University of Iowa
Iowa Research Online
Theses and Dissertations
Summer 2012
New Orleans brass band traditions and popular
music : elements of style in the music of mama
digdown's brass band and youngblood brass band
Matthew Thomas Driscoll
University of Iowa
Copyright 2012 Matthew T. Driscoll
This dissertation is available at Iowa Research Online: http://ir.uiowa.edu/etd/3287
Recommended Citation
Driscoll, Matthew Thomas. "New Orleans brass band traditions and popular music : elements of style in the music of mama digdown's
brass band and youngblood brass band." DMA (Doctor of Musical Arts) thesis, University of Iowa, 2012.
http://ir.uiowa.edu/etd/3287.
Follow this and additional works at: http://ir.uiowa.edu/etd
Part of the Music Commons
NEW ORLEANS BRASS BAND TRADITIONS AND POPULAR MUSIC:
ELEMENTS OF STYLE IN THE MUSIC OF MAMA DIGDOWN’S BRASS BAND
AND YOUNGBLOOD BRASS BAND
by
Matthew Thomas Driscoll
An essay submitted in partial fulfillment
of the requirements for the Doctor of
Musical Arts degree
in the Graduate College of
The University of Iowa
July 2012
Essay Supervisor: Professor, David A. Gier
Copyright by
MATTHEW THOMAS DRISCOLL
2012
All Rights Reserved
Graduate College
The University of Iowa
Iowa City, Iowa
CERTIFICATE OF APPROVAL
_______________________
D.M.A. ESSAY
_______________
This is to certify that the D.M.A. essay of
Matthew Thomas Driscoll
has been approved by the Examining Committee
for the essay requirement for the Doctor of Musical Arts
degree at the July 2012 graduation.
Essay Committee: ___________________________________
David A. Gier, Essay Supervisor
___________________________________
Jeffrey Agrell
___________________________________
John Manning
___________________________________
John Rapson
___________________________________
Richard B. Turner
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I wish to express my gratitude to several teachers, friends, and family members
who helped me develop the skills necessary to complete this project. First I would like to
thank Dr. David Gier for his patience as a fantastic mentor and for his musical guidance.
Without his help none of this would have been possible. A specific thanks to my friends
and family who have always encouraged me to pursue my goals as a musician: to my
friend, Beverly Barfield, and the writing center at the University of Iowa for their helping
hands in developing my writing skills as an author. Most importantly, I want to thank my
wife, Ginny, for her endless support, encouragement, words of wisdom, and infinite love
through our lives together, but especially during the completion of this essay.
ii
TABLE OF CONTENTS
LIST OF FIGURES .............................................................................................................v
CHAPTER I.
INTRODUCTION .....................................................................................1
Background .......................................................................................................2
Review of Literature ..................................................................................4
Purpose of the Study .........................................................................................8
Methodology and Organization of Essay .........................................................8
CHAPTER II.
HISTORY OF THE NEW ORLEANS BRASS BANDS......................10
Foundation of a New Orleans Brass Band ......................................................10
Military Influence ...........................................................................................14
Benevolent Societies and Jazz Funerals .........................................................18
Second Line Rhythm (Beat) ...........................................................................20
The First Brass Bands .....................................................................................24
Brass Band Revival.........................................................................................27
CHAPTER III.
POPULAR MUSIC MOLDS THE REPERTOIRE .............................31
Popular Music Genres.....................................................................................32
Maryland, My Maryland ............................................................................33
Cakewalks to Ragtime ....................................................................................38
Panama ......................................................................................................39
Jazz to Rhythm and Blues (R&B) ..................................................................42
Dirty Dozen Brass Band .................................................................................47
My Feet Can’t Fail Me Now ......................................................................49
Rebirth Brass Band .........................................................................................51
Do Whatcha Wanna ...................................................................................53
Soul Rebels Brass Band ..................................................................................57
Soul Rebels Creative Process ....................................................................60
Sour Rebels Music .....................................................................................61
CHAPTER IV.
NEW ORLEANS STYLE ARRIVES IN MADISON .........................65
A Brass Band Tradition Starts in Madison .....................................................65
Mama Digdown’s Brass Band ........................................................................66
Mama Digdown’s Music ...........................................................................67
Youngblood Brass Band .................................................................................70
Influence of New Orleans on Youngblood ................................................74
Youngblood’s Music .................................................................................75
Avalanche .............................................................................................78
Brooklyn ................................................................................................80
J.E.M. ....................................................................................................83
CHAPTER V.
CONCLUSION.....................................................................................88
Hurricane Katrina ...........................................................................................88
Suggestions for Further Study ........................................................................90
APPENDIX A.
LEMAR LEBLANC INTERVIEW .....................................................91
iii
APPENDIX B.
ERIK JACOBSEN INTERVIEW ........................................................97
APPENDIX C.
JORDAN COHEN INTERVIEW ......................................................101
APPENDIX D.
DAVID SKOGEN INTERVIEW.......................................................103
APPENDIX E.
NAT MCINTOSH INTERVIEW .......................................................106
APPENDIX F.
CHRISTOPHER OHLY INTERVIEW ..............................................109
APPENDIX G.
CHARLES WAGNER INTERVIEW ................................................111
BIBLIOGRAPHY ............................................................................................................117
iv
LIST OF FIGURES
Figure
1.
In the Sweet Bye and Bye ..........................................................................................20
2.
Habanera ..................................................................................................................22
3.
Tresillo ......................................................................................................................22
4.
Cinquillo ...................................................................................................................22
5.
3-2 Clave ...................................................................................................................22
6.
2-3 clave....................................................................................................................23
7.
Mardi Gras Indian rhythm tresillo ............................................................................23
8.
Mardi Gras Indian rhythm cinquillo .........................................................................23
9
New Orleans Jazz Funeral ........................................................................................25
10.
Maryland, My Maryland ...........................................................................................34
11.
Maryland, My Maryland, four-bar introduction. ......................................................35
12.
Maryland, My Maryland, interlude...........................................................................36
13.
U.S. Army, Assembly Call ........................................................................................36
14.
Maryland, My Maryland, O Tannenbaum melody ...................................................36
15.
Maryland, My Maryland. ..........................................................................................37
16.
Second line bass drum rhythm ..................................................................................37
17.
Panama, original piano melody ................................................................................40
18.
Panama, Eureka Brass Band introduction ................................................................41
19.
Bass drum and cymbal rhythm to Panama ...............................................................42
20.
Rhythm of lyric to My Feet Can’t Fail Me Now ......................................................50
21.
My Feet Can’t Fail Me Now, St. Thomas melody ....................................................50
22.
Sousaphone bass line, Do Whatcha Wanna ..............................................................55
23.
Percussion and vocal parts, Do Whatcha Wanna .....................................................55
24.
Ffun melody ..............................................................................................................56
v
25.
Call and response instrumental dialogue, Do Whatcha Wanna ................................57
26.
No Place Like Home, sousaphone bass line, Violent Femmes Blister in the
Sun ............................................................................................................................63
27.
Avalanche, introduction, mm. 1-4, score in C ..........................................................79
28.
Avalanche, introduction, mm. 5-8, score in C ..........................................................79
28.
Avalanche, sousaphone part......................................................................................80
29.
Brooklyn, sousaphone bass line ................................................................................81
30.
Brooklyn, sousaphone feature ...................................................................................82
31.
J.E.M., introduction ..................................................................................................85
32.
J.E.M., measures 19-22.............................................................................................86
vi
1
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
This topic developed while researching the Youngblood Brass Band as a project
for the Advanced Brass Pedagogy and Literature class. I was impressed with the band’s
level of talent and the innovative mixture of styles. Youngblood uses the traditional
instrumentation of a New Orleans brass band (trumpets, trombones, saxophones, and
percussion) and their music incorporates jazz, rap, and rock influences. My initial
research focused on how and why the New Orleans music influenced this band in
Madison, Wisconsin. Beyond the instrumentation, I was unfamiliar with the history,
origins, and influence of New Orleans brass bands.
In the summer of 2005, I traveled to New Orleans for the International Trombone
Festival. In addition to the recitals and master-classes, I had the privilege of seeing a live
performance of the Soul Rebels. I had no idea that I was about to see a traditional New
Orleans brass band. When I first arrived, the audience members were in different
locations of the club. As the Soul Rebels started to take the stage, the crowd began to
gather in anticipation of the live music. By the time the Soul Rebels played their first
notes everyone was gathered around the small stage area shoulder to shoulder with hardly
any room to move. After the band played their first tune of the night, I was hooked on
the music and could not get enough of it. The Soul Rebels combined the styles of hiphop, rhythm and blues (R&B), funk, reggae, and jazz. Among the repertoire the band
played that night were originals I had never heard, and an arrangement of a song by the
popular hip-hop group Outkast. My initiation to a true New Orleans brass band left me
wanting more of the music and the knowledge of why the ensemble was so popular in
New Orleans. More importantly, I wanted to know how this music inspired Youngblood
Brass Band in Madison, Wisconsin.
Later that same year I attended a performance by Youngblood in Iowa City. After
arriving early, I was able to briefly interview one of Youngblood’s members, Charles
2
Wagner (trumpet). I asked him, “What is your connection to the New Orleans brass
bands?” He explained that the band’s origins come from the study of the New Orleans
music and playing with the same instrumentation. After listening to Youngblood live, it
confirmed my decision to continue with this investigation into why they play this style of
music directly related to New Orleans, and how they got started.
Background
Brass bands in New Orleans make up a large part of the city’s music and culture.
In general, people associate this style of music with Mardi Gras and funeral processions,
but in fact there is more to the music than those celebrations. The New Orleans brass
band style has continued to be an audience-centered form of music, which has been
transferred and transformed throughout the world.
From its inception, the majority of brass band repertoire was developed through
the incorporation of popular music into their style. As the band’s music changed with
society and time, the foundation of rhythm and connection to their African heritage,
dating back to dance and music celebrations at Congo Square, remained.
Brass band musicians first learned a repertoire of marches, funeral dirges, and
hymns, along with dance music and popular tunes.1 At the end of the nineteenth century
ragtime, cakewalks, and two-steps were the popular music styles added into the brass
band tradition. Later in the twentieth century the popular musical genres incorporated
were jazz and R&B. Dejan’s Olympia Brass Band fused the rhythms of R&B with the
Congo Square beat also known as second line rhythms. The Olympia band also played
arrangements of R&B tunes. In the 1970s and ’80s, the Dirty Dozen Brass Band and the
Rebirth Brass Band continued the evolution of popular music into the repertoire. The
aforementioned styles continued to be utilized into the twenty-first century. Now
contemporary bands like the Soul Rebels Brass Band include rap in their original works
1 William J. Schafer, Brass Bands and New Orleans Jazz. (Baton Rouge, LA: Louisiana State
University Press, 1977).
3
and have even played arrangements of songs by the heavy metal group Metallica. Though
there has been research on the evolution of brass band music through the 1980s, there is a
lack of information regarding contemporary bands and their utilization of traditional
brass band elements as well as the incorporation of popular music of the last 30 years.
The modern bands manage to make brass band music exciting for new audiences,
not only by incorporating elements of popular music, but by holding on to the forms and
rhythms of a traditional New Orleans brass band. The phrasing and form of the music is
related to the march, one of the first styles the bands played, which usually includes eight
to sixteen bar phrases. Then, when jazz influenced the bands, they added a traditional
element of jazz form with a solo section in the middle of the piece. The main underlying
element is the rhythm in the percussion with the added syncopation, referred to as the
second line beat. The second line rhythm is what makes the music danceable and attracts
audiences. Rhythms that are prominent in R&B, funk, and hip-hop have been added on
top of the second line beat. That element has continually attracted audience of all ages,
but especially new younger audience members. This paper helps the reader understand
both the traditional elements and the new elements in the music of the New Orleans brass
bands and how the traditions have been adopted and modified by two bands from
Madison.
Mama Digdown’s Brass Band and Youngblood Brass Band connect to the
tradition yet move the style forward by incorporating popular music (which is itself a
time-honored practice). These groups traveled to New Orleans to study the most popular
bands who were playing parades, funerals, and clubs. The Madison bands befriended the
members of the local bands, particularly members of the Hot 8 and the Soul Rebels. With
a better understanding of the music and the traditions, Mama Digdown’s made a
conscious effort to portray New Orleans culture with dignity and respect. In a similar
manner, but with a different approach, Youngblood took the ideas of compositional
practice and the incorporation of popular music styles to another level. The paper will
4
show how Youngblood is an extension of the New Orleans brass band style because they
play the newest forms of popular music through elements of style, rhythm, and
compositional technique. All of these elements can be heard in the music of Youngblood.
In that respect, they are like the Dirty Dozen and now the Soul Rebels.
Review of Related Literature
There are limited resources regarding the New Orleans brass band history, music,
and style. Some of the resources mention that popular music was added to the New
Orleans brass band repertoire but do not elaborate any further. In regard to Youngblood
Brass Band and the Madison bands, no scholarly resources are present.
William Schafer’s book Brass Bands and New Orleans Jazz (1977) mentions how
brass bands played the popular music of the day.2 There is some commentary on how the
bands arranged the original works into brass band tunes. In general, the book covers the
history of the brass band from the late nineteenth century into the 1970s. Schafer tells of
the beginnings of the brass bands in New Orleans, what music was played, and where it
was performed. Schafer writes about the popular brass bands at the time the book was
published and argues that the bands helped to develop the beginnings of jazz. In the
appendix, he includes a transcription of a piece from 1894, Fallen Heroes, a popular
dirge. This book is helpful in understanding the early history of the brass bands and the
early repertoire played.
Mick Burns’ Keeping the Beat on the Street: The New Orleans Brass Band
Renaissance (2006) is a book about brass bands in New Orleans.3 Burns documents the
contemporary brass bands and writes about the most popular bands from the late 1970s to
the beginning of the twenty-first century. He mainly features the Fairview Baptist
2 Ibid.
3 Mick Burns, Keeping the Beat on the Street: The New Orleans Brass Band Renaissance. (Baton
Rouge, LA: Louisiana State University Press, 2006).
5
Church Brass Band, Hurricane Brass Band, Chosen Few Brass Band, Dirty Dozen Brass
Band, and Rebirth Brass Band. He includes interviews with members of those bands,
with comments in the introduction about how the Soul Rebels are taking the brass band
traditions further into the future. Another book written and compiled by Mick Burns is
The Great Olympia Band (2001), which includes an introductory chapter commenting on
the importance of Dejan’s Olympia Brass Band and his experiences with the members of
the band.4 The majority of the book focuses on interviews compiled over the years with
members who have played with the Olympia band.
In Richard Turner’s recent publication, Jazz Religion, the Second Line, and Black
New Orleans (2009), the author discusses the New Orleans brass bands and their
connection to their African, Haitian, and Cuban heritage through religious and musical
practices.5 This book provides an understanding of the lineage of the brass band traditions
in New Orleans.
Richard Knowles’, Fallen Heroes: A History of New Orleans Brass Bands,
provides the history of the brass band movement up to 1996, the year of publication.6
Knowles recaps some of the history that Schafer discussed and features some of the early
popular brass bands. Knowles also discusses the brass bands involvement with the
recording and film industry.
Herlin Riley, Johnny Vidacovich, and Dan Thress wrote New Orleans Jazz and
Second Line Drumming, which details the percussion rhythms.7 This book is a method
4 Mick Burns, The Great Olympia Band. (New Orleans, LA: Jazzology Press, 2001).
5 Richard Brent Turner, Jazz Religion, the Second Line, and Black New Orleans. (Bloomington:
Indiana, Indiana University Press, 2009).
6 Richard H. Knowles, Fallen Heroes: A History of New Orleans Brass Band. (New York: W.W.
Norton, 1993).
7 Herlin Riley, Johnny Vidacovich, and Dan Thress, New Orleans Jazz and Second Line
Drumming. (Warner Brothers Publishing, 1996).
6
book, with transcriptions of popular rhythms of the brass band’s drum sections. It has
commentary and description about the rhythms and how the style has affected drum-set
playing outside of the tradition. Reid Mitchell’s book, All on Mardi Gras Days, has
specific chapters that are helpful when outlining the brass band’s roots.8 Those chapters
cover the early days of Mardi Gras and Louis Armstrong. There are other books that
discuss New Orleans brass bands in chapters and sections that are concerned primarily
with jazz or New Orleans music, but none that contribute significantly to the literature.
Articles providing evidence of the rhythmical background of brass band music
trace influences back to West Africa and the Caribbean. These articles support the
assertion that brass bands have used elements of popular music since their beginnings. In
addition, Christopher Washburne’s article, “The Clave of Jazz: Caribbean Contribution to
Rhythmic Foundation of an African-American Music,” provides an account of brass
bands’ rhythmic foundations.9 Yet another article that supports this information is that of
John Collins, “The Early History of West African Highlife Music.”10 Karl Koenig, author
of the New Orleans, Jazz Club; the Second Line, is known for his research in early jazz
history.11 He has a series of articles that discuss the teachers of the early brass bands of
New Orleans and their impact on the number of brass band musicians in and around the
region.12 In addition to the scholarly research in journals, there are online magazines of
CD reviews of brass band music. Two magazines that have offered insight on brass bands
8 Reid Mitchell, All on a Mardi Gras Day. (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1995).
9 Christopher Washburne, “ The Clave of Jazz: Caribbean Contribution to Rhythmic Foundation
of an African-American Music.” Black Music Research Journal 17, no. 1 (Spring, 1997) 59-80.
10 John Collins, “The Early History of West African Highlife Music.” Black Music Research
Journal 18, no. 3 (1989). 221-230.
11 Karl Koenig, “Louisiana Brass Bands and Their History in Relation to Jazz History.” New
Orleans, Jazz Club; the Second Line (1983).
12 Karl Koenig, “Professor Hingle and the Sweet Sixteen Brass Band of Point a La Hache.” New
Orleans, Jazz Club; the Second Line (1983).
7
are Offbeat13 and Where Y’at Magazine.14 These magazines, which are printed monthly
and offered online, focus on the music, culture, and cuisine of New Orleans.
There are two important documentaries detailing the lives of musicians in the
early brass bands and the traditions in which they participated. Sing On documents brass
bands from 1914 through the 1960’s, and New Orleans Jazz Funerals from the Inside, a
video narrated by Milton Batiste, the lead trumpet player from Dejan’s Olympia Brass
Band, describes the history of the funeral procession. Another helpful resource in
understanding the activities and repertoire of a jazz funeral is a CD that features The
Magnificent Sevenths Brass Band.15
Web pages of the contemporary brass bands presented in this essay have been
vital resources in staying current with the bands’ activities, touring and new music. Some
of those bands are Dirty Dozen,16 Rebirth,17 Soul Rebels,18 Mama Digdown’s,19 and
Youngblood.20
13 Louisiana Music and Culture, www.Offbeat.com, (Accessed December 2011 and 1 January
2012).
14 WHERE Y’AT Magazine, www.whereyat.com/neworleans/, (Accessed November 2, 2008).
15 Magnificent Sevenths, Authentic New Orleans Jazz Funeral, CD 2004.
16 Dirty Dozen Brass Band, www.dirtydozenbrass.com, (Accessed October 6, 2009).
17 Rebirth Brass Band, www.rebirthbrassband.com, (Accessed November 2011 and February 13,
2012).
18 Soul Rebels Brass Band, www.soulrebelsbrassband.com, (Accessed February 1, 2012 and
January 1, 2012).
19 Mama Digdown’s Brass Band, www.mamadigdownsbrassband.com, (Accessed March 3,
2010).
20 Youngblood Brass Band, www.youngbloodbrassband.com, (Accessed December 15, 2011).
8
Purpose of the Study
The purpose of this study is to trace the history of brass bands and show how they
have incorporated popular music within their style of playing since their inception in
New Orleans. There are no studies that focus primarily on how popular music has been
incorporated in the music of the brass bands. This essay discusses specific brass band
compositions, pointing out the popular music elements. This study will also show how
the movement has influenced the establishment of other bands, with a concentration on
groups from Madison, Wisconsin. There will be an in-depth investigation of two bands:
Mama Digdown’s Brass Band and Youngblood Brass Band, with a discussion of their
history, music, and connection to the New Orleans brass band style. This essay will be
the first document to present material on the active brass bands of Madison.
Methodology and Organization of the Essay
A historical overview of the brass bands and their development before being
labeled as a brass band will be included in chapter two. This chapter will discuss the
contributing factors leading up to their formation.
Chapter Three discusses the incorporation of popular music into brass band
repertoire. The repertoire includes examples that incorporate elements of the march,
ragtime, funk, and hip-hop. There is a concentration on three contemporary brass bands:
the Dirty Dozen, Rebirth, and the Soul Rebels. Interviews with Lemar LeBlanc (Soul
Rebels) and Phillip Frazer (Rebirth) highlight the ways in which the bands created their
own repertoire while staying true to the traditions of the music.
Chapter Four concentrates on the two groups from Madison that are based on the
musical styling of New Orleans brass bands. This chapter presents interviews with key
members of the bands Mama Digdown’s and Youngblood Brass Band. There will be an
analysis of their music to identify traditional elements of New Orleans brass bands. There
will also be specific examples of Youngblood’s music that show how they have
9
incorporated new styles from popular music of today. Interviews with members of the
Soul Rebels, Mama Digdown’s, and Youngblood are included in the appendices.
10
CHAPTER II
HISTORY OF THE NEW ORLEANS BRASS BANDS
Many factors contributed to the existence of New Orleans brass bands. The first
to be discussed is Congo Square and the musical activities that took place there. The
second factor was military instruments and repertoire of the first brass bands. Those
instruments were included in the musical celebrations of Congo Square, and military
music became some of the first repertoire of the brass bands. The third contributing
factor to the New Orleans brass band tradition was benevolent societies. These societies
hired bands to play for funerals and parades, which gave the bands more publicity and
provided opportunities to play at other parades and social events. The traditions of New
Orleans brass bands are a combination of African-American heritage, military influences,
and funeral processions.
Foundation of a New Orleans Brass Band
Brass bands have performed in parades and funeral processions in New Orleans
for more than a century. The repertoire, however, has changed as a result of the influence
of popular music. The foundation of brass bands dates back to the beginning of the
nineteenth century, when slaves gathered to express themselves through music and dance.
The addition of popular music to the African diaspora allowed slaves an outlet for
expression and cultural remembrance.
At the beginning of the nineteenth century, New Orleans had a large black
population that was mixed with slaves and free Negroes, a term commonly used at that
time.21 Free Negroes populated the area due to immigration and because of emancipation
laws that allowed slaves to be freed under certain circumstances. For example, one rule
stated that if a slave taught a master’s children, that slave would be free; another rule said
21 H. E. Sterkx, The Free Negro in Ante-Bellum Louisiana. (Cranbury, New Jersey: Associated
University Presses, Inc. 1972),15.
11
that if a slave had a child with a non-slave, the child was free along with the mother.22
More than half the population of free Negroes was from Haiti, having fled the country in
search of a better life.23
Code Noir, translated as Black Code, was a law that gave slaves permission to
have Sunday afternoons free in New Orleans to play music and dance.24 Congo Square,
which is now Armstrong Park, was the public gathering place where free Negroes joined
the slaves in these celebrations. Louisiana was the only state in the United States to
allow such self-expression by slaves. The population of Louisiana and New Orleans
included people originating from Senegambia nations such as Bambara, Mandinga,
Wolog, Fulbe, Nard, Mina, Fon, Yoruba, and Konga as well as areas of the Caribbean.25
At these musical performances, the Congo Square gatherers sold fruits, vegetables, and
homemade goods.
White people would also congregate in Congo Square, drawn by the sounds of
musical celebrations that included singing and rhythms played on percussion
instruments.26 Lichtenstein reports that it became a form of entertainment to the white
audience, as they showed curiosity and support. The white audiences not only enjoyed
the music produced by slaves but participated as well. This active participation of all
races and backgrounds is at the heart of the modern New Orleans parades. These weekly
Sunday celebrations began around 1835, although some sources state that the Sunday
gathering at Congo Square had been in existence as early as the beginning of the
22 Ibid., 16.
23 Ibid., 275.
24 Ibid., 16.
25 Freddi Williams Evans, Congo Square: African Roots in New Orleans. (Lafayette, LA:
University of Lousiana at Lafayette Press, 2011), 47.
