1940 - March 7

 Josh White Trio - March 7 1940

Richard Havers - Uncompromising Expression

The company's first session of 1940 at Reeves Sound Studios came almost a year after their first releases. Although the choice of artist was unusual given the direction Blue Note would go on to take, it made sense for the label at this point in time. Looking for another big seller to rival 'Summertime', Lion decided to team blues player Josh White with Sidney Bechet, and they were accompanied by Wilson Everett Myers on bass.

Dan Morgenstern - Hot Jazz at Blue Note

Born in Greenville, South Carolina [in 1914] (the years 1908, 1915 and 1916 have also been given), Josh White was the son of a preacher and as a child sang in a sanctified church choir. He became associated with the blues early on, serving as a guide for blind street singers.

His repertoire included folk songs, current political material, occasional pop tunes (he scored a big hit with "One Meat Ball"), and Elizabethan airs, as well as blues and gospel.

Wiki Page

In February 1936, he punched his left hand through a glass door during a bar fight, and the hand became infected with gangrene. Doctors recommended amputation of the hand, which White repeatedly refused. Amputation was averted, but his chording hand was left immobile. He retreated from his recording career to become a dock worker, an elevator operator, and a building superintendent. During the time when his hand was lame, he squeezed a small rubber ball to try to revive it.

One night during a card game, White's left hand was revived completely. He immediately began practicing playing the guitar and soon put together a group, Josh White and His Carolinians, with his brother Billy and close friends Carrington Lewis, Sam Gary, and Bayard Rustin. They soon began playing private parties in Harlem. At one of these parties, on New Year's Eve 1938, Leonard De Paur, a Broadway choral director, was intrigued by White's singing. For the past six months, DePaur and the producers of a Broadway musical in development, John Henry, had been searching America for an actor, singer, and guitarist to play the lead role of Blind Lemon, a street minstrel who wandered back and forth across the stage narrating the story in song. Their initial auditions with native New York singers were unsuccessful, so they looked through previous race record releases to find a suitable artist. They eventually narrowed their search down to two people, Pinewood Tom and The Singing Christian, both pseudonyms used by White.

Downbeat - February 1940

DM

Careless Love is a folk song from way back; not the blues, but with a blue feeling - a sample of the many ingredients that went into the making of jazz, which, like all music, started with the voice. The singer accompanies himself on guitar. Josh White excelled in both roles. The performance also includes...Sidney Bechet. He's on clarinet here, and when he solos, his warm, woodsy sound melds with the strum of White's acoustic guitar in a very special way.

RH

Some blues historians have dismissed White as a musician who sold out, but he...appeared at Café Society and was admired by the liberal left. On March 7 1940, White and Bechet cut 'Careless Love', a New Orleans classic that had been covered by just about everyone from 'King' Buddy Bolden, the Crescent City cornetist, to Bessie Smith.

Max Harrison - The Complete Blue Note recordings of Sidney Bechet

There have been many complaints about White's singing, but he he is heard on Careless Love and Milk Cow Blues in his earlier and better manner. [Sidney] Bechet must have done a fair amount of vocal accompanying in his time yet Blue Note was the first company since the 1920s with the wit to record him in his role. Actually, White's guitar takes the lion's share of the accompanimental space and the clarinet sols are lovely interludes, commentaries on White's vocal melodies and their words.

Session Information

Reeves Sound Studios, NYC, March 7, 1940

Sidney Bechet, soprano sax; Josh White, guitar, vocals; Wilson Ernest Myers, bass.

RS671 A	Careless Love (Blues)	Blue Note 23
RS672	Milk Cow Blues	Blue Note 23, BST 89902,

from the same session (not released on Blue Note)

673        Careless Love 

674        Prison Bound 

676-A     Hard Time Blues 

675-B    Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday 

677        Motherless Children Part 1 

678        Motherless Children Part 2 

Sources and attribution:

Dan Morgenstern - Hot Jazz at Blue Note - CD-8-35811-2

Max Harrison - The Complete Blue Note recordings of Sidney Bechet - MR6-110

Richard Havers - Uncompromising Expression - Thames and Hudson