Encore
Title
Encore
Description
Jazz recording by the Jazz Incredibles for Music Masters. Personnel of the Jazz Incredibles on this recording include Jean Kittrell on piano/vocals, John Becker on banjo, and David "Red" Lehr on sousaphone. A full track list is available in the liner notes and cover transcription, which also includes the story of the forming and naming of the Jazz Incredibles written by Jean herself.
Creator
Jazz Incredibles
Publisher
Music Masters
Date
1990-1991
Rights
For digital rights and permissions, see https://www.siue.edu/lovejoy-library/about/policies.shtml
In copyright. http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
Relation
Jean Kittrell Digital Collection
Type
Sound
Identifier
SIUE_REF_CD.NRJA5
Transcription
[Back cover]
ENCORE Jazz Incredibles
1. Bourbon Street Parade (Paul Barbarin, c. 1940) Sousaphone 3:12
2. 12th Street Rag (Euday Bowman, 1914) Banjo 1:52
3. You've Gotta See Your Mama Every Night (Rose & Conrad, 1923) Vocal 2:11
4. Black and White Rag (Charles L. Johnson, 1908) Ensemble 2:49
5. Somewhere My Love (from movie, Dr. Zhivago, 1965) Banjo 3:47
6. Frankie and Johnnie (19th cen. American folk song) Vocal 3:57
7. Basin Street Blues (Spencer Williams, 1928) Sousaphone 2:54
8. After the Loving (Alan Bernstein, Richie Adams, 1976) Banjo 3:26
9. High Society (Porter Steele, 1901) Sousaphone 3:58
10. I Had Someone Else Before I Had You (Harry Harris, Joe Darcy, Jack Stanley, 1925) Vocal 3:29
11. Bohemia Rag (Joseph Lamb, 1919) Ensemble 3:30
12. Sugar Blues (Clarence Williams, 1923) Banjo 2:52
13. When Ragtime Rosie Ragged the Rosary (Lewis F. Muir & Edgar Leslie, 1911) Vocal 3:21
14. Hungarian Dance No. 5 (Johannes Brahms, 1869) Banjo/Sousaphone 1:58
15. Memories of You (Eubie Blake, 1930) Sousaphone 3:24
16. There'll Be Some Changes Made (Benton Overstreet, 1921) Vocal 4:12
17. Spanish Eyes, also titled Moon over Naples (Bert Kaempfert, Charles Singleton, Eddie Snyder, 1965) Banjo 2:58
18. Please Don't Talk about Me When I'm Gone (Stept, 1930) Vocal 3:34
19. Whispering (Schonberger, Coburn, V. Rose, 1920) Sousaphone 3:22
20. The Lady is a Tramp (Rodgers & Hart, 1937) Banjo 2:10
21. Tiger Rag (Nick LaRocca, 1918) Sousaphone 4:59
TOTAL PLAYING TIME 67:53
For Additional CDs, cassettes or bookings, please contact: JEAN KITTRELL
[Inside jacket]
THE JAZZ INCREDIBLES
The JAZZ INCREDIBLES trio began a regular weekend gig in 1983 aboard the Lt. Robert E. Lee, a floating restaurant/saloon permanently moore on the Mississippi River just south of the famous Saarinen Arch memorializing St. Louis as the Gateway to the Western frontier. In the beginning we were just having fun playing jazz, and I do mean fun. These guys put humor into their music and crack wild jokes between tunes as well. As the months passed, and night after night they played beautiful, unique, often astounding, improvisations, I realized I was working with two world-class musicians. So many times I described their performances as "incredible" to our audiences that I finally said, "This Friday night trio is going to be called the JAZZ INCREDIBLES because you two are incredible, and I find it incredible that I'm playing piano with you." Thus our modest name came about.