26 Grace Lichtenstein and Laura Dankner. Musical Gumbo: The Music of New Orleans. (New
York, W.W. Norton, 1993), 19.
12
nineteenth century. Later, as brass bands took form, Sunday became a popular day for
the bands to parade through the band members’ neighborhoods.
The music at Congo Square accompanied dances of African origins like the
bamboula and calinda, with links to the Caribbean.27 Yoruban religious worship
included bodily celebration; in the words of a scholar Freddi Evans, “to meditate was to
dance.”28 Ventura describes how Africans believed the spirit world and human world
intersect. The Yorubans believed that the body became the crossroad, and that dance was
a spiritual/religious connection. They believed that the right angles formed by the
intersections of the cross represent the place where the spirit and human world come
together. The dances at Congo Square were an act of religious celebration, similar to the
Yoruban celebrations. People that participated in the music and dance celebrations were
not restricted to Congo Sqaure: there were also reports of the style of dance in the streets,
backyards, and dance halls throughout New Orleans.29 In the twentieth and twenty-first
centuries, the second line dancers following brass bands incorporated elements of these
dances.30
The rhythm-based music that accompanied these dances was performed on
homemade instruments linked to Africa.31 Materials were collected from nature and
modeled after prototype instruments from West Africa.32 Performers used sticks to beat
on animal bones, skulls, and drums made from barrels of various sizes. The performers
27 Ibid.
28 Michael Ventura, Shadow Dancing in the U.S.A. (Los Angeles, CA: Jeremy P. Tarcher, Inc.,
1976), 109.
29 Evans, 94.
30 Turner, 5.
31 Kmen,Henry. Music in New Orleans: The Formative Years 1791-1841. (Baton Rouge,
Louisiana State University Press, 1966), 226.
32 Evans, 63.
13
played rhythms of African and Caribbean origin that later become the heart of the
rhythmic cells of New Orleans brass bands. Typically, a master drummer was responsible
for the foundational beat. His task included “sending signals and cues, alerting other
musicians and dancers of breaks in the music, and responding to the constantly shifting
improvisations of other participants.”33 Other instruments included balafons and stringed
instruments that resembled, respectively, the marimba and the guitar. Surrounding
participants used their hands and feet to clap and stomp rhythms while the
“congregation” (those not actively playing percussion instruments) danced and sang.
Those musical activities reconnected them with their African and Haitian spiritual
heritage.34 Marie Laveau was a free Catholic woman of color, born in 1801, who became
the most important spiritual leader in New Orleans.35 Laveau was a Voodoo queen who
combined Haitian vodou with Catholicism,36 performing dances accompanied by drums.
The drummer of the Voodoo ritual was viewed as a holy servant. Like many other
religious traditions from Africa, Voodoo rhythms were considered prayer or worship, not
music until later generations labeled it as such.
The music that was played during the celebrations was improvised and
syncopated, and utilized “call and response,” which created participation with the slaves
and free Negroes who were not playing percussive instruments. Improvisation,
syncopated rhythms, and call and response are still at the foundation of brass band music
today, “yet disguised enough to make them accessible to a larger audience.”37
33 Ibid.
34 Turner, 39.
35 Turner, 26.
36 Ventura, 125.
37 Rick Koster, Louisiana Music: A Journey from R & B to Zydeco, Jazz to Country, Blues to
Gospel, Cajun Music to Swamp Pop to Carnival Music and Beyond. (Cambridge, MA: Da Capo
Press, 2002), 58.
14
Although the music and activities of the New Orleans brass band are largely
based upon African origins, European music also had a profound effect on the bands’
development. Germans, Spaniards, and Italians immigrated to New Orleans before the
Civil War, and many of the immigrants were trained musicians who taught free Negroes
how to play an instrument.38 An advertisement in one New Orleans newspaper offered
free lessons to black musicians on a brass instrument. New Orleans also had a longtime
connection to the Paris Conservatory: a scholarship, established before the United States
purchased the territory from France, was provided to a person of color to study in Paris.39
Studying privately with a teacher introduced black musicians to written music,
which led to all-black ensembles that played classical music, music for dance, and Creole
folk songs with French lyrics. All-black orchestras performed concerts in a classical
setting, in which people listened to the ensemble while seated. These all-black orchestras
played for social dances, incorporating African syncopated rhythms into the music,
making the music more danceable and helping them become popular.40 This idea of
playing popular music selections with syncopation carried over to the brass band
performances.
Military Influence
Europeans contributed to New Orleans brass bands not only through classical
training, but also through the military institutions. Brass bands performed the repertoire
of the military bands, giving them music to play at a parade. During the War of 1812, the
governor of Louisiana recognized the city’s love for brass bands and parades and passed
38 Sterkx,15.
39 Kmen, 274.
40 Ibid.
15
a bill that authorized a new militia unit made up of free Negroes of the state.41 This bill
afforded free Negroes the opportunity to play for social events as well as to march.42
In 1820, the New Orleans Independent Rifle Company posted an advertisement
offering men of color free lessons on keyed bugles in exchange for joining the military.43
This posting was made in response to the increasing popularity of all-black military units.
The training contributed to the free Negroes’ knowledge of brass instruments and
provided an outlet for free Negroes to express themselves during time off from work.
Black soldiers in these bands played military-style marches infused with African
syncopated rhythms, like those heard at Congo Square.
By 1830, a newspaper reported free Negroes playing Yankee Doodle on fife and
drums accompanied by a dancing crowd.44 If this performance had taken place in the
twenty-first century, the crowd would be referred to as the “second line.” This early
incarnation of the second line is unique, because if Yankee Doodle had been performed in
its standard compositional form, such a large crowd might not have gathered to dance.
Traditionally, Yankee Doodle would have been played to march the troops to battle. The
band, however, incorporated their musical heritage and experiences from Congo Square
into their arrangement of Yankee Doodle. This made it danceable, with syncopated
rhythms improvised on drums and fifes playing the main theme. Some may have been
embellishing the melody.
The militia companies grew and eventually several companies existed throughout
Louisiana. By 1838, three thousand free Negro men were uniformed and had their own
41 Sterkx,183.
42 Ibid.
43 Kmen, 202.
44 Ibid.
16
military bands.45 The all-black militia units marked the start of the brass band tradition in
New Orleans.46
The brass band instrumentation evolved over time. The musicians first played
homemade instruments at Congo Square and eventually replaced them with manufactured
ones. During the Civil War, many bands were assigned to each regiment primarily
playing bugles and drums. Schafer’s research shows that when the war concluded, there
was an abundant supply of brass instruments available to the general public, because
when the ensembles disbanded, soldiers sold their instruments to pawn shops on Rampart
Street in New Orleans.47 Koenig explains that the recently invented keyed bugle was
mass-manufactured. He believes that the advancement in valves contributed to the
flexibility and range of timbres available, leading to the popularity of the instruments.48
The keys made it easier for non-musicians to learn how to play, causing an increase in the
demand for brass instruments.
Schafer and Koenig document the instrumentation of the first brass bands in
personnel lists discovered in their research. These lists give the members’ names and the
instruments they played, confirming the scholars’ theories as to what instruments were
used in the first brass bands. They were the Eb and Bb cornet, alto horn, baritone, valve
trombone, Eb bass tuba, marching bass drum, cymbal, and marching snare drum.
At the turn of the twentieth century, the instruments of wind and jazz dance
bands’ influenced the evolution of brass bands. The cornets that were played were
pitched in Eb and Bb. The wind band’s repertoire in the nineteenth and early twentieth
45 Ibid., 203.
46 Mary Ellison, “Dr. Michael White and New Orleans Jazz: Pushing back Boundaries while
Maintaining the Tradition.” Popular Music and Society Vol. 28, No. 5, (December 2005), 619638.
47 Kmen, 226.
48 Koenig, 4-11.
17
centuries had parts written for Bb trumpets and Bb cornets, so eventually Eb cornets gave
way to solely Bb parts. The instrumentation of a wind band included clarinets and
saxophones, both eventually becoming part of the brass band’s instrumentation. An Eb
clarinet was popular initially, for its high pitch that could cut through the other brass
instruments and carry the melody.49 Later, the Bb clarinet replaced the Eb clarinet, which
probably blended better with the ensemble because of its timbre. The saxophones were
added as a result of the popular dance band sounds of New Orleans in the middle to late
1910s.50 The alto and tenor saxophone replaced the alto and baritone bugles: “These
instruments inject[ed] a dance-band element into the band’s sound.”51 The slide trombone
replaced the valve trombone because of dance bands. Brass bands switched from tuba to
sousaphone at the beginning of the twentieth century. However, photographs from the
middle of the twentieth century show brass bands employing the tuba and the
sousaphone. The majority of the bands use the sousaphone because of its lighter weight
compared to the tuba, which makes it easier to carry while marching in parades.
The percussion section was made up of marching military drums, including the
bass drum, snare drum, and cymbal. A wire hoop, made of material similar to a wire coat
hanger molded into a circle and clamped together with a wooden handle, was used
instead of a regular bass drum mallet. When the wire hoop struck the cymbal, the sound
could be heard more easily as it played the upbeats to the bass drum’s downbeats.
Eventually the Rebirth Brass Band used a screwdriver to replace the wire hoop. It
became the mallet of choice for other bands to follow.52
49 Schafer, 39.
50 New Grove Dictionary of Music, 2nd ed., volume 12, Jazz, “Schwandt, Erich and Lamb,
Andrew.”
51 Schafer, 39.
52 Burns. Keeping the Beat on the Street, 113.
18
Contemporary bands play the same three percussion instruments. One exception
is the Dirty Dozen Brass Band, which replaced the marching percussion with a drum
set.53 Other bands kept the original marching percussion and added auxiliary percussion
instruments like the bongos, congas, and suspended cymbal, mainly for performances at
clubs or on a stage.
Brass bands added microphones to their live performance to ensure the vocals
could be heard. The electric guitar was added to some bands, which helped the bands add
more effects to mimic the sounds that could be heard on R&B or hip hop albums.
Benevolent Societies and Jazz Funerals
At a time when many immigrants and former slaves were in need, benevolent
societies began to spring up around New Orleans in the middle of the nineteenth century.
Predominantly black benevolent societies were established to help former slaves and
immigrants when they arrived to America by providing medical services, educational
funds, burial funds, and means for self-help.54 These societies felt it was important to
conserve the African cultural concepts and celebrations.55 Benevolent societies, then
known as mutual aid and benevolent clubs, were attracted to the brass bands’ music.56
Benevolent societies often hired brass bands for parades, weddings, parties, and
funerals. As a result of playing such varied social events, the bands developed a wide
repertoire. A significant portion of the literature was derived from different stages of a
funeral ceremony: the wake, the procession, and the joyous send-off. Funerals were often
provided for members of the benevolent societies and their family members, as well as
53 Ibid.
54 Jazz Funerals, DVD produced by David M. Jones (New Orleans, LA: DMJ Productions, LLC,
1995).
55 Michael P. Smith, “Behind the Lines: The Black Mardi Gras Indians and the New Orleans
Second Line.” Black Music Research Journal, Vol. 14, No. 1 (1993): 43-73.
56 Jazz Funerals, DVD.
19
respected musicians in the community, with a funeral parade reported in the newspaper as
early as 1830.57
The wake service took place either at the church or at the home of the deceased.
The music consisted of hymns of Methodist and Baptist origin and African-American
spirituals. Family and friends gathered to sing these hymns and spirituals like As I Lay
My Burden Down, Down by the Riverside, and What a Friend We Have in Jesus.58 For
that reason, those hymns became part of the repertoire.
On the day of the funeral, the band met at the church and proceeded to the burial,
followed in the procession by the casket and the congregation. The band played dirges as
accompaniment. The bass drum was struck four times, then the band began playing as
the body came out of the church and proceeded to the cemetery. Figure 1 is the
introduction to In the Sweet Bye and Bye as performed by The Magnificent Sevenths.
The snare drum plays an introductory rhythm with snares off, then a drum roll leads into
the bass drum playing the first eighth note on the “and” of beat three in measure two.
Then the second, third, and fourth “sound” of the bass drum is played in measures three
and four as the band begins the melody on beat three of the fourth measure led by the
lead trumpet, as seen in Figure 1. Other pieces played, included Just a Closer Walk with
Thee; Lead Me, Savior; and Walk Through the Streets of the City.59 This band ceremony
before reaching the cemetery was referred to as “cutting the body loose.”60 The band
would play Taps for a military person or the blues for a “blues man.”61
57 Kmen, 207.
58 Magnificent Sevenths, Authentic New Orleans Jazz Funeral, CD 2004.
59 Ibid.
60 Ibid.
61 Jazz Funerals.
20
Figure 1 In the Sweet Bye and Bye
Once the ceremony was over and the casket was lowered, the bands celebrated the
life of the departed with upbeat music. When the cadence of the drum became more
active and faster in tempo, the band played syncopated marches, upbeat hymns, and
popular ragtime and jazz compositions of the day. One of the most popular upbeat
hymns, When the Saints Go Marching In, is still popular today. Other trendy pieces
performed were Bourbon Street Parade, Didn’t He Ramble, Feels So Good, and Panama.
The organizational pattern of the procession placed the band and grand marshal as
the first line, with the second line including the people who followed the band back from
the burial. The procession of people danced to the upbeat music as they followed the
band away from the graveyard. The second line tradition, or “second lining,” refers to
people from the neighborhood who would join in the celebration and dancing as the band
marched away.
Second Line Rhythm (Beat)
The second line rhythm is a common phrase used to describe the rhythms of the
percussionist performed in a New Orleans brass band. The second line rhythm, also
referred to as second line beat, originated in Congo Square and then became the
prominent rhythm performed in brass bands during parades.
21
Jordan Cohen, the bass drummer of Mama Digdown’s Brass Band was asked to
describe the second line beat:
There isn’t one second line beat, broadly speaking; I’d say it
involves two different clave patterns and their interplay. One
would be two dotted quarter notes followed by the quarter note,
and the other is five dotted eighth notes starting on the “&” of 1.
But these don’t necessarily have to be explicitly stated, and there
are a ton of variations based on an awareness of these claves.
Another important element is an accent on the last upbeat of the
phrase, but again, it’s not a hard and fast rule.62
Two dotted quarter notes followed by the quarter note is similar to the clave rhythm
Evans reports was played at Congo Square as seen in Figure 5 and is referred to as the 32 clave.
Lemar LeBlanc describes the second line beat as being directly related to Africa
and Congo Square, but that it has been modernized and updated over the past one
hundred years, combining jazz and Afro-Cuban rhythms.63 Cohen discusses the different
versions of the second line beat: the bass drum and mounted cymbal play a combination
of the African rhythms of Congo Square with European marches. That combination
emphasizes the last upbeat of the phrase while the snare drum plays a blending of the
march-rhythm and the 2-3 clave beat, shown in figure 6.64 This blending, combined with
the syncopated rhythms of the Cuban and Caribbean clave, tresillo, and cinquillo, are the
“second line beat.”
Freddi Williams Evans agrees with LeBlanc in her book Congo Square: African
Roots in New Orleans, and writes that there were four main rhythms that came from the
dance and music celebrations at Congo Square.65 Those rhythms, the habanera, the
62 Jordan Cohen, interview by author, email questionnaire, 24 August 2010.
63 Lemar LeBlanc, interview by author, digital recorded phone interview, Coralville, IA., 26
March 2010.
64 Stanton Moore, Take it to the Street: A Study in New Orleans Street Beats and Second-line
Rhythms as Applied to Funk. (New York, NY: Carl Fischer, 2005), 7.
65 Evans, 42-44.
22
tresillo, the cinquillo, and the clave, provide “the rhythmic patterns of the New Orleans
street beat, bamboula beat, second line beat, and New Orleans beat.”66
Figure 2 Habanera
Figure 3 Tresillo
Figure 4 Cinquillo
Figure 5 3-2 Clave
The rhythmic patterns can be traced to Africa and Cuba with the tresillo and
cinquillo at the foundation of the New Orleans brass band’s street beat.67 Stanton Moore,
the New Orleans drummer who studied the rhythms of the New Orleans brass bands and
Mardi Gras Indian rhythms, states that the brass bands use 2-3 and 3-2 clave because it
66 Evans, 42.
67 Ibid. 40.
23
emphasizes the “Big 4,” the fourth beat of measure two, as shown in Figure 6.68 The
clave rhythms are in two bar phrases and the use of the 2-3 clave help to emphasize the
“Big 4.”
Figure 6 2-3 clave
The tresillo and cinquillo from Figures 7 and 8 are two frequently performed
rhythms of the Mardi Gras Indians. Moore says, “the grooves are played on bass drums
(usually turned sideways and often without a bottom head), tom-toms, snare drums
(usually with snares off), calfskin-headed tambourines, cowbells and sometimes congas
and liquor bottles.”69 Moore implies that there are no strict rules on how to perform these
rhythms; rather, it is important to feel the rhythm.
Figure 7 Mardi Gras Indian rhythm tresillo
Figure 8 Mardi Gras Indian rhythm cinquillo
68 Moore, 7.
69 Ibid.
24
The First Brass Bands
The Congo Square celebrations, the influence of the military band, and funeral
processions contributed to the formation of a New Orleans brass band. Jazz historians
generally agree that 1880 marked the official beginning of the New Orleans brass bands.
It was during that decade when the brass bands began to be recognized as formal groups
and the instrumentation began to evolve into what is known today.
The first brass bands in New Orleans were the Excelsior, Eureka, Deer Range,
Pelican, Pickwick, Olympia, Onward, and St. Joseph Brass Bands.70 These were some of
the most popular bands, and they performed at many social events in and around New
Orleans. Brass bands were so popular in the late nineteenth century that thirteen played
at President James A. Garfield’s funeral in 1881.71 In 1883, the Excelsior Brass Band
played for the opening of the New Orleans Cotton Exposition and was known as “the
finest black brass band in the city.”72 Just as the brass bands were hired for major events
in the beginning of their existence, the bands have consistently been booked for such
mainstream events through today.
The first brass bands performed for major events, parades, or dances, and they
wore matching uniforms, as seen in Figure 2. The brass bands at the turn of the twentieth
century wore formal, military-style coats with matching slacks. The cap had a bill in the
front and the band’s name across the front of it, like a military Marine or Navy cap.
Patent leather shoes completed the brass band uniform.
70 Schafer, 8-9.
71 Lichtenstein and Dankner, 20.
72 Schafer, 9.
25
Figure 9 New Orleans Jazz Funeral73
The brass bands of New Orleans from the 1890s through the beginning of the
twentieth century usually consisted of ten to sixteen members. There were two to three
each of cornets or trumpets, trombones, and clarinets, though once saxophones became
part of the instrumentation the bands included a mix of clarinets and saxophones. There
was one tubist, one person playing the bass drum and cymbal, and one snare drummer.
All of the bands had a designated leader who called rehearsals and booked performances
for the band. The bandleader was likely a musician who was influential in bringing the
band together. Often, the leader was the tubist or snare drummer.
The people who played in these brass bands were dedicated musicians, and
among them were educators of the craft. Brass bands have had important instructors
73 Hurricane Brass Band, www.hurricanebrassband.nl, (Accessed September 25, 2011).
26
throughout the history of the genre. In the beginning of the brass band era, Paul
Chaligny, Robert Hingle, James B. Humphrey, and Dave Perkins performed in their own
brass bands, and taught young musicians the brass band repertoire and how to improve on
their instrument.
Humphrey was a black man who taught on the east bank of the Mississippi River
that included the Magnolia, Deer Range, and Oakville Plantations. He established a
Black Band Academy, where he taught young musicians how to play instruments and
introduced them to the brass band music.74 He was the founder of the Eclipse Brass
Band, which met twice a week for three to five hours per rehearsal.75 Humphrey wrote
marches and other exercises for the band to play in the brass band style. In a distinct New
Orleans tradition, a family that had multiple musicians participated in brass bands and
other musical genres. Humphrey had relatives to carry on the tradition of brass bands in
the early twentieth century — for example, his nephew, Percy Humphrey, played in the
Eureka Brass Band.
Hingle, a white man, was a lawyer and musician who taught white and black brass
bands on the west bank of the Mississippi, the area of Point a la Hache.76 The all-white
brass bands were most likely more of a community band in the style of a British brass
band than one that played marches with the syncopation and elements of Congo Square.
Hingle helped start three popular brass bands in the late nineteenth century. The first was
the Sweet Sixteen Brass Band that began in 1883; the other two were St. Joseph Silver
Cornet Band and the Juvenile Brass Band.77
74 Schafer, 22.
75 Ibid.
76 Karl Koenig, “Professor Robert Hingle and the Sweet Sixteen Brass Band of Point a La
Hache.” (New Orleans, Jazz Club; the Second Line, Fall 1983), 4.
77 Ibid., 5-11.
27
During the Great Depression, the brass band tradition in New Orleans saw a
decline. Although a few bands survived within the black communities, they were not as
popular as the Excelsior, Eureka, Deer Range, Pelican, Pickwick, Olympia, Onward, and
St. Joseph Brass Bands.78 Harold Dejan was a prominent brass band musician and was
the band-leader of Dejan’s Olympia Brass Band. Musicians like Dejan kept their skills
polished and the bands that survived during those decades hired him to play. Dejan
shared that the Eureka, the Tuxedo, Manuel Perez’s, and Henry Allen’s brass bands hired
him during the Depression era. One of the requirements for brass musicians was the
ability to read music, “If you couldn’t read, you couldn’t play with them.”79 Dejan states
that, “New Orleans music went backward because of the Depression,” implying that
musicians learned by ear rather than through “literate” training.80
Brass Band Revival
The 1950s marked a revival of brass bands, and the Eureka, Olympia, Onward
and the Original Zenith brass bands all rose to prominence.81 In the middle of the
twentieth century, technology assisted the brass bands, resulting in them being heard by
larger audiences via radio, recordings, and television broadcasts. Bands also toured cities
around the world making this genre of music known across the globe.
The earliest recording of a New Orleans brass band was in the middle 1920s,
when Jack Laine's Reliance Brass Band was recorded performing at Mardi Gras.82 The
first documentary of a working brass band featured Eureka’s 1951 tour of Washington,
78 Schafer, 22.
79 Ibid.
80 Burns, The Great Olympia Band, 35.
81 Turner, 113.
82 Sign On. VHS, directed by Barry Martin, (American Music, 2001).
28
D.C.83 The film, by David Ashforth, included footage of the band playing traditional
songs, and interviews with the musicians about the repertoire and events for which they
performed in New Orleans. One year later, three to four brass bands, including the
Jackson Brass Band, were featured in additional films by Ashforth.
