Art Tatum : Art's Blues ( 1947 ) ( Fabulous Dorseys )

[Duckworth17]

The first, slower part is derived from Pops (Armstrong).

The second is an homage to Beiderbecke...who was white, and recorded with Tommy Dorsey. 

[Redflowers9]

When I hear Art Tatum, I've only got one thing in my head: "How does he do that?"

[TheBlitz1]

that horn is way too loud

[KareemByEar1Year]

Another video that won't let me go to bed!

[SunsetSix]

Was that a D'angelico New Yorker the guitarist was playing? Looked like it might have been.

[2300skiddo]

Jimmy Dorsey plays a great solo here, enough said. Tatum was a virtuoso, but that isn't what makes a great jazz musician. In fact, I like this relatively simple solo from him better than the endless variations on variations of his later years. And that certainly is George Van Eps, why wouldn't it be? Another guy whose later playing (fingerstyle, not with a plectrum, as here) was more technical but possibly less rewarding. Anyway, we shouldn't be quibbling and quarreling. This is great - thanks!!

[marvinkmooneyoz]

This is definitely a sort of "old school" jazz that isnt my preference...but art tatum is an exception to that rule 100%!! Its no racism that I dont really feel this track too much but that I love Art Tatums playing during this era; thats just Art Tatum, the individual deity, praise be unto him.

[fugueoflife]

I LOVE Art Tatum. This is priceless footage.

[bishopdm1]

I don't know why the guitarist has been identified as George Van Eps. Doesn't look like him, doesn't play like him.

[Rastaleus2]

Not about racism at all - it's about stupidity and complete lack of musical taste! The Dorseys dont even belong on the same BLOCK as the Great Art Tatum! God Help us!

[douskara]

Damn sometimes when I see so much talent gathered at one place I get irritated. It's like god is playing a prank on you on what you can't reach.. . True magic in this clip!

[homensnaterraenomar]

this makes me so happy

[dougiesy]

Of course you will bring race into this, you can't hear what is really going on

[coskss]

its has nothing to do with race, art tatum is great, and they should have given him a longer solo but too much and it becomes the fabulous tatum not the fabulous dorsyes like movie where tis clip comes from..

[andersingram]

VERY nice .... and the blonde wasn't too bad neither !

honestly why does every you tube message board have to turn into a race arguement ... so boring....

black and white people can play jazz together ... use your ears and get over yourselves

[GotsTricks]

He could even beat racism. Truly an amazing man. 

[sgivas]

MAN!!! These other jokers dont even belong in the same ROOM with Tatum.....SHEEEESHHH.... the ultimate indignity, such a genuis relegated to second billing (Under the ???? DORSEY's??? Huhhhhh???) This world is sinking!!!

[goinghomesomeday1]

@sgivas @sgivas Listen to the music - music has no colour - it has beauty - it has a soul.

Very sadly in those times the Black American had it very tough. For music's sake let’s leave the colour at the front door and just enjoy the music.

[lastnameinthebook]

By far the best part of a mediocre movie. Great jam.

[ipublica]

Sparkling eyes, vibrant energy, great genius in people considered small and insificant by society – those times have gone. What you have today other than perversity put on stage, and imitation and again lack of genius, total robotic performance given out as genius. Shit, shit, shit on it. The times of genius have gone forever, because genius is adjustment to self, not to stupid consumerism.

[dreadwicked]

@ipublica Things ain't what they used to be :) But I think not everything has changed for the worst. Today's popular culture is truly horrible, we can agree about that. But artists left out of what's considered to be the mainstreem have more possibilities to bring their stuff to the world, more stylistic freedom, etc. compared to the cats some 50+ years ago.

[KatzenImNebel]

Chapeau!

[repersonudonknow]

too FABULOUS !!

[izzyvulaca]

just not as exciting as it used to be! gosh this was just great

[Brrrendan2]

yeeeeeeeah

[Leebm29]

What great bunch of giants, that was Charlie Barnet on the tenor,Ziggy Elman trumpet Lee Mason

[benwaddelling]

Don't you just WISH you were there?