"BIG JOHN" BECKER, a native St. Louisan, is famous for his rapid single-string technique, eleveating the tenor banjor to a melodious solo isntrument. One of the world's greatest tenor banjoists, he is often compared to Harry Reser and Eddie Peabody. John began playing banjo at age eleven, then plaed guitar for twenty years before returning to the banjo in 1950. A professional musician since 1937, Becker became well known during the golden era of St. Louis' Gaslight Square, leading BIG JOHN'S BANJO BAND at the Golden Eagle and the Lorelei. Subsequently he and bassist Russ Polette formed a mighty duo, working for years at the Bayou Belle, a popular St. Louis Restaurant. After John and I played our first gig together in 1977, paired by booker and band leader Jack Engler, we liked our sound and decided to form a trio with bassist Bill Jouston. Charlie Wills booked us as the BLUES EMPORIUM into the RELee for a three-week engagement in January 1978. In 1983 Bill retired and Red joined the trio, which eventually became the JI. That three-week engagement on the Lee lasted thirdteen years (1978-1990).
DAVID "RED" LEHR from New Athens, Illinios, where he owns a meat market and processing plant, is a jazz virtuoso of the sousaphone - a world-class musician combining technique with showmanship. His musical career began at age five when he was big enough, standing on an orange crate, to play his daddy's trombone. In high school, as the strongest and tallest kid, he began to play the big sousaphone with which he has intrigued audiences ever since. In 1955 he began a long-standing engagement in St. Louis at the Banjo Palace (across from Busch Stadium on Market Street), followed by two years at The Sting (on Lindbergh). In annual trips to New Orleans he made frequent guest appearances in jazz spots on Bourbon Street and elsewhere in the French Quarter. Red and I became acquainted when his four-piece OLD ST. LOUIS LEVEE BAND (they were together sixteen years before I met them) joined me on Saturday nights on the RELee in 1978 for what turned out to be another thirteen year engagement. So Friday nights Red and I played with John in the trio and Saturday nights with the OSLLB.
And what about JEAN KITTRELL? Well, I was born in Birmingham, Alabama, where I grew up playing piano in the Southern Baptist Church. At Blue Mountain College, Mississippi I didn't major in piano - I didn't like the teacher's pianistic style. Instead I majored in music theory - harmony, counterpoint, and musical coposition - valuable knowledge for jazz, which I began playing in 1957 in Norfolk, Virginia, where my then-husband, cornetist Ed Kittrell, and I organized the CHESAPEAKE BAY JASS BAND. In 1958 we moved to Chicago, joined the CHICAGO STOMPERS, and took them to Germany for a two-month tour in 1959. Then I dropped out of jazz until 1967, when I began a two-year SRO solo engagement in St. Louis at the Old Levee House on Laclede's Landing. After completing my Ph.D. in Modern British Literature (1973), I joined the English faculty at Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville and the MISSISSIPPI MUDCATS JAZZ BAND. Eventually I served four years as Chair of the English Department, while playing jazz on the weekends.
The JAZZ INCREDIBLES gradually became known throughout the USA, appearing in several jazz festivals. Then we traveled abroad to France, Germany, and The Netherlands, on three one-month European tours in 1985, 1987, and 1989. We were also featured in the week-long Edinburgh, Scotland, Jazz Festival in 1989, 1990, and 1991, where John's banjo artistry made him an outstanding favorite with the Scots.
One of the best friends the trio has ever know entered our lives in 1983 when Gene Pokorny came as Principal Tubist to the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra. Gene is a rare human being, a great talent - probably the world's greatest classical tubist - who can be completely self-forgetful in pushing to the fore another talent. Gene recognized in Red a unique, amazing musical phenomenon, and brought musicians, visiting conductors, the business manager, and the gneral manager of the St. Louis Symphony, to the RELee saloon to hear him. As a result, the JAZZ INCREDIBLES and the OLD ST. LOUIS LEVEE BAND gave a series of summer pop concerts with the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra in 1987, 1988, and 1989, and were honored to be included on a cut of Gene's astounding CD, "Tuba Tracks."
