Bunny Berigan & Jimmy Dorsey together with Freddie Rich!!!

[jeffsuzette]

Bunny was great for range, style, tone, and melodic invention.

[bhsisthebest]

Wonderful... I did not know about this one. Pity it is not complete....

[mikezeee722]

This clip is from the Vitaphone short film "Mirrors," which was filmed at Warner Brothers' Brooklyn, NY studio in late February, 1934. Also in the film were Vera Van and the Eton Boys. In addition to Bunny Berigan, the following musicians are seen: Jimmy Dorsey on clarinet; Hank Ross on tenor saxophone; and Walter Gross on piano. He later wrote the lovely waltz "Tenderly."

See "Mr. Trumpet--the Trials, Tribulations and Triumph of Bunny Berigan," a new biography of him by Michael P. Zirpolo.

[charyuht]

Marsalas cannot hold a candle to either Bix or Bunny: his playing, when one compares it to the other two, is simply third rate. This is great and thanks for the posting.

Ted

[JohnLewisBartee]

Anyone have any idea on who the guy playing the sax solo is???

[PowerToasty]

@eflatalto4 Obvious troll is obvious

[fredwallin815]

Like to see the whole film.  To bad people with a Cobb stuck their a..... Feel a need to preach so mich

[u47tube]

@eflatalto4 So, is that your first lesson: swing is not jazz? Hear that, folks? And he wants to give lessons! I think he must be one of these black professors who are currently trying to slant jazz history. Next thing he'll preach is that swing is white and that no blacks played swing. FLAT ALTO player: you're embarrassing yourself severely. You've lost this argument; so you've desperately lowered yourself to twisting my comments into racism. AND YOU USED THE N WORD. We're done here. Now go die.

[u47tube]

@eflatalto4 If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem. In your pathetic case, you're so oblivious to the hype and bullshit, that you willingly kiss the asses of those black "historians" and film makers whose agenda is to distort jazz history by downplaying drug additction amongst black greats, while exaggerating it amonst white greats, in cheap, shameless attemps to decimate the white contributions to jazz. Fuck that, I say. Bye bye, sucker!

u47tube 8 seconds ago

[u47tube]

@eflatalto4 Ahhh, hahahahahahaha! He can recognize a great musician when he SEES one! Oh, my Lord, this is priceless!!! Ahhhh, hahahahahahaha!!! Hasn't anyone ever told you you're supposed to LISTEN to music? Ahhh, hahahahahahahaha!!! Look, turd, now finally I understand why you're musically inept. And since you think musicians are to look at, you've no business posting here or associating with greats like me. So long, pathetic. Ahhhhh, hahahahahahahaha!!!

[u47tube]

@eflatalto4 Ahhhh, hahahahahaha! SEE that, folks? After 70 years, he recognizes a great musician when he SEES one! Try LISTENING for the next 70 years, ahhhh, hahahahahahaha!!!

[u47tube]

@eflatalto4 70 years and all you get about music is technique. That's pathetic, and your deaf comments speak for themselves. You're a piece of shit and not worth any further of my time. I removed comments in order to edit them in a way that even a disillusioned clown like you might get. You're full of shit--don't give me that 70 years crap. You're 17, maybe, and a petty little turd at that. Ignorant too--those assholes who are attempting to distort jazz history love you. Keep kissin' ass, boy.

[u47tube]

@eflatalto4 Anyone reading your childish replies knows you're just an earless, souless asshole who knows and appreciates so little about the great trumpet heritage that he doesn't even know how to spell "Berigan" let alone FEEL his soul. It's pathetic. You've got tons to learn, kid. You're what the hip and all-knowing call LAME. Now run along, squirt, go stick that punk tongue up your Wynton's ass, and come back if you ever discover jazz.

[u47tube]

@eflatalto4 PART III: You talk of musicianship! Bix was a self taught pianist. In a 1938 issue of Metronome, Frankie Trumbauer recalled witnessing Bix transcribe MacDowell's "Adirondak Sketches" to the piano completely by ear. That arrogant punk Marsalas ought to have his face slapped for speaking like he did about such MASTERS!!! As for you, Mr, flatalto, I hope you choke on a reed for your blind, ignorand support of that glorified bum Marsalas.

