The Frank Trumbauer Collection (Fabulous, Acrobat, Trapeze: two-CD collection)

by Mark Gabrish Conlan • Copyright © 2021 by Mark Gabrish Conlan • All rights reserved

Last Monday I received a Frank “Tram” Trumbauer collection from CD Universe that seems to have come from a company with three different imprints: Fabulous, Acrobat ahd their parent company, Trapeze. I was a bit disappointed that it contained only one of Tram’s last three studio recordings for Capitol in 1946, “You Took Advantage of Me” – though the other two are available on YouTube. These were the sessions Tram didn’t want released because the other musicians had shown up drunk – the man who’d put up with Bix Beiderbecke for five years probably thought, “Here we go again … ” – and they didn’t come out until Capitol used one of them in 1952 to fill out a compilation album of great jazz saxophonists called Sax Stylists, but they’re quite remarkable and if I’d heard them “blind” I probably would have guessed Paul Desmond. They sound an awful lot like him even though Desmond hadn’t recorded yet when these sides were made! The first time I played through the Trumbauer collection I followed it up with the fourth disc in the Bix Restored box – one of my favorites because it begins with the Adrian Rollini Club New Yorker band session (which included three songs, progressive instrumentals “Humpty Dumpty” and “Krazy Kat” as well as “Baltimore,” a straightforward dance tune). It also includes acoustically recorded dates with Sam Lanin and Willard Robison as well as the first round of Bix’s solo records with the studio band Bix and His Gang. All these represented some of Bix’s greatest playing at a time when he was still at peak form before all the drinking started to wear him down (as did the grind of his prestigious gig with Paul Whiteman) – at least in part because the transfer of Rollini’s “Baltimore” here is so much better than on the Trumbauer compilation.

But the Fabulous/Acrobat/Trapeze two-CD collection of Frank Trumbauer, which with all its faults (some pretty dubious curation – like including songs on which Tram doesn’t soio while leaving out ones on which he does, like the haunting April 1928 Paul Whiteman record “Do I Hear You Saying [I Love You]?” which I’ve cited as the closest solo from the Tram-Bix years to the later style of Lester Young – and also the wildly variable quality of the transfers with the odd result that the Sam Lanin “Broadway Bellhops” side, “There Ain’t No Land Like Dixieland to Me,” acoustically recorded for the budget-conscious Harmony label, sounds clearer than the electricals on either side of it on the disc, Adrian Rollini’s “Baltimore” and Paul Whiteman’s “Changes”) and the sense that disc one was simply a dumping ground for the Trumbauer sides with Bix Beiderbecke the company didn’t have room for on their Bix collection, still sounds great and includes some of Tram’s lovely sax work. As I mentioned above, my biggest disappointment in this set was it included only one of Trumbauer’s final three studio recordings in L.A. in 1946 for Capitol, which Tram asked them not to release because some of the other band members had shown up drunk for the session – though, like Bix on almost all his records, they’d been able to play professionally and even well despite their intoxication) but they used in 1952 to fill out an LP compilation of great jazz saxophonists) but which sounded quite lovely to me (Tram’s cool playing eerily anticipates Paul Desmond’s style aud suggests that he could have adapted to modern jazz without sacrificing his originality the way Pee Wee Russell did) despite Trumbauer’s own condemnation of them (quoted by Philip and Linda Evans in their Trumbauer biography):

“I approached Johnny Mercer [then A & R man for Capitol and also one of the company’s founders] with an idea to organize a small band and re-do some of the famous records that were made in the 1920’s and early 1930’s, using the same or very similar solo passages for a matter of record, and supplying a more modern accompaniment which would make the records more or less current. Johnny thought this was a grand idea, and we set our first date for Capitol, and as this was to be an event, we naturally hired the best men available. When the record date actually started, I was the only one there. About thirty minutes later a few of the men showed up, and after another thirty minutes the remainder of the band appeared so fractured that they couldn't play even the simple passages.

“I pleaded with the Capitol representative on the date to call it off, and in desperation he said he must have something to present to the home office to substantiate payment of the date. Needless to say, I was heartsick, as a large file of explanation was to no avail, and naturally these records were so bad they couldn't possibly be released. I am positive Johnny Mercer was never aware of what happened to what we both thought was an excellent idea.

"But, lo and behold, in 1952 I picked up an album that Capitol had released titled Sax Stylists which included many of the ‘greats,’ and heading the list of these sax stylists was my name; and I found that they dug into their archives and pressed one of these rejects with no consideration for my reputation, and pressed a record that was extremely bad by comparison with all other presentations in the album … ”

The Evanses (husband-and-wife biographers of both Bix and Tram) also quoted a 1968 letter they got from Pee Wee Erwin, the trumpeter on the 1946 Capitol Trumbauer date, that confirmed Tram’s recollection: “The date you mentioned for Capitol [some] were so drunk (not Tram but others), it was a disgrace.” The Evanses added that pne other musician from that session, who asked anonymity, remarked, “Not all of the guys showed up bombed, but there were several that did. It was really an insult to this great musician, and no matter how many apologies were given after the date, the damage was done. You could just see the hurt in Frank‘s eyes. He didn‘t deserve that at all!”