Another facet of the musical activities of the JAZZ INCREDIBLES is our function as the essential core of a seven-piece Dixieland jazz band, JEAN KITTRELL AND THE ST. LOUIS RIVERMEN, founded in 1984. This band concertizes throughout the USA and Canada and has produced seven cassettes.
The Music of the JAZZ INCREDIBLES on this CD, selected from four of our cassettes recorded in 1990 and 1991, includes four Dixieland classics featuring the sousaphone (Bourbon Street Parade, Tiger Rag, High Society, and Basin Street Blues), three rags (Bohemia, 12th Street, and Black and White), one classical selection (Brahms' Hungarian Dance No. 5), several slow ballads - four featuring the banjo (Somewhere My Love, After the Loving, Spanish Eyes, and Sugar Blues), two featuring the sousaphone (Memories of You and Whispering), a brilliant banjo rendition of Rodgers and Hart's The Lady is a Tramp, and six vocals by me. There are no blues in terms of [Back jacket] musical structure and harmony included, even though two titles include the word "blues." High points for me are John Becker's original bluesy effect on Sugar Blues, his woderfully melodic obligato over the piano melody in Spanish Eyes, Red's trilling throughout the last chorus of High Society, and John and Red and Johannes Brahms. I'll confess I also enjoy my original words tagging I Had Someone Else Before I Had You, and added to the breaks in See Mama Every Night. John discovered that When Ragtime Rosie Ragged the Rosary was based on the 1898 Ethelbert Nevin composition, The Rosary. Listen when he plays it between my two vocal choruses on this song. (The Rosary was his very first banjo solo.)
Our trio feels very lucky to have had so much fun playing and making friends throughout our music. We thank you for your interest in our work and hope you enjoy these selections.
-Jean Kittrell
THE JAZZ INCREDIBLES
John Becker.....tenor banjo
David "Red" Lehr......sousaphone
Jean Kittrell......piano and vocals
Recorded and mixed July 1990 and May 1991 at Music Masters, St. Louis, Missouri
Engineering, Greg Trampe Producer, Jean Kittrell
Photo, Richard Schaumberger Typography by John Pavlik, Type 1, Edwardsville
CD Manufactured by Audio Duplication & Services, St. Louis, Missouri
ENCORE Jazz Incredibles
1. Bourbon Street Parade (Paul Barbarin, c. 1940) Sousaphone 3:12
2. 12th Street Rag (Euday Bowman, 1914) Banjo 1:52
3. You've Gotta See Your Mama Every Night (Rose & Conrad, 1923) Vocal 2:11
4. Black and White Rag (Charles L. Johnson, 1908) Ensemble 2:49
5. Somewhere My Love (from movie, Dr. Zhivago, 1965) Banjo 3:47
6. Frankie and Johnnie (19th cen. American folk song) Vocal 3:57
7. Basin Street Blues (Spencer Williams, 1928) Sousaphone 2:54
8. After the Loving (Alan Bernstein, Richie Adams, 1976) Banjo 3:26
9. High Society (Porter Steele, 1901) Sousaphone 3:58
10. I Had Someone Else Before I Had You (Harry Harris, Joe Darcy, Jack Stanley, 1925) Vocal 3:29
11. Bohemia Rag (Joseph Lamb, 1919) Ensemble 3:30
12. Sugar Blues (Clarence Williams, 1923) Banjo 2:52
13. When Ragtime Rosie Ragged the Rosary (Lewis F. Muir & Edgar Leslie, 1911) Vocal 3:21
14. Hungarian Dance No. 5 (Johannes Brahms, 1869) Banjo/Sousaphone 1:58
15. Memories of You (Eubie Blake, 1930) Sousaphone 3:24
16. There'll Be Some Changes Made (Benton Overstreet, 1921) Vocal 4:12
17. Spanish Eyes, also titled Moon over Naples (Bert Kaempfert, Charles Singleton, Eddie Snyder, 1965) Banjo 2:58
18. Please Don't Talk about Me When I'm Gone (Stept, 1930) Vocal 3:34
19. Whispering (Schonberger, Coburn, V. Rose, 1920) Sousaphone 3:22
20. The Lady is a Tramp (Rodgers & Hart, 1937) Banjo 2:10
21. Tiger Rag (Nick LaRocca, 1918) Sousaphone 4:59
TOTAL PLAYING TIME 67:53
For Additional CDs, cassettes or bookings, please contact: JEAN KITTRELL
[Inside jacket]
THE JAZZ INCREDIBLES
