St. James Infirmary

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Louis Armstrong (1953)
St. James Infirmary ( tenor saxophone ).

St. James Infirmary (also St. James Infirmary Blues ) is an American folk song of unknown origin whose copyright was secured by Joe Primrose (a pseudonym for Irving Mills ) and Don Redman in 1927. After a first recording by Louis Armstrong , the song developed into a jazz standard .

history

The text of St. James Infirmary builds on a traditional British folk song of the 18th century: The Unfortunate Rake (also The Unfortunate Lad or The Trooper Cut Down in His Prime ). The song, sung in Dublin as early as 1790, is about a soldier who goes to prostitutes and then dies of a venereal disease . The content of the song changed over time; in North America, where the song was also recorded, gambling addiction and alcoholism became the causes of the young man's death. From the song the American song Streets of Laredo developed , but also the Gambler's Blues , which was published in 1926 by Phil Baxter. Its first recording was made in March 1927 with the interpreter Fess Williams; Carl Moore (from Arkansas) and Phil Baxter (from Texas) were listed as authors on the record. A second recording from January 1928 is known from Tennessee; The singer was Buell Kazee. In both cases the song is performed as a Euro-American folk ballad. This song, which was published in 1927 as Those Gambler's Blues in a collection of songs by Carl Sandberg, The American Songbag , with reference to three independent, regionally dispersed sources, is lyrically largely identical to the St. James Infirmary . On the other hand, the St. James Hospital recorded by Alan Lomax is lyrically closer to the folk songs, but close to the melody of the gambler's blues and thus, in Lomax's view, represents a kind of link between the folk ballad and the pop song. Already from 1924 an instrumental recording of Whitey Kaufman's Original Pennsylvania Serenaders under the title "Charleston Cabin", in the first third of which the basic melody of the "St James Infirmary Blues" can be clearly recognized; Roy Reber is named as the author of this version .

The title of the song may be derived from St. James Hospital in London , a religious foundation that treated lepers . The hospital was closed in 1532 when Henry VIII bought the land to build St James's Palace there. The song may even point back further into history.

Features of the song

The song may not be a real blues , but it has traits "that make it appear blues-compatible". Not only do his “lines of text follow the usual metric in the blues ”, but it is also written in a blues-like minor key. Each chorus consists of eight bars , but its form is in one piece and the typical repetition that is due to call and response is missing .

In the three- verse song, a man relates that he went down to St. James Infirmary , where he tragically found his girl (the so-called "baby") laid out dead. The narrator relinquishes their fate to God and presents himself as a globally unique “sweet man”. For his own funeral, he asks for all possible status symbols to be provided so that he can make another real impression on “the boys”. In the version sung by Louis Armstrong, the beginning of the song reads as follows:

I went down to St. James Infirmary,
Saw my baby there
Stretched out on a long white table,
So cold, so sweet, so fair.

First recordings by Louis Armstrong

Armstrong recorded the first version of the St. James Infirmary on December 12, 1928 . His Savoy Ballroom Five was expanded to include arranger and woodwind player Don Redman, who may have contributed the song. After a four-bar intro by the winds, the trumpet comes to the fore and, surrounded by the clarinet , introduces the topic twice. Then Armstrong sings, only accompanied by the rhythm section . In the following, the trombone plays half the time, so that the passage through the chorus is extended to 16 bars before the trumpet takes over the lead again. Armstrong is only now breaking away from the theme on the trumpet and inventing melodic variants in his improvisation ; a call and response with the clarinet follows .

Impact history

The song reached high places in the American charts several times:

  • Louis Armstrong and His Savoy Ballroom Five (1929, # 15)
  • King Oliver and His Jazz Band (1930, # 9,)
  • Cab Calloway and His Orchestra (1931, # 3)
  • Artie Shaw and His Orchestra (1942, # 18)

Armstrong kept coming back to the play later; he recorded it with his orchestra around 1932 and with his All Stars in 1947. The Calloway version is inspired by the 1929 version by George E. Lee , which is slower than the Armstrongs. Calloway also interpreted the song in Dave Fleischer's Snow White film Snow White (1933); there Koko the clown is dancing behind Betty Boop in her glass coffin . Even Bing Crosby Musical Birth of the Blues (1941) contained the song. In Abbas Kiarostami's 1997 film The Taste of the Cherry there is a recording of the song at the ambiguous end. In 2002 a cover version interpreted by Atsushi Kimura was used in the film Metropolis , based on Osamu Tezuka's comic strip .