I first got turned on to Trumbauer’s Capitol recordings from a post by David Tenner on the Bxography Forum Web site (https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/bixography/). He included links to all three of the sides on YouTube: “You Took Advantage of Me” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DU80MuG7ejY), the one included on the Trumbauer collection; “Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WFF8E0AXcxs); and “China Boy” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QUXc4DPDUMo), the one included on Sax Stylists. Discogs lists three copies of the Sax Stylists album (two on a 10-inch LP and one as a box of three 45’s) with the following contents:

Coleman Hawkins and His Orchestra: “What Is There to Say?” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rwFuLmRQHT0)

Dave Matthews and His Orchestra: “Sepia Nocturne”

Eddie Miller and His Orchestra: “The Hour Of Parting” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hRlp1QCNjSA)

Murray MacEachern and His Orchestra: “Someone” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t_lHuaT7fkw)

Benny Carter and His Orchestra: “Prelude to a Kiss” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DhAsMnbaM3s)

Stan Kenton and His Orchestra, featuring Vido Musso: “Come Back to Sorrento” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aP0gjlCzcH0)

Frankie Trumbauer and His Orchestra: “China Boy” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QUXc4DPDUMo)

Georgie Auld and His Orchestra: “Fly, Fly, Fly”

The only other records on that list I actually had in my collection were Coleman Hawkins’ “What Is There to Say?” (ironically one of the personnel lists on Discogs has him playing alto sax instead of tenor!) and Benny Carter’s “Prelude to a Kiss.” I was able to look up the other ones on YouTube except the Matthews “Sepia Nocturne” – I kept getting links to the modern musician of that name – and the Auld “Fly, Fly, Fly.” The Hawkins and Carter sides are estimable records played by working bands (instead of studio groups) and I can guess why Tram, with a band of studio players with various numbers of sheets to the wind, felt his reputation would suffer by comparison. This also doesn’t explain how the other two sides, “You Took Advantage of Me” and “Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea,” ultimately saw the light of day. Also Murray MacEachern was normally a trombonist (though the Discogs personnel lists him as playing alto sax – but then this is the same list that moved Hawkins from tenor sax to alto!) and Stan Kenton was a pianist and bandleader, though “Come Back to Sorrento” was a feature for Vido Musso on tenor sax. (I looked up the MacEachern side on YouTube and found it was an alto sax feature but it was with a full band and I suspect MacEachern may have been the leader but not the sax soloist. My guess is this is a medium-sized combo drawn from the Kenton band and the sax is Art Pepper. To make it even stranger, there’s no trombone solo on the record – the solo instruments are alto sax, tenor sax and trumpet, and the tenor might be Musso again.) Later I bought a copy of the 10-inch LP of Sax Stylists on Discogs and found that MacEachern did indeed play alto sax on the record. As the liner notes explain, “Most people know Murray MacEachern plays fine trombone, but few realize he’s one of the best alto saxists in the business.” The LP gives the personnel as Murray MacEachern, alto sax; Mac McLaughlin, tenor sax; Frank Wiley, trumpet; Bill Bates, piano; Arnold Robins, bass; and Jimmy Landreth, drums. The record was made July 19, 1944 in Los Angeles.

There’s also an odd record by Joe Venuti’s Blue Four, “Running Ragged,” on which for at least the second time in his recorded career Trumbauer plays a jazz solo on bassoon (he takes his first solo on the record on bassoon and his second solo on sax); I’ve long treasured the Whiteman “’Tain’t So, Honey, ’Tain’t So” not only for Bix’s lyrical improvisation (based on the song’s verse, not its chorus, as Bix had done before on “Can’t Help Lovin’ That Man” from Whiteman’s 12-inch Show Boat medley) and Bing Crosby’s heartfelt vocal (on one of Willard Robison’s quirky Southern-church numbers) but Tram’s delightful bassoon solo, and here’s another one, a record described thus on the ’20’s Jazz Web site (https://www.20sjazz.com/videos/joe-venuti-1/runnin-ragged.html) thusly:

“This recording was made in New York City on October 28th 1929 featuring Joe Venuti violin, Eddie Lang guitar, Frankie Trumbauer bassoon & c-melody sax, and Lennie Hayton piano.

“‘Runnin' Ragged,’ a.k.a. “Bamboozlin’ the Bassoon,’ was composed by Joe Venuti, Eddie Lang, Lennie Hayton, and Frank Trumbauer.

“This classic recording from ‘Venuti & Lang’ is made complete with the addition of Frankie Trumbauer's saxophone and especially his bassoon producing original ‘on-the-spot’ solo work composed at the session.

“It is for this reason that all who were present – Lennie Hayton, Joe Venuti, Eddie Lang, and Frankie Trumbauer – appear as its credited authors.

“A very brief intro ending with a low note from Trumbauer's bassoon gives way to the sudden and speedy delivery of stringed bliss from Joe Venuti and his legendary partner Eddie Lang.

“As the title implies, this number takes on a rather frantic feel facilitated through the playing of the famous stringed duo. Then this record is split up a bit by fresh solo breaks from Trumbauer and Hayton.”