Dejan played in brass bands the majority of his life, largely the Eureka Brass
Band. In the 1960s, Dejan helped to keep the old traditions of the brass band alive. He
revived the name of an early brass band from the turn of the twentieth century. While he
played with the Eureka band, the band was so popular it was offered more performances
than they could play. A second band with whom Dejan played at the time took some of
the leftover jobs, and he referred to the latter as Number Two Eureka:
I was using the name the Number Two Eureka at that time. I was
playing with that band when Barry Martyn came from London. He
said “Now, I’d like to change that brass band name.” I said, “I
always said I’m gonna call my band Dejan’s Olympia Brass Band,
’cause the first Olympia Brass Band was organized in 1883 and
when I was a kid I played in the Olympia Serenaders.”84
Dejan’s Olympia Brass Band wore uniforms like the bands at the end of the
nineteenth century. The name of the band was labeled on the front of the bands’ hats and
on the head of the bass drum. At the beginning of the twentieth century, brass bands
played for funerals and found any reason to march in a parade, most often on Sundays as
a memory to Congo Square celebrations.85 Dejan’s Olympia Brass Band made it a
priority to play at funerals and march in as many parades as possible.86
The Olympia band exposed the culture of New Orleans music and brass bands to
people around the globe. As stated by LeBlanc of the Soul Rebels, Olympia band was
83 Ibid.
84 Burns. The Great Olympia Band, 35.
85 Burns. Keeping the Beat on the Street, 161.
86 Burns. The Great Olympia Band, 36.
29
the first to play at major events overseas, and performed at the Super Bowl. They were
featured in a movie, and played for the King and Queen of England.87 Major European
music festivals featured the band at their events, including “The David Frost Show” in
London and the Volks Festival in Berlin.88
Milton Batiste joined Dejan’s Olympia Brass Band as lead trumpet player in
1963. He was well respected in New Orleans and also played in rhythm and blues bands.
“Milton Batiste created and coached three different versions of the Junior Olympia band
during the 1980s, based largely on the Tambourine and Fan Club (a neighborhood youth
sports and social club).”89
When Dejan’s band could not play for minor events, such as a parade or funeral,
they gave the job to the Young Olympians, one of the Junior Olympia bands. Dejan
states, “They’re not playing that garbage like other bands are playing, just copying after
these rock and roll players. They’re trying to play the traditional music, to keep the good
New Orleans tradition going.”90 Four members of the Young Olympians Brass Band
would later come together to form the Soul Rebels Brass Band.
Danny Barker is another musician in New Orleans recognized for perpetuating
brass band traditions. Barker was the guitarist with Jelly Roll Morton, a musician who
also made efforts to educate youth about brass band traditions. Barker created a brass
band composed of young teenagers who wanted to learn and made his headquarters at
Fairview Baptist Church.91
87 Lemar LeBlanc, phone interview by author, Coralville, IA., 26 March 2010.
88 Burns, The Great Olympia Band, 6.
89 Ibid.
90 Ibid., 37.
91 Burns. Keeping the Beat on the Street. 15.
30
Barker taught young musicians the traditions and heritage of second lining, and
his pupils became known as the Fairview Baptist Church Brass Band. The band played
for funerals and parades.92 In the 1973, the band was featured in an article in Jive
magazine discussing the impact of the band members on the community and on music.93
Jazz musicians in the 1980s were once again inspired, as they had been by the turn-ofthe-century brass bands. Dr. Michael White and Wynton Marsalis were two examples of
the new breed to emerge from the Fairview Baptist Church Band.94 Fairview Baptist
Church spawned other bands as well, including the Hurricane Brass Band, Younger
Fairview Brass Band, and the Dirty Dozen Brass Band.
Contemporary bands like the Dirty Dozen have inspired many other brass bands
by continuing to incorporate popular music genres of the day. The Dirty Dozen started in
1977 and updated New Orleans brass band music with aspects of R&B and soul, while
incorporating jazz classics of John Coltrane, Freddie Hubbard, and the Jazz Messengers.
They played the traditional repertoire, but often with faster tempi and more intricate
rhythms.
The Rebirth Brass Band followed the Dirty Dozen’s lead as a contemporary group
to re-work the repertoire. Rebirth credits the Dirty Dozen as being an influential band
who inspired them to explore other popular music genres in the 1980s. Rebirth combined
elements of hip-hop with their music and added rap. The fusion of those styles and
rhythms with brass band music spawned other New Orleans brass bands in the 1990s,
including the Soul Rebels, to be discussed in more detail in Chapter Three.
92 Ibid., 15.
93 Ibid., 18.
94 Turner, 115.
31
CHAPTER III
POPULAR MUSIC MOLDS THE REPERTOIRE
Brass bands survived and flourished by incorporating popular music.
Contemporary brass bands are no exception to this tradition. This chapter discusses the
specific pieces that have been part of the brass band repertoire since the turn of the
twentieth century. It will focus on how the band members adapted popular music into
their own style to fit the band’s instrumentation, technique, and aesthetic. In addition, the
continuation of popular music’s influence on the repertoire will be discussed in
relationship to specific bands.
Early brass bands built their repertoire both from the music played at funeral
processions and that of immediate appeal.95 Often bands were hired to play for public
events where the audiences may not have been familiar with hymns and spirituals. To
make the audiences comfortable, the brass bands performed familiar pieces, such as
marches that were also played by military and town bands at the time. Popular dance
music — such as the foxtrot, cakewalk, two-step, and eventually ragtime, a jazz precursor
— were also incorporated into brass band literature. This practice of developing
repertoire became part of the present day tradition that attracts an audience through wellknown melodies. Adding syncopation through the second line beat and improvisational
techniques into unique arrangements allowed brass bands to unite popular music (nonwestern classical music) with the spiritual roots of their heritage.
As jazz became increasingly popular during the 1920s and ‘30s, these new
arrangements were appropriated into the standard repertoire. Songs by well-known jazz
artists like Louis Armstrong, Sidney Bechet, and Kid Ory could be heard in the sound of
New Orleans street parades.
95 Schafer, 68.
32
Beginning in 1948 and lasting through the 1950s, R&B became the next popular
music genre to be appropriated. Olympia Brass Band was the first to incorporate R&B
into its music. Eventually Dirty Dozen and Rebirth revived the traditional repertoire with
the adaptation of new rhythms and electronic instruments from popular music in the
1970s and ‘80s. Other styles to soon follow were funk and hip-hop, which were
eventually adapted by contemporary bands. The Olympia and Dirty Dozen were primary
inspirations who continually updated the genre by incorporating popular music. This
affected the overall feel of the music through the rhythms in the percussion and
harmonies in the horns.
Popular Music Genres
As stated, one of the first genres brass bands incorporated into their music was the
march. With several union bands stationed in and around New Orleans, the march
became a well-known form.96 The New Grove Dictionary of Music describes a march as
“music with strong repetitive rhythms and an uncomplicated style usually used to
accompany military movements and processions.”97 Because of the popularity of the
military and processions in New Orleans, the style of the march worked well with the
activities of the brass band. The march’s repetitive rhythms, steady tempo, and standard
meter are much like the brass band style of playing, with the rhythms in the percussion
and melodies in the horns. With the additions of syncopation and improvisation from
Congo Square and the Caribbeans, brass band music was transformed into a dance driven
by the drums and ostinato bass line of the tuba.
The brass bands of New Orleans are like a mobile jukebox. This is because
originally they were hired to perform a wide repertoire for their audience. Arrangements
96 Karl Koenig, “Louisiana Brass Bands and History in Relation to Jazz History,” New Orleans
Jazz Club: The Second Line, (Summer 1983), 10.
97 New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, 2nd ed., vol. 15, March “Tyrrell, John.”
33
of familiar tunes became a popular outlet because it was a way that the bands engaged the
crowd’s participation before the band performed original compositions.
Maryland, My Maryland
Elements of the march can be heard in the brass band arrangement of Maryland,
My Maryland. The band took the Maryland state song and made it into a march with
rhythms that are heard in the drums with a light syncopation.
In 1861, as the Civil War began, James Ryder Randall, caught up in pride of his
home state, wrote a nine-stanza poem titled Maryland, My Maryland. In 1939 the song
was set to the tune of the popular German folk song O Tannenbaum, or as Americans
sing it, O Christmas Tree, and was adapted as the state song. Figure 10 is a facsimile
copy of the original composition. The compositional structure is ABA form with a fourbar introduction and scored for voice and piano.
The Eureka Brass Band featured an arrangement of Maryland’s state song on
volume two of The Music of New Orleans.98 The band’s arrangement was transposed
down a whole step, from its original key of G major to F major. The meter was changed
from 3/4 to cut time, resulting in the sound of a march, with syncopated upbeats in the
cymbal, and the bass drum “Big 4,” and swung eighth notes in the melody. The
instrumentation was changed from voice and piano to alto saxophone, tenor saxophone,
two trumpets, trombone, tuba, snare drum, bass drum and cymbal.
98 The Music of New Orleans, Vol. 1.
34
Figure 10 Maryland, My Maryland
Traditionally, New Orleans brass band arrangements and original compositions
most often begin with the tuba or drums. The Eureka Brass Band followed this style of
arrangement in Maryland, My Maryland and began their arrangement with the drums.
The lead trumpet joins the drums in the third bar of the four-bar introduction as seen in
Figure 11. The Eureka Brass Band arranged the song into a two-part song with a four-bar
introduction and an interlude, which is played at the beginning of the second part, and
every time the second part is repeated. The first melody will be referred to as the A
Section and the O Tannenbaum melody will be referred to as the B Section. An Interlude
is performed before each return of the B Section.
35
Figure 11 Maryland, My Maryland, four-bar introduction
The interlude melody is also played during the second section, the A part of the O
Tannenbaum melody, but not the B section of the original. The interlude played by the
lead trumpet includes the following melody from Figure 12 while the rhythms of the
marching percussion continue through to the B section. The trumpet interlude was likely
inspired by a military bugle call because of its rhythm and the sound. An example is
provided in Figure 13. It sounds as though it could be the Assembly or Adjutants’ bugle
call of the U.S. Army because of the similar dotted-eighth rhythms found in both.
Another plausible reason for the bugle call is Irving Berlin’s popular Alexander’s
Ragtime Band, which incorporates the bugle call from Swanee River.99 Alexander’s
Ragtime Band became yet another popular source upon which the brass bands could
draw.
99 David A. Jasen, Alexander’s Ragtime Band, and Other Favorite Song Hits, 1901-1911. (New
York: Dover Publications, Inc. 1987), Introduction.
36
Figure 12 Maryland, My Maryland, interlude
Figure 13 U.S. Army, Assembly Call.100
Figure 14 Maryland, My Maryland, O Tannenbaum melody
The O Tannenbaum melody in Figure 14 is from the Maryland state song
arrangement that constitutes the B Section of the Eureka Brass Band’s rendition. The
saxophones, 2nd trumpet, and trombone play this melody while the lead trumpet plays the
interlude. The percussion and tuba parts kept a simplified version of the second line beat
as the foundation. The percussion rhythm was in a march style playing on the beat, with
the incorporated “and” of two in the second bar of the two bar phrase known as the “Big
4.”
100 United States Army Band, http://bands.army.mil/music/bugle/, (Accessed October 2, 2011).
37
Figure 15 Maryland, My Maryland
The percussion instruments maintain a driving beat as rhythmic accompaniment.
The snare drum plays a march-like rhythm while the bass drum plays quarter notes on the
beats of one and three; this measure alternates with the second measure, when the bass
drum plays on one, two, three, and four of the A section. The tuba plays on the same
beats as the bass drum in order to emphasize the strong beats of this ostinato rhythm. The
marching bass drum seen in brass bands has a cymbal attached to the top of the
instrument, allowing one performer to play both instruments simultaneously. As a result,
one player is manipulating the syncopated rhythm of the cymbal against the bass drum
throughout the arrangement.
Figure 16 Bass drum second line rhythm
In New Orleans, brass bands’ rhythm was more about being familiar with what
the other musicians were playing rather than everything being as precise as possible.
Lemar LeBlanc, the snare drummer of the Soul Rebels Brass Band, said in an interview
38
that the way percussionists have always played in a brass band in New Orleans is that the
player had to feel the rhythm, and its roots date back to Congo Square.101 The feeling to
which Leblanc is referring is the syncopation that occurs on the “and” of two in bar two,
which can be seen in measure two of Figure 16. During the B section, the bass drum only
plays on beats one and three. The tuba plays on beats one, three, and four. The
syncopation is created by the cymbal as the tuba emphasizes the bass drum’s down beat
and allows the music to be heard as if it were moving forward to the next measure, thus
giving the piece the feeling of a dance.
Cakewalks to Ragtime
Cakewalks were a popular genre in the 1890s dating back to the 1840s when
black slaves performed plantation dances to imitate their owners.102 Koenig describes the
cakewalk, and its rhythm of sixteenth-eighth-sixteenth, as a main motif and claims that
ragtime had similar rhythms. Because of the similarity in rhythms between the cakewalk
and ragtime, they are commonly mistaken for one another.103 The most commonly
mistaken cakewalk is the Mississippi Rag by William H. Krell, published in 1897.104
Ragtime was created by African Americans and was most popular in the first
decade of the twentieth century. Because of the ragged, syncopated rhythms the style was
given the name “ragtime” and primarily was written for piano. It was written in the strict
form of a march, but with folk song material and rhythmic flexibility.105 Koenig describes
how the ragtime was constructed:
101 Leblanc interview.
102 The Harvard Dictionary of Music, 9th ed. Cakewalk “Kernfield, Barry.”
103 Karl Koenig, Jazz in Print (1856-1929): An Anthology of Selected Early Readings in Jazz,
(Hilsdale, NY; Pendragon Press, 2002), 67.
104 David A. Jasen. Cakewalks, Two-Steps and Trots for Solo Piano: 34 Popular Works from the
Dance-Craze Era. (Mineola, New York, Dover Publications, Inc., 1997), iii.
105 Koenig, 67.
39
Whether deliberate or not, the composition of ragtime took the
form of the popular music of the era, the military march. The
musical form of the cakewalk, ragtime and the march are basically
the same. The march was a composition style that used various
melodic themes in two or more sections, including a trio with
transitions to proceed from one section to the other. Of course, the
main difference was in the rhythm. Both utilized steady rhythm,
but ragtime included syncopation.106
Syncopation is characteristic of both styles, with the cakewalk being lightly syncopated
as compared to the rag, which had more prominent syncopation. Because of that
similarity, the rag is a more accessible rhythm for dancing and reproduction by the
majority of the population, and works well with the style of the brass bands.
Panama
Panama, or Panama Rag, is commonly mistaken as a ragtime piece. It is a twostep, which is a sub-genre of the rag that is lightly syncopated, similar to a cakewalk, but
not to the degree of a rag. The two-step was most popular at the beginning of the
twentieth century and lasted through World War I. Panama and other two-steps were
printed most frequently from 1900-1910.107
William H. Tyers is the composer of Panama. Tyers was born in Petersburg,
Virginia in 1870; his parents were former slaves in the state.108 He was a prominent black
composer and performer in the late nineteenth century who experienced immediate
success arranging for musicals in New York City after 1898.109 Panama, arranged by
Louis Dumaine, is a frequently performed piece of the New Orleans brass band
repertoire. Harold Dejan said, “He’s (Dumaine) the one that arranged all the hit numbers
106 Ibid.
107 David A. Jasen. Cakewalks, Two-Steps and Trots for Solo Piano: 34 Popular Works from the
Dance-Craze Era. (Dover Publications, INC. Mineola, New York, 1997), iii.
108 http://ragpiano.com/comps/wtyers.shtml (Accessed October 3, 2011).
109 http://lcweb2.loc.gov/diglib (Accessed August 10, 2011).
40
like Panama.”110 His brass band arrangement has been recorded by Eureka, Olympia, and
Onward brass bands and often performed by jazz artists such as Kid Ory.
Tyers’ original composition is in 2/4 time, therefore the brass bands did not
change the original meter. The original follows the military march form as discussed by
Koenig, written into sixteen-bar phrases, with each phrase being a strain. There are three
different strains of sixteen-bar phrases and a trio section in the middle before the last two
strains end the piece as a recapitulation of the beginning theme.
The brass bands use the same phrasing and form as both the original and
Dumaine’s interpretation. A slight modification is found within the trio section, which is
replaced as a repeated solo section. The main themes in each strain are variations of the
original melody, with the tuba and bass drum playing a march-like rhythm as an
accompaniment. The marching rhythms were popular and easily recognized because the
repertoire was performed in parades throughout New Orleans. The first measure of the
first strain in the original piano composition has the melody starting on the second
sixteenth of the first beat, as seen in Figure 17.
Figure 17 Panama, original piano melody
The brass band arrangement shifts the first sixteenth note to begin on beat two of
the first measure, with the eighth notes being swung, as seen in Figure 17. When the
melody line is shifted to the upbeat, it becomes more accessible to brass band
instrumentation. This version is simpler to play with swung eighths notes, fitting the tuba
110 Burns, Great Olympia Band, 35.
41
and percussion parts within the brass band. (The adaptation of music to fit a New
Orleans brass band will be discussed later in relation to interviews with Lemar LeBlanc.)
Figure 18 Panama, Eureka Brass Band introduction
The shifting of the rhythm allows the bass and percussion rhythm parts to play
solos before the other instruments enter. The bass and percussion play on the pickup to
the downbeat of the first strain. The tuba plays from beat four of measure two into beat
one of measure three, which becomes a standard rhythm with the bass drum, as seen in
both Figures 18 and 19. The emphasis is placed on the fourth beat of measure two or the
upbeat of two in cut time. The bass drum (the top line) mimics the tuba rhythm while the
cymbal syncopates the weak beats. The cymbal plays on the weak beats, beats two and
four, as seen in Figure 19.
42
Figure 19 Bass drum and cymbal rhythm to Panama.
Jazz to Rhythm and Blues (R&B)
World-renowned jazz artists from New Orleans fused brass band styles with
ragtime into their music. These musicians built on an African heritage that would mutate
from ragtime to jazz, and eventually, R&B. “Long before anyone coined the word ‘jazz,’
New Orleanians were accustomed to hearing the sound of these brass instruments
marching through their neighborhoods.”111 Some of the first jazz musicians remembered
the profound effect that brass bands had on their lives and musical output. Popular brass
bands such as Eureka and Tuxedo employed jazz musicians like Louis Armstrong,
Sidney Bechet, Buddy Bolden, and Jelly Roll Morton.112
The development of brass bands and jazz blended the Uptown and Downtown
neighborhoods of New Orleans through parades and second line activities. Uptown was
generally a poorer, black, Protestant population while most Downtown musicians came
from the middle class and were educated through private music instruction. Many of the
Downtown jazzmen were Creoles “of color,” children of African mothers and French or
Spanish colonist fathers.113 The Downtown people did not think highly of the “rough
111 Lichtenstein and Dankner. 21.
112 Turner, 113.
113 Jason Berry, Jonathan Foose, and Tad Jones, Up from the Cradle of Jazz: New Orleans
Music Since World War II, (Athens, GA: The University of Georgia Press, 1986), 9.
43
Uptown jazz,” but were forced into collaboration by later segregation laws (i.e. Plessy v.
Ferguson) in order to make a living performing music.114 Uptown musicians like Buddy
Bolden interacted with Downtown musicians like Sidney Bechet to create a distinct style
in the brass bands leading to the beginnings of jazz.
Buddy Bolden came from a family of musicians with roots in the church and is
reported to be the first jazz musician. His participation in brass bands was limited when
compared to artists such as Sidney Bechet, Jelly Roll Morton, and Louis Armstrong.
Anthony Holmes Brass Band hired the young Bolden to play parades, which became his
stepping-stone into the future career of an artist. Sidney Bechet remembered the second
line parades going through his neighborhood. People made any excuse to have a parade
and often dropped what they were doing to come outside, enjoy the music, and participate
in the second line.115 Bechet believed the experiences of participating in the second lines
and performing with brass bands helped his career as a jazz musician.
Louis Armstrong was inspired by brass band performances and remembered
participating in second line activities as a young boy. Later, he played as a member of
brass bands at funerals and parades and participated in Mardi Gras Indian rituals and
celebrations. Jelly Roll Morton, in his interviews with Alan Lomax, describes the
influence of second line traditions in his music and hints at his own participation as a
“spy-boy” for one of the Mardi Grad Indian tribes.116 These artists went on to have
careers outside of New Orleans and gave credit to the brass bands, noting the bands’
impact on their careers and music.
The repertoire created by jazz artists in the 1920s and 30s was immediately
embraced by brass bands and remains part of their repertoire, today, in the twenty-first
114 Ibid.
115 Sidney Bechet, Treat It Gentle, (New York, NY: Twayne Publishers Inc., 1960), 61.
116 Alan Lomax, Mister Jelly Roll, (New York, NY; Duell, Sloan and Pearce, 1950), 15.
44
century. Some of the most performed and recorded jazz pieces are Basin Street, Muskrat
Ramble, Monday’s Date and What a Wonderful World. Just as brass bands performed
jazz repertoire, so did the jazz artists in turn perform the repertoire of the brass bands.
Some of the common repertoire that is heard in jazz is from the brass band, including the
hymns and spirituals from the funeral processions and ragtime favorites such as Panama
Rag, Tiger Rag and the Maple Leaf Rag.
Bebop and R&B were introduced in the 1940s and ‘50s. In the early 1940s jazz
musicians like Dizzy Gillespie, Thelonious Monk, Charlie Parker, and Miles Davis were
credited with creating bebop. Bebop musicians wanted to create music that was not part
of the New Orleans jazz revival, which they saw as “Jim Crow” entertainment with
segregation values117 or the standard jazz of the thirties designed for dances like the
foxtrot. Their explorations into form, rhythm, and harmony affected both the repertoire
and the instrumentation of brass bands. The influence of bebop led some brass bands to
replace the snare and bass drums with a drum set, and to incorporate a bebop style on the
ride cymbal that provided more freedom in the accompaniment for improvisation. The
Dirty Dozen was one of the first bands to integrate the drum set and bebop style with
intricate melodic and improvisational material in the horns into the repertoire of brass
bands.
R&B was introduced in 1949 through what was known as “race records” by the
US Billboard Magazine and is a combination of African-American styles such as blues,
jazz, and gospel.118 “Jazz records in the R&B catalogs tended to be those especially
aimed at African-American dancers and party-goers, and placing a stress on overt swing
and blues feeling.”119 With its foundation of rhythm and style, R&B became a popular
117 Jack V. Buerkle and Danny Barker, Bourbon Street Black, (New York, NY: Oxford
University Press, 1973), 199.
118 New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, 2nd ed., vol. 12, Jazz “Tucker, Mark.”
119 Ibid.
45
genre that brass bands added to their existing repertoire. As a result, R&B changed the
role of the sousaphone from playing basic chord-structured bass lines on the beat to
syncopated, “riffing bass lines” (or ostinati) with the wind instruments. This sousaphone
riffing is the antecedent to electric bass styles in R&B and funk bands.120
Before R&B was added, drumming was march-like, with syncopated upbeats, but
after the influence of R&B, the rhythms became more syncopated.121 Percussion rhythms
were affected by R&B variations of Latin and shuffle rhythms that had impacted
contemporary brass bands. Commonly the drumming style of R&B is referred to as
“shuffle” and also “shuffle-beat.” The shuffle-beat of R&B made the beat a little more
relaxed while still emphasizing the upbeat of four or “Big 4.” Fats Domino’s I’m Walking
is an example of an R&B shuffle that is a popular piece performed by many brass bands.
R&B rhythms “enabled drummers [in brass bands] to produce a backbeat embedded in
grace notes, larded with flams, drags, and rolls.”122
Mardi Gras Indians, another parade tradition in New Orleans, was brought to
popular attention by the Neville Brothers when they recorded repertoire such as Indian
and Red, Big Chief. Hey Pocky Way, recorded by The Meters, included Mardi Gras
Indians performing on percussion instruments.123
R&B influence was credited to a musician in the Olympia Brass Band by the
name of Milton Batiste Jr., who also played with R&B groups in New Orleans. Mick
Burns believes that for the local musicians who were born in the 1930s, R&B was the
“natural idiom” for them to play because it was the popular genre during their teenage
120 Antoon Aukes, 100 Years of New Orleans Second Line Drumming, (Oskaloosa, IA: C.L.
Barnhouse Company, 2003), 84.
121 Burns. Great Olympia Band, 61-65.
122 Ibid., 41.
123 Ibid., 54.
46
years.124 “Milton embodied the most important aspect of New Orleans musical tradition,
the tradition of evolutionary change.”125 New Orleans brass bands “have never been
interested in copying older styles,” and as a result the addition of R&B to the brass
bands’ sound and repertoire was a natural progression.126
Second Line was the first New Orleans brass band piece to add R&B and was
arranged by Batiste. The book The Great Olympia Band, compiled by Burns, includes an
interview with Batiste where he describes how he arranged Second Line.
