets, many dancers enjoyed the tunes from the dance-floor, and the audience showed their appreciation with applause after solos and at the end of the songs.
The third set started of with "Ole Miss" by W. C. Handy and continued with "Breeze", with Jon Doyle once again playing in the chalumeau register. Ed Hayes sang a vocal, and all four wind-players went over beside him to play background harmonies. After "Lonesome Road", "You Do Something to Me", and "Out of Nowhere" (almost never played at a traditional jazz concert, but it worked very well here), the band played "Wrap Your Troubles in Dreams" (with a cornet-clarinet duet by Larmon and Jon) and ended the concert (appropriately enough) with "Farewell Blues" in a good bouncy two-beat pulse that only emphasized what a great rhythm-section the Silver Creek Jazz Band has with Rob Schmidt, Bob Alexius, and Ed Hayes.
The audience obviously enjoyed the performance of these less-played but nonetheless valuable old songs by the Silver Creek Jazz Band, and central Texas will now have one more classic and classy band. I'm sure we'll hear much more from this band in the future.
