What is this thing called, Love?

A few years ago, 2003 to be exact, I was researching Count Basie as 2004 was going to be the centennial of his birth (August 21) and I wanted to start a rehearsal big band to play his music - kind of a continuing-ed course on how to properly interpret the Count's music. In the process of digging up archival film footage of the band, I came across Bruce Ricker's film "The Last of The Blue Devils", which featured priceless, live video footage of Basie's seventies vintage band playing live at the University of Kansas: "Moten Swing", "One O'Clock Jump", "Jumpin' at the Woodside" and a particularly authentic rendering of "Night Train". If you are a fan of this type of music or a student of mid-western jazz and blues, you should absolutely own this film. At the time, I had mostly been playing blues and R&B gigs, and I was well aware of the place of "Night Train" in the pantheon of saxophonic anthems. I also knew that Jimmy Forrest had written (or borrowed - more on this later) the tune but I didn't realize until the end of the film that the tenor player performing in the movie WAS Jimmy Forrest. And there began my study of Jimmy Forrest.

Over the five years, I have compiled much information, scholarly and musical, on my G3 iBook that survived years of world travel, including a repair trip from Costa Rica to Canada and back and to its final resting place in Budapest after its hard drive AND the external drive died in the same week. Through the good graces of a data recovery team in Budapest all this material has survived and I intend to share what I have gathered so far and will continue to do so. I'm going to present the definitive reference work on the life and music of Jimmy Forrest.

This work on Jimmy Forrest will be serialized, piecemeal, until it is finally assembled into form, here on this blog. I've learned so much about the blues, Kansas City and St. Louis music, historical research and how to play the saxophone over these years that I think it should be shared, through one posting or on thousand.

I once read a statement by Joseph Campbell, that to truly understand an authors journey, you had to read as many of his books as possible. I have applied this to Jimmy Forrest, by listening to his playing, reading what is written about him, watching him perform on video, transcribing and practicing his solos, and I think I'm now ready to share what I have learned.

Lastly, be patient with this blog. Life is busy, so this historical-musical yarn is going to unravel slowly and, at times, may completely unravel: I'm going to do all the work right here. If a reference isn't in place, be patient. If a link breaks, let me know. If you're reading and interested, leave a comment. If I got a fact wrong, send me a citable source and I'll correct it. Above all, if you haven't done so yet, watch the movie that got me started.