[godhelpme2009]

wow , even that brief solo from Tatum contained "the magic" .

[MrArrpee]

Django Reinhardt on drums..? XD XD

[odietarceo]

it's important to note what Tommy say's preceding this scene, "let's go hear a real musician."

[stanbb11]

i'll lost for words

[sirjuandabicho]

Maravilloso, muchas gracias.

[legator]

haha the sax guy's face when tatum plays the major arpeggio, danger of being overshadowed at all?

[bushwacker2008]

this is some really awsome stuff here.

dont get any better. too bad they dont make like that any more.

[MacktheFilet]

Unfortunately, he only gets the 10 second solo because he was the token black man. Given, all of the others are very talented, but nothing compared to Art Tatum. Yes, this is from a movie, so what? It is real playing and at least we get a few extra seconds of hearing Art Tatum to enjoy. Enjoy every second as though it were a thousand notes. Do this because he came pretty close to hit that mark with every second that he played.

[cenotosa1]

It has nothing to do with race. Art Tatum is a great, and they should have given him a longer solo, but too much and it becomes the Fabulous Tatum not the Fabulous Dorseys like the movie where this clip comes from.

[Shackamaxon]

Nice to see Tatum with a band. Tatum played solo more often than not because there were so few bands or other musicians for that matter that could keep up with him.

[helmut4lyfe]

Nobody could keep up with Tatum.

[FightingTheWitness]

what are the changes tothis?

[omreetheG]

its a blues

[FightingTheWitness]

yeah i know, but it sounds altered or different or weird minor variation

[SunsetSix]

Wouldn't you love to go into a club today and see that kind of performance? Where have our giants gone?

[dearmalika]

OMG! This is genial!

[KBVRdjFEVA]

What absolutely amazing musicians.

[dangerousdaveT]

The Dorseys were great musicians but Art was giving them a lesson here....

[brabazon10]

Art was obviously held in high regard by the Dorsey brothers, and so they included him, but it was a bit of a token gesture. Art seemed happy to be playing on a movie set.

[MattieSongbird]

Music without the noise!

[amusiathread]

Awesome playing. Clearly out of a movie, the whole "everyone gets a 10 second solo" thing is a little cheesie, but the playing is perfect. That's a lot of talent crammed into 3 minutes.

[hermes604]

Holy god... this is the coolest thing I've seen on youtube.

[misospecial]

what a clip! thanks!

[Flextones]

Two bar break to introduce the tune. One chorus and a tag at the end. I am pissed off.

[BlueBlueFeelin]

sweet!

[williamanesbitt]

Amazing footage... just wish Tatum would've gotten more than one chorus and a little tag at the end. I think people just didn't know what they had then, or there would have been camera and recording crews recording every move Art made.

[benbendude]

Tatum is not only playing a 12 bar blues. He's playing all kinds of substitution changes. And even if he was playing a 12 bar blues, it's what he does with it that is very burnin'. He never composed any music but he influenced people like Bird who did compose a lot of amazing compositions. Tatum is one of the early founders of bebop. The bebop guys like Bird and Dizzy were copying his substitution changes. Like the" I got rhythm" substitution changes.

[JazzmanJibilla]

We sadly lack jazz in movies these days.

[JoeRailfan]

What an assemblage of jazz talent! And I have to put in a plug for George Van Eps, a great and long underrecognized guitarist, as adept on his instrument as Tatum was on his. This clip provides only the tiniest hint of Van Eps' talent.  Still, nice to see him in his prime (he was 34 at the time).

[cattleprods911]

passed out.....

[macflyfilm]

The music nowadays is WAYY much better. Sorry. And yes, I am being sarcastic.

[mrpossibilities]

Interesting. I had read that Art Tatum, despite his amazing virtuosity and harmonizing skills, never composed. Is this theme actually his?

[phillyjazz]

There is no "theme" here. Art is playing the chord progression to a standard 12-bar blues form, and all the instrumentalists are just improvising on those chords. This does nt count as a "composition."

