Happy Birthday to "*Champion Jack Dupree*":http://allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=11:jifexq95ldke, born on this day in 1909 in New Orleans. Before his death in 1992, Dupree was one of the last true barrelhouse piano players with a career dating back to the 1920s. It's with good reason that virtually every fresh-faced and eager student of blues piano is instructed to pick up some Champion Jack Dupree records and listen carefully.Having lost his parents in a house fire that was reputedly set by the Ku Klux Klan, Dupree grew up in the Colored Waifs' Home For Boys - the same orphanage that housed Louis Armstrong for part of his childhood. As a young adolescent he was working New Orleans street corners for pocket change and hanging out with local barrelhouse piano masters to soak up their technique. Before long he was pounding pianos in the bordellos and bars of the French Quarter himself, gradually building a reputation. Around 1930, Dupree left New Orleans and meandered north, playing clubs and parties along the way until he wound up in Chicago. He spent a year there without finding much musical success - he sold bootleg whiskey to supplement what were only occasional piano-playing gigs. When he moved on to Detroit in search of better luck, he made music a sideline while he explored the world of boxing. Eventually he moved to Indianapolis and embarked on a professional boxing career, fighting more than 100 bouts and winning the title of lightweight champion of Indiana.Dupree never fully abandoned music for boxing, however, and in 1940 he made his first recording in Chicago for Okeh Records. He kept up a steady output for the next two years, turning out sides that evoked his New Orleans heritage despite his Windy City surroundings. In 1942 he was drafted by the Navy and served as a cook in the Pacific. He was captured by the Japanese and was a prisoner of war for two years. Upon returning to the States, he was ready to leave boxing behind and focus on his music. He settled in New York City and became a busy recording artist, turning out a long list of records for many different labels; when contractual restrictions put up a roadblock, he simply recorded under a pseudonym.Even with his musical accomplishments, Dupree was not immune to the racial discrimination that plagued the U.S. in the mid-20th century. Having grown tired of it, he moved to Europe in 1959 and lived in France, Switzerland, Denmark and England before settling in Germany. He toured throughout Europe and recorded for several labels, and cultivated a fan base that allowed him to live comfortably. He returned to the States in 1990 to play at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, and he also managed to record a comeback album of sorts called _Back Home In New Orleans_. He made a repeat appearance at the 1991 festival in New Orleans, and recorded one more album titled _Forever And Ever_. Not much later, in 1992, he died at home in Germany.The video clip included here shows Champion Jack Dupree playing the slow blues "Poor Boy" with King Curtis and his band, live at the Montreux Jazz Festival in 1971. (It's a _good_ slow blues, dermahrk!) It may be a bit long, but it offers a great look at Dupree's engaging performance style, interacting with the audience and punctuating the tune with impromptu shouts and some cool body english on the piano. King Curtis' sax solo is a show-stopper, as is the guitar solo by Cornell Dupree (no relation). On bass it's Jerry Jemmott, and the drummer is none other than Bernard "Pretty" Purdie, often called the world's most-recorded drummer. A non-musical highlight of the clip is when Champion Jack tries to sneak a few gulps of his beer while he apparently thinks he's off-camera during the sax solo (or maybe he just doesn't care). _Love_ how he just keeps playing with his right hand.
dermahrk says
Hey, I really liked this - a LOT. What a LIFE this guy lived! Reading that bio was something else.
I'm trying to get a better handle on what I don't like about slow blues, and this video helps. I think it's slow guitar blues, where each phrase that is sung (say, six notes maximum) is followed by an absolute flurry of lead guitar (20 notes minimum) - over and over. When the accompaniment is piano (Otis Spann or Jack here), or sax, they don't seem to be in such a hurry to squeeze in so much weedle-weedle, and the variety of the instrumentation really helps. Having said all of that, I LOVE Cornell's solo here, much of which is as slow and thought-out as the vocal lines. That helps a lot too.
The fact that Jack, with his background, is singing "Got no mother or dad" is touching, and note that his beer-sneaking comes right after the verse about "drinking like a fool".
Happy Birthday to "*Champion Jack Dupree*":http://allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=11:jifexq95ldke, born on this day in 1909 in New Orleans. Before his death in 1992, Dupree was one of the last true barrelhouse piano players with a career dating back to the 1920s. It's with good reason that virtually every fresh-faced and eager student of blues piano is instructed to pick up some Champion Jack Dupree records and listen carefully.Having lost his parents in a house fire that was reputedly set by the Ku Klux Klan, Dupree grew up in the Colored Waifs' Home For Boys - the same orphanage that housed Louis Armstrong for part of his childhood. As a young adolescent he was working New Orleans street corners for pocket change and hanging out with local barrelhouse piano masters to soak up their technique. Before long he was pounding pianos in the bordellos and bars of the French Quarter himself, gradually building a reputation. Around 1930, Dupree left New Orleans and meandered north, playing clubs and parties along the way until he wound up in Chicago. He spent a year there without finding much musical success - he sold bootleg whiskey to supplement what were only occasional piano-playing gigs. When he moved on to Detroit in search of better luck, he made music a sideline while he explored the world of boxing. Eventually he moved to Indianapolis and embarked on a professional boxing career, fighting more than 100 bouts and winning the title of lightweight champion of Indiana.Dupree never fully abandoned music for boxing, however, and in 1940 he made his first recording in Chicago for Okeh Records. He kept up a steady output for the next two years, turning out sides that evoked his New Orleans heritage despite his Windy City surroundings. In 1942 he was drafted by the Navy and served as a cook in the Pacific. He was captured by the Japanese and was a prisoner of war for two years. Upon returning to the States, he was ready to leave boxing behind and focus on his music. He settled in New York City and became a busy recording artist, turning out a long list of records for many different labels; when contractual restrictions put up a roadblock, he simply recorded under a pseudonym.Even with his musical accomplishments, Dupree was not immune to the racial discrimination that plagued the U.S. in the mid-20th century. Having grown tired of it, he moved to Europe in 1959 and lived in France, Switzerland, Denmark and England before settling in Germany. He toured throughout Europe and recorded for several labels, and cultivated a fan base that allowed him to live comfortably. He returned to the States in 1990 to play at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, and he also managed to record a comeback album of sorts called _Back Home In New Orleans_. He made a repeat appearance at the 1991 festival in New Orleans, and recorded one more album titled _Forever And Ever_. Not much later, in 1992, he died at home in Germany.The video clip included here shows Champion Jack Dupree playing the slow blues "Poor Boy" with King Curtis and his band, live at the Montreux Jazz Festival in 1971. (It's a _good_ slow blues, dermahrk!) It may be a bit long, but it offers a great look at Dupree's engaging performance style, interacting with the audience and punctuating the tune with impromptu shouts and some cool body english on the piano. King Curtