Meade Lux Lewis - September 2 1940
Discographical Note: Cuscuna/Ruppli 2nd Ed. Note: Exact date has not been ascertained, but is definitely earlier than October 4 which was quoted previously.
Boppin Bob - Meade Lux Lewis
Meade Lux Lewis (September 4, 1905 – June 7, 1964) was an American pianist and composer, noted for his work in the boogie-woogie style. “Lux” was a boyhood nickname arising from his penchant for doing “Alphonse and Gaston” routines. He would stroke an imaginary beard as part of his performance, and so his friends dubbed him the “Duke of Luxembourg,” soon shortened to “Lux.”
He helped establish boogie-woogie as a major blues piano style in the 1930s and 1940s. Lewis took the rollicking piano form out of the clubs and cat houses and onto the concert stage in 1938 where its fast-flowing rhythms and charging solos delighted audiences and eventually laid the groundwork for rhythm & blues and later rock & roll.
Max Margulis - BN 15/16 Brochure
A characterization of Meade "Lux" Lewis's musical gifts must of necessity be tentative and sketchy. His artistic scope eludes definition, because it is constantly undergoing both expansion and intensification. Although each new composition is a sock to complacency, Lewis is by no means an enfant terrible with a flair for sensational device. His music is solidly grounded in the authentic tradition of hot jazz.
In short, Meade "Lux" Lewis's musical sensibility has unpredictable walls of profundity. Each successive recorded creation demands a revaluation of Lewis's total output. Just as "The Blues, Parts 1-4 (BLUE NOTE Set 8/9) occasioned a thoroughgoing revaluation of Lewis's contribution to the field of hot jazz, and to the expressive resources of piano music specifically, the four new compositions, which BLUE NOTE is introducing at this time, must induce transformations of judgment and enrichening of comprehension.
In its 12-inch version, the "Honky Tonk Train Blues" is perhaps the definitive music apostrophe to the poignant motive of the lonesome railroad train. A companion piece to this music may be short of a miracle, but "Six Wheel Chaser" daringly sounds another aspect of the same mood and suggestive material. The two remaining pieces, sufficient in themselves, are incomparable.
BB
His best known work, "Honky Tonk Train Blues", has been recorded in various contexts, often in a big band arrangement. Lewis remade it for Parlophone in 1935 and for Victor in 1937 and a recording exists of a Camel Caravan broadcast, including "Honky Tonk Train Blues" from New York City in 1939.
William Russell – Hot Society Rag – 1940
The new Blue Note release of Meade “Lux” Lewis piano solos again brings to the limelight the talents of this highly imaginative artist. This brilliant 12-inch recording of Honky Tonk Train Blues recalls to mind the greatness and vitality of a phenominal composition which must be regarded as a masterpiece of modern music.
Tell Your Story is a moderately-fast Boggie Woogie blues. The left hand plays a bass figure of even 8ths with insistent drumlike pounding. The bass, as well as certain melodic features, resemble the style often used Pete Johnson. More remarkable than this evidence of Lux's long association with Pete at Cafe Society is his skill and discriminating taste in the selection of ideas and in formulating hie distinctive and unmistakable style.
The American Record Guide – December 1940 – Volume 7 Issue 4
Honky Tonk Train Blues (Lewis); and Tell Your Story Blues. Blue Note No. 15, price $1.50
Six Wheel Chaser; and Bass On Top. Blue Note No. 16, price $1.50. All four sides - piano solos by Meade "Lux" Lewis.
This makes the third Honky Tonk Train Blues Lewis has recorded: the first and original, was Paramount 12896; the second, English Parlophone R2187; and now the third in a revised. 12-inch version.
Meade 'Lux" Lewis did not originate the boogie woogie style of piano playing. But whether he did or not is only of historical importance. What really matters is that Lewis has raised that style of playing to a level of perfection equalled by no other exponent of that art. There is a certain smoothness, vigor, intensity of feeling about his work which makes it sound like genuine form of jazz expression, not a freak manner of playing the piano. Regardless of its merit as (and it can sound pretty empty and annoying in the hands of anyone than an expert) there is no denying that boogie woogie played by Lewis is a joy to the ear.
Honky Tonk Train Blues is certainly the most famous of all boogie woogie pieces, Yancey’s Special notwithstanding. It is a remarkable musical picture of a train in motion and in passing it be noted that the only other pieces of music about train that any kind of international renown are Honegger's Pacific 231 and Ellington's Daybreak Express; one definitely jazz and the other with certain characteristics. Lewis' new version gains immeasurably by up-to-date recording and extension to twelve-inch size. A comparison with the curlier Parlophone recording reveals very little change in style or interpretation but a faster pace which suits the music excellently. It is hardly apparent just where Lewis extended the work.
