Click above image for larger picture and better detail. Kid Thomas Valentine at Kohlman's Tavern, New Orleans Records NOR 7201, 1972, vinyl: VG++ cover VG+ This great traditional New Orleans jazz LP was recorded at Kohlman's Tavern in Algiers, New Orleans on June 1st, 1968. Kid Thomas' career began in 1910 at the age of 14 when he played professionally with the Picwick Brass Band. His career last 77 years, still playing professionally when he was 91 years old. Thomas has signed the back of this album (though his signature is illegible, it is the one that starts with a very clear "K"). Also having signed are: Emanuel Sayles, Joseph Butler, Worthia "Showby" Thomas, Joseph "Kid Twat" Butler, Emmanuel Paul and one signature that I do not recognize. Click here to view the signatures on the back of the album. Worthia "Showboy" Thomas, tuba. Nicknamed "Showboy" because of his penchant to up and leave with traveling shows. Worthia Thomas, when in New Orleans, was a regular with the George Williams Brass Band. Bass player, Joseph Butler, was a longtime affiliate of Kid Thomas. He went by the dubious nickname of Kid Twat. Short bios of Kid Thomas, Emanuel Sayles and Emmanuel Paul by Scot Yanow of the All Music Guide appear below with Scott's kind permission. Kid Thomas One of the more controversial of the New Orleans revivalist players of the 1960's, Kid Thomas Valentine was hailed by some partisans as one of the great interpreters of "the real jazz" while others could not get beyond his erratic intonation and his occasionally out-of-tune solos. The feeling was there but the technique tended to be uncertain. However allowances could be made for his advanced age since Kid Thomas was still playing when he was 91! Valentine (who was often simply known as Kid Thomas) began playing at the age of ten and when he was 14 he joined the Pickwick Brass Band; his professional career would last 77 years! He worked locally until 1922 when he moved to New Orleans, freelancing in a variety of brass and dance hall bands (including his own Algiers Stompers which he formed in 1926) throughout the next few decades. Valentine first appeared on records in 1951 and he was a regular at Preservation Hall starting in 1961, often playing with George Lewis. Valentine participated in tours of the North that were organized by Big Bill Bissonnette and was one of the last original proponents of the pre-Louis Armstrong New Orleans trumpet style. He recorded fairly frequently after 1951 for such labels as American Music, MNO, Center, Mono, 77, Jazzology, Riverside, Jazz Crusade, Music of New Orleans, San Jacinto, Dixie, Jazz Macon Club, La Croix, Storyville, Paragon, Sonet, Smoky Mary, Maison Bourbon, Honky Tonk, Lulu White's Black Label, Picayune and Maryland Jazzband. -- Scott Yanow Emanuel Paul Emanuel Paul was one of the first tenor saxophonists to be accepted in the New Orleans jazz world; in fact, his tenor often took the place of a baritone horn in brass bands. He started music fairly late, playing violin when he was 18, playing banjo in the mid-1920s and then switching permanently to tenor. Paul joined the Eureka Brass Band in 1940, began a longtime association with Kid Thomas Valentine in 1942 and recorded quite a bit through the years, including with the Eureka Brass Band, Kid Thomas, Oscar Celestin (1953), Emmanuel Sayles and the Olympia Brass Band. Paul's style was unaffected by later innovations and throughout his career he had a unique sound and function of his own in New Orleans jazz. Paul led two albums for the European Jazz Macon Club label in 1967; his sidemen on the live sets include Valentine, George Lewis and Butch Thompson. -- Scott Yanow Emanuel Sayles A longtime fixture in New Orleans, Emanuel Sayles was a valuable supportive player and an occasional soloist for decades. Although he studied violin and viola early on, Sayles was self-taught on banjo and guitar. After attending high school in Pensacola, Florida, he moved to New Orleans where he played with William Ridgley's Tuxedo Orchestra. Sayles worked with Fate Marable, Armand Piron and Sidney Desvigne on riverboats and in 1929 recorded with the Jones-Collins Astoria Hot Eight. After moving to Chicago in 1933, Sayles led his own band and worked extensively as a sideman in both jazz and blues settings, recording with Roosevelt Sykes. He moved back to New Orleans in 1949, performing with most of the top local players including George Lewis (who he toured Japan with in 1963-64) and Sweet Emma Barrett. Sayles worked in Cleveland with Punch Miller in 1960 and spent a few years (1965-67) in Chicago working as a house musician at Jazz Ltd. After coming back to New Orleans in 1968, Sayles played with the Preservation Hall Jazz Band and became a world traveler. Emanuel Sayles, who recorded with Lewis, Barrett, Punch Miller, Peter Bocage, Kid Thomas Valentine, Earl Hines (1975) and Louis Cottrell among others, also led his own sessions for GHB (1962), Nobility (1963), Dixie (1969) and the Italian Big Lou label (1969). -- Scott Yanow Autograph autographs autographed signed |
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by Louis Maistros Signed copies available exclusively on the net here at Louie’s Juke Joint, just click this link to order! Quotes: "Louis Maistros has written a lyrical, complex, and brave novel that takes enormous risks and pulls them all off. He is a writer to watch and keep reading, a writer to cherish." "The Society of North American Magic Realists welcomes its newest, most dazzling member, Louis Maistros. His debut novel is a thing of wonder, unlike anything in our literature. It startles. It stuns. It stupefies. No novel since CONFEDERACY OF DUNCES has done such justice to New Orleans. If Franz Kafka had been able to write like Peter Straub, this might have been the result." “The Sound of Building Coffins is easily one of the finest and truest pieces of New Orleans fiction I've ever read.” “One has to write with considerable authenticity to pull off a story steeped in magic and swamp water that examines race and class, death and rebirth, Haitian voodoo, and the beginnings of jazz in 1891 New Orleans...The plot is complex and magical, grounded in the history of the city, without being overly sentimental. There is a comfort with death as a part of life in this work that reveals deep feeling for the city and its past....Highly recommended for all fiction collections, especially where there is an interest in jazz." Signed copies available exclusively on the net here at Louie’s Juke Joint, just click this link to order! |