There were school dances at this place called the Longshoremen’s
Hall and Dave Bartholomew had a band; Dave used to do a thing
where he played with a horn Badabaaaa Ba Badabaaa Ba and
they’d go Babadobado Babadobado, you know, into the blues. I
heard a clarinet player in the street playing the Whooping Blues or
Picou’s Blues, or what you know as Joe Avery’s Piece. So I put the
two together and now we record something that hasn’t been
recorded, a mixture of rhythm and blues and jazz.127
Harold Dejan’s Olympia Brass Band in the 1950s and ’60s played arrangements
of R&B songs and was the first band to add these elements to the brass band repertoire.128
Ray Charles and Little Richard were a few of the artists Dejan’s Olympia Brass Band
included in its repertoire.129 Olympia’s style changed along with its repertoire and
reflected the evolution of popular music, which at that time was rhythm and blues.130
“This, in turn, gave them enormous popularity and credibility with their home crowd and
provided the inspiration for a whole new generation of brass band playing, which
124 Ibid.
125 Ibid., pg. 15.
126 Ibid.
127 Burns. The Great Olympia Band, 108.
128 LeBlanc interview.
129 LeBlanc interview.
130 Burns. Great Olympia Band, 15.
47
included the Rebirth, the Dirty Dozen, and all of the young bands you hear on the streets
of New Orleans today.”131
Dirty Dozen Brass Band
The Dirty Dozen Brass Band grew out of Danny Barker’s Fairview Baptist
Church project that started in 1972.132 Barker’s mission was to teach young musicians
about the traditions and repertoire of the brass bands in New Orleans. The musicians
were in a large band that was referred to as the Fairview Baptist Church Brass Band,
where the members learned about the second line traditions and African heritage of the
New Orleans brass band. The band’s repertoire is comprised of jazz standards, popular
music from the 1970s, and updated traditional brass band repertoire. The following
section will describe the genesis of the new direction that was created by the Dirty Dozen
Brass Band.
Following an initial participation with the Fairview Baptist Church, the original
members of the Dirty Dozen played in brass bands such as the Olympia and Tornado.
Each musician brought a distinct musical background to the band. For example,
trombonist and original member Charles Joseph studied with avant-garde reedman Kidd
Jordan, while Roger Lewis, the baritone-saxophone player, performed in Fats Domino’s
band.133 When the Dirty Dozen played in parades and second lines, they incorporated
songs like Thelonious Monk’s Blue Monk, Jimmy Forrest’s Night Train, Lee Morgan’s
The Sidewinder, and the television theme song from The Flintstones.134 While the
younger crowd was in favor of the new songs the band performed, this new repertoire
131 Ibid.
132 Burns. Keeping the Beat on the Street, 16.
133 Scott Jordan, “Second-Line Evolution: after 25 years, the Dirty Dozen Brass Band makes its
own New Orleans traditions,” Down Beat, September 2002, 32.
134 Ibid.
48
caused some controversy with purists because it was not the traditional music played
during second line parades.
Originally, the Dirty Dozen had planned to learn more about the traditional New
Orleans repertoire because it was their interest and what Barker had taught them. Gigs
were lacking in the late 1970s and early 1980s and performing traditional repertoire
provided more opportunities for work.135 The band’s interest in other popular music led
to incorporating these new styles into their existing traditional repertoire. Gregory Davis,
a trumpet player in the Dirty Dozen who interviewed with Jordan Scott, states that the
members “started bringing in Charlie Parker and Miles Davis tunes, or James Brown and
Marvin Gaye, trying to figure out a way to do something with it.” Bebop was not
considered by previous brass bands, but the jazz musicians of Dirty Dozen were inspired
by their artistry and improvisational skills. Once the Dirty Dozen figured out how to
blend the styles of the popular music, jazz, and R&B, they found repertoire to play and
were eager to present it to people in parades. Popular music from R&B artists such as
Brown and Gaye influenced the bass line and horn melodies through rhythm and style.
Traditionalists felt the new songs were not part of the culture and the authentic
sound of the brass bands of New Orleans. Matt Sakakeeny discussed the contrasting
notions of traditionalist and non-traditionalist in his dissertation, Politics of Power: New
Orleans Brass Bands and the Politics of Performance. Sakakeeny says, “Though the
members of the Dirty Dozen were schooled in traditional brass band music, they came to
represent a musical, aesthetic, contextual, and ideological break with tradition.”136
Regardless of the controversy, the Dirty Dozen merely continued with what brass bands
had done since 1880. Mick Burns agrees with the continuation of the tradition in his
135 Ibid.
136 Matt Sakakeeny, “Instruments of Power: New Orleans Brass Bands and the Politics of
Power” (PhD diss., Columbia University, 2008), 194.
49
book, Keeping the Beat on the Street; the New Orleans Brass Band Renaissance. He
discusses the Dirty Dozen and states that the “brass bands in New Orleans have always
adapted the music that was popular in their time, in a sense, they (the Dirty Dozen) were
part of that same tradition.”137 The Dirty Dozen’s evolved brass band sound was wellreceived, and they were signed to Columbia Records, a major recording label, in 1987.
My Feet Can’t Fail Me Now
Before signing with Columbia Records the Dirty Dozen first released My Feet
Can’t Fail Me Now for Concord Jazz. The album not only featured original compositions,
but also included arrangements of jazz standards such as Bongo Beep by Charlie Parker
and Thelonius Monk’s Blue Monk. Additionally, the album included brass band
standards like, Li’l Liza Jane and St. James Infirmary. Li’l Liza Jane was composed in
1916 by Countess Ada de Lachau and was a song from the three-act comedy Come Out of
the Kitchen. The Dirty Dozen played the song faster and more energetically with an upto-date bass line played on the tuba. R&B and funk influenced the percussion rhythms
mixed with the second line rhythms. In the last section of the song, the Dirty Dozen’s
version of Li’l Liza Jane incorporates The Isley Brothers’ 1959 classic Shout, a song that
was popular throughout the 1960s and ‘70s and was covered by many bands. The call and
response melody can be heard in the coda where the lyrics “a little bit softer now” are
sung as the band diminuendos before rising again to “a little bit louder now” in a raucous
fortissimo.
The last track, My Feet Can’t Fail Me Now, displayed a more energetic and faster
tempo than typically heard among traditional brass. The sousaphone and baritonesaxophone were also added on this initial presentation of the melody. The trombone
joins the ensemble on the repeat of the melody, while the sousaphone plays constantly,
ornamenting the rests that are in the baritone saxophone and trombone’s lines. The main
137 Burns, Keeping the Beat on the Street, 64.
50
lyric in Figure 20, “my feet can’t fail me now,” is a combination of R&B and funk
influences. The rhythm of the phrase is from I Don’t Believe You Wanna Get Up,
released in1977 by the R&B group, The Gap Band.138 The lyric comes from the 1978
Funkadelic song, One Nation Under a Groove.139
My Feet Can't Fail Me Now
Trombone
trans. John Griffin
26
9
Figure
q = 132 20 Rhythm of lyric to My Feet Can’t Fail Me
1:13Now
? bb 44
∑
My Feet Can’t Fail Me Now presents a coda that quotes a popular Sonny Rollins
.
bœ
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Ó
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.
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œbœ21.œ The melody
œbœis played
œ
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jazz
by the
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b St. Thomas,
37
2:46
trumpets and saxophones
while the sousaphone and percussion play second line rhythms
f
4
42
mixed
with
. R&Bb œand funk. influences.
bœ
? bb œJ ‰ Œ ‰
50
? bb
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œ œ™ œÓ
f
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B bb ‰ œ ˙™
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56
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Figure 21 My Feet Can’t Fail Me Now, St. Thomas melody.
138 Jacobsen, interview.
139 Sakakeeny, pg.183.
œ ˙™
‰J
œ
J
˙™
51
In 2009 the band released a 25th anniversary copy of the album, My Feet Can’t
Fail Me Now, having recorded a total of twelve albums. Their 2006 album, What’s Going
On, featured rappers Chuck Dee and Guru. Chuck Dee was the lead rapper of Public
Enemy, a hip-hop group from the 1990s. Guru, a rapper from Gang Star, combined rap
with jazz.140 The success of Dirty Dozen’s recordings and performances during the past
thirty years has given a face-lift to the New Orleans brass band repertoire. Having toured
frequently in the U.S. and over 30 countries, the Dirty Dozen have left their mark. They
have opened for artists such as David Bowie, Dr. John, and the Black Crowes,141and have
spread the sound of the New Orleans repertoire across the U.S. and the world. Their work
has promoted the creation of brass bands such as the Rebirth Brass Band and Mama
Digdown’s Brass Band, a group located in Madison, Wisconsin.
Rebirth Brass Band
The Dirty Dozen’s revolutionized sound inspired a group that would also be
influential in the propagation of the New Orleans traditional repertoire, Rebirth.
Borrowing Dirty Dozen’s technique of mixing traditional New Orleans brass with
popular musical trends, Rebirth has been producing cutting edge music since the early
1980s. This section will discuss the popular music motives utilized in their original
composition, Do Whacha Wanna (1984).
In 1983, brothers Phillip and Keith Frazier, along with their friend Kermit
Ruffins, formed Rebirth Brass Band. They attended Joseph S. Clark High School where
they participated in the marching band together and were able to convince friends to join
their group. Initially, Phillip Frazier was tasked with forming a band for a Mardi Gras
parade. Since then, with the exception of a few personnel changes, the band has remained
140 New York Times, www.nytimes.com, (Accessed July 15, 2011).
141 Dirty Dozen Brass Band webpage, www.dirtydozenbrass.com, (Accessed July 22, 2010).
52
together (Ruffins left the group in 1992).142 Like the Dirty Dozen, Rebirth continues
mixing popular music into their brass band sound, playing in second line parades and
funerals, and touring the world.
In the beginning, Rebirth listened to the recordings of the Preservation Hall Jazz
Band and the Olympia Brass Band, inspiring them to learn the jazz style and traditions of
a brass band.143 The most influential band was the Dirty Dozen. Philip Frazier stated the
first time he heard the Dirty Dozen was when his father drove him to the Glasshouse, a
club where they had a weekly Monday night performance. Frazier said he could hear
them through the door and it piqued his interest to become a brass band musician.144 In
addition to popular brass bands and jazz records, Rebirth also was interested in R&B,
funk, and eventually hip-hop. Specifically, the music of Michael Jackson and Stevie
Wonder influenced Rebirth’s sound through the rhythms in the percussion and horns.145
Philip Frazier explained in an interview that Rebirth’s music is supposed to make
one want to dance. Frazier stated, “when people want to go out and dance, they don’t care
about chord changes.”146 Music with simple chord changes allows the sousaphone to play
a repetitive “set-line,” which makes the music more danceable. Frazier believes that
people want to hear a “hook.” A hook is the melody that the audience will remember and
want to hear again. “With a good hook, they always recognize that song, and it makes
them feel like dancing.”147 A “hook” has a rhythmic element, which promotes the dance
142 Burns, pg. 115.
143 Burns, pg. 116.
144 Ibid.
145 Philip Frazier, phone interview by author, 15 March 2010.
146 Ibid.
147 Ibid.
53
quality of the music. For that reason, R&B, funk, and hip-hop naturally progress into the
brass band music.
Rebirth’s first album, Here to Stay (1984), was recorded at The Grease Lounge in
New Orleans. This album showcased the band’s traditional repertoire, like Lord, Lord,
Lord, alongside jazz pieces such as Sweet Georgia Brown and Blue Monk. The original
works on the album use dance rhythms, noted by Frazier, in the percussion parts and
syncopated melodic bass line of the sousaphone. These elements are also heard on
Chameleon, a Rebirth hit and now part of the new traditional music of New Orleans brass
bands. Rebirth’s second album, Feel Like Funkin’ it Up (1989), documents the band’s
maturity and creativity by incorporating hip-hop along with jazz and R&B. Feel Like
Funkin’ it Up features three traditional brass band songs, Big Fat Woman and I’m
Walking by Antoine “Fats” Domino and Big Chief played during Mardi Gras by Earl
King. Rebirth was the first brass band to incorporate the style of Michael Jackson into
their music. Shake Your Body (Down to the Floor) is an arrangement of Michael
Jackson’s song from 1978, now a staple in the brass band repertoire. Three original
compositions are featured: Do Whatcha Wanna, Feel Like Funkin’ it Up, and Leave That
Pipe Alone.
Do Whatcha Wanna
Do Whatcha Wanna, one of the most popular Rebirth pieces composed by Kermit
Ruffins, was rated number one on the charts for fifteen weeks straight on a New Orleans
R&B radio station.148 Recording a popular original work more than once is a common
occurrence among the New Orleans brass bands. Works that have been recorded twice
by Rebirth include Herbie Hankock’s 1973 hit Chameleon and original Feel Like Funkin’
It Up. Rebirth features their original work, Do Whatcha Wanna, on two different
recordings. The first work is from the album Feel Like Funkin’ It Up (1989) and was
148 Sakakeeny, 190-193.
54
recorded again on the album, Ultimate (2004). Both are based off of the track Ffun that is
featured on the R&B group’s self-titled album Con Funk Shun (1977).149 From that
album there is another track with the name of Dowhachawannado. When listening to the
lyrics sung phonetically, they sound like, “do what ya want ta do,” repeated sporadically
throughout the track. When Rebirth incorporated this lyric they sang “do what ya wanna”
in a syncopated rhythm.
The main thematic materials that construct the work are presented on both
recordings. On the Ultimate album, there is an added introduction that begins with the
bass line, shown in Figure 22, and is the most noticeable difference besides the extended
solo section. The bass melody stays the same throughout the piece with some variation to
the notes while keeping the same rhythm.
The percussion parts are improvised and are similar in both recordings. They are
performed on the snare and bass drum, cymbal, vibra-slap, and various auxiliary
percussion like the cow bell and wood blocks. The rhythms played on the percussion
instruments, seen in Figure 23, display second line rhythms that can be heard at a Mardi
Gras Indian parade. Percussion instruments are important in the parades because the
Mardi Gras Indians use them to improvise rhythms while the second line participants join
in the celebrations. In Do Whatcha Wanna the syncopated rhythm is sung during the
percussion interludes between the repeat of the first horn melody and the tenor saxophone
solo.
Following the introduction, the first melody is played. The trumpets and
trombones play off of each other creating a call and response pattern. The trumpets start
the melody and are answered by the same melody and rhythm from the trombones
(Figure 25). The middle section features a solo that is improvised on the tenor saxophone
and mixed with counter melodies on the trumpets and trombones. The solo section is
149 Jacobsen interview.
55
followed by the Ffun melody (Figure 24) played repeatedly to the end of the piece as the
tenor saxophone continues to improvise. Rebirth plays the Ffun melody in a slightly
slower tempo and swung rhythm that gives it a more laid back feel.
Figure 22 Sousaphone bass line, Do Whatcha Wa
Figure 23 Percussion and vocal part, Do Whatcha Wanna
56
Figure 24 Ffun melody
Their recent album, Rebirth of New Orleans reached number one on the CMJ jazz
charts for 2011 and won a Grammy award for the Best Regional Roots Music Album on
February 12, 2012.150
150 Rebirth Brass Band, www.rebirthbrassband.com, (Accessed November 2, 2011 and February
13, 2012).
57
Figure 25 Call and Response instrumental dialogue, Do Whatcha Wanna
Soul Rebels Brass Band
Members of the Soul Rebels grew up in New Orleans, bringing a variety of
experiences to their musical style. They were influenced by local brass bands, jazz
musicians, marching bands, and the popular music heard on the radio. Nick Pope, an
author with Where Y’at Magazine, describes the Soul Rebels’ sound as a foundation of
58
melodic grooves by the sousaphone and percussion over which “rap verses and horn
solos alike can flourish without any awkward moments.”151 Their musical inspiration and
training brought new traditions to the New Orleans brass bands.
Members of the Soul Rebels attended Fortier and McDonough high schools in
New Orleans, meeting through the schools’ marching bands. Later, they attended and
performed at historically black colleges in the Southwestern Atlantic Conference
(SWAC). These marching bands played arrangements of popular music with
choreography. LeBlanc believes that the audience attending the football games did not
want to hear Sousa marches, but music they could connect to, similar to music they heard
on the radio.152 Derrick Moss, the bass drum drummer of the Soul Rebels, says the
marching bands played the music they heard on “Soul Train.”153 He learned leadership
skills from participating in college-level marching band exercises, which continue to
serve him as the Soul Rebels’ co-leader and bass drummer. He was a drum major at
Southern University and says it was there he learned how to stop and start the show, set
the tempo for songs, and set up dance routines.154 Those movements became a key
element of the Soul Rebels’ showmanship.
The Soul Rebels became a group in 1991 with eight members; four of the original
members performed with the Young Olympians, taught by Milton Batiste, after returning
from college. When they played with the Young Olympians, Batiste taught them how to
play traditional brass band music and gave them a better understanding of second line
rhythms, bass line grooves, and the construction of compositions. The other four
151 Nick Pope, “The Soul Rebels New Regime,” Where Y’at Magazine, (Accessed November 2,
2008).
152 LeBlanc, interview.
153 Roger Hahn, “The Soul Rebels,” http://www.offbeat.com/2012/01/01/the-soul-rebels/,
(Accessed January, 4 2012).
154 Ibid.
59
members played with a band named Def Generation, where they met Cyril Neville, who
helped them form the Soul Rebels. Neville said that the band resembled Bob Marley’s
song Soul Rebels (1970) and that is where the band’s name originated.155
The Soul Rebels’ foundation gave them a point from which to start building their
own style. Popular music of the 1970s and 80s influenced the development of their
sound, with rap and reggae as major inspirations, along with R&B, funk, and rock. Lemar
LeBlanc, the snare drummer and leader of the Soul Rebels, reflects on popular music
influences on the Soul Rebels.
Rap and hip-hop groups that personally influenced the Soul Rebels
were: Public Enemy, Tribe Called Quest, Digital Planet, and
Naughty by Nature. These groups were classified more as positive
and got the party going. Other groups were from the “gangsta” rap
scene like, on the West Coast, NWA and Ice Cube. Amongst these
styles of rap, the band was also heavily influenced by R&B and
other music that was reflective of that time. Music of the 1980s
and the early jazz greats can also be heard in the Soul Rebels’
sound.156
The band experiments with all forms and genres of music. One of LeBlanc’s favorite
bands is The Doors.
LeBlanc believes it is important to establish a good foundation by learning the
traditional repertoire, because it is crucial to understanding the feel of the music.
The Soul Rebels basically started playing all traditional repertoire
and we know all of those tunes. All the way back from Indiana,
Lord, Lord, Lord, gospel tunes, and traditional Armstrong songs
and jazz artist songs like Bill Bailey and Sweet Georgia Brown.
Those songs help to give you a solid foundation, so that when
you’re ready to play the funk songs you are able to do so much
with them. A lot of the younger guys start off just at the funk
songs, which are in Bb and do not have chord changes; therefore,
when they want to add something to the songs, they are not able to
do it because they haven’t learned the basics and a good
foundation.157
155 LeBlanc.
156 Ibid.
157 Ibid.
60
Soul Rebels’ Creative Process
LeBlanc refers to reading music on a staff, such as classical music or the music a
student learns in school band, as “the scholastics of music.” Although the musicians in
the Soul Rebels know how to read music they learn their repertoire through the aural
tradition. He compared popular music’s compositional process to that of the brass bands,
noting that in the beginning stages the music is not written down. This creative process
usually starts with an initial idea, such as a melodic motif. That motif could end up being
the main melody or a “catchy” accompaniment riff, which is built up by adding different
melodies, accompaniment sections, percussion rhythms, and sometimes sung or rapped
lyrics. An example: When Leblanc has an idea, he presents it to the band and they build
on that initial idea. Leblanc explains:
When I come up with a bass line or a drum beat, I’ll throw it out
there like a baseball, then another member will catch it and throw
it to the second baseman. That member will then take it and add
something and throw the ball to the third baseman. Hopefully by
the time it gets to the home plate, it will be a homerun.158
As a result, an original composition by the Soul Rebels is a collaborative effort.
Sometimes, the band member who comes up with the initial idea for the song might not
have the popular melody or accompaniment that grabs the audience’s attention. It is
important to a have a “catchy loop” or “riff” in a song in order for it to appeal to a large
audience.
Once the band develops the ideas, the new composition will start with either the
sousaphone or drums and then the first melody begins. Lyrics are sung or rapped and also
imitated by the trumpets, saxophones, and then trombones. The first melody is referred
to as the “head” and is repeated two times, usually about sixteen measures. After the
head, the solo section begins. The saxophone usually is the first to perform an
improvised solo, then the trombone and trumpet. After the solo section, the composition
158 Ibid.
61
goes back to the head followed by an “outro.” The outro, as quoted by LeBlanc, is a coda
or tag to the end of the piece.
Leblanc shared that when the Soul Rebels are in a rehearsal, the band sometimes
will go into it with a goal of creating a new song, and they will not leave until they have
done so. The band is constantly coming up with new ideas to present in a rehearsal or a
performance to “keep it fresh.”
Brass bands in New Orleans have always played their own arrangements of
popular music. The Soul Rebels have arranged popular music and classic jazz, which
they do to connect to the audience before playing their original compositions. Once the
Soul Rebels have the attention of the audience, the crowd welcomes the band’s creativity.
Playing an arrangement of a song is a slightly different process compared with the
creation of an original composition. LeBlanc explains the difference:
With the cover songs and arrangements, it’s a little easier. That is
someone else’s song and ideas and all we’re really doing is
imitation and adding something else to it. The foundation of the
song has already been laid, then we put our own spin on it. It still
has the original idea. You don’t want to disrespect any of the
original composer’s ideas. That is kind of the code of ethics with
artists: We always respect each other’s works.159
On their tour of France in March 2010, the band was asked by a large choir for
permission to get a transcription of one of their songs so the choir could sing it. Although
the compositional process is aural, the band does read and write music. When a request
is made for a transcription, the members take the time to transcribe the music on paper to
distribute.
Soul Rebels Music
Leblanc says that he and the other members of the Soul Rebels are jazz artists first
who draw inspiration from other jazz artists like Louis Armstrong, Wynton Marsalis,
Miles Davis, John Coltrane and “all the greats.” This is demonstrated on the band’s first
159 Ibid.
62
album, Jazz Classics: A Tribute to Louis Armstrong, released in 1991. On Jazz Classics,
the Soul Rebels recorded classic jazz charts as well as traditional brass band music.
Included on the album are Ain’t Misbehavin’, What A Wonderful World, Basin Street,
Dark Town Strutters Ball, Monday’s Date, Back O’ Town Blues, Lord, Lord, Lord, Canal
Street Blues, Mardi Gras in New Orleans, Jesus in on the Main Line, Big Leg Woman,
and Sleepy Time Down South.
The Soul Rebels’ distinctive sound was developed in 1994 on their second album,
Let Your Mind Be Free. The album consists mainly of original compositions, with
several tracks displaying the band’s lyric rap skills. There is also an arrangement of
Miles Davis’ Footprints (1967) and Grover Washington Jr.’s Santa Cruzin’ (1978). Both
have been made into true New Orleans brass band songs through the second line rhythms
and danceable melodic ostinato groove played on the sousaphone. New Orleans radio
stations regularly played reggae music in the 1980s and 1990s, and that style of music
soon found its way into the brass band repertoire. Let Your Mind Be Free borrows the
vocal styles and rhythms of percussion from reggae. Let Your Be Free became part of
brass band repertoire based on the new traditions and styles of the Soul Rebels.
No More Parades, the band’s third album released in 1999, continued with their
flowing rap lyrics and creative melodies. By the time No More Parades was released, the
band had decided to concentrate more on marketing and their creative potential. They rap
about playing in a second line parade and how they are finished with that part of the brass
band. That is not to say they do not participate in parades anymore, they are more
focused on their music and promoting the band. In the ten years following their decision,
the Soul Rebels released three albums. The first was Rebelution (2004), which featured
jazz artist Josh Roseman and hip-hop artists CopperTop, Rasheed, and Scratch. Urban
Legend was the Soul Rebels 2006 release with more original compositions, and two
songs, Skin and Work it Out, previously recorded by the band.
63
LeBlanc states that the band likes all music and has experimented with varied
genres included classical and country-western. Although no material has been recorded
by the Soul Rebels in those styles, rock has made its way in the band’s music and can be
heard on their album No Place Like Home (December 2009). The song No Place Like
Home features the band singing and rapping about why New Orleans is home. During
those lyrics about New Orleans, the sousaphone plays a repeated bass line from a Blister
in the Sun, a song by the Violent Femmes (a popular music group from the 1980s and
90s), during the rapping.
Figure 26 No Place Like Home sousaphone bass line/ Violent Femmes Blister in the Sun.
In November 2011, the Soul Rebels performed in London on BBC’s television
show Later with Jools Holland. There they met the superstar heavy metal group
Metallica. Impressed by the Soul Rebels’ performance, Metallica invited the band to
perform with them on their 30th anniversary celebration in San Francisco. By December,
the Soul Rebels not only were performing on the same stage as Metallica, but the band
had also added heavy metal music into their repertoire. “Each show kicked off with a
tribute by the Soul Rebels, who “rebelized” Metallica classics, including Enter Sandman
and One.”160 The Soul Rebels’ experience seemed to have given them the necessary boost
to complete their first radio-ready album, Unlock Your Mind (2012). This album features
the Grammy-nominated recording artist Trombone Shorty.
160 Soul Rebels Brass Band, www.soulrebelsbrassband.com, (Accessed February 1, 2012).
64
In a follow-up interview, LeBlanc was asked how hip-hop has affected the Soul
Rebels. He states that the popularity and business side were very appealing because he is
trying to learn from and promote the Soul Rebels music the same way by having a
booking agent and a manager. Brass bands have also influenced hip-hop artists like Li’l
Wayne and Master P, both of whom are from New Orleans. Although they may not
admit to the brass band’s influence in their music, LeBlanc says that it can be heard in the
rhythm and the slang and syntax of their words. Brass bands were the first major
superstar of New Orleans because of the “organic quality of the music.”161
When the major hip-hop acts perform for a live audience they have electronic
instruments such as a keyboard and a drum machine, and people want to hear the emotion
behind the music. That is what the brass bands of New Orleans bring to their
performance each and every time.
The Soul Rebels have toured all over the United States and worldwide. The
Rebels were booked in 2005 on the Xingolati: Groove Cruise of the Pacific, a three-day
music cruise that showcased the band alongside popular music groups like, G Love and
Special Sauce, the Flaming Lips, Medeski, Martin and Wood, and the John Popper
Project.162 More recently, the Soul Rebels have performed at the London Jazz Festival in
2010 and again in 2012.
161 LeBlanc.
162 Pope, Where Y’at Magazine.
65
CHAPTER IV
NEW ORLEANS STYLE ARRIVES IN MADISON
Chapter four is the discussion of the brass bands in Madison, Wisconsin, all based
on personal interviews with the band members, and extensive listening to their music.
Mama Digdown’s Brass Band will be discussed first because of its members’ key role in
Youngblood Brass Band’s existence. The majority of the research presented is on the
Youngblood Brass Band and its music, and will explore how it is an extension of the
New Orleans brass band genre.
A Brass Band Tradition Starts in Madison
As the sound of New Orleans’ brass moved into Madison, Wisconsin, change
occurred not only in the race of the players, but also in the cultural source of the music’s
influence. Contemporary brass bands such as Dirty Dozen and Rebirth influenced bands
world-wide through their recordings, especially in the Midwest. The New Orleans bands
appealed to many people because of the second line rhythms in the percussion, which
gave the music a dance quality. The dance rhythms were appealing to the musicians in
Madison who began to study the music. As the music of New Orleans migrated to the
Midwest, two bands emerged, Mama Digdown’s Brass Band and Youngblood Brass
Band.
These Madison brass bands formed in high school, where they first gained
exposure to and began imitating the repertoire of other New Orleans brass bands. Most of
the members of these groups also went on to receive some form of classical music
training at the university level. Mama Digdown’s Brass Band was the first brass band in
Madison. It had members in common with the Youngblood Brass Band in the beginning,
until those members broke off to start their own brass band and to create their own sound,
based off of the New Orleans style. Mama Digdown’s and Youngblood have many
original compositions in the New Orleans style. Mama Digdown’s learned the traditional
66
repertoire from the early twentieth century through the contemporary bands like Dirty
Dozen and Rebirth.
Youngblood Brass Band also learned the traditional and contemporary repertoire,
but they took the New Orleans style of playing, composition, and instrumentation to a
new level. They experimented with the acoustical boundaries of the ensemble, with hiphop-influenced rhythms on the percussion and extended techniques on the sousaphone,
and rapping by David Skogen. For further study of the style, they traveled to New
Orleans to listen to as many bands as possible. While there, they met the most popular
bands, including the Dirty Dozen, Rebirth, Soul Rebels, and the Hot 8. Other musical
genres that can be heard in Youngblood’s sound are jazz, R&B, funk, 1980s pop music,
rock ’n’ roll, and drum and bugle corps.
Other bands have formed because of this renaissance in Madison. About ten other
brass bands exist in Madison and the surrounding counties, all of whom play in the New
Orleans styles inspired by Mama Digdown’s and Youngblood. Mama Digdown’s has a
list of substitute musicians who play with the band if regular members are not available
for a performance. The majority of the musicians on the list come from New Tradition
Brass Brand, an up-and-coming band that plays many local shows. The Madison scene
has spread to other regions of the country, as well. Examples are the King Pin Brass Band
(based in Milwaukee), BS Brass Band (Chicago), Jack Brass Band (Minneapolis), and the
Sugartone Brass Band, which was started in New York by Moses Patrou, who used to
play with Mama Digdown’s and Youngblood. This connection to Madison introduced
Kenny Warner to the New Orleans style. Warner is the sousaphone player for Sugartone
and was the featured sousaphone player for Youngblood on the band’s last album, Is That
a Riot?
Mama Digdown’s Brass Band
Erik Jacobsen is the leader of Mama Digdown’s Brass Band. He grew up in
Minneapolis, Minnesota, where he fell in love with the New Orleans brass band sound
67
after an initial listening session. He brought that passion for New Orleans music to
college in Madison. Jacobsen describes his experience of listening to the Dirty Dozen
Brass Band for the first time:
When I was a sophomore in high school, I had a band director that
would go and listen to records every day during lunch. He would
play different records, and if the students listening to them liked
them, they were allowed to borrow the records. My high school
teacher gave me a Dirty Dozen Brass Band record, My Feet Can’t
Fail Me Now, to listen to. I had never heard anything where the
tuba played real funky, and I had never heard a New Orleans brass
band. I started to learn some of the bass lines off of the Dirty
Dozen records, with Curt Joseph playing tuba on the recording.
Since that time, he has collected many recordings of any New Orleans brass band. Out of
all his recordings, Jacobsen was drawn to Rebirth because of the members’ experiments
with contemporary genres of music.
Rebirth incorporated popular music from artists such as Michael Jackson and
R&B groups like The Gap Band and Rick James. When he was a freshman at the
University of Wisconsin, Jacobsen thought he wanted to start a brass band because of his
deep passion for the style of music, by way of New Orleans. He introduced his friends to
the New Orleans style of music, and through word of mouth, other musicians became
interested. Four of the members were music majors and four were non-music majors.
Mama Digdown’s first performance was at The Art Fair in the Square in Madison.
Jacobsen said, “We crashed that art fair.” By this he means the band brought something
different to an art fair that the crowd was not expecting to see or hear. From that point
on, they were booked for gigs.
Mama Digdown’s Music
The majority of the music of Mama Digdown’s is not written down. The
repertoire is learned aurally, much the same way New Orleans bands learn their music.
In an interview, Jacobsen explained his belief that sheet music stops people from
listening to each other, and that such communication is at the core of the New Orleans
brass band style. Out of a couple hundred songs Digdown’s knows, only about five have
68
a written lead line. Many of the popular brass bands in New Orleans have a large
repertoire, ranging from the traditional through the contemporary. Mama Digdown’s
made a point of learning the entire standard repertoire. There are at least twenty
traditional songs the band keeps in its repertoire, such as High Society and A Closer Walk
With Thee. Both are examples of songs that most people can recognize and that relate to
New Orleans.163
At Mama Digdown’s inception, the band started to “play riffs” from other brass
bands and popular songs on the radio. It was through their riffs that they came up with
their original songs, although the band always tried to stay close to the New Orleans brass
band style and sound. In an interview, Christopher “Roc” Ohly, the saxophonist for
Mama Digdown’s, comments:
We didn’t really get the music until we started going down there,
meeting, and becoming friends with the people who actually live
this. We play it, we represent it the best we can. I think we do a
pretty good job as compared to other brass bands I’ve heard that
aren’t from New Orleans. But, it is something that is part of a
culture that we didn’t grow up in so we’re just trying to do our
best.
Jordan Cohen, the bass drummer of Mama Digdown’s, also comments on the band’s
attempts to stay true to the New Orleans sound:
Learning to play second line music in a convincing and authentic
style without growing up in New Orleans took years and many,
many hours of listening and playing. It was indispensable to have
people like Jeff Maddern in the band, who had lived in New
Orleans and played in the Hot 8, and who was able to say when the
music didn't feel right and encourage us to get there. We went to
New Orleans a couple times a year and listened to as many bands
as we could, which was valuable, but in my opinion it takes
immersion to really learn to play the music.
In a sense, it is like learning a foreign language. A person can learn through a class,
audio, or video recording, but the best way to synthesize the information is to go to that
country to fully immerse oneself in that specific language.
163 Jacobsen, interview.
69
Later in the same interview, Jacobsen said that, whether it’s via the arrangement,
the quoting of a “pop” song within an original piece, or the music’s influence on the
band’s repertoire, New Orleans brass bands always have incorporated popular music. In
the true style of New Orleans, Mama Digdown’s does this too. On its newest album, the
band stays true to its roots by playing traditional brass band repertoire like St. James
Infirmary, an arrangement of Terence Trent D’Arby’s R&B song Sign Your Name, and
originals like Mojito.
A standard piece like St. James Infirmary is featured on their most recent album,
We Make ’Em Say Ooh (2009). They play the song in the standard form through a couple
of times, then on one of the repeats of the chord changes, the accompaniment in the horns
quote an Outkast song, Spottieottiedopalicous. Sign Your Name, a popular R&B song that
was released in 1987, was arranged for this album. When Mama Digdown’s plays Sign
Your Name as a brass band, the trumpets play the melody and counter melodies and the
trombone plays a large role in supporting the sound of the shout chorus or counter
melody to the main chorus line.164
Mojito is recorded twice on We Make ’Em Say Ooh. The first time the brass band
plays Mojito in their traditional instrumentation, but the second recording of Mojito is a
“bounce remix.” Bounce refers to a style of New Orleans rap that deepens the connection
to New Orleans music, where the artists take a rhythm or phrase from a local brass band,
then incorporate it into a loop. A loop is a short phrase or rhythm that is repeated many
times, also referred to as a “riff.” The loop is programmed into a drum machine and
played by a DJ. Sometimes lyrics are rapped over that loop. For the Mojito bounce remix,
a DJ mixed the melody with other digital sounds and scratching to create the loop.
Mama Digdown’s makes a point of sounding like a well-rounded New Orleans
style brass band and does not set out to purposefully incorporate new music in its
164 Christopher Ohly, phone interview by author, 15 November 2010.
70
repertoire. Jacobsen says, “I don’t think one could say that Mama Digdown’s is breaking
any ground with our music other than the fact that we are a bunch of white guys who are
really good at it.” Jacobsen also says that they are not creating something new, like
Youngblood.
Youngblood Brass Band
While Mama Digdown’s stayed at the heart of the traditional New Orleans brass
band style, the Youngblood Brass Band built a new sound from the traditional music. As
Jacobsen comments, “In Youngblood Brass Band there is a conscious thinking about how
they are going to push the brass band farther, or in a different direction that it has not
gone before.” That direction is shown through the progression of their albums. In the
beginning, the sound of Youngblood was very close to traditional New Orleans brass
bands with regard to the form of the music, style of playing, and instrumentation. But as
the band evolved, their repertoire and style changed as the members experimented with
various genres of popular music.
Youngblood, like the Soul Rebels of New Orleans, is moving the genre forward
by experimenting with the sounds of the brass band. The differences between the two
groups are that the Soul Rebels are from New Orleans and have a different musical
background with a true connection to Congo Square, while Youngblood has created an
ensemble pushing the acoustic barriers through the study of New Orleans brass bands.
The two bands offer the listener two different representations of how far these ensembles
have come over one hundred years. Both however, are similar in that their beginnings are
influenced by cutting-edge popular music. The Soul Rebels were a major inspiration for
Youngblood’s music.
One of the founding members of Youngblood, Nat McIntosh, started playing tuba
when he was ten years old. He always enjoyed playing the tuba, but he did not get
“hooked” until he heard the possibilities for the tuba in brass band music. He has a story
similar to that of Jacobsen’s introduction to New Orleans brass bands. Nat and his
71
brother, Ben, started listening to the Dirty Dozen Brass Band growing up in Colorado
before moving to Oregon, Wisconsin. Nat always liked loud, intense, and danceable
music but never found a way to play that kind of music on the tuba until he was thirteen,
when his mom played a Dirty Dozen record in the other room while he was playing video
games. After listening to approximately four tracks from the music, he realized “the
funky bass player was a sousaphonist.”165 From that day he started to experiment with
ways to make the bass lines he was hearing come alive on his tuba. First it was through
the music of the Dirty Dozen, then Rebirth, using their Rollin album as an example, and
more recently, he has been most interested in the group the Soul Rebels.
McIntosh brought two key components to Youngblood. The majority of
Youngblood’s pieces on the Unlearn and Center: Level: Roar albums grew out of
McIntosh’s creative compositional skills. The technique in which McIntosh presents his
ideas to the band is like that of the New Orleans brass bands. As LeBlanc discussed, the
Soul Rebels’ creative process is a collaborative effort through which the band members’
ideas are combined to compose a new piece. In McIntosh’s original works, he creates all
of the ideas. Charles Wagner, a trumpet player with Youngblood, describes the process
by which McIntosh teaches a new piece to the band. He has ideas in his mind of how the
piece will go, and he either plays each part on his sousaphone or sings it. Then, he puts it
all together.166
Secondly, McIntosh has contributed his use of extended techniques on the
sousaphone. He explains how he uses his extended techniques, and the effects he is
trying to achieve when performing them:
Most of my extended techniques have no names because to the
best of my knowledge I’m the only one who does them, but the
main pre-existing one is called multiphonics. That’s where I play a
165 Nat McIntosh, interview by author, 19 February 2010.
166 Charles Wagner, interview by author, 24 February 2012.
72
note and sing a note at the same time to harmonize with myself.
The hard version of that technique is what I call independent
multiphonics, which is where you play a bass line and sing a
melody on top. All of the high-pitched, tweety sounds are my
scratch sounds, which are mostly an imitation of cuts and scratches
a hip-hop DJ makes. I do those both by singing high and by
playing high into the horn and tonguing really fast and
rhythmically. I also make a distorted sound that I call “cosmic
bass” where I change the shape of my mouth cavity to put a flangestyle effect on the notes, which can be augmented by doing
multiphonics with it and making different vowel sounds with the
voice, which flanges the sound more. I’m a fan of authentic
extended techniques that you can produce by yourself as opposed
to pedals or mic manipulation to make it sound different. That said,
I would love to play around with a boomerang pedal someday so I
can loop myself. That would be pretty awesome.
After arriving in Oregon, Wisconsin, the McIntosh brothers met David Skogen, a
founding member of Youngblood. Skogen is the bandleader, snare drummer, and emcee
of the band. He began his musical training in the school orchestra in fourth grade, where
he played cello, before moving to percussion in fifth grade. He joined the Wisconsin
Youth Symphony Orchestra in seventh grade and the Oregon Marching Band in the
eighth grade. These were his first two serious musical experiences, and he says that both
pushed him to try hard and taught him about work ethic and community building. At the
age of thirteen, not long after he joined the marching band, he began African drumming
classes. After his initial experiences with Mama Digdown’s, he became interested in
Cuban, Brazilian, and jazz music, and thoroughly enjoyed drumline in the marching
band. All of these influences are represented in Youngblood’s music. Skogen primarily
occupied his time with classical music, marching music, and “the music of the African
diaspora.” By the end of his high school career, he had learned of hip-hop and punk rock.
Skogen was introduced to Mama Digdown’s through Matt Ravenport, who played
with that band at the time. Ravenport was Skogen’s percussion instructor and taught the
African drumming class that Skogen attended. Mama Digdown’s was Youngblood’s
main influence in Madison and the group who opened their eyes to the greater musical
tradition of New Orleans brass bands. It was not long after being introduced to Mama
Digdown’s that Ben McIntosh began to play trombone with them. After Ben moved to
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college, Nat played trombone in the band, and when Digdown’s snare drummer left the
band, Skogen took his place. Two other musicians joined the band from Oregon High
School: Moses Patrou, a percussionist, and Youngblood’s lead trumpet player, Mike
Boman.
The members who attended Oregon High School were eager to start a band in the
New Orleans style after listening to Dirty Dozen and Rebirth. Nat McIntosh thought
starting a brass band seemed to be the obvious outlet. The McIntosh brothers talked their
friends into forming a group and they played recordings of Rebirth’s tracks, including
Mercy, Mercy, Mercy, featuring the R&B and jazz saxophonist Maceo Parker. Skogen
says, “Within a year or two, it (the band) had branched out to include Joe Goltz
(trombone), Charles Wagner (trumpet), and Carl Barstch (tenor saxophone), who
attended Monroe High School.” Wagner met Skogen through the Wisconsin Youth
Symphony in 1993.
Wagner remembers his first jam session with McIntosh and Skogen during
rehearsals for the 1995 Badger Conference Honors Band. He sets up the moment in a
recent interview:
I was sitting there during a break and the guys were in the back
kind of jamming. Dave Skogen and Nat and others were jamming
and playing rudimentary stuff, and Dave asked if I would like to
come back there and jam. Dave knew me from Wisconsin Youth
Symphony.
Wagner remembers the tune they were “jamming” to was Rebirth’s Chameleon. From
then on, the interest spread to their friends in high school.
The next members to join were Carl Barstch, the original tenor saxophone player,
who no longer is playing with Youngblood, and trombonist Joe Goltz, who is still with
the band. Wagner and Barstch approached Goltz about joining the band by playing him a
recording they had put together. At first, Goltz was not interested in brass band music,
but he thought it was a great sound being driven by the horns and percussion. Goltz
enjoyed the music and thought it was “cool” because he already liked ska and jazz. In the
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summer of 1996, Wagner asked if Goltz wanted to play trombone with them because a
trombone player had left the band. At first Goltz was hesitant to say yes, because he was
not sure he could handle the repertoire. He decided to try it out, and with the additions of
Goltz and Barstch, the brass band was complete.
The four from Oregon High School joined forces with the four from Monroe High
School and began under the name, One Lard Biskit. The newly formed band played the
traditional New Orleans repertoire and experimented with imitating the contemporary
brass bands by whom they were initially influenced. By the middle of the 1990s, this
meant groups like not only the Dirty Dozen and Rebirth, but the Soul Rebels and the Hot
8. Sometimes the members from Monroe High School would meet up with the Oregon
High School members to play as a pep band for the high school basketball games. This
was where they experimented with their sound and caught the public’s eye. For example,
one of their first tunes was the theme from the video game Super Mario Brothers. This
experimentation with music through the form of a pep band at a basketball game is
similar to a New Orleans band playing in a parade and presenting new material to the
second line participants.
The band shared members with Mama Digdown’s until they decided to commit
fully to One Lard Biskit, which shortly afterward became Youngblood Brass Band. The
first album released under that name was Word on the Street (1998), which features
original compositions but is in the traditional New Orleans style. During that time, when
they were experimenting with the New Orleans bands’ repertoire and incorporating their
own interest into that style, they traveled to New Orleans to learn the style hands-on.
The Influence of New Orleans on Youngblood
Youngblood’s instrumentation and compositional technique are directly related to
the brass bands of New Orleans, and they are a fusion of music genres. Youngblood’s
music has clear evidence of jazz and rap influences, including swung rhythms,
incorporation of improvisational techniques, hip-hop effects imitated in the percussion
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and horns, and rapped lyrics. During the first five years of the band’s existence, they
studied the music of the brass bands, “traveling to New Orleans and befriending, playing
along, copying, trying, failing, trying again to do what they were doing, and the elusive
character was the gravity of the music, the groove, the fire ... things that have nothing to
do with playing notes well.”167 Youngblood gave extra gratitude to the Hot 8 Brass Band
for being “incredibly gracious and patient.” Skogen says, “It should be noted as well that
many of our first trips to New Orleans were with Mama Digdown’s, who gave us the
model of how serious one had to be about attempting to represent this culture accurately,
or at the very least not misappropriating it.”
They pay homage to their predecessors by performing a traditional song by one of
the New Orleans brass bands during their live performances. The New Orleans brass
bands’ foundations are their rhythms and their homage to their African heritage. For
Youngblood, the foundation of their music exists primarily through the rhythm and
compositional structure. As the band got older and gained more experience, they realized
they wanted to go a different direction. Other musical interests and influences created
Youngblood’s sound.
Youngblood’s Music
This section discusses three pieces: Avalanche, which demonstrates rap skills;
Brooklyn, an instrumental piece; and J.E.M., a dirge without percussion. These pieces
demonstrate how Youngblood have infused New Orleans style brass band music with
popular music, and created unique compositions.
Nat McIntosh credits Youngblood’s sound as stemming “mostly from New
Orleans street funk with lots of Afro-Cuban and Brazilian elements, ’70s soul sounds,
thought-provoking, conscious hip-hop, basically anything that rocks.”168 His extended
167 David Skogen, interview by author, Microsoft word questionnaire, 18 February 2010.
168 Nat McIntosh, interview by author, Microsoft word questionnaire, 2 April 2010.
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techniques were developed through the imitation of the sound effects in the music. Nat
also draws inspiration from the artist Frank Zappa and pop icon Michael Jackson, as well
as bands from a variety of genres, such as Rage Against the Machine, Jerseyband, The
Roots and Carlinhos Brown. The diversification in his musical influences accounts for
the melodic ideas that are heard in his compositions. Charles Wagner, like McIntosh, has
developed a compositional style that is influenced by popular music and his experiences
in Latin, jazz, and salsa groups.
Wagner shares his classical knowledge with the group. He received a degree in
classical trumpet performance from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, and a
master’s degree in classical performance from Duquesne University in Pittsburgh. In
addition to those accomplishments, Wagner has professional experience with a small
orchestra outside of Pittsburgh and is a former member of the Columbus (Ohio)
Symphony. He performed with those orchestras until he decided to concentrate on jazz,
thinking it was time to study improvisation before he got too old. He brought his jazz
improvisation, classical “chops,” and compositional skills to Youngblood. Wagner’s
experience with Latin and salsa groups improved his improvisational skills as a trumpet
player and influenced the harmonic language of his compositions. Skogen’s contributions
as a percussionist combine with Wagner’s compositional and harmonic skills to give the
music its drive and danceable qualities.
In addition to his interest in Afro-Cuban drumming, Skogen’s percussion writing
and improvisation were influenced by drum and bugle corps. The drum and bugle corps
style of playing is demonstrated through the precision of articulation, dynamics, and
percussion “features” that are an exaggerated element of Youngblood’s live shows. In a
drum and bugle corps, the percussion focuses on technique and tight ensemble playing.
The percussionists of Youngblood demonstrate strong technique and ensemble skills by
playing intricate rhythms and grooves on each piece. The style brings a dance quality and
a sense of raw energy to the performance. The majority of the band’s musical influences
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are “sample-based, experimental, hip-hop, and music with guitars.”169 Skogen says it is
nice to hear musical motifs from experimental popular music like heavy metal, hip-hop,
and electronic music played by all-acoustic group — meaning Youngblood. Youngblood
constantly experiments with sound combinations and orchestrating. This is proven on
their album Unlearn (2000).
The album features hip-hop artists Talib Kweli, Mike Ladd, DJ Skooly, and Frank
Zappa’s longtime vocalist, Ike Willis. DJ Skooly’s techniques are featured on Acousticon
Theme, amongst the original compositions. The Trilogy represents a hip-hop battle with
McIntosh on sousaphone and Skooly trying to outdo each other. In true New Orleans
brass band fashion, Youngblood arranges a Stevie Wonder and a Michael Jackson song.
One of the featured arrangements is Stevie Wonder’s Pastime Paradise. To add to this
arrangement, “We took the chorus from the song It’s a Shame (1973) by The Spinners
and made that the trombone part for the song.”170 Also featured is Michael Jackson’s
Human Nature (1982), from which they maintained all of the original themes and bass
lines, with a second line beat addition in the percussion.
The members of Youngblood established themselves as a band, presenting some
of their most popular repertoire on Center: Level: Roar (2003). This album was inspired
by hip-hop and was recorded at a time when the band members were listening to artists
such as The Roots, Buckshot Lefonque, and Busta Rhymes. After realizing his talent at
writing, Skogen decided to try rapping. Before the album was released, Youngblood
played a few shows in Madison and tried out new techniques that featured Skogen
rapping. They noticed that the crowds were interested in the new songs and that the
audiences grew show after show. Skogen’s rapping is featured in the popular original
work Avalanche.
169 Skogen, interview.
170 Joe Goltz, phone interview by author, 30 March 2010.
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Avalanche
Avalanche is molded together by the extension of the bass line and the technique
of the sousaphone and percussion. In the introduction of the song, shown in Figure 27,
the loud, tenuto, quarter notes are played on the downbeats. The bass drum and cymbal
are struck on the downbeat as the snare drum plays fortissimo upbeats. The strong
syncopation brings energy, thereby intensifying the emotion of the song. Similar to Busta
Rhymes or The Roots, Skogen’s rapping begins once the band has settled into a rhythmic
groove.
The lyrics are rapped over the horn accompaniment with interludes of DJ effects
played on the sousaphone. McIntosh does this through the use of multiphonics, wide
vibrato, growl sounds, and scratching sounds. Starting in measure fifteen of Figure B,
McIntosh plays multiphonics and wide vibrato on the tied eighth note to the half note
through measure twenty-two. Following the whole note in measure twenty-three (Figure
28), there are two written measures of rest, then the sousaphone plays the scratching
effects to take the listener back to the beginning theme. Skogen continues to rap over the
effects into the rhythmic theme that began on measure three in Figure 27.
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Figure 27 Avalanche introduction mm. 1-4, score in C
Figure 28 Avalanche introduction mm. 5-8, score in C.
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Figure 29 Avalanche sousaphone part
Brooklyn
Nat McIntosh’s Brooklyn is another feature song on the Center: Level: Roar
album. Like Avalanche, Brooklyn is an original composition. This piece is one of
Youngblood’s most popular works and in 2004 it was featured in an interview on NPR.171
Youngblood’s talent and musical influences are blended through the driving rhythms of
the percussion, the melodic lines of the accompaniment, improvised solos, and hip-hop
effects demonstrated on the sousaphone.
When compared to LeBlanc’s description of the Soul Rebels’ compositional form,
the overall structure of the piece is similar to that of the New Orleans brass bands.
LeBlanc refers to the basic structure of a piece as beginning with an introduction. Then it
moves to the “head,” which has one or two melodies played in an eight to sixteen-bar
phrase. Following the head there are two or three improvised solo sections, then a shift
back to the head before the closing “outro” or coda. Brooklyn is structured in a similar
way: it begins with an eight-bar introduction followed by a “head” consisting of two
eight-bar melodies. The middle section is improvised solos played on the trombone and
on the tenor saxophone. There is a recapitulation of the introduction at the end of the
solos. The repeat of the introduction is followed by a drum break and a sousaphone
feature then returns to the head with a short “outro” at the end.
171 National Public Radio, http://www.npr.org/, archive interview (accessed on March 4, 2005).
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A preface to the published transcription of Brooklyn provides instructions to the
percussionist playing the piece, the parts are simply “blueprints.”172 The variations of
rhythms and embellishments that Youngblood includes in live performances are left out
of the transcription. The instructions finish by stating that “the groove” is more important
than the technique. “The beats for each section are based on a single pattern, which we
interpret relatively freely (with a degree of improvisation), much the way one would
approach a rhythm based on clavé.”173 That is fair to say for the sousaphone part too.
Figure 30 Brooklyn, sousaphone bass line
The musical example in Figure 30 is the bass line played by the sousaphone.
McIntosh embellishes the bass line with DJ effects during the rests on beats three and
four of the first three measures of rehearsal H. Rehearsal H is the repeat of the
introduction before the eight-bar drum feature at rehearsal I. Beginning at the fifth
measure of rehearsal I, as seen in Figure 31, the sousaphone part is notated with a fourbeat glissando for two measures and is then repeated. This effect is a combination of
slurring through the harmonic series and singing at the same time to imitate a hip-hop
sound. At the end of the drum-break, the sousaphone takes over and is featured using
172 Brooklyn has been transcribed by Youngblood and is now for sale on the Layered Arts
Collective webpage, www.layered.org.
173 Nat McIntosh, Brooklyn, (Madison, WI: Layered Music, 2003/2010).
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independent multiphonics in which McIntosh sings the same melody he is playing
(Figure 31).
Figure 31 Brooklyn sousaphone feature
After the release of Is that a Riot? (2006) Nat McIntosh, the band’s creative mind,
left to play with the Dallas Brass. Kenny Warner of Sugartone Brass Band replaced
McIntosh for this album. It was the most challenging time for the band and forced more
members to create musical ideas. McIntosh’s absence elicited more talent in the band,
resulting in a collaborative effort in the creation of the repertoire for the album.
According to Wagner it was an unfocused album and there are a wide variety of tunes,
which he believes represented the “full personality of the band.” The end result was the
most experimental album they have produced:
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You hear a lot more jazz influence, drum and bass type stuff, New
Orleans influence, a gospel tune cover that is the last tune on the
album. The tuba player at that time came up with that, with his
Gospel background. He conducts a huge gospel choir in
Brooklyn.174
The experimental music is demonstrated through tracks like Bone Refinery, Dead Man
Stomping, and J.E.M.
In Bone Refinery, the percussion section imitates a drum machine, and
accompanies Skogen’s rapping. Also featured is a horn melody that sounds like a
synthesizer loop. Another hip-hop tune is Dead Man Stomping, for which Wagner wrote
the horn parts, and Skogen wrote the percussion lines. Wagner wrote this in a 6/4 meter,
with a contrapuntal ending.
J.E.M.
J.E.M. is an original composition by Wagner, an instrumental piece without
percussion. Wagner refers to it as “a cappella horns.” He says he decided to write a
piece for only horns because Youngblood is known for playing loudly. It allows the
audience to calm down, lets the percussion take a break, and allows wind players to cool
off their embouchures before continuing with their high-energy, “in-your-face”
performance. The song displays the musicality of the band through intonation, phrasing,
and dynamics and, as a classically trained musician, Wagner likes this kind of
composition. He relates the music to a dirge without the joyous sendoff. Wagner relates
the story behind the composition:
J.E.M. stands for Jill, Eric, and Maria. Jill is a cousin of mine that
my sis and I were very close to. She was killed in a car crash
awhile back in Indiana sitting in the passenger seat. He was a very
close family friend of her family ... and drunk driving.
Eric and Maria are the brother and mother of an ex-girlfriend
whom I was with for about 6 years starting in undergrad through
postgrad school. Maria died very quickly of pancreatic cancer (I
was there for the last few days and helped carry her out of the
174 Wagner, interview.
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room post-mortem — not pretty). Eric died of an enlarged heart at
29 years. The truly tragic aspect is that he had returned from
Sweden, where he was getting a grad degree in bio-chem (and
taking the uppers that hurt his heart), to be there to see his mother
before the end. He died in bed two or three days before she did.
My ex found him. His mother never knew.175
Wagner says, “I was sitting down at the piano and came up with an interesting
chord progression.”176 Wagner was also inspired by a particular passage in Mahler’s
Symphony no. 5, “after the opening of the first movement when the strings play.”177 In
Figure 32, the second trumpet, the tenor saxophone, and the lead trombone start at
rehearsal A. These three instruments were chosen to represent Jill, Eric, and Maria. They
begin in a simple rhythm, and the harmony is in a unison that represents the calm before
the tragedy. At rehearsal B, the other instruments join in to represent a last conversation
with their loved ones.
175 Charles Wagner, email message to author, 19 August 2010.
176 Ibid.
177 Ibid.
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Figure 32 J.E.M. introduction
There is a pause on the upbeat of three in the third measure of Figure 33, “like
each of their deaths,” then each line fades away until the last, sustained to the end of the
piece. Wagner says, “That is as close as I could get to the scene of my ex's Dad
sprinkling two-fifths of his family's ashes into a river in Lodi, California.”178
178 Ibid.
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Figure 33 J.E.M. measures 19-22.
In 2010 Nat McIntosh returned to Youngblood, rejuvenated after a four-year
sabbatical. The band went on tour to Europe in the spring and fall of that year, bringing a
new sound to their classic repertoire. They performed a live show in Madison at the High
Noon Saloon to kick off their tour. The energy was electric and the house was packed to
capacity, with standing room only. The repertoire was mainly the featured tracks from
Center: Level: Roar, the band’s first composition, Word on the Street, and some of the
newer songs from Is That a Riot?
Most recently, Youngblood has collaborated with the Swiss hip-hop artist Bligg.
In September 2011 they were contacted by Bligg to record new repertoire for his latest
album. “Bligg was looking for some kind of band that represents a live performance and
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brings some heat to their performances.”179 Bligg and his producer met the band in
Madison to record. Youngblood was asked to accompany Bligg on his latest album. The
challenge was to arrange all of the tracks to fit Youngblood’s instrumentation.
They dispersed the tracks to the members of Youngblood a couple of weeks before the
recording session. Nat McIntosh arranged about six tunes, and Matt Hanzelka, Zach
Lucas, Tony Barba, and Charles Wagner each arranged one track. The members of
Youngblood took liberties with their arrangements. For instance, Dave Skogen wrote the
percussion parts so that they were able to change the key and feel of the songs, leaving
only the original tempo markings. They toured with Bligg through Europe in March
2012.
Youngblood is evolving further from a traditional New Orleans brass band. Now
they represent an ensemble that plays experimental music in a New Orleans
instrumentation. Lemar LeBlanc of the Soul Rebels says that a band playing in the New
Orleans brass band style needs to learn the traditional repertoire, because it is the history
of the music being played.180 Like a New Orleans brass band, Youngblood established a
firm foundation in the traditional music, and now explore the realm of their musical
interests.
179 Wagner.
180 LeBlanc.
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CHAPTER V
CONCLUSION
This essay presented the evolution of New Orleans brass band literature with a
focus on the incorporation of popular music. Brass bands absorbed elements of popular
music that invigorated their musical heritage, and helped make the genre popular with
audiences all over the world. Dejan’s Olympia Brass Band helped to update the repertoire
by adding the style of R&B. Danny Barker helped preserve the traditions of the New
Orleans brass band, and then fostered the Dirty Dozen in his Fairview Baptist Church
Brass Band. The Dirty Dozen continued the tradition of incorporating the popular music
of the day by introducing the styles of funk and soul.
The Dirty Dozen Brass Band sparked a revolution in New Orleans music through
their recordings and tours. They inspired bands like the Black Bottom Brass Band from
Japan and the Hurricane Brass Band from the Netherlands. Dirty Dozen’s music inspired
two tuba players who were motivated by the inventive bass lines derived from R&B and
funk. Both tuba players ended up in Madison, Wisconsin, and started their own bands
with a love of New Orleans brass band music.
In Madison, there is a large concentration of musicians who have been inspired by
the sounds of New Orleans. These musicians are creating music in the tradition of the
New Orleans bands that also moves the genre forward through the incorporation of rap,
and other current musical trends. The Youngblood Brass Band saw endless possibilities
with the New Orleans instrumentation and generated their own music by composing in
the same style as the Dirty Dozen and the Soul Rebels. Now they are considered an
original, cutting-edge brass band, sharing their music with global audiences.
Hurricane Katrina
In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina’s devastation of New Orleans, the
surrounding parishes, and the Gulf Coast in 2005, many musicians evacuated to Baton
Rouge, Louisiana, Birmingham, Alabama, Atlanta, Houston, and other areas of the
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country. Although Katrina might have slowed down the musicians with the immediate
flooding, it did not stop the music making of New Orleans. These artists lost many
personal possessions during the flood and have since tried to pick up the pieces and
continue bringing music to New Orleans.181
Musicians of the Rebirth and Soul Rebels brass bands evacuated to Houston,
where they continued performing. Kermit Ruffins, formerly with Rebirth, played his
usual Thursday performance on September 8, 2005, only this time in Houston. Other
well-known artists of New Orleans, like the Neville Brothers, Fats Domino, and Dr.
Michael White, were also affected by the storm. The Neville Brothers are still displaced
in Texas and Nashville, Fats had his home and recording studio restored, but he does not
live at the residence. White says that he still possesses his glorious memories of jazz and
the knowledge he gained from the older musicians he met. White compares the Katrina
tragedy to a jazz funeral’s joyous resurrection — although hard times are in the future,
with the rebuilding of the city, he looks forward to the beginning.182
Bruce Raubern, director of the Hogan Jazz archives at the University of Tulane,
believes other blends of styles might be created as a result of Katrina. He speculates it
could be similar to the changes attributed to a great flood that occurred in the city in 1927
after which people were displaced to Texas from Louisiana. Soon after, a style of
Zydeco, referred to as Texas Zydeco, appeared.183 Something of a similar nature could
happen as the musicians displaced by Hurricane Katrina settle in other regions of the
country, blending some of New Orleans’ styles with other regional styles of music.
181 Keith Spera, Groove Interrupted: Loss, Renewal, and the Music of New Orleans, (New York,
NY; St. Martin’s Press, 2011), 1-8.
182 Michael G. White, “Reflections of an Authentic Jazz Life in Pre-Katrina New Orleans,”
(Journal of American History, December 2007), 827.
183 Bruce Boyd Raubern, “They’re Tryin’ to Wash Us Away: New Orleans Musicians Surviving
Katrina,”(Journal of American History, December 2007), 818.
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Although musicians from New Orleans have been displaced, brass bands are
thriving and continue to play throughout the city. The Soul Rebels kept their Thursday
night gig at La Bon Temps Roule. Even during the aftermath of Katrina, the members of
the band traveled from Houston every week to keep their New Orleans connection alive.
Many music clubs on Frenchmen Street, the edge of the French Quarter near New
Orleans Center for the Creative Arts (NOCCA), feature brass bands throughout the week.
A few of those clubs are the D.B.A. and The Blue Nile Nightclub. The Blue Nile has
featured Soul Rebels and, every Sunday night, the Sunday Night Brass. Brass bands have
gained a lot of attention from Katrina. One example is the HBO documentary, When the
Levees Broke by Spike Lee, which followed the Hot 8 Brass Band during the immediate
flooding of Katrina. Another film, Street Kings, was featured on the Documentary
Channel in 2011. Street Kings documents a battle of the most popular brass bands in New
Orleans sponsored by Red Bull.
Suggestions for Further Study
There are many avenues for future research of New Orleans brass bands.
Research is needed to provide the history and oral testimony of the specific bands of New
Orleans discussed in this essay. There are many more bands in New Orleans than were
mentioned and their repertoire can also be researched in more detail, as can the roles of
each instrumental section in the ensemble.
Spin-off bands have formed because of New Orleans brass band music. One such
band is Bonerama, which is not fully in the brass band instrumentation but includes four
trombones, a drum set, guitar, and sousaphone. The compositional style is similar to a
brass band’s, with the sousaphone playing the bass line, but with more of a rock-based
feel. Another area of research could trace the influence of New Orleans brass bands on
musicians from other countries, such as the Black Bottom Brass Band in Japan and the
Hurricane Brass Band in the Netherlands.
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APPENDIX A
LEMAR LEBLANC INTERVIEW
Lemar LeBlanc interview on March 16, 2010.
Can you tell me how the Soul Rebels Brass Band started and information about
your musical background?
Soul Rebels started in 1991. We started out as Young Olympia Brass Band. Most of the
guys met in high school and in college all from New Orleans. Majority of the band went
to St. Augusta High School, Forshades High School, and John McDonald High School.
We all went to different colleges and played in the high power, highly entertaining
marching bands in the Southwestern Athletic Conference (SWAC). The bands were
similar to those bands you would see in the movie “Drum Line.”
In the college bands we were able to polish and fine-tune what we had already learned in
elementary through high school band. We had great band directors in college Benjamin
Butler at Texas Southern University, Mr. Grimmer at Forshades, and Dr. Isaac Brady at
Southern University. Majority of the members that went to Augusta High School also
went to Texas Southern University. It was a plethora of well-trained band directors who
influenced us and showed us that music could be a way of life.
The members of the Soul Rebels came from two bands: Young Olympia and another
band that was started by one of the Neville brothers, Def Generation. That was around
1990-1991. Cyril Neville actually named us. He said we sounded like the soul rebels
from a Bob Marley song.
What popular music styles influence the Soul Rebels?
When we started the Soul Rebels we played more traditional tunes like the Olympia
Brass Band. The Olympia Brass Band is one of the most popular bands that plays
traditional repertoire. Although the Olympia Brass Band back in the 1950s and 60s
played with a lot of funk and R&B influence and then was also the most popular band.
Playing the tunes of Ray Charles and Little Richard that they arranged.
At the time Soul Rebels began, Public Enemy, Naughty by Nature, Digital Planet, and
Tribe Called Quest. We had that mixture of rap where all the colors in rap music where
visible and made to be picked from, it wasn’t just segmented towards gangsta rap. You
had positive and party-style hip-hop “Throw ya hands in the Air,” and the conscience
rappers like Tribe Called Quest and Public Enemy. The west coast scene was also around
then with the gangsta rap with the artist like Ice Cube and “NWA.” Along with all the
rap influenced mentioned there was also the heavy R&B influence. Our music was
basically reflective of that time. A lot of us also loved the music from the 1980s. Me,
myself loved The Doors, rock music. At the inception of Soul Rebels it was basically on
that accord. We were definitely influence by jazz artist like; Louis Armstrong, Wynton
Marsalis, Miles Davis, Coltrane all the greats. The jazz influence was there because we
are jazz artist.
As time went on we started to experiment with the music of Tchaikovsky, Beethoven,
Bach, and even a little country-western music. Curtis Watson brought some Calypso and
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that was influenced by Reggae. At that time, Reggae music was being played on the
airwaves in New Orleans.
How does popular music effect the style of Soul Rebels?
When we were in the black marching bands in high school and college, those bands
always played the music that was popular of that era because it engaged the crowd. The
people would not only come to football games to see the games but to watch the bands.
Sometimes people came to the games just to listen and watch the band.
The band had to know choreography of dance movements with the songs they would
play. Soul Rebels wanted to incorporate all of that in our music too. We are also
reflective in our attire and dress.
We still had the traditional and jazz side because we are jazz musicians, then sneak in our
influences of that time into our music. We reach from all different genres. Each member
of the Soul Rebels pulls from all of the music that each member has learned in our lives.
Now that we are older our musical library has gotten bigger. Everything from Earth,
Wind and Fire to Stevie Wonder, Arlen Oats, are tunes we might play from.
All the popular music and culture influence our band like stated before from music,
choreograph, and what we wear.
The college marching bands of the SWAC is a large base of our influence from
intonation, power, and dance steps. You can see a lot of Soul Rebels in what those bands
do.
What is the Soul Rebels compositional/creative process?
Original compositions are done like most originals from other artist like Quincy Jones
and others. One of the band members will come up with an idea and present it to the rest
of the band. We then push each other artistically by adding to the song and bring
something to the song. Just like any musical piece, because the person who came up with
the original idea, another band member may add something to the song that could touch
the masses of the people that the original composer didn’t necessarily put in the song.
That could be what the song is known by.
Therefore when I come up with a bass line or drum beat, I’ll throw it out there like a
baseball then another member will catch it and throw it to another member. The ball will
then be thrown to all the in-fielders and hopefully by the time it gets to home plate, it will
be a homerun. And will add on to that and that process will continue until the ideas have
developed into a song.
With the cover songs and arrangements, it’s a little easier. That is someone else’s song
and ideas and all we’re really doing is imitating and adding something else to it. The
foundation of the cover song has already been laid, then we put our own spin on it. It is
still has the original idea. You don’t want to disrespect any of the original’s composer’s
ideas. That is kind of the code of ethics with artist, we always respect each other’s
works.
Usually the compositions are created aurally. Will say what key the song will be in and
discuss the rhythms and then that will go from there.
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If one of our original compositions is going to be on a soundtrack or like when we went
to France, a large choir wanted to learn some of our songs. They asked for copies of the
charts. At that time is when we write the music on the staff. Other than that we operate
on the high level that we’re on.
What is the current music scene with the brass bands in New Orleans?
It’s just like sports. The personnel is constantly changing with brass bands.
When I first started the Olympia Brass Band and the Dirty Dozen were the two bands.
They were getting all of the high profile gigs and still playing some of the traditional
tunes that the members in those bands learned when they were younger. From these
band came the Rebirth Brass Band.
When we first started, we played tradition but now we do more rap, R&B, hip-hop.
Today, a lot of the younger bands don’t learn the traditional tunes. Soul Rebels basically
started playing all the traditional repertoire and we know all those tunes. All the way
back from Indiana, Lord, Lord, Lord, gospel tunes, and traditional Armstrong songs and
jazz artist songs, Bill Bailey, Sweet Georgia Brown. Those songs help to give you a solid
foundation, so that when you’re ready to the funk songs you are able to do so much with
them. A lot of the younger guys start off just at the funk songs. Which are Bb and do not
have chord changes therefore when they want to add something to the songs they are not
able to do it because they haven’t learned the basic and a good foundation.
Harold Dejan’s Olympia Brass Band was the first to play overseas, play at a Super Bowl,
featured in the film Live and Let Die. They played for the king and queen of England and
did it all.
For the Soul Rebels, Olympia is the standard then Dirty Dozen. Olympia is the standard
of how the brass bands became commercial.
Follow up Interview with Lemar LeBlanc conducted on May 31, 2011
Can you explain what the 2nd line beat is, and how do you incorporate it into the
Soul Rebels music?
The 2nd line beat basically at its most primitive role as an African beat. It has been
modernized and updated over the years from the early 1900s with an Afro/Cuban mixture
and also into the jazz era. So all that combined gives you the modern day second line
beat. The upbeat as we call it. It has like a big bang on it like, boom boom boom boomba, that drive beat, that dance beat. That’s that New Orleans second line dance beat.
At its rawest primitive form it came from Africa and Congo Square when slaves were
able to relax on Sundays and play their rhythms and dance and play like the would in
their more primitive homeland. You know how it is, America is like a melting pot, the
beat has incorporated all different kinds of rhythm form the Cuban influence, with the
jazz influence, and now you have what you have today.
In the Soul Rebels, we take (the 2nd line beat) from the tradition and mixed it with our
own innovative form of playing it. A lot of syncopated rhythms, a lot of hip-hop
rhythms, some R&B influence, so all of that is still in the music.
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How do you incorporate the 2nd line beat with the influence of the popular music?
Well, what you would do is, you’d take a pop song, like a Jay-Z song on a funk beat and
you would put in the double time with the cymbal and put in that little syncopated
African drive beat and mix. So you might have a Jay-Z song like (singing, New
York……) the Jay-Z song with Rihanna
It’s all about the feel.
How would you teach someone your music? Would it be aurally or through music
notation?
We can do it anyway. It ultimately has to be the feeling. And the feeling, you know it
can’t really be taught, it has to be more or less felt and learned and it comes part of you.
