[Harp-L] Review : Harmonica Swing

["Planet Harmonica" <lists@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi ! 

I have been a bit silent these last few weeks for reasons mostly pertaining 
to my workload. I have stopped my updates on the May St Aignan festival but 
I will resume them when time allows. In the meantime, I'm releasing stuff 
that was already written just to liven up a sad webpage. Here are the first 
few paragraphs of a review of the Frémeaux compilation Harmonica Swing that 
I posted today on my weblog at http://harmonica.typepad.com : 

"Toots is, in my humble opinion, both the best and the worst thing that 
happened to Jazz harmonica. The best because his music is wonderful, and 
also because he gave the instrument visibility and credibility in a musical 
milieu where no concessions are made. The worst because he was so 
influential that very few players today have managed to step out of his 
shadow. To some extent, they all sound like Toots, although he can hardly be 
blamed for it. 

That's one of the reasons that I don't listen to much harmonica jazz. 
Another one is that chromatic players have this tendency to focus on the 
pretty and mellifluous, "between a smile and a tear" aspect of the 
instrument. If you read me regularly, you know that I'm not much of a fan of 
romantic jazz, and this probably explains that... 

So figure my astonihsment, nay, my utter joy at the discovery of an entire 
musical tradition of pre-Toots jazz, players who, for the most part, were 
not influenced by other harmonica players. Of course, I knew of Larry Adler, 
but I didn't associate him with jazz as much as I associated him with 
vaudeville, perhaps wrongly. But Harmonica Swing presents us with many more 
players, some of whom sadly faded from the limelight in the late 40s, 
despite their obvious and amazing talent." 

Ben