[u47tube]

@u47tube Correction: Eastwood Lane composed "Adirondak Sketches." Edward MacDowell composed "Woodlands Sketches," another piece that Bix was featured on, playing piano, during Paul Whiteman concerts.

[u47tube]

@eflatalto4 PART II: This was a weak and cheap attempt to rewrite history and steer attention away from the drug abuse of black players. Come on, altoflatboy, get with the times: black jazz documnetaries are deliberately biased. Black professors are attempting to rewrite history. And if I ever run into that punk Marsales, I'll remind him of how he unforgivably described Bix in Trumpet Kings: "An alhohalic whose legend has grown larger than the man." (CONTINUED)

[u47tube]

@eflatalto4 PART I: Well of course you'd disagree. You don't hear feeling and soul, just musicianship. And lest we forget the lesson your arrogant Wynton taught you in his Trumpet Kings documentary, wherein, HE deems who in the trumpet heritage is worthy! Let's see...anytime the almighty Wynton had anything nice to say about white trumpeters, like Bunny, he'd quickly add a biased reminder of their alcohalism, as though whites were the only players on drugs. (Continued)

[eflatalto4]

@u47tube

[caponsacchi]

And we were led to believe that pyrotechnics didn't arrive until Diz and Bird. And Dorsey is only a footnote, remembered by his ordinary "So Rare." Much of what I've seen on youtube puts him in the same league as Shaw and Goodman, except on either horn.

[joomuck]

The small talent of Winton Marsalis as opposed the the overwealming talents of Bix and Bunny, it is like speaking of a baseball player who sits on the bench and the coach, out of guilt, allows that player to take the field. Marsalis lacks historical accuracy and focus and, most certainly, he overates his talent as a musican. His arrorgance outstrips his talent. I could forgive him if only his comments with respect to Bix had been more balanced. With respect to colour, jazz is blind.

Ted

[Frankieman1]

I wonder if someone could answer this question. I read once when Bunny colasped in Pennsylvania and  was rushed to the hospital, someone stole his trumpet....any truth to t his?

[cenotosa1]

@Frankieman1 I think it was because he was an alcoholic, but I don't know.

[TorontoEd7]

Wow, love that great 30s sound and energy!

[alanicu2]

Is the tenor player using a metal mouthpiece--didn't know they had them back then

[hyltonx]

great fun to listen to Fred Rich studioband(prob 1934) with one of very few filmclips with Berigan.. Maybe the tenorman is Skeets Herfurt, later on a member of Tommy Dorsey´s saxsection

[soalegria100]

RONALDO !!!! (Brasil)

[u47tube]

It's sad how an over-rated punk like Wynton Marsalas is not only regarded as among that great trumpet heritage but is trusted as an authority on it, such as we saw in Trumpet Kings, wherein, when speaking on Bunny, he obviously methodically emphased Bunny's alcohalism while conveniently side stepping the heroin addiction of other black greats. Marsalas' most ignorant unforgivable commentary in that film was his summation of Bix: "An alcohalic whose legend has grown larger than the man."

[zedzil]

Agree 100%. For Winton Marsalis and Ken Burns, white jazz just does not exist. Jazz is not a Black only music - it is an amalgam of many influences, African and European. Listening carefully to Bunny Berigan you can hear the incredible creativity that he had inserted into his music, the same as Bix who had preceded him. There were great Black and also White innovetors and creative powers in Jazz .

[cenotosa1]

Don't forget asian. There weren't as many asian jazz musicians, but they still contributed enough to deserve some credit.

[harvardkarbodie]

@zedzil Methinks both of them would be the first to agree with you. Certainly since the 30's, jazz has been a happy mix. I"m no fan of Ken Burns, if anything he's a generalist and a populist of history. But it's very odd that you accuse him of focussing only on black musicians. He didn't. But the fact is that jazz started as a black art, like it or not. Read your history. To accuse Marsalis or Burns of reverse racism is ludicrous.

