Deep Creek
Posted in Jazz on Mar 7th, 2009 No Comments »
The opening is a seven note downward phrase played by the whole band. The trumpet enters with the theme, Jelly Roll’s salon piano behind, brass bass on long, low notes. Three full piano chords fortissimo introduce a trombone solo. Trombone and trumpet are a bit ill at ease, not quite composed.
Things get into the groove with the entry of the soprano sax, a busy confident solo with the band playing chord notes behind, growing louder as the solo progresses, the brass bass farting like a polite elephant all the while.
Jelly Roll’s solo is composure personified, assured, dignified and gentle, as if he is playing just for himself. Its elegance takes us back to a polite French and Spanish Creole society at the turn of the century, the society Jelly Roll long dreamed of being a part of. And he is no crude blues player. His playing is distant, nostalgic and dreamy. Towards the close of his solo he turns upwards full chords in double time then grace notes his way back down.
Russell Procope’s clarinet enters with a six note blues bent phrase that he repeats twice, building up the tension with the band behind him till he signs off high up in the air. The whole band comes in with the last chorus on a four note riff, soprano sax weaving away up in front.
Last word is Jelly Roll’s – a single faint chord high up, like a ghost come back to haunt us from over eighty years ago.
