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Wednesday, August 22, 2007
While Kip heroically battles the World Zionist Conspiracy (aka capitalism), let's take a trip to jazz age Harlem. Hey, what's that smell?
SENDIN' THE VIPERS
The Mezz Mezzrow Orchestra
RCA/Bluebird: 1934
Available on: Rhapsodies in Black, Dope & Glory, et al
Say hello to serial convert Mezz Mezzrow. Russian Jew by birth, he converted to black music at 15, which he discovered, of course, in prison. (It "hit me like a millennium would hit a philosopher," said Mezz.) Black music was just a gateway drug. Under its pernicious influence Mezz converted to the demon weed and became a lifelong viper. Here's how he describes the experience:I began to feel very happy and sure of myself. With my loaded horn I could take all the fist-swinging, evil things in the world and bring them together in perfect harmony, spreading peace and joy and relaxation to all the keyed-up and punchy people everywhere. I began to preach my millenniums on the horn, leading all the sinners to glory. In a rapidly accelerating spiral, Mezz left Chicago (having converted to New York) and moved to Harlem, where he converted to Negroism (see also Norman Mailer.) And that, of course, led him right back to prison, where he famously asked to be confined in the colored cell block. ("I don't think I'd get along in the white blocks," said Mezz.)
Like Woody Allen, Mezz was only an okay clarinetist. He did write a decent song.
REALLY THE BLUES
Sidney Bechet and Tommy Ladnier and His Orchestra
RCA/Bluebird : 1938
Available on: Really the Blues
[Buy It]
He leveraged some synergy by using the same name for his autobiography (co-written with Bernard Wolfe.) But basically Mezz was famous for being Louis Armstrong's dealer and such a master stoner that an especially thick marijuana cigarette (aka "fatty") was known in Harlem as a "mezz."
Across the street from Mezz lives Willie the Lion. He grew up in Newark. His business card says Hebrew cantor. Only he's a shvartzer. See?
RELAXIN' (WILLIE'S THEME)
Willie "the Lion" Smith
The Memoirs of Willie the Lion Smith
RCA Victor : 1967
[Buy It]
According to the African-American registry, Willie became cantor of the black synagogue in Harlem in the 1940s. I wish I'd known about that place growing up; I had to settle for Adas Israel. Here he goes, rambling on like somebody's grandpa, talking about the good old days, wearing his trademark derby hat, and sporting a jaunty cigar roughly the size of a mezz.
THE CLEF CLUB
Willie "the Lion" Smith
The Memoirs of Willie the Lion Smith
The Clef Club was the Skull and Bones of black Jews, guys like Rabbi Arnold Ford, who became Marcus Garvey's musical director. (He's the guy who wrote the Garvey theme song, the "Universal Ethiopian Anthem.") As Willie tells it, in those days these was no racism, a point he emphasizes by singing, "that's why they call me shine."
Look, there's Langston Hughes, writing Fine Clothes to the Jew. It sure was a crazy, mixed-up world back then. Who knew?Labels: conversions, jazz, megan
posted by Megan
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