[u47tube]

@harvardkarbodie History, you declare... Actually, since the teens--ODJB--jazz has been a happy mix. Actually before that. Although ODJB recorded in the teens, they didn't just learn that music--they had been playing it alongside the black pioneers.

[harvardkarbodie]

@u47tube excuse me but it's hard enough to have conversations like this with people in real life time (commonly called face to face) let alone to respond to a comment to a comment that i made a year ago. but for the record, ODJB equals what?

anyway, i stand by my opinion that black people started jazz. i've seen no history offering any other opinion. or shall we suggest that Stephan Foster was an early progenitor of white jazz? or shall we parse the word "jazz" until we kill it dead?

[u47tube]

@harvardkarbodie Yes, it's been a year. Someone commented and it appeared in my box. So, I replied. While here revisiting, I reviewed and was inspired to add additional comments. I think maybe you didn't read all of my new comments, or you're conveniently side stepping them. Or, like the professors, ignoring the m altogether so as to impose your slant. In my P.S. I said blacks pioneered jazz. What more do you want? Then you so condescendingly mention the ODJB. CONTINUED...

[harvardkarbodie]

@u47tube excuse me but it was YOU that mentioned them. i didn't even know what the acronym stood for when you first used it!

[u47tube]

@harvardkarbodie ODJB is always the first line of attack in the movement to minimize the white contribution to jazz. You can't just dismiss ODJB. You ever listen to them? They were great players. And soon after they recorded this black-derived music, it went viral, and the record companies began recording THE black artists. Again, I emphasize, the ODJB was on the scene, playing it years leading up to recording it. They recorded their interpretation of what they derived from the black pioneers.

[harvardkarbodie]

@u47tube i never even knew what ODJB stands for until i just googled it. give me a break. i really don't wish to be sucked into a race-based argument let alone one about music history. i don't claim to be a music historian, nor do i claim to want to win brownie points for my very small point. however, if you wish some brownie points, please feel free to take as many as you wish.

[u47tube]

@harvardkarbodie You challenged my comments and you created the race argument here. And if you didn't know of ODJB, you had no business making a race argument without first doing your homework. You seem to let what I write into one ear, out the other. Your replies no longer address or even challenge my points. Instead you take offense and try to mask it with sarcasm. You're wasting the time I give to try and have a serious discussion. You can't learn and grow by letting ego shut out knowledge.

[harvardkarbodie]

@u47tube challenge you? i made one small comment a year ago TO SOMEONE ELSE. a year later you appeared with the comment about objd or ojbd. and now all of a sudden i'm accused of race baiting simply because i have a different view of the history of jazz than you do. who are you? are you a jazz historian or someone out for a bit of ego thrill by doing the old anonymous internet slamming of other's opinions? one thing is clear is that you dont take difference of opinion very well.

[harvardkarbodie]

@u47tube it's certainly nice to learn new things, but one thing i do know about race relations is that white people have often taken credit for things they saw black people doing. just reading the wiki about ODJB makes it plausible, if not totally clear that they were able to take credit for things because they had the power to commercialize. but it is also very well known that the question of who created jazz has been controversial from the start. just ask jelly roll morton!

[u47tube]

@harvardkarbodie I wish you could ask Roy Eldridge, for one, about Norman Granz. Granz documented black jazz both on recordings and live concerts (JATP). The cats had money in their pockets and their work was documented for all time. Milt Gabler and his Commodore Records, was the only company with the courage to record Billie Holiday's "Strange Fruit" her impassioned political statement on blacks in the south. Shame on YOU, Wiki and the "professors" for degrading such essentials as commercialism

[u47tube]

@harvardkarbodie @harvardkarbodie Burns did. One example: Stan Getz was portrayed only for "Girl from Ipanema" instead of his 50 years in jazz and was shown only being arrested for narcotics. NOT FAIR. You need to get with it and read between the lines and see the slants. There currently is a movement to downplay the roll of whites in jazz history. Sadly, even many professors teach this slanted interpretation of jazz.