The JAZZ INCREDIBLES trio began a regular weekend gig in 1983 aboard the Lt. Robert E. Lee, a floating restaurant/saloon permanently moore on the Mississippi River just south of the famous Saarinen Arch memorializing St. Louis as the Gateway to the Western frontier. In the beginning we were just having fun playing jazz, and I do mean fun. These guys put humor into their music and crack wild jokes between tunes as well. As the months passed, and night after night they played beautiful, unique, often astounding, improvisations, I realized I was working with two world-class musicians. So many times I described their performances as "incredible" to our audiences that I finally said, "This Friday night trio is going to be called the JAZZ INCREDIBLES because you two are incredible, and I find it incredible that I'm playing piano with you." Thus our modest name came about.
"BIG JOHN" BECKER, a native St. Louisan, is famous for his rapid single-string technique, eleveating the tenor banjor to a melodious solo isntrument. One of the world's greatest tenor banjoists, he is often compared to Harry Reser and Eddie Peabody. John began playing banjo at age eleven, then plaed guitar for twenty years before returning to the banjo in 1950. A professional musician since 1937, Becker became well known during the golden era of St. Louis' Gaslight Square, leading BIG JOHN'S BANJO BAND at the Golden Eagle and the Lorelei. Subsequently he and bassist Russ Polette formed a mighty duo, working for years at the Bayou Belle, a popular St. Louis Restaurant. After John and I played our first gig together in 1977, paired by booker and band leader Jack Engler, we liked our sound and decided to form a trio with bassist Bill Jouston. Charlie Wills booked us as the BLUES EMPORIUM into the RELee for a three-week engagement in January 1978. In 1983 Bill retired and Red joined the trio, which eventually became the JI. That three-week engagement on the Lee lasted thirdteen years (1978-1990).
DAVID "RED" LEHR from New Athens, Illinios, where he owns a meat market and processing plant, is a jazz virtuoso of the sousaphone - a world-class musician combining technique with showmanship. His musical career began at age five when he was big enough, standing on an orange crate, to play his daddy's trombone. In high school, as the strongest and tallest kid, he began to play the big sousaphone with which he has intrigued audiences ever since. In 1955 he began a long-standing engagement in St. Louis at the Banjo Palace (across from Busch Stadium on Market Street), followed by two years at The Sting (on Lindbergh). In annual trips to New Orleans he made frequent guest appearances in jazz spots on Bourbon Street and elsewhere in the French Quarter. Red and I became acquainted when his four-piece OLD ST. LOUIS LEVEE BAND (they were together sixteen years before I met them) joined me on Saturday nights on the RELee in 1978 for what turned out to be another thirteen year engagement. So Friday nights Red and I played with John in the trio and Saturday nights with the OSLLB.
And what about JEAN KITTRELL? Well, I was born in Birmingham, Alabama, where I grew up playing piano in the Southern Baptist Church. At Blue Mountain College, Mississippi I didn't major in piano - I didn't like the teacher's pianistic style. Instead I majored in music theory - harmony, counterpoint, and musical coposition - valuable knowledge for jazz, which I began playing in 1957 in Norfolk, Virginia, where my then-husband, cornetist Ed Kittrell, and I organized the CHESAPEAKE BAY JASS BAND. In 1958 we moved to Chicago, joined the CHICAGO STOMPERS, and took them to Germany for a two-month tour in 1959. Then I dropped out of jazz until 1967, when I began a two-year SRO solo engagement in St. Louis at the Old Levee House on Laclede's Landing. After completing my Ph.D. in Modern British Literature (1973), I joined the English faculty at Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville and the MISSISSIPPI MUDCATS JAZZ BAND. Eventually I served four years as Chair of the English Department, while playing jazz on the weekends.
The JAZZ INCREDIBLES gradually became known throughout the USA, appearing in several jazz festivals. Then we traveled abroad to France, Germany, and The Netherlands, on three one-month European tours in 1985, 1987, and 1989. We were also featured in the week-long Edinburgh, Scotland, Jazz Festival in 1989, 1990, and 1991, where John's banjo artistry made him an outstanding favorite with the Scots.
One of the best friends the trio has ever know entered our lives in 1983 when Gene Pokorny came as Principal Tubist to the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra. Gene is a rare human being, a great talent - probably the world's greatest classical tubist - who can be completely self-forgetful in pushing to the fore another talent. Gene recognized in Red a unique, amazing musical phenomenon, and brought musicians, visiting conductors, the business manager, and the gneral manager of the St. Louis Symphony, to the RELee saloon to hear him. As a result, the JAZZ INCREDIBLES and the OLD ST. LOUIS LEVEE BAND gave a series of summer pop concerts with the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra in 1987, 1988, and 1989, and were honored to be included on a cut of Gene's astounding CD, "Tuba Tracks."
Another facet of the musical activities of the JAZZ INCREDIBLES is our function as the essential core of a seven-piece Dixieland jazz band, JEAN KITTRELL AND THE ST. LOUIS RIVERMEN, founded in 1984. This band concertizes throughout the USA and Canada and has produced seven cassettes.
The Music of the JAZZ INCREDIBLES on this CD, selected from four of our cassettes recorded in 1990 and 1991, includes four Dixieland classics featuring the sousaphone (Bourbon Street Parade, Tiger Rag, High Society, and Basin Street Blues), three rags (Bohemia, 12th Street, and Black and White), one classical selection (Brahms' Hungarian Dance No. 5), several slow ballads - four featuring the banjo (Somewhere My Love, After the Loving, Spanish Eyes, and Sugar Blues), two featuring the sousaphone (Memories of You and Whispering), a brilliant banjo rendition of Rodgers and Hart's The Lady is a Tramp, and six vocals by me. There are no blues in terms of [Back jacket] musical structure and harmony included, even though two titles include the word "blues." High points for me are John Becker's original bluesy effect on Sugar Blues, his woderfully melodic obligato over the piano melody in Spanish Eyes, Red's trilling throughout the last chorus of High Society, and John and Red and Johannes Brahms. I'll confess I also enjoy my original words tagging I Had Someone Else Before I Had You, and added to the breaks in See Mama Every Night. John discovered that When Ragtime Rosie Ragged the Rosary was based on the 1898 Ethelbert Nevin composition, The Rosary. Listen when he plays it between my two vocal choruses on this song. (The Rosary was his very first banjo solo.)
Our trio feels very lucky to have had so much fun playing and making friends throughout our music. We thank you for your interest in our work and hope you enjoy these selections.
-Jean Kittrell
THE JAZZ INCREDIBLES
John Becker.....tenor banjo
David "Red" Lehr......sousaphone
Jean Kittrell......piano and vocals
Recorded and mixed July 1990 and May 1991 at Music Masters, St. Louis, Missouri
Engineering, Greg Trampe Producer, Jean Kittrell
Photo, Richard Schaumberger Typography by John Pavlik, Type 1, Edwardsville
CD Manufactured by Audio Duplication & Services, St. Louis, Missouri
Original Format
Compact disc
Duration
67:53:00
Collection
Citation
Jazz Incredibles, “Encore,” Digital Exhibits, accessed April 28, 2024, https://digitallis.isg.siue.edu/items/show/2800.