[mrpossibilities]

So it was true, then. He never composed

[phillyjazz]

Whenever a jazz musician improvises, they are "composing" in real time. Art Tatum typically improvised on themes of popular songs of the day. There is no question that he was capable of creating chord structures and melodies from scratch, but I do not know personally of any such "tunes" attributed to him as a composer. A popular practice of the era was to take well-known song like "I Got Rhythm" and superimpose a new melody on it. I suspect Tatum did similar things (to avoid copyright.)

[mrpossibilities]

Yes, of course, that's what I meant by "composed". I share the opinion that improvising is composing, but I was speaking in the mere context of creating a tune with a standardized and original melody and chord changes

[phillyjazz]

On the Album "Piano Starts Here" there is a tune called "Tatum Pole Boogie" where he is lited as composer.

[schnieef]

I wished T. Dorsey had played so hot more often.

[MillerMusicStudiosTV]

WOW!!!! The MASTERS!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 5*****

[manhatin]

The top of the mountain

[phillyjazz]

Really great jazz musicians do not make a distinction about race. Charlie Parker used Red Rodney and Chet Baker, and Miles used Bill Evans because of their extraordinary musicianship. Granted, most of Jazz' early innovators were black and creole, and the music would never have been created without the enormous contributions of African-American innovators. However, in this day and age, you can hear a 20-year-old Japanese girl playing the greasiest B3 in the world. Jazz knows no boundaries.

[manhatin]

dedwards0117, That's 27,895 for and 1 against.

[dedwards0117]

For what, this guys horn doesn't sound like shit. When the song starts, I don't like his sound. I see all of you took it personal, acting as if good players cant play a few bad notes. But who am I to argue, you all are the experts.

[dedwards0117]

That tenor sounds like it has shit in it. Maybe the guy playing it has shit in his mouth, but it sounds like shit.

[Bumblebee38]

I believe that the shit is elswhere ! Sorry

[dedwards0117]

You're right, it's in the horn.

[manhatin]

Miles Of Smiles !

[Morahman7vnNo2]

Tatum's smile alone lifts me up, but when the other guys come in...Wow, my cheeks are aching just thinking about it.

[Goryllo]

surely jazz rocks, but what does rock do? it probably jazzes... these guys are great

[ellihaysee]

Hopefully, these guys, wherever they all are right now, are doing this still.

[yungatown]

Art Tatum....Charlie Barnet!!!!!!!!!!! freakin amazing musicians

[manhatin]

NeverBeenTall ,

Yeah, the real deal.

[NeverBeenTall]

Aw man. This is real music.

Soulja Boy..... go play in traffic.

[manhatin]

All these gentlemen "get'r done".

[yantravimana]

@manhatin gitter dun.

[matoflash]

All white, only Art Tatum was the real man.

[trump34]

I have to disagree with you on that one, buddy. And I'm black. All of them held their own. Its your kind of ignorance that hinders the music and the whole human race. But you are probably grown and you can't be raised twice. There's a one word poem written by the great bassist Milt Hinton. "Listen." That means not with your eyes but with your ears.

[matoflash]

I hear were you're getting, and I understand. It might be coincidence, I don't know why, but I just always liked the black jazzmen better. For me they seemed to have that kind of fire, that the whites did not have. And that does not mean that I differentiate between black and white.

When I look for example at Joe Zawinul (who's white) in Cannonball's band, I hear the fire. But looking at these guys I just don't feel it. They don't have the right athmosphere for me,the feeling I am looking for.

[mietraching]

This was a Hollywood production number, not a home video of a real jam session. Someone in the background yelling "Cut! Makeup!," etc. Better than average for that atmosphere, and just great to see them all. Plus, after 55 years of close listening, never could hear color - only quality.

[DeanSwosProductions]

stop looking and listen.

[pedalla]

i also think black musicians are far more better in more than just jazz genre than white people... black musicians can really play something you really can feel... i don't know if it is something that can be proven why... ok.. maybe they are not better, but certainly there are some differences.. i just know i feel it that way..

still i don't want to disrespect either race...

[michaeljamsmith]

I wish I had you sitting right here as I would challenge you tell me who is white and black without looking. You can either play jazz or you can't. I don't see how you could possibly tell me a jazz guitarist who can surpass Joe Pass. Maybe more black people than white people can play jazz, but individually color don't mean shit in jazz.

[pedalla]

alright, you convinced me with your joe pass argument, it doesn't depend on race who is better jazzist... but i personally think that in art you can't talk about better or worse, it's their expression of art you like more or less..

so i still stand by my opinion that there are differences, i know there is something i like more in jazz of black musician.... and i feel that even more in blues... white folks sometimes just can't freely play the music.. they have limits and rules in playing music..

[michaeljamsmith]

The blues is a deep expression of experience. The black experience in will come out.I don't think a rich black kid is going to have more authentic blues than Stevie Ray Vaughan. Jazz players are musical intellectuals. Jazz has its roots in Classical as well as blues so Europrean culture had a strong voice. Unlike blues, funk, R&B, etc, jazz evolved with white and black musician sharing and playing together. Jazz is truly universal as great players come from all nations and cuttures.

[Diomedes22]

@michaeljamsmith jazz evolved with 'white and black musicians sharing'. I love this bullshit. Jazz evolved within the black community in spite of white racism and with no real contribution from whites, other than to first belittle it and then try to steal credit for it.

[michaeljamsmith]

@RaceWithTheDevil And this is the best part: black and white musician love to play each others music. The better part of my life has been playing everything from blues to heavy metal to hiphop with black and white musicians. Nobody insisting one style is superior to the other. Nobody claiming anyone is "stealing" anything. Educate yourself. Checkout Captain Kirk Douglas of The Roots - a black rock guitarist missing Hendrix and Van Halen in a hip-hop band -with a white bass player. Imagine that!

[Diomedes22]

@michaeljamsmith wes montgomery

[michaeljamsmith]

@Diomedes22 wes isnt' even the best black jazz guitarist. He needs to stand in line behind Charilie Christian and George Benson. Wes had a beautiful and unqiue style, but he wasn't in the same league with Joe Pass or Tal Farlow.

[dreadwicked]

@michaeljamsmith Wes was Benson's main inspiration dude. And comparing musicians of this caliber to decide who's the best is simply ridiculous. They are all gifted and original and it's the diferencies that make each one unique. Black & white ain't all the colors in the palette you know ;)

[michaeljamsmith]

@dreadwicked I don't think you are a player. You see, there are those ineffable qualities that are an extension of a musician that you can hold up to judgement. We don't argue that. Then there is technique, musical knowledge, vocabulary, speed, complexity, etc. We can and do argue that all day. It may be very hard, from a listener's point of view to compare say Al Dimeola to Wes Montgomery. Wes would most likely win. But by players standards, Al would come out on top by a mile.

[michaeljamsmith]

@RaceWithTheDevil Maybe a dictionary will help. Or it the secret world of musicians you do not fathom. Nothing I said could be clearer. Buy a copy of Guitar Player Magazine. Sorry, it will not play upon notions of race black Vernon Reid is as respected by the metal folks as is white John Hammon, Jr. by the traditional blues cats. But if you are so into race (another of the "white man's lies") did this. There is virtually no racism amoung musicians. We moved beyond that stupidity.

[michaeljamsmith]

@RaceWithTheDevil Let me illustrate the disconnect caused by rampant ignorance practiced by those who live by race. That "black face" some people consider "racist?" Let me tell you truth about black face. Black face was the only way black and white musicians could play together. And here is another gem: No white man playing jazz, blues, or R&B - included Elvis- every claimed to invent anything. Never claimed anything more than a love and respect for the culture the music they loved sprang.

[michaeljamsmith]

@trump34 I have to disagree with part of your disagreement. Ignorance never has and never will hinder music. It may hinder certain commericial exploitations. The ignorance of the racists has never hindered the musicians innate need to interface with other musicians and race means nothing in the equation. Some nut was ranting about no black flamenco or asia country musicians. No stars, but we all play it all. I have played every type of music with every race. God I love being a musician!