But you can only teach it to a certain degree. We can teach through a musical apparatus
or we can basically through a way all of the sheet music and teach it to you like a folk
tale, from one mouth to the other. From one hand signal, from one listening signal to the
other. We have the ability to do it both ways. The musicians in the band can read music.
The best way to start though, is probably without the music. Just giving a hands on
demonstration of what the music is. Then form there you can dissect it and go into each
individual’s learning style that works best for him. Some like to learn through reading
music, others like to just give it to me and I will try and work through it. It depends on
the individual.
But it’s best to start off just playing it without music and let a person hear it and feel it.
How would you describe the form of the music of the Soul Rebels?
4/4 time most of the time, it’s melodic. Most of the tunes have a melody and a bridge in
it. Then have an outro. Some have a turn around in it, sometimes it will modulate. We
utilized all the forms of music. We play all dynamics and articulation, we use it all.
The basic form of the music is usually, the tuba starts the tune off, the bass, the
foundation, the sousaphone. And then the drums come in and builds on top of that,
sometimes the drums can start. Usually it starts from the back row and then from there
you go on to the melody and the words which are emulated (imitated) by the trumpets
and saxophones and then trombones.
Then you have a solo after they play the head 2 times, about 16 measures. With the solo
you play a background behind the soloist. Then you go to another instrument’s turn to
solo. Usually the saxophone always starts first, then to a trombone and last is the trumpet.
Then you go back to the head then out.
Does the style of bounce hip-hop still exist in New Orleans?
Fortunately New Orleans has become a hip-hop Mecca like New York. You have Li’l
Wayne as you know is from New Orleans, he’s regarded as probably the top rapper in the
game right now. His style is New Orleans, but he’s brought a lot of attention to New
Orleans to now just be recognized as a “bounce” city. Bounce is an element of New
Orleans music that definitely plays to the subtleties of hip-hop. Meaning that is usually
young urban kids who are spitting out rhythms in a repetitive formatted rhythmatic way.
But, we have now been put on the map like a New York or California because of Master
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P and Cash Money, Li’l Wayne and all those other people. Bounce still exist, but we’re
like any other major urban city, we have Chris Brown, Nicki Minaj, that’s the main music
here too. The credence of it is like when the Essence Festival comes every 4th of July.
You have people from all over coming to Essence, but you have the influence of locals
who go to Essences and par-take in it. Rebirth and us are fortunate to play at it with the
top 10 artists around of the day.
Do you think the music of Li’l Wayne was influenced by the brass bands?
I think it was, he says it wasn’t and tries to totally distance himself from it. From what I
hear he doesn’t like to totally distance himself from brass bands and second line music.
His music and his style is all a part of brass band music.
Brass Bands were the first major superstar of New Orleans, it’s just that because our
music is so organic, meaning that it doesn’t use electricity, it don’t get the respect of it.
They were the first showmen before you had a Li’l Wayne, before you had a Master P.,
you had Louis Armstrong who was the first superstar. Armstrong brought some pizzazz
and some flavor to a music that was just. He brought his flavor of music and rhythms to
it. That’s all Li’l Wayne’s doing. LeBlanc sings a Li’l Wayne lyric. That’s still New
Orleans from his slang to his syntax in his words, and that come from the brass bands.
We’ve been doing it for years. So yes, I would have to say his style is a direct descendant
of New Orleans. That’s why it’s so popular. I mean that’s why I think it’s so appealing,
because people like to hear New Orleans people talk, our tempo, our rhythm, our food
and flavor. It’s all connected.
How has hip-hop music influenced the music of the Soul Rebels and other brass
bands?
Definitely by the popularity and the business side of it. You know Li’l Wayne is a worldrenown class act. You can’t just call and book him yourself; you must talk to his manager
and his team. So, that part is what has influenced the brass band. Specifically Soul
Rebels, we want to be respected like a major act like that. So you gotta have a team, we
have a manager, booking agent, and team that does all kind of things. You gotta have all
that when you want to be considered legitimate act. That’s what Li’l Wayne and Master P
have influenced on the brass bands, the business side of it.
Musically, I think obviously their music is good, and I like it, you know so I think we
both take from each other. Obviously they use more electronic things like a Triton
keyboard or whatever keyboard they’re using. I know sometimes the artist have a
tendency to go a little more organic, to kind of validate themselves with a live band. You
know that’s where we start from, so I would have to say we both trade off each other’s
styles.
Last time we discussed how the SWAC conference has influenced the Soul Rebels
with choreography in your songs.
College and high school marching bands are based on the military. What the black
colleges did, they incorporated more soul and pop music to make it more entertaining.
With me being a music person, I can enjoy a band just playing “Stars n Stripes” or
“March Grandiose” but the college person probably wouldn’t enjoy that as much. If you
just saw a military band coming out playing “……singing ………” I would enjoy it
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because I am into the music, I like to hear what the 1st baritone is doing, the trombone.
the black colleges put the R&B music, the soul and pop music so it would be little bit
more entertaining.
Can you elaborate more on why it’s important for the younger band to establish a
good foundation by learning the traditionals?
It’s like anything else, when something becomes so popular, capitalist society and market
it and make it into a selling commodity.
Brass band music is the same way. Cause we want to make the money Li’l Wayne makes,
but with that comes a certain commercializing of it. SO, when I was in the music it
wasn’t as commercial as it is now. So I was blessed to have the ability to learn the grass
roots music from Young Olympian Brass Band. That was our foundation. Its like you go
to work every day and you fix a car with a ratchet wrench or screw driver, but then five
years from now my son may fix the car with a power tool. That’s the way that has
happened to the music. Why should you have to learn use a crescent wrench when you
can just go straight to the power drill, and that’s what’s happening to the music. They
feel like that with the music and don’t learn the traditionals like Lord, Lord, Lord, Oh
Didn’t He Ramble; they just go straight to the pop songs. Because the consumer don’t
have time to intellectualize what it is. I like it, I want it, and that’s it. But, from a
musician’s standpoint you kind of have a duty to teach it and entertain at the same time, it
can’t hurt. That is why it’s important to learn the traditional because it teaches about the
music and the life of that time. Armstrong’s music reflected life of that time, so that’s a
history lesson in itself.
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APPENDIX B
ERIK JACOBSEN INTERVIEW
Erik Jacobsen, leader and sousaphone player of Mama Digdown’s Brass Band
Interview conducted on February 23, 2010.
Tell me about the background of Mama Digdown’s Brass Band.
I grew up in Minneapolis. When I was a sophomore in high school I had a teacher that
would go and listen to records everyday during lunch. He would play different records
and if the students listening to them liked them, they could borrow the records.
From there I jumped to the Rebirth Brass Band. I fell in love with the band when I was a
freshman at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, in the tuba studio. Eventually I
thought because I like brass band music so much, I should start my own brass band. A
couple of other guys in the school of music joined me in Madison and we started Mama
Digdown’s Brass Band. Through word of mouth we found other players. There were 3
or 4 music majors, and about 4 guys who were not music majors. We got everyone
together and “we crashed this art fair,” called Art Fair in the Square in Madison. We
went on the street and played, the people loved what we were doing. From that point on
we started booking gigs.
One thing that we never did was use sheet music, and that is true until the present. All of
us can read music but the brass bands of New Orleans don’t use sheet music. I feel like
sheet music stops people from listening to each other and New Orleans brass band style is
real dependent on that idea. We just got used to picking up riffs from other bands or riffs
from the radio. It’s important because the tradition of brass bands in New Orleans in
aural. Out of the couple of hundred songs we know there may be about five that have
been created through the lead line written down on sheet music.
Playing in the second line parades is pertinent to new music being created. During the
parades, a trombone player might come up with a 4-16 bar phrase and then the whole
band joins in and plays the riff together. Once that is completed, one of the trumpet
players may play something and the band picks up on that and plays that melody. Most
of the band’s primary activities is to play in the second line parades. A lot of the music
during these parades is creating the songs “on the spot.” Therefore, no one brings charts
along on the second line parades.
What are other elements of the brass band tradition in Mama Digdown’s?
There are few brass band in New Orleans that have a static membership, like the Soul
Rebels, Rebirth (within a year or two they will have basically the same members). Most
of the brass bands in New Orleans have a different membership. It is kind of whoever is
available can will play. Rotating list of musicians that play with all the brass bands.
Most of the brass bands all play pretty similar repertoire. The repertoire relies largely on
Rebirth songs because they have great composers in the band and they are the most
popular brass band. Mixed in with a lot of Dirty Dozen songs. These songs have become
standards that people know.
We have made a big point in Mama Digdown’s to learn all the standard repertoire. We
learned all the brass band songs that are recorded, and when we’re down there we try to
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learn all the new songs we hear. Therefore, we are trying to stay current. So, if we go to
New Orleans we can sit in with bands because we know the songs.
Overall, we have had about 30 something players to play in and out of Mama Digdown’s.
Members to move on to different things or to go to other projects or have moved on to
Younblood. If we have a gig and we need a sub, we have a list of guys to choose from.
Since we have a pretty long list songs to choose from and they can learn the new ones as
we go along.
Who are the traditional brass bands?
There is a continuum of brass bands in New Orleans. Treme. Algiers Brass Band, and
the Storyville Stompers Brass Band. Craig Klein, trombone player in Bonerama, he leads
the Storyville Stompers. In the middle is the New Birth Brass Band. On the other end are
Rebirth and the Soul Rebels.
Everyone can play the traditional repertoire. Soul Rebels and Rebirth don’t play it as
much because that is not there main concentration. But, they can play it and it will sound
good. On the other hand the Paulin Brothers and New Birth Brass Bands knows the
traditional repertoire and will play it if there is a funeral or a second line parade for the
tourist. The tourists want to hear the traditional stuff.
There about 20 traditional songs that everybody knows, even if you are in a funk band. If
it is anything more than that it will probably be one of the more traditional bands because
they will dig deep into the repertoire. All the brass band do have their original
compositions even the traditional bands. Treme has a song, Gimme My Money Back,
New Birth Brass Band has a song called, Caribbean Second Line, and the Soul Rebels
song Let Your Mind Be Free. All these songs have became standards and everybody
knows those songs. Then the Rebirth Brass Band have many songs that have become
standards. There are also a lot of “Pop” songs that have become standards.
That is what brass bands have always done. When the brass bands were playing at the
turn of the century they were playing the popular songs of the day. The ragtime,
marches, spirituals, and all the way through the Olympia Brass Band adding R&B with a
shuffle beat they added, and then the Dirty Dozen playing popular music. Dirty Dozen in
the 1970’s, Rebirth in the 1980’s, Soul Rebels in the 1990’s, Hot 8 now.
What are the brass bands playing in the clubs?
There is not a lot of separation between the band and the audience. The band will start
playing and the crowd will start singing along or cheering and the two are in it together.
There is a function for the band to play songs that people know. So, they take the stuff
off the radio because that is the songs that will get the crowd going, because it is the
songs the crowd knows. A lot of ways the brass bands are like jukebox. Whatever is
current on the radio that is what they are doing.
What are examples of the repertoire of the turn of the twentieth century brass
bands?
The song “High Society” brass bands still play that today. It is a standard march, like a
Sousa march. It has a trio section and a dog-fight, all the standard sections of a march. It
seems more written. Example: 1st trombone part, 2nd trombone part, it sounds more
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orchestrated. There are some guys that will improvise over the parts, but it is more like a
small marching band type of a song.
The marches of the turn of the century, the bands would loosen it up with their
background coming from a black church and knowing spirituals and gospel. Put that beat
to it boom, boom, boom, boom-ba, in the bass drum, then you have that second line
rhythm or beat.
What are your thoughts on brass bands developing outside of New Orleans?
There’s a couple of different impulses going on. First of all you have all these guys that
play in bands and popular music and funk appeals to them. If you play guitar you can
join a rock band. If you play trombone or tuba what else are you gonna do?
With Mama Digdown’s, we want to be just a solid, well-rounded New Orleans style brass
band. We haven’t really set out to purposefully incorporate new kinds of music in to our
sound. I don’t think one could say that Mama Digdown’s is breaking any ground with
our music, other than the fact that we are a bunch of white guys who are really good at it.
We are not creating something new like YBB. With YBB there is conscience thinking
about how they are going to push the brass band farther or in a different direction than it
has gone before.
Brass band musicians don’t make the best jazz musicians and vice versa. It just depends
on who is in the band and what flavor they want to make.
How does Youngblood Brass Band break away from Mama Digdown’s Brass Band?
Ben McIntosh joined Mama Digdown’s. Ben and Nat McIntosh, Dave Skogan, Charlie
Wagner, and Joe Goltz had a band called “One Lard Biskit.” Ben was playing with us at
the time and the rest of the guys would come to our shows and hang out with us. When
Ben went to college Nat started to play trombone in the band. Dave Skogen would play
with the band from time to time. Then when our snare player left we asked Dave to take
his place. Dave and Nat were still in high school at the time and another kid Moses
Patrou who was in high school as well along with a slightly older guy Mike Bowman (in
YBB now).
So, at one point we had four members of YBB in the band who had all started with us
when they were in high school. We all went to New Orleans with these guys. At some
point the four guys in One Lard Biskit came to us and wanted to leave Mama Digdown’s.
They want to take their idea they had for their own band and go hard-core. Go in a hiphop direction and try to take it on the road and devote all their time towards the project.
At the inception of YBB the members were playing in both bands. There still are some
of the members who play with us and when they go on the road we have other subs to
call. Sometimes I will sub with them if their tuba player cannot make it. I subbed for
them on a few shows in France.
There are also brass bands that have started here in Madison because of what we started.
There is a new brass band that is starting to play a lot of shows called “The New
Tradition Brass Band”. We have some of their musicians come and sub with us as well
too. It is like a little scene that replenishes itself.
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Sugartone Brass Band in New York, four guys that started that band used to play in
Mama Digdown’s. Kenny is a tuba player that played in YBB after Nat left for a while
and is playing with them. It is like a transplant band that stemmed from us in New York.
Sometimes that band and musicians will sub with each other.
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APPENDIX C
JORDAN COHEN INTERVIEW
Below is an email response to an interview question about Jordan Cohen and his
activities with Mama Digdown’s Brass Band. The interview took place in August 24,
2010.
Tell me about your music background and experience with Mama Digdown’s
Hi Matthew,
I started playing with Digdown in 2002, when Evan left to study abroad for a year. He
asked if I had ever thought about playing snare drum in a brass band, to which I answered
"yes" because I had heard a couple of recordings of Rebirth Brass Band ("We Come to
Party" and their appearance on Maceo Parker's "Southern Exposure" album, both in high
school) and was intrigued. When Evan returned in a year, I switched to bass drum.
Learning to play second line music in a convincing & authentic style without growing up
in New Orleans took years and many, many hours of listening and playing. It was
indispensable to have people like Jeff Maddern in the band, who had lived in New
Orleans and played in the Hot 8, and who was able to say when the music didn't feel right
and encourage us to get there. We went to New Orleans a couple times a year and
listened to as many bands as we could, which was valuable, but in my opinion it takes
immersion to really learn to play the music.
The New Orleans brass band scene is so localized, and the information doesn't really get
disseminated outside of New Orleans. For example, with other styles of music (we'll say
salsa music), there are masters of the style living all over the world, as well as books,
videos, etc. With New Orleans second line music, the harmonic & rhythmic ingredients
are deceptively simple, what you do with them is what makes the music come alive (one
could call this "style" or "fire"). The kids down there grow up with it, so they have years
of immersion in the style. For us to simulate that, we have to listen to lots and lots
recordings, both studio albums and bootlegs. Things really got a lot easier with the
emergence of Youtube. At first there was only tiny handful of second line videos, but
now there is a wealth of great footage available (thanks to second line documenters like
"BigRedCotton").
There is also a lot of friendly competition between musicians and bands there, and in my
opinion that's a big part of why the music sounds the way that it sounds. All the
musicians in Digdown have had some similar experiences in New Orleans, and I think
that comes from the musicians down there wanting us to respect the music and do it
justice.
I haven't seen bands from any other part of the world make as much of an effort to
immerse themselves in second line music, or to absorb it as thoroughly as some of the
musicians in Digdown and Youngblood. I think that's because they don't have the benefit
of people like Erik, Roc, and Jeff, who place great value on being able to sound like a
New Orleans band and on the educational process needed to accomplish that.
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Follow up questions to the initial email.
1) Can you describe what the 2nd line beat is?
There isn't one second line beat. Broadly speaking, I'd say it involves two different clave
patterns & their interplay. One would be two dotted quarter notes followed by a quarter
note, and the other is five dotted eighth notes starting on the "&" of 1. But these don't
necessarily have to be explicitly stated, and there are a ton of variations based on an
awareness of these claves. Another important element is an accent on the last upbeat of
the phrase, but again, it's not a hard & fast rule.
2) How are the 2nd line beats and rhythms incorporated into the music of brass
bands today in New Orleans and Mama Digdown’s?
It's the heart of the music. In Digdown, even though we don't get a chance to play real
second line parades, we try not to play any rhythms that wouldn't work in a second line
parade.
3) As popular music influences the output of brass bands music, is the 2nd line feel
still there? If so, describe how?
The second line feel is definitely maintained by all of the young brass bands. Even when
they play modern hip-hop or R&B songs, they adapt them to the feel & structure of
second line music. Here's an example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hBZ0PatzRo8
We try to do the same thing when we do arrangements of popular songs (Michael
Jackson, New Edition, Terence Trent d'Arby, whoever).
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APPENDIX D
DAVID SKOGEN INTERVIEW
Interview Questions for David Skogen of Youngblood Brass Band.
1) I know the band formed with a majority of you going to the same high school,
could you tell me more about the formation of the band?
The McIntosh brothers (Nat and Ben) moved to Oregon, WI in 1994. Around that time,
Mama Digdown’s Brass Band got started in Madison. I was familiar with Mama
Digdown’s through my drum teacher (who played with the band) and soon Ben McIntosh
was playing trombone with them. We decided to start a brass band of our own in 1995,
and at the time it was all Oregon High School kids. Within a year or two, it had branched
out to include Joe Goltz (trombone), Charley Wagner (trumpet), and Carl Bartsch (tenor
saxophone), who all attended Monroe High School, and hour to the south. Joe and
Charley still play with the band. Most of us had met in the Wisconsin Youth Symphony
Orchestra, strangely.
2) Can you tell me about your music background?
I started playing cello in 4th grade with the school orchestra. I started playing percussion
in the school band in 5th grade. I continued on both. I joined the Wisconsin Youth
Symphony Orchestra in 7th grade and the Oregon Marching Band in 8th grade, which
were my two first serious musical experiences, both of which pushed me to try harder and
taught me a little something about work ethic and community building. I started studying
West African music and New Orleans brass band music at about 13, and at 15 was sitting
in with Mama Digdown’s and helping form what would later become Youngblood. By
this time I was interested in Cuban, Brazilian and Jazz music, and was also really
enjoying drum-line. I soon found my way to hip-hop culture and punk rock, though a
little later than most (I was 17-18 by this time), because I had occupied most of my time
with classical music, marching music, and the music of the African diaspora. I didn’t
know it at the time, but I was unconsciously studying music in a very chronological way.
I was lucky to have the teachers I had (and the community around me) to push in these
directions.
3) Were you inspired by New Orleans bands? If so, how (were you inspired by the
New Orleans brass bands)?
Of course. They were the only brass bands we listened to. We spent at least the first 5
years of our existence studying, traveling to New Orleans, befriending, playing along,
copying, trying, failing, trying again to do what they were doing, and the elusive
character was the gravity of the music, the groove, the fire…things that have nothing to
do with playing notes well. The New Orleans bands that helped us out at the time were
incredibly gracious (and patient) with us, most notably the Hot 8. It should be noted as
well that many of our first trips to New Orleans were with Mama Digdown’s, who gave
us the model of how serious one had to be about attempting to represent this culture
accurately, or at the very least not misappropriating it.
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4) Were there specific brass bands you started imitating at first or did YBB come up
with their own sound?
As stated before, we spent most of our youth imitating New Orleans bands. Rebirth, Dirty
Dozen, Soul Rebels, Pinstripes, Paulin Bros., Young Olympians. That being said, at the
same time we were trying to write original tunes. We didn’t really focus on having our
own specific sound until about 1999, with the Unlearn album. We realized that if all we
did was imitate, we would always be a step behind the New Orleans bands, and that we
were doing ourselves a disservice by not incorporating the other genres of music that so
moved us, like hip-hop, punk, jazz, Brazilian. I do still think, though, that if a musician
deigns to get involved in the performance of a primarily folkloric, indigenous music,
there is a degree of immersion that needs to take place, and ‘doing your homework’ is
totally vital. Most people believe that just because they might be good musicians, that
they play their instruments well, and can copy what notes other people play, that they can
likewise copy someone else’s music accurately, or add to a tradition without any real
understanding or emotional commitment to that tradition. I would disagree…but I have
no idea where that line is, and I’m certainly not the arbiter of any tradition, most
especially New Orleans brass band music. I’m an admirer.
5) What separates YBB from other brass bands playing in the N.O. brass band
tradition?
I don’t think we sound much like a New Orleans brass band, and I wouldn’t say that
Youngblood is part of the New Orleans brass band tradition. Our players tend more
towards jazz experimentation and improvisation, and our attitude/performance aesthetic
tends more towards hip-hop and rock. Our instrumentation is that of a New Orleans brass
band, and we tend to play one or two New Orleans tunes in a set, but it’s more in
homage. We cut our teeth studying New Orleans music, which is the reason I think we
can have our instrumentation without sounding novel or kitschy. New Orleans brass band
music is what taught us how to groove and rock a beat with this particular set-up, but we
are not a New Orleans brass band.
6) Off what styles and genres is the YBB’s music based?
Anything our members/writers enjoy. We don’t have any rules in that regard.
7) What popular music groups and artist inspires YBB?
See answer to question #6. We have 9-10 members in the band, with very different
musical tastes, so it would be disingenuous for me to simply list my current favorite
artists. It can safely be said that most of the music we look to for inspiration comes not
from brass music whatsoever. Sample-based music, experimental music, hip-hop, music
with guitars, these are the places where the boundaries of music are currently being
pushed.
8) What are some of the traditional elements that can be heard in YBB that are like
the traditional styles heard in the New Orleans brass band beginnings?
Having two drummers: one on snare, one on bass drum; the inclusion of sousaphone; the
frequent use of call-and-response in songwriting, which one could attribute to gospel, or
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trace all the way back to Africa. Also, hopefully, that specific kind of raw energy that
pervades New Orleans music.
9) Do you think the style of New Orleans Brass Band has become a genre that stands
alone with the growing popularity of brass bands playing in the style all over the
world?
I’m not sure what you mean. Do I think that New Orleans brass band music is an utterly
distinct, vital, and essential contribution to the worldwide musical conversation?
Certainly. Do I think New Orleans brass band music is more popular now than it was 30
years ago? I have no idea. Do I think that Youngblood has contributed to a greater
awareness of New Orleans brass band music? I would hope so, but I have no idea.
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APPENDIX E
NAT MCINTOSH INTERVIEW
Interview Questions for Nat McIntosh of Youngblood Brass Band, received on
February 19, 2010.
1) I know the band formed with a majority of you going to the same high school,
could you tell me more about the formation of the band?
The band started during my sophomore year of high school at Oregon High. My brother
and I were itching to put together some kind of group and we’d both been listening to a
lot of Dirty Dozen and Rebirth, so a brass band seemed the obvious way to go. We
talked all of our friends into it by playing them a recording of Maceo Parker and the
Rebirth brass band playing “Mercy Mercy Mercy”. That was about the funkiest thing any
of us had heard up to that point. We started out covering other brass bands’ music
exclusively but after a while I tried my hand at writing and we started to develop our own
sound. Our first gigs were playing pep band for basketball games but eventually we
started opening up for our friends’ bands for free and worked our way up to paying gigs.
2) Tell me about your music background.
