"St. Louis Blues" -- Moments of Splendor and Glory
Notes on a playlist, regarding a book project
In an un-footnoted appendix to his marvelous 1979 study Yesterdays: Popular Song in America, musicologist Charles Hamm listed “St. Louis Blues” as the most-often recorded song by anybody anywhere as of 1950. I’ve gathered some of my favorite versions in a playlist.
Here’s the playlist:
Here are some quick notes.
The first on the list inspired me to try to write a book, which I’m working on! Louis Armstrong played with members of the New York Philharmonic in 1956, Leonard Bernstein, conductor. The speeches by the conductor and the trumpeter afterward are fathomlessly rich. The arrangement works too.
Bessie Smith with Louis Armstrong, 1924 – a classic, maybe the most famous version, certainly the first I remember hearing, by many years. Smith all power, Armstrong accompanying beautifully. Smith recorded it again in 1929, for her only film appearance, a 15-minute film titled St. Louis Blues, starring her. The arrangement and performance – Smith fronting a hot band and a full, classically-polished choir – are fabulous, but the sound quality is substandard, and the audio recording has never been released in the US and is not on Spotify, though the film is available on YouTube. In the 1970s, Etta James recreated some of the arrangement with a choir, in a terrific performance, which closes the playlist.
The list isn’t quite chronological, nor is it quite thematically arranged. I’ve grouped the subsequent comments by category.
The Scat Singers
“St. Louis Blues” became a vehicle for exuberant virtuosity. Armstrong’s first version as a leader in 1929 (he recorded it many times) features his marvelous scatting as well as dancing, bouncing horn licks for the close. Cab Calloway made his recording debut in 1930 with an even wilder scatting – and an arrangement that quoted those dancing, bouncing horn licks. Ella Fitzgerald recorded it many times between 1940 and the 1980s, sometimes scatting, sometimes as a ballad; the one on the playlist, from 1958, features some mid-tempo power and some virtuoso up-tempo scatting. Babs Gonzalez and Pearl Bailey follow Calloway with outrageously hip lyrical interpolations.
The Pianists
Thomas “Fats” Waller made several great recordings of it; the list has one. Art Tatum recorded it at his first session (1933). Boogie-woogie pianists Albert Ammons, Meade “Lux” Lewis, Pete Johnson, and Hadda Brooks (not on Spotify) followed with hot versions. Tatum revisited it in 1940, in a boogie-woogie arrangement, after Earl Hines had a hit with “Boogie-Woogie on the St. Louis Blues.” Later, Erroll Garner, Mary Lou Williams, and Dave Brubeck played it hot – as did many other pianists. Hines and Brubeck each recorded it many times; Williams at least twice. My favorite Hines version isn’t on Spotify.
A Woman’s Song
Like many if not most of the earliest published blues songs, “St. Louis Blues” was written for a female voice. White singer Marion Harris waxed a lovely version in 1920. In addition to Smith, Fitzgerald, Bailey, and James, the list has classic jazz and blues versions by Billie Holiday, Maxine Sullivan, the Boswell Sisters, LaVern Baker, and Alberta Hunter.
The Guitarists
Sylvester Weaver isn’t a big name despite his being the first blues guitarist to record on the slide guitar; his late ‘20s version accompanied by Walter Beasley is a tasty instrumental. The great Hawai’ian guitarist Sol Ho’opi’i, the great European jazz guitarist Django Reinhardt, and the ‘50s-’60s virtuoso Brazilian “easy listening” guitarists Los Indios Tabajaras all have fine instrumental versions, while ragtime-blues guitarist Big Bill Broonzy blazes, also without singing.
The Male Blues Singers
Classic blues shouters Jimmy Rushing and Big Joe Turner wail on it. The classic guitarist-singers Josh White, Furry Lewis, and Lonnie Johnson nail it too. In addition, the Callahan Brothers, a country act, weigh in with some close-harmony yodeling.
The Swingers
In addition to Fitzgerald, Holiday, the Boswells, Armstrong, Waller, Tatum, and Hines, the Dorsey Brothers recorded a kicking big-band arrangement (written by Glenn Miller before he headed up his own band); a soloist quotes Armstrong’s mentor Joe “King” Oliver’s classic 1923 solo on “Dipper Mouth Blues,” one of the most influential solos ever. (I wrote about it here.) Miller, on the eve of the US entrance into the Second World War, recorded a “St. Louis Blues March” as a flag-waver, perhaps partly in homage to the lively, bursting, ragtime version recorded in 1919 by James Reese Europe’s 369th U.S. Infantry “Hell Fighters” Band. My favorite version by Duke Ellington (live in Fargo, 1940) isn’t on Spotify – bizarrely, it ends with a quotation from George Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue.”
The Jazz Modernists
Cuban-born Afro-Cubop bandleader Machito blazed with a mambo arrangement. Dizzy Gillespie three versions here exemplify innovation-within-continuity. His late-’40s version shows a cubop influence while quoting his frequent collaborator Charlie Parker’s classic blues, “Parker’s Mood” at the opening and close. His late ‘50s version features a hot small-band, more Latin rhythmic influence, and a rousing, original closing riff-based tune. His ‘70s funk version (titled “Shim-Sham-Shimmy on the St. Louis Blues”) keeps the rousing riff-based tune from the ‘50s arrangement, and the ‘50s handclaps, and adding some tasty scat singing. Babs Gonzalez’s version (mentioned above) features a tasty tenor solo by a then 19-year-old Sonny Rollins.
The 1958 Handy Bio-Pic
Nat “King” Cole, anomalously, played Handy in the movie, titled, St. Louis Blues. (Handy wasn’t known as a singer.) Co-starring with Cole were Ella Fitzgerald, Pearl Bailey, and Eartha Kitt. Versions by all of them are on the list. Kitt’s version quotes elements from Armstrong’s 1954 recording with his All-Stars, from his tribute album to W. C. Handy.
The Late-’50s Revival and Beyond
In the wake of the 1958 bio-pic, “St. Louis Blues” began receiving a wider range of interpretations. Teen-beat R&B versions by the Isley Brothers and LaVern Baker from the late ‘50s and early ‘60s. (Baker revisited it in a smoky, deep-blues arrangement in 1991.) Rock ‘n’ Roll by Brenda Lee in 1959 (album title: Grandma, What Great Songs You Sang!) and St. Louis native Chuck Berry in 1965, nailing it in his characteristic style. “St. Louis Blues Twist” by Perez Prado, who had earlier assayed a “St. Louis Blues Mambo.” More jazz modernism from Gil Evans and his big band, featuring Julian “Cannonball” Adderly on alto saxophone. More modern R&B from Herbie Hancock (featuring Stevie Wonder on harmonica and singing) from 1999. Smoky lounge-smooth jazz from David Sanborn in 2008. The jazz avant-garde shows up in Sun Ra’s version.
Another Symphonic “St. Louis Blues”
The great stride pianist, songwriter, blues accompanist (and friend Louis Armstrong, Fats Waller, and Duke Ellington) James P. Johnson wrote a symphonic suite on “St. Louis Blues” in 1934. It might have been performed once; most of the score was lost; one movement survived. It’s here in a latter-day recording.
Lots of other great versions, some of them not on Spotify, some of them feeling unnecessary to this right now, though I’ll probably change my mind. And I’m sure there are great versions out there that I’ve never heard. The endlessness . . . whelms!