[gtibanez7]

@trump34 Could not agree more. I like to listen you might learn something .The Dorsey got the best musicians and it shows and those were in real racist times that some people can,t let go.Pathetic

[shawntoh]

@trump34 Excellent point! Most people just hear music--they don't listen! What I mean specifically is perceptive listening.

[JosephNScott]

Jimmy Dorsey is greatly underrated today. His fans included Lester Young and Charlie Parker.

[culbeni]

Tatum is the only man of 1947 in that film

but the drums recording sounds good

[hugleberthumperdink]

what do you mean by Tatum is the only man of 1947?

[jazzfanjohn]

Is that Glenn Ford at the table?

[joomuck]

These guys could swing! Thanks for the posting.

[NeverBeenTall]

To be that great must have been a wonderful feeling.

[drxl44]

The drummer, Ray Bauduc, wrote South Rampart Street Parade, a Dorsey band success of 1937.

Is there a genuine version out there somewhere?

[mooniemoney]

This happened so long ago but still speaks to me.

[mooniemoney]

Life always gets better when I watch this clip.

[gleo123]

piano solo is perfect

[iwanttowatchsomethin]

Barnett's tone!

[hugleberthumperdink]

yes man yes its incredible

[whillop]

I'm William Tatum , & my Uncle was Art Tatum , not this Art Tatum , but hey , whaddya want , this IS YouTube .

[osiriscorr]

Thank you.

[manhatin]

Valekorn ,

No, that's Jimmy Dorsey

[Valekorn]

thanks!

[JimBites]

Wonderful cut featuring some of the finest instrumentalists of their time; unfortunately, America was not taking jazz seriously, therefore ignoring the great historical value of archival footage. Art Tatum on film is just a bit more than Charlie Parker, totalling a whopping seven minutes. That is a shame, for both men were the truest of Giants. There are contemporary players who follow Art's lead; check out Chucho Valdes in "Calle 54", or Michel Camilo. You will be thrilled, I guarantee!

[Valekorn]

was benny goodman on clarinet???

[mfh2kdw210]

That was Jimmie Dorsey on clarinet who also played an amazing alto saxophone.

[kernkopje]

thanks for posting this!

[TheBeatlesrox]

Solid!

[DesmondSun4U]

Just wish I was there, Great Man

Regards, Des

[manhatin]

Long Live The Groove !!!!!!!!!!!!

[laffeycaffey]

i saw this clip randomly on TCM a few weeks ago. It's actually pretty rare to see Tatum at all in clips like this, let alone with ensemble groups. He wasn't the greatest ensemble player. He was his own ensemble... like an ensemble of 10 fingers.

[cvwtzhaar]

i havent seen this movie in long time. great post!

[steviebboy69]

i havent seen it at all yet but got it off ebay on 16mm film. will project it soon.

[PhilippeLernould]

fabulous !

[manhatin]

GhettoSven,

Big and apparently happy as well.

[GhettoSven]

Yeah, there is something with the "good old days", things I've never even heard...once upon the time when America was big.

[ganimber3]

i know what you mean ghetto, but everything is in cycles, so we are due time. keep your fingers crossed, and eat your vitamins.

[manhatin]

MARKMANIATT,

That "sounds" good !

[MARKMANIATT]

When you arrive in Heaven this is whats waiting for you!!!

[hugleberthumperdink]

dam well hope so man, then id be a happy man

[manhatin]

Leebm29 , I wish I could find more clips like this.

[Leebm29]

Charles Barnett--- My favorite all time big band--- Of course Jimmy Dorsey Ziggy Elman and the others added a lot. The music with video helps me appreciate it! They make it look so effortless---sign of real pros Thanks for showing this! Leebm29

[manhatin]

brianCIM, Your comment made my day.Thanks !

[brianCIM]

no problem. hopefully more people will see it. it is a treasure

[brianCIM]

awesome post manhatin. i thought i had seen every tatum clip available. you  made my day. THANKS!

[Wderganc]

I was thinking the same thing.

[honkymonky78]

me too...