Two for Tea

The  John Clark/Henry Francis Duo

To purchase CD, contact Jazzbnd@aol.com or http://www.swinglegacy.com/cds.html  
 

John Clark plays professionally with his own wolverine Jazz Band (www.wolverinejazzband.com), which is dedicated to performing, preserving, and expanding traditional jazz.  They enjoy great success and have recorded 7 CDs.  He has played with numerous other traditional jazz bands (New Black Eagle Jazz Band, Paramount Jazz Band) and several big swing bands.  He performs regularly with Henry's band, The Swing Legacy, and is on their latest CD.

Henry Francis is what is known as a "stride" pianist (watch and listen to his left hand!), An almost extinct species characterized by its athletic left hand.*  He is principally influenced by Fats Waller (hence the name "thins"), Art Tatum, Duke Ellington and Count Basie. As a soloist, he has played at many jazz clubs in the Boston vicinity, at Hanratty's in New York, and at various jazz festivals.  A solo piano CD has been well-received.  Henry also leads and writes the arrangements for The Swing Legacy (www.swinglegacy.com) a septet which presents the repertoire, polish, and energy of classic big-band swing music.  They have recorded 2 CDs.

* The Stride Piano School of American Music dictates that both hands earn a living.  The most obvious attribute of this style is that the left hand is continuously engaged in reciprocating motion (hence the name "stride"), and this athletic activity provides a very strong rhythmic and harmonic foundation, enabling the piano to generate a full, orchestral sound.

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1. RIVERBOAT SHUFFLE Originally titled "Free Wheeling", this tune was written by an Indiana University law student named Hoagy Carmichael.  He gave it to the Wolverines, a band featuring Bix Beiderbecke, who recorded it in 1924 after deciding to apply a more marketable title.
    
2. WILLOW TREE was written by Fats Waller for the 1928 Broadway show "Keep Shuffling".  It is a study in "blusiness", although structurally it is not a 12-measure blues.
    
3. TEA FOR TWO to demonstrate the versatility of Vincent Youmans' iconic 1924 song, we play it in 3 different tempos, squeezing out every possible bit of musical nourishment.  Henry begins with the seldom-heard verse, a miniature musical gem in  its own right.  This song became a playground for jazz pianists, in which they competed to see who could produce the most complex variations of the original song.  Henry joins the fracas in his second solo chorus, tipping his hat to Art Tatum
    
4. BLUES IS BAD Written by Fats Waller (we assume), but never recorded commercially.  We learned it from a rare 1937 recording Fats made for himself at home.  This is a poignant, introspective piece, along the lines of his "Black and Blue".
    
5. THE ENTERTAINER This popular Scott Joplin rag, published in 1902 as a piano piece, is characterized by the call-and-response structure, which we emphasize in our version.
    
6. J. FRED COOTS MEDLEY: YOU GO TO MY HEAD (1938):  LOUISIANA FAIRY TALE (1935), SANTA CLAUS IS COMING TO TOWN (1934).  Here we pay tribute to J. Fred Coots, a very fine and greatly underrated songwriter.  Coots was a close friend of Fats Waller, and Fats recorded many of his songs, which have much the same musical temperament as Waller's songs.
    
7. BEALE STREET BLUES  Among the first blues ever published, this 1916 tune by "The Father of the Blues" W.C. Handy was named for the notorious street in Memphis that nurtured music and sinful revelry in equal parts.
    
8. SOPHISTICATED LADY  This typically lush Duke Ellington ballad was composed in 1933, and it has fueled jazz musicians ever since.  Duke, as always, was ahead of everyone.  John pays tribute to Duke's long-time baritone saxophonist Harry Carney.  Apropos of the introduction, John neglected to remind Henry that he is not in fact Alexander Scriabin.
    
9. PANAMA Published in 1911 as a habanera, it soon became a popular staple of New Orleans parade bands, as a 2/4 march.
    
10. THE MOOCHE (1928) During his four year tenure (1927-31) at Harlem's Cotton Club, Duke Ellington developed his so-called "jungle sound", designed originally to make the band appear as exotic, primitive, and African as possible to the affluent whites who ventured uptown in droves for cultural titillation.  However, in retrospect, he had created a sophisticated, vital, expressive orchestral medium. "The Mooche" is, with its strong slow 4/4 beat and its very imaginative harmony, an archetypical Ellington jungle piece.  The Mooche was the name of a slow dance.
     
11. JA-DA  Not being content to play this simple little ditty as normal people would, we present it in 8 different keys (avoiding, however, the really hard ones.)
     
12. NUAGES  The great French Gypsy guitarist Django Reinhardt composed this tune (also known by it s English title "Clouds") in 1940, while avoiding the Gestapo in Paris.  The floating harmonic quality of the piece brings to mind the French impressionist composers Debussy et al.
     
13. RICHARD RODGERS MEDLEY   WHERE OR WHEN (1937), YOU ARE TOO BEAUTIFUL (1932), BLUE ROOM (1926).  Among the greatest of American Broadway-show composers, Richard Rodgers survived various trends and evolved through many stylistic phrases.  His compositions from the period on which we concentrate are faultless examples of art uniting with craft.
     
14. I'M COMING VIRGINIA Donald Heywood's great song from 1927 is primarily known as one of the first jazz ballads, immortalized by a Bix Beiderbecke/Frankie Trumbauer recording.  John's use of the soprano sax is inspired by Sidney Bechet's classic 1941 recording.
     
15. I'LL ALWAYS BE IN LOVE WITH YOU  Originally a very popular waltz from 1929 (demonstrated by Henry's introductory chorus), this attractive song was eventually converted to 4/4 time by a few enlightened jazz bandleaders such as Count Basie, Fletcher Henderson, and Benny Goodman.