Six Wheel Chaser is quite plainly a continuation of the same expression. The theme is different but the style. pace, form, and mood are the same. This should prove a worthy successor. or rather supplement to Honky Tonk Train. The playing and recording are impeccable.
Tell Your Story and Bass on Top are no less interesting musically, particularly Bass on Top, in which the bass part is given unusual prominence. The "walking bass" effect so characteristic of all boogie woogie playing is here strikingly emphasized.
One has a well satisfied feeling after hearing all four sides and an overwhelming admiration for Meade "Lux” Lewis' art. Also a feeling of gratitude to Blue Note for having preserved this fine work so effectively.
Down Beat – 1 November 1940 – Volume 7 Issue 21
Lux Lewis Cuts Four Solos; 15 Old Classics Reissued
BY BARRELHOUSE DAN
Boogie woogie piano tops the current record output. four 12-inch sides by Meade Lux Lewis, issued by Blue Note at 235 Seventh avenue, New York, setting a fast pace for the commercial waxworks. Feature of the Lewis date was his new and longer cutting of his Honky Tonk Train Blues, a fast 8-to-a-bar performance rating among Lewis' finest.
Honky Tonk is one of the most original boogie tunes ever written. And along with his equally-noted Yancey Special, it made Meade Lux almost a household byword among musicians. This new version taken at much faster tempo and the two extra inches allow him more opportunity to improvise. Moreover, it’s excellently recorded.
His Talents Limited
Tell Your Story, the reverse, also is acceptable boogie. Its weakness lies in the fact that it is very
similar to Six Wheel Chaser and Bass On Top, the two other sides issued by Blue Note. The numbers are 15 and 16 and each sells for $1.50. Bass On Top is outstanding, showing Lewis' walking bass figures. But even so, his limitations are obvious. Not as versatile, or as solid, as Ammons or Pete Johnson, Lewis isn’t quite capable of making four distinctly different sides. Even so the new Honky Tonk and Bass On Top are still recommended. Boogie followers will have a ball with any or all of the four sides. But non-boogie fans will have to look elsewhere for stabs.
The New Leader November 16 1940: Volume 23 Issue 46
Boogie Woogie Piano
Jazz piano has been loosely divided into two classes: trumpet-style, pioneered by Earl Hines, influenced by Louis Armstrong, and borrowing from the classical; and boogie woogie, crystallized by Jim Yancey out of less concise forms, fundamentally rhythmic, and only very slightly melodic. Though there are many gradations and off-shoots, this distinction is essentially valid. Boogie woogie makes full utilization of the resources of the piano as a percussive instrument, creating its effects by the play of rhythm against rhythm and the tension of repeated figures in both the bass and the treble.
There are two new 12-inch records in this style made by the most technically brilliant of the boogie woogie pianists, Meade “Lux” Lewis.
Titled Honky Tonk Train Blues, Tell your Story, Six Wheel Chaser and Bass on Top, these four sides are as good a sample of Lax's improvisation as you are likely to find. They demonstrate the overwhelming drive, the rhythmic precision, and the great fertility of ideas which he brings to his playing.
Honky Tonk, a virtuoso work of astonishing dexterity and musicianship, has been put on 10-inch several times, but in this version its program gets fuller development and builds up to a greater climax.
In Bass on Top, simpler but very effective, there is a delicate counterpoint of dynamics built around the traditional "walking bass” figuration. Tell your Story is in a slightly more lyric vein.
Six Wheel Chaser is another “train blues” which loses only by its proximity to Honky Tonk. Both these records are issued by Blue Note.
Session Information
Reeves Sound Studios, NYC, October 4, 1940
Meade "Lux" Lewis, piano.
RS791 B Honky Tonk Train Blues BN15 BLP 7018 BN-LA-158-G2
RS792 C Bass On Top BN16 BLP 7018
RS793 A Six Wheel Chaser BN16 BLP 7018
RS794 A Tell Your Story BN15 BLP 7018
RS794 B Tell Your Story No2 BN22
Sources and Attribution:
https://fromthevaults-boppinbob.blogspot.com/2020/09/meade-lux-lewis-born-4-september-1905.html
The Complete Blue Note Sessions of Meade Lux Lewis and Albert Ammons
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