Jazz Gillum Vol. 3 1941 – 1946

Jazz Gillum

Complete Recorded Works (3rd April 1936 to 25th January 1949)

Vol. 3: 4th July to 18th February 1946

Featuring the recordings of:

Jazz Gillum, vocal / harmonica; Big Bill Broonzy, guitar; probably Alfred Elkins or Al Collins, imitation bass; Amanda Sorter, washboard. Jazz Gillum, vocal / harmonica; probably Horace Malcolm, piano; Big Bill Broonzy, guitar; Alfred Elkins, stand-up bass or imitation bass. Jazz Gillum, vocal / harmonica (except on 18, 19); Blind John Davis, piano; Big Bill Broonzy, guitar; Alfred Elkins, stand-up bass or imitation bass. Jazz Gillum, vocal / harmonica; Roosevelt Sykes, piano; Big Bill Broonzy, guitar; Ransom Knowling, stand-up bass. Jazz Gillum, vocal / harmonica; Big Maceo Merriweather, piano; Leonard Caston, guitar; Alfred Elkins, stand-up bass.

Genres: Blues, Urban Blues, Early Chicago Blues, Mississippi Blues, Blues Guitar, Blues Harmonica, Blues Piano,

Abridged from this album’s original booklet notes. This collection picks up the Jazz Gillum story during the session of July 1941! On this date Washboard Sam was replaced by one Amanda Porter (also known as Ann Sortier or Sorter the wife of Charlie McCoy) a lady whose collection of household utensils makes Sam’s scullery appear impoverished. Hear Jazz Gillum and Big Bill Broonzy strain to remain serious as Amanda clouts, scrapes or rattles everything in sight; pots, pans and what sounds like the kitchen sink! At times the affect is similar to the arrival of a piece of modern sculpture at the bottom of a lift-shaft. The last song done that day was Gillum’s hymn to male bonding Me and My Buddy,

Me and my buddy never will have no fallin’ out ‘Cos we got wise to wimmin; we know what it’s all about.

Did Gillum and Big Bill  have a falling out, perhaps over the authorship of Key To The Highway? It is strange that, despite their long association there is no mention at all of Jazz Gillum in Big Bill Broonzy’s autobiography. By the time of Gillum’s next session Pearl Harbor had been attacked and the US was at war. In these last two sessions before the Petrillo ban on recording took effect Jazz knocked out sixteen titles including his version of Casey Bill Weldon’s Outskirts Of Town and Tell Me Mama, a number previously passed around between Big Bill and Louis Lasky. Two tracks, Water Pipe Blues and You’re Tearing Your Playhouse Down did not see issue until well into the age of the long playing record. It is some measure of Bill Gillum’s popularity that of the sixty six sides he had cut for Bluebird since 1936 these were the first to stay in the can. If these were Jazz Gillum’s glory days they were soon to be cut short when Uncle Sam tore his playhouse down by inducting him into the army. Gillum remained in the service until 1945 when he returned to civilian life and tried to pick up the reins of his recording career while supporting himself by working at more mundane jobs. At his first post-war session he took advantage of the presence of Roosevelt Sykes to record Five Feet Four over Sykes’ “44s” backing. For a couple of years it seemed as if the old times had revived – but there were soon to be some major changes in public taste that would spell the end for Jazz and a lot of his contemporaries.

Keith Briggs Copyright 1993 & 2007 Document Records

DOCD-5199