Charlie Christian

Uh, this, this...

You know, what they teach you at school was never quite as, as relevant as, um, what you could learn from Bix Beiderbecke, you know, on a, on, on a 78 RPM record, you know? And Louis Armstrong, and, uh, Les Paul and, and Charlie Cr- Charlie Christian and, uh, you know...

Um, a- and then, you know, The Kinks and The Yardbirds and, uh, and, um, you know, Jerry Lee, Jerry Lee and, uh, uh, um, you know, uh, the, the rockers.

You know, Elvis even.

Yeah, and don't forget, Hammond also encouraged Benny Goodman to integrate his small band.

So Teddy Wilson and Charlie Christian were in there.

And, you know...

If they couldn't play the South, what the hell with the South? Goodman was a big enough draw.

learned it from Brunzi.

Quite possibly.

And the swing thing, you mentioned Goodman and Charlie Christian, which I want to come back to, but another phenomenon that's going on from the late 30s to the early 40s that really connects swing to rock and roll is this trend of people like count basie doing songs with singers like jimmy rushing and billy holiday uh you know and chick webb has ella fitzgerald uh you know billy ekstein's with earl heinz i mean so many of these singers are with that we think of as jump blues performers start out as part of swing orchestras

oh yeah you always had to have a vocalist or vocalist or even better a a a girl singer, a boy singer, and a trio.

And also you

had Charlie Christian, who's this bebop visionary from Oklahoma, this black – hick kid from the sticks, and John Hammond and Benny Goodman bring him into the Benny Goodman Orchestra.

So he's simultaneously doing classical music, pop music, but also on the cutting edge of jazz innovation and in a very earthy way with the most funky down-home African-American innovators going.

Yeah, it's an

Those six men made swing history when they first started playing together.

Benny on his clarinet, Gene Proop on the drums, Lionel Hampton on the vibraphone, Teddy Wilson on the piano, Charlie Christian on the guitar, and Artie Bernstein on the bass.

When those fellows played together, the joint really rocked.

Yes, Benny Goodman always hired the men who were tops in their field, the best pianists and drummers and trumpeters in the business.

Yeah.

Who's this incredible figure who discovered Count Basie, Billie Holiday, Teddy Wilson, Charlie Christian, um, Aretha Franklin, Bob Dylan, Leonard Cohen, Bruce Springsteen, Stevie Ray Vaughan.

I mean, this incredible career.

Tell us about John Hammond.

I love the piano, but, uh, the guitar looked really fun, and, uh, I just, um, wanted to take a few lessons, learn the chords and stuff, and then I got into, deeper into the guitar through rock and roll and the blues, and then just being curious about other guitar players I'd been hearing about.

Wes Montgomery, Charlie Christian, Django Reinhardt, these people, like, from recent history at that time.

This is, like, the '80s.

I was listening to getting serious about music.

And you-

Like these-

... talked a little bit about your influences, Charlie Christian and Wes Montgomery.

Who would you say was the first guy when you listened to him and you go like, "Wow, I wanna play like him"?

And, uh, while he was with Whiteman, he meets a pair of Italian jazz musicians, Eddie Lang and Joe Venuti, who are incredibly important.

Eddie Lang, widely considered to be the first jazz guitarist, before Django Reinhardt, before Charlie Christian, before Wes Montgomery.

And Joe Venuti-

Yeah

But what is more likely is that his technique and power came from having to be heard above the bal musette accordion players that he accompanied in the dance halls of Paris.

[clears throat] It's no mystery why Gunther Schuller in his book, The Swing Era: The Development of Jazz from 1930 to 1945, refers to the Rex Stewart Django Reinhardt session as, quote, "Amongst the priceless gems in the entire history of chamber jazz." Schuller also in a footnote wrote, "It would be fascinating to know whether Charlie Christian ever heard in his formative years the playing of Django Reinhardt, that extraordinary Belgian-born maverick who also developed early on an essentially melodic linear virtuoso style.

This, however, came out of French, Spanish gypsy folk traditions rather than any intrinsically American jazz styles, let alone blues." I'm just gonna play you a track, a quick one of, uh, from that recording.

The session with-- [upbeat jazz music] That's not it.