By Hot Lips Page and Art Hodes of song in the traditional jazz became popular. Versions by Cab Calloway, Benny Goodman and Stan Kenton let the song come into the big band repertoire. In addition, pianists such as Erroll Garner , Red Garland and Hank Jones interpreted the song, as did trumpeters through to Enrico Rava and Tiger Okoshi . Especially in soul jazz , musicians such as Les McCann , Jimmy Smith , King Curtis and Della Reese , later Allen Toussaint , Boogaloo Joe Jones and Trombone Shorty with Booker T. Jones, took on the song, but also from musicians who can be classified as more avant-garde Archie Shepp , Marc Ribot and Peter Brötzmann was picked up. A more recent recording of the song can be found on Klaus Doldinger's album from 2016 with Helge Schneider as a guest on the Hammond organ.

The song was also recognized in the blues genre. Blues singers like Julia Lee , Josh White interpreted the song as well as Bobby Bland . In its episode there are versions by Janis Joplin , Lou Rawls , Jackie Wilson , Eric Burdon and The Animals , The Doors , Van Morrison , Joe Cocker or Angela Brown . Guitarist Eric Clapton played a live version of the song with pianist Dr. John for the music channel VH1 .

The White Stripes carried the song over to the rock .

Blind Willie McTell sang Dying Crapshooter's Blues, a variation with new lyrics; Bob Dylan also borrowed from St. James Infirmary for his song Blind Willie McTell . On the basis of St. James Infirmary , the Free and Equal Blues (by Earl Robinson and Yip Harburg ), known from Josh White , was created, in which the doctor of the hospital points out that the blood plasma does not care what skin color the donors have and its conclusion is that all people should be treated equally.

In Albert Camus' novel The Plague , St James Infirmary is the only record available to the group of main characters in the isolated city of Oran .

In the 2018 film Wach by Kim Frank , the protagonist Nike sings the song as an ambient version.

literature

  • Robert W. Harwood: I Went Down to St. James Infirmary: Investigations in the Shadowy World of Early Jazz-Blues in the Company of Blind Willie McTell, Louis Armstrong, Don Redman, Irving Mills, Carl Moore ..., and Where Did This Dang Dong Come from Anyway? Harland Press, Kitchener 2008, ISBN 978-0-9809743-0-0 .
  • Hans-Jürgen Schaal (Ed.): Jazz standards. The encyclopedia. 3rd, revised edition. Bärenreiter, Kassel u. a. 2004, ISBN 3-7618-1414-3 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ For example in versions by Jack Teagarden , Wild Bill Davison or Teddy Wilson . See Schaal: Jazz standards. P. 464.
  2. ↑ Allegedly the song was published in 1925 by Phil Baxter and Carl Moore, but the two did not claim the copyright. See Robert H. Harwood Phil Baxter, bandleader, 'co-composer' of Gambler's Blues (aka St. James Infirmary)
  3. ↑ a b c d cf. the liner notes by Kenneth S. Goldstein for Folkways album The Unfortunate Rake: A Study in the Evolution of a Ballad
  4. ^ Robert B. Waltz, David G. Engle: Bad Girl's Lament, The (St. James' Hospital; The Young Girl Cut Down in Her Prime) [Laws Q26]. In: The Ballad Index. Fresno State University, Fresno, California, 2011, accessed July 15, 2012 .
  5. ^ A b Frank Driggs, Chuck Haddix: Kansas City Jazz: From Ragtime to Bebop. A history. New York 2005, p. 90.
  6. ^ Robert W. Harwood: Buell Kazee: the second recording of St. James Infirmary.
  7. ^ Rob Walker: Letters From New Orleans. Garrett County Press, 2005, p. 187.
  8. ^ Sarah Vowell: The Magical Mystery Tour.
  9. ↑ a b c Schaal: Jazz standards. P. 464f.
  10. ^ Betty Boop: Snow White. with Cab Calloways St. James Infirmary
  11. ↑ Toshiyuki Honda: Metropolis (Original Soundtrack)
  12. ↑ Cindy Clark: The White House sings the blues. In: USA Today. Gannett, February 22, 2012, accessed July 15, 2012 .
  13. ↑ Eric Clapton & Dr. John - VH1 Duets YouTube
  14. ^ Walker: Letters From New Orleans. P. 190 and Willie McTell (Pseudopodium)
  15. ↑ Michael Gray: Song and Dance Man III: The Art of Bob Dylan. 2000, chapter 15
  16. ^ Elijah Wald : Josh White and the Protest Blues. In: Living Blues. 158 (7/8 2001)
  17. ↑ Kim Frank: WAKE | The film. In: YouTube. Borderline, September 17, 2018, accessed January 9, 2019 .