I’ve been a tuba player since I was 10, and I’ve always been really into it. I only got fully
hooked when I first heard brass band music though. I always liked loud, intense,
danceable music but could never find a way to play that sort of music on tuba. When I
was 13 my mom put on a Dirty Dozen record in the other room while I was playing video
games, and I was grooving on the music for four tunes before I even noticed that the
funky bass player was a sousaphonist. That was it for me.
3) Were you inspired by New Orleans bands? If so, how (were you inspired by the
New Orleans brass bands)?
Pretty much answered that one above I guess
4) Were there specific brass bands you started imitating at first or did YBB come up
with their own sound?
Like I said above, in the very early days we played a lot of Dirty Dozen tunes, but we
eventually moved on to the Rebirth Sound, their “Rollin” album being a particular
favorite, and more recently have been most interested in another group called the Soul
Rebels, a group which incorporates a lot of hip hop and a really intense, unstoppable live
show into the mix. They’re still my favorite brass band.
5) What separates YBB from other brass bands playing in the N.O. brass band
tradition?
I guess it’s our influences. The band has a lot of different tastes and approaches and they
all make their way into the final product in some way or another. Dave’s multicultural
drum training has certainly made a difference. And I suppose my extended techniques
help make the band stand out as a fresh voice in the brass band scene
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6) Off what styles and genres is the YBB’s music is based?
Mostly New Orleans street funk but with lots of afro-cuban and brazilian elements, 70’s
soul sounds, thought-provoking conscious hip-hop, basically anything that rocks
7) What popular music groups and artist inspires YBB?
I’ve been inspired a lot by artists like Frank Zappa and Michael Jackson and Rage
Against the Machine and Jerseyband and Tied and Tickled Trio, Squarepusher, the Roots,
Carlinhos Brown, Hermeto Pascoal. Everyone in the group has their own influences
though. My brother Ben loves 80s music so he was constantly quoting Take On Me or
She’s a Maneater during his solos.
8) What are some of the traditional elements that can be heard in YBB that are like
the traditional styles heard in the New Orleans brass band beginnings?
The instrumentation is the most notable one. In spite of playing some pretty different
music and taking some liberties with the standard way of playing some of these
instruments, we’re still dealing with trumpets, trombones, saxophones, drums and tubas
here. That’s as traditional as it gets, unless we had a clarinet in the band. But we’ve
found that we’re able to create some unique and interesting sounds with these old
instruments, particularly the bass drum/snare drum combination. And we still try to keep
a few New Orleans traditionals in our catalogue to remember where it all came from.
9) Do you think the style of New Orleans Brass Band has become a genre that stands
alone with the growing popularity of brass bands playing in the style all over the
world?
Not yet and possibly never. Bands without singers never get very popular, and a band
with no singer AND no guitarist? Forget about it. The Dirty Dozen has taken It about as
far as they can go by attaching themselves to the Jam Band scene, and they had to do it at
the expense of their music and their authenticity. I don’t think we’ll ever see a brass band
video on TRL but if we do I hope it’s a YoungBlood one.
10) What extended techniques do you use to improvise beats on the Sousaphone?
What sounds are you trying to imitate? In what ways did you decide to imitate
those specific sounds and why did you use the specific techniques to accomplish
that?
Most of my extended techniques have no names because to the best of my knowledge I’m
the only one who does them, but the main preexisting one is called multiphonics. That’s
where I play a note and sing a note at the same time to harmonize with myself. The hard
version of that technique is what I call independent multiphonics, which is where you
play a bassline and sing a melody on top. All of the high pitched, tweety sounds are my
scratch sounds, which are mostly in imitation of cuts and scratches a hip hop DJ makes. I
do those both by singing high and by playing high into the horn and tonguing really fast
and rhythmically. I also make a distorted sound that I call cosmic bass where I change
the shape of my mouth cavity to put a flange-style effect on the notes, which can be
augmented by doing multiphonics with it and making different vowel sounds with the
voice, which flanges the sound more. I’m a fan of authentic extended techniques that you
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can produce by yourself as opposed to pedals or mic manipulation to make it sound
different. That said, I would love to play around with a boomerang pedal someday so I
can loop myself. That would be pretty awesome.
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APPENDIX F
CHISTOPHER OHLY ITERVIEW
Christopher Ohly, saxophone player for Mama Digdown’s Brass band, interviewed on
November 15, 2010.
What is your background in music?
Dad plays piano and my mom is an opera singer.
Piano lessons, elementary music and public schools.
UW Madison School of Music
How did Mama Digdown’s Brass Band begin?
Erik and I are the founders of the band. Erik and I were friends at UW Madison, School
of Music, and we were playing in a band called, Black Tech Davies together. He
introduced me to the Dirty Dozen Brass Band around 1991 or 92. That was something
he knew about being a tuba/sousaphone player, he was real interested in finding
music/bands that incorporated his instrument in the music. Then that led to Rebirth and
their music.
We thought why don’t we do something like that. So then we got more serious about it
and brainstormed for a name of a band and eventually by the spring of 1993 Mama
Digdown’s was it.
How does Mama Digdown’s incorporate the New Orleans sound and style into their
music?
New Orleans brass band music is something that is unique and has gotten a lot of
attention in the past years and especially very recent years since the levees broke and
Hurricane and the TV show Treme. It is over a hundred year tradition and we are just
trying to be a part of that by doing what we can to understand it, grow from it, and try to
learn from that every time we play.
It was a long maturation process. We didn’t really get the music until we started going
down there and meeting and becoming friends with the people who actually live this. We
play it, we represent it the best we can. I think we do a pretty good job as compared to
other brass bands I’ve heard that aren’t from New Orleans. But, it is something that is
part of a culture that we didn’t grow up in so we’re just trying to do our best.
My playing has evolved into that. I studied jazz studies, chord changes, and all the
different things that were more the classical jazz. Playing brass band music is really what
I have evolved into as a saxophone player. I don’t really have any more tricks. I really
kind of enjoy playing that way and that is really what I am best suited for as well.
Can you give me an example of one of Mama Digdown’s composition and relate it
the New Orleans brass band music in terms of form, style, and technique?
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Again, the brass band tradition is something of its own and we are playing off of that.
Some of the elements that people relate to it from Dirty Dozens music. They brought it
from the old tradition to the more modern by playing pop songs and funk songs and R&B
tunes.
We play tunes of traditional repertoire. Songs like Bill Bailey, What a Wonderful World
and brass band classics.
On our latest album, we have a Terrance Trent Darby song, Sign Your Name. Its not a
recent pop tune, but it’s a pop tune that was done a few years ago. When we play it as a
brass band; the trumpets play the melody and counter melodies, the trombone play a large
role in forcing that sound of the shout chorus.
Part of what a brass band does is that there is a standard form. Play head charts, then you
have background or solo sections and maybe some break down sections. Within those
backgrounds you’re quoting other songs. That tune, Sign Your Name quotes a Backstreet
song in the background over the same changes. Brass bands do that (quote other tunes),
they do it all the time. That’s just what it is. We play a Michael Jackson song, which is
something we are working on right now for a new album.
What’s the brass band scene like in Madison with Mama Digdown’s and
Youngblood being so popular?
The formation of brass bands itself happened. Therefore, that has enabled to have subs
for the bands. There anywhere from 20-30 guys to find musicians for a gig because they
have all played with us or have their own band.
other bands:
King Pin Brass Band (Milwaukee)
New Tradition Brass Band (Madison)
BS Brass Band (Chicago)
Jack Brass Band (Minneapolis)
The interesting thing is the development of brass band in the high schools. There is a
brass band elective in a few area Madison schools at one point. Brass Band music is the
garage band version for horn players. It is the grease and the dirt and getting gritty and
having fun. Of course the groove is there.
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APPENDIX G
CHARLES WAGNER INTERVIEW
Charles Wagner phone interview in Coralville, Iowa February 20, 2010.
I know the band formed with a majority of you going to the same high school, could
you tell me more about the formation of the band?
Originally the band started in Oregon, WI and that was were the leaders of the band, Nat
McIntosh and Dave Skogen went to High School. I wasn’t there for the initial talks of
getting the band together. I am from Monroe High School that is about an hour south of
Madison, WI and about 45 minutes south of Oregon High School. I along with a
saxophone player (Carl) Bartsch, who played on The Word on the Street album, and Joe
Goltz. I met Dave and Nat at an honor band playing classical music. I was sitting there
during a break and the guys were in the back kind of jamming. Dave Skogen and Nat
and other were jamming and playing rudimentary stuff and Dave asked if, “you would
like to come back here and jam.” Dave S. knew me from Wisconsin Youth Symphony
Orchestra.
I was 17, Dave was probably 14 or 15, and Nat was about the same age, maybe a year
older than Dave. That is how I met the guys and that is what got me into the band. Carl
and Joe joined a little bit after that. That is basically how the band got together. After we
went through a little bit of membership turmoil; people graduating from high school or a
few years later and some people left to go do other things. The majority of the guys went
to University of Wisconsin in Madison or U of W Plattville. All those guys stayed in the
band and things progressed from there.
What is your music background?
I have an undergraduate degree in classical trumpet performance U of W Madison and a
master degree in classical performance from Duquesne University in Pittsburg. I alone
have always been focused in classical music while receiving a scholarship to Wisconsin
and do Duquesne and already a beginning career in orchestra. I was in a small orchestra
out of the Pittsburg area and Columbus Symphony. Up until a few years ago I still
played in the orchestras until I decided to do the “jazz thing” which is what I always
really loved listening to but never did any jazz studies besides playing in big bands at the
universities. I decided it was time to study improvisation before I got too old.
How were you inspired by N.O. brass bands?
Listening to CD’s, this is literally what the McIntosh brother did while living in Colorado
before moving to Wisconsin. Dave was a killer drummer, pretty much born to drum
basically, he started to get gigs real early on and he was particularly influenced by a guy
named (Matt Ravenport). He is on the One Marked Bisquit Album. He was kind of
Dave’s mentor early on and still is till today. Ravenport came and did an African
drumming class and Dave was really struck by the style. This would get Dave introduced
to the Mama Digdown’s Brass Band which was our main influence here in town and
opened our eyes to the greater musical tradition of New Orleans brass band. Dave started
playing gigs with Mama Digdown’s and hanging out and found out that there are other
people who listen to this style of music. If Mama Digdown’s Brass Band did not exist we
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would not probably not exist. YBB may exist but wouldn’t have the ties to the music
early on in our formative years.
After Youngblood got older and more experienced, we quickly realized that we wanted to
a different direction. Mama Digdown’s is a quality sound brass band but stick to more of
the traditional New Orleans style, the current on the street sound of New Orleans.
Therefore we owe that to them and respect them highly.
Whenever we do a cover song or traditional New Orleans street song we are showing our
respect to the tradition and we owe that to Mama Digdown’s B.B.
What were the specific brass bands Youngblood imitated? What makes Youngblood
different?
Early on we were doing all Rebirth Brass Band covers and arrangement of Super Mario
theme song, pretty much pep-band stuff. Because most of the band was under 18 and
couldn’t get into any clubs and play we were pretty much a glorified pep-band. The
Oregon pep-band would only play the first half of their basketball games and the others
in the band would show up would wait for the school band to quit, then we would sit in
the stands and play and “Thank God” nobody told us to stop. Played cover tunes at the
games like Chameleon and Mercy Mercy. Then started playing some of the early stuff
from Rebirth Brass Band.
We agreed early on they we don’t want to be a cover band or New Orleans brass band
and that is what has made Youngblood today going musically. Soon after we started
playing covers of tunes that were not brass band songs. Thanks to Nat, he was always
able to just write the stuff in his head. We would learn about 3 tunes at time in a
rehearsal rather than struggling to arranged a song. That’s how we do it, oral tradition.
Quickly we discovered that we didn’t want to do all the same old tunes. Doing bad
versions of New Orleans music. Frankly, we are not from the south, and New Orleans
brass band music is directly related to the African Diaspora and slavery and we're not
black guys. We will of course honor this music and play it from time to time but we’re
not going to just do what they do because we are from 17 hours north of New Orleans,
we’re gonna do our own thing.
Where did the name Youngblood Brass Band come from? How did hip-hop get
incorporated into the band’s repertoire?
Moses (our bass drummer for Word on the Street and on Unlearn), his old girlfriends
decided that we should be Youngblood because we were young and had some fire in our
blood. At that time it is a mental shift for us and we decided we do not want to do the
normal thing. We were all listening to hip-hop back then. The hip-hop stuff was huge,
started listening to the The Roots, Buckshot Lefonque, and Busta Rhymes. That was
really the music that was speaking to us. Just part of our generation, and decided it was
time to put that in to our music. At the same time Dave started to realize that he was a
writer. Dave decided, “why wouldn’t I rap” or at least spoken words over the hip-hop.
This happened around 1997-98. At that time we were getting better and we had some
upgrades in the band. Played some shows in Madison and noticed the crowds were in to
it. We noticed that crowds would come back and see us and getting bigger. Ends with a
culmination this to the album in Center; Level; Roar; with all originals and just a few
cover tunes.
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Is that a Riot: first project without Nat being a part of it. It was kind of an unfocused
album with a wide variety of tunes, which I think is actually preferable because it
represents the full personality of the band. Each individual is able to contribute and we
have all gotten old enough to where we actually have competent writers, other than just
Nat. You hear a lot more jazz influence, drum and bass type stuff, New Orleans
influence, and a gospel tune cover that is the last tune on the album. The tuba player at
that time came up with that with his Gospel background. He conducts a huge gospel
choir in Brooklyn.
What are the styles and genres YBB’s music is based off of?
Let’s just take Is That a Riot as an example. The track Is That a Riot, after listening to
about the first minute of it, you think it is definitely a brass band tune. It is standard
form, with some hype introduction and trombone sax trio stuff. I wrote it purposefully not
to be normal sounding. There is nothing really ripped off just written in a standard form.
Standard in a sense, like Rebirth Brass Band and Soul Rebels Brass Band. Another tune I
wrote was JEM.
JEM was written at a time in my life when I was feeling a little blue. I was sitting down
at the piano and came up with an interesting chord progression. I call it a cappella horns.
I thought why not write an a cappella Bjork sounding, strange, fluid moving little horn
chorale. I kind of like that stuff being more a classically trained musician and
Youngblood being kind of loud band it worked well as a contrast to what we do. I also
thought with the well-rounded musicians with nice tones in the band, we could make the
tune sound good. We can get the drums out of there for a track and play that. It has
some counterpoint in there but I really didn’t think about it in terms of composition
standpoint I just put down what I thought sounded good. The other tune I wrote on this
album was Dead Man Stomping.
It is hip-hop. It has a verses about 2/3 of it and ends with kind of a contrapuntal sounding
ending and some big huge kind of explosion stuff at the end. The actual music of it is all
basically in 6/4 meter. I left the drum writing up to Dave because he is gonna do a better
job. Stuff I like to listen to in general, jazz especially is stuff that is really fully
harmonized, lots of voices, like Wynton Marsalis. I love Wynton Marsalis. I love things
that are harmonized to the max, and that is how I tend to write.
The last thing I will say about Youngblood’s music in general is that: “Is that a Riot”
kind of suffered from not having Nat around because he is a master of form. Nat loves
pop music, Michael Jackson, Madonna; he thinks in terms of Pop writing. That is why
the tunes on “Center: Level: Roar” are so affective. We definitely made a conscious
effort to get away from some of that. Some of the music is kind of rambling and seems
unfocused from how people are used to hearing Youngblood sounding traditionally. It
was a way for us to reflect our collective muscle and show a different side of the band.
We think of things kind of blunt because we are mic-ed because of the vocals. In a live
show we think of the audience and try to mix it up. Maybe start loud then go to a soft
song, another loud song and even a super loud song. We don’t apologize for not being
able to reproduce our albums live exactly how you hear them on the CD, we’re not Bon
Jovi with a Grammy award winning sound guy.
Do you think the style of New Orleans Brass Band has become a genre that stands
alone with the growing popularity of brass bands playing in the style all over the
world?
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Well, that’s a good question. My short answer is no because really and truthfully no one
knows about New Orleans Brass Bands. If that hurricane hadn’t happened nobody would
know about New Orleans music. People know that city like the south side of Chicago
referring to the crime rate and things related. Of course every city has a bar that plays
New Orleans style of music.
We have traveled to 48 states; we haven’t been to Alaska and Hawaii. We show up and
people haven’t even conceived of what is going on, on stage. They know what a tuba or
a sousaphone is but the have only thought of what our band does in terms of marching
band. People started to pay more attention we included influence of hip-hop and funk.
We want the crowds to dance, point blank.
The show is supposed to be fun and for people to dance and that is the main thing that
ties us into New Orleans brass band tradition. It’s organic music; people making real
sounds, playing real instruments, without electronic instrument like keyboards and
synthesizers.
In this country it doesn’t matter what the instrument if it is something you like then
people can probably get into it.
New Orleans music is not really influencing American music. When the hurricane
happened there were tunes that showed up with horns in the mix, as part of the beats.
People in this country celebrate Mardi Gras and that is the true extent to what this country
relates to New Orleans music.
When you go to Europe it’s a little rosier because Europe doesn’t judge the people
playing the music. It’s like when some of the first jazz musicians traveled to Europe they
felt like a normal person and not being judged by the color of their skin.
The difference between us and the other New Orleans bands is that we don’t try to act
like from New Orleans or the south. YBB takes pride in is that we want to make sure that
New Orleans brass bands are given their due respect as being different and being the
originator within that culture of where it comes from. Youngblood doesn’t usually like to
march around when we do gigs. We say the YBB is a brass band that plays on stage. We
want to get as much sound as we can get and we want to be “F-ing” loud and were gonna
play hip-hop and you can’t rap without a microphone. We try to have as little novelty
and cache as we can. When New Orleans bands goes over seas they can choose. They
can say, “ were being hired to play New Orleans music, so they will play older sounding
more traditional music. And some band like Hot 8 and Soul Rebels will play a little more
updated music, heavier in funk and hip-hop influence music. The nice thing over in
Europe is that they accept you for what you bring.
Follow-up interview February 24, 2012
Discuss Nat McIntosh’s compositional process and how he taught the parts to the
band members.
CW: It’s in the aural tradition; the way that people has been teaching music to each other
forever. You play it and they play it back until you figure out your parts. Its call and
response. He’s got it all in his brain. For example, if eight of us are sitting in a rehearsal
somewhere. Nat will say okay, trumpets come over to the corner here. Then he will teach
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the first trumpet their part then to the second trumpet. He will teach the parts by playing it
on his tuba then to the individuals. You just do it by repetition and Nat just sits there until
the player has learned the part. The better the person’s ear, the faster they learn the part
and the faster the rehearsal goes.
Tunes like Round One from Center: Level: Roar, it was a tough one to get through, but
once you learn it, it basically stays with you. There are tunes we may not have played in
forever and I could probably listen to the tune one time and remember my part because
there just engraved in your brain.
MD: That is very interesting because that is a similar process of learning the music of
how the Soul Rebels compose according to Lemar LeBlanc’s interview.
CW: Well it’s the way that Mama Digdown’s did it and they learned it from talking to the
guys down in New Orleans, then everything just went from there. It’s not necessarily the
process of how we learn music anymore, because the music is starting to get more
complicated. Nat has a good pattern and step logic to his music and a lot of the stuff back
in those days was very straight forward as far as forms go, so his mind is good at keeping
track of things like that. We are starting to get into music now that isn’t repetitive. It’s
getting more and more difficult to do tunes like that. Even the way we record now, we
single track things and don’t play at the same time anymore for recordings. Now the
people will write up their tunes in Finale and upload it as a midi-file to our recording
software so we can listen to what it sounds like roughly. Some members also flat out
compose by typing things into the (piano) keyboard into a midi format to have the
playback. We don’t tend to have the elaborate process anymore like we did when Nat was
composing everything. He (Nat) may still do it that way, but for me I prefer to write my
music out.
Can you discuss the Bligg collaboration?
Bligg was looking for some kind of band that represents a live performance and brings
some heat to their performances. Last September (2011), Bligg wanted to set up a
recording session. Initially they wanted to fly the band to New York City and record
there, but we decided to just have them fly to Madison because it was only two guys,
Bligg and his producer/drummer. It is our central location, all of our equipment is in
Madison, and it would be cheaper. We can do all of the recording and tracking in our
friend’s studio.
Basically the way it went down: Youngblood had received the tracks, with and without
the vocals a few weeks in advance of them coming to record with us. We all divided the
tunes up. Nat did the bulk of the work and Matt Hanzelka took three of the tunes, Zach
Lucas our sax. player took one tune and Tony Barba took one tune. I took one tune call
Rendezvous, which nobody wanted anything to do with that one because it didn’t have
any kind of dance feel. I just turned it basically into a classic sounding dirge. Which
worked out well because that is the genre that I am comfortable writing in.
So basically we walked in to the studio those tunes in various states of completion and
anything that was done with drums Dave and Fred was testing out drums and laying
down some beats to start working on things. Meanwhile, the rest of us were sitting there
frantically writing out all of these charts on our laptops and midi keyboards. It went about
as well as you could possibly expect.
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Bligg and his crew did a very minimal amount of editing to the stuff that we wrote, other
than the tracks that had guest vocalist. We had to keep those in the track. We had to work
around those things. Otherwise, we had complete control. We could change keys and
change the feel. The metronome markings had to stay the same. But, you could put a cuttime or double-time the metronome markings. That was about the extent of it. We all did
a really great job. I think we knocked the entire album out in about eight days and then
we had a little time to mix some things and have fun in Madison.
Youngblood took the opportunity to get Tony Barba, our one time touring, not on any of
the albums yet, to play back-up saxophone. We took advantage of someone that wanted
to pay him to come in and play. Barba contributed and played bass clarinet on the album,
which is something that we have always wanted to have, the bass clarinet. We all had a
sax player in town Andrew Spano (works at Dr. Sax) to lend the bass clarinet. He has
Roscoe Mitchell’s bass clarinet and it was the instrument that Tony borrowed. Now
Tony is going to be coming on the tour with Bligg (March, 2012).
Can you tell me about the new album that Youngblood is currently working on?
Will there be bass clarinet on the album?
You know every album we make we are caring less and less about the actual brass band
instrumentation. You never know what’s going to happen. The last album we had some
real jazzy stuff, hip-hop stuff, straight Brazilian stuff, spoken word and some of it got a
little freer. I think this album is going to be little more structured than the last album.
Dave is driving most of the stuff. Most of the musical ideas are Dave’s and Matt
Hanzelka’s as well. Matt is not really writing any music, but kind of managing the music
and making it playable.
It is going to be dance-beat driven. It’s kind of complicated to be honest with you, we’re
all actually kind of nervous to see how it’s gonna go learning the stuff. Dave wrote all of
the music on the keyboard. Playing his midi controller into Pro-Tools. It is hard to
memorize because there are a lot of little variables changing from section to section.
We don’t try to sound like we sound live. We’re there to make people dance and not there
to play like we are in the studio. There might be some people that have trouble with that
because everything’s not crystal clear. The older albums are crystal clear and super dry.
Those albums back in those days; we didn’t actually know what we were doing. They
don’t have enough bass, there not live enough, now out albums are starting to loosen up.
This album will sound even better than the last one as far as the audio goes.
117
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February 2010.
LeBlanc, Lemar, Interview by author, digital recorded phone interview, Coralville, IA.,
26 March 2010.
LeBlanc, Lemar, Interview by author, digital recorded phone interview, Coralville, IA.,
31 May 2011.
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February 2010.
Ohly, Christopher, Interview by author, digital recorded phone interview, Coralville, IA.,
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Skogen, David, Interview by author, Microsoft word document questionnaire, 18
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Wagner, Charles, Interview by author, digital recorded phone interview, Coralville, IA.,
20 February 2010.
120
Wagner, Charles, Interview by author, digital recorded phone interview, Coralville, IA.,
24 February 2012.
Websites
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http://www.interactivemaven.com/~whereyat/index.php?option=com_content&t
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January 1, 2012)
Youngblood Brass Band, www.youngbloodbrassband.com, (Accessed December 15,
2011)