[u47tube]

@harvardkarbodie P.S.: No one's disputing that blacks pioneered jazz But neither blacka nor whites OWN jazz. Music is art. Art is a creation GIVEN to the world in the name of humanity. I kinda like what Bill Evans used to say: "You can't take on the world's problems by yourself; so, I choose to create music to in some small way try to make the world a better place." (Dig that, Winton.)

[jeffsuzette]

@u47tube Wynton is a lot of things, and a great trumpeter is among them. But he is an opinionated jerk about Bix, and many other things. Bunny can play! So can Wynton.

[u47tube]

@jeffsuzette Well, technically playing the trumpet great does not place him among the greats.

[u47tube]

Fabulous Bunny! Captures his big fat open tone, too. his idol, Louie, was quite an admirer of Bunny as well. In Winthrop Seargent's book, Louie's quoted as saying: "Bunny's the blackest sounding white trumpeter I ever heard..." Coming from Pops, that compliment had nothing to do with race and everything to do with soul and feeling. Continued in next post, please...

[cw1310]

I once heard that Bunny Berigan, kept a picture of Louis Armstrong, in this trumpet case. Any one happen to know if this story is true, or not?

[ziggyelman]

I have read that more than once, and I believe it was mentioned in the biography on Berigan as well...never heard anyone say it wasn't true, at least.

[caponsacchi]

I heard that. His career was short, but he rather than Roy Eldridge may have been the greatest between Pops and Diz. There was also an incredible trumpet player with Glen Gray's Casa Loma--Sonny Dunham.

[gferrick]

@cw1310  it was harry James who kept Louis' picture in his case.

[u47tube]

@gferrick Hi, there's a book on Harry James--I forget the title. But the author tells of how Harry took Clifford Brown's album with him on the road, and of how devistated Harry was when Clifford was killed.

.

[rcwambold]

So great to SEE Berigan and J Dorsey!! Many thanks!!

[ziggyelman]

78rpmscott, thanks for that info! imdb says it was shot in 1934 as well I see, but I have heard several people say it had to be earlier, but it looks like 1934, not 1930-1931

[78rpmscott]

From the Jimmy Dorsey discography by Robert Stockdale both JD and Bunny were called in by Rich to make this Vitaphone short in Brooklyn. At this time, JD and his brother Tommy were leading their band on radio and records. Bunny was one of the top freelancing musicians in the country. This was done sometime in early 1934 and the tenor player is Hank Ross - a journeyman who played in a number of recording bands.

[ledzep10001]

Bunny is playing let handed in this clip. Any other clip he is playing right handed. The only other left handed trumpet player I know of was Freddi Jenkins of the Duke Ellington band. Can ayone comment on this?

[Mineolan]

That's a mirror shot. When the camera pans away, you can see (from the back) that he's playing right-handed.

[ingewb2601]

Trumpeter Edward "Corky " Cornelius was also a lefty. He played with Les Brown, Buddy Rogers, Benny Goodman, Gene Krupa & Glen Gray. Was married to Krupa singer Irene Daye. Died 4 months shy of his 29th birthday in 1943 from a kidney ailment. Check the 1942 YouTube clips of him soloing with the Casa Loma band.

[jonnybogue]

Nick LaRocca of the Original Dixieland Jass Band played left handed, too, and after a while played on (rare) left handed trumpets/cornets (with the bell on the right).

Yaa--this threw me, too, but I guess it WAS a mirror shot.

[odietarceo]

is Jess Stacey on piano?

[rsalvucc]

I was thinking Bob Zurke. Absolutely amazing footage of Berigan. NEVEr saw anything like it

[ingewb2601]

I think I once read it was Walter Gross. He was a staff pianist at the time; but is best known as the composer of "Tenderly."

[Frankieman1]

Thank you for that wonderful clip....I thought there was none left to see.

[ziggyelman]

Isn't it nice to see him like this?? I wonder if there is any other footage gathering dust, or if this and the other few clips here are it???

[joomuck]

It is very seldom that one sees a clip of Bumny Berigan and the others that I have seen are not nearly as clear: wonderful.

[annanoli]

No,not Eddie miller.Not one of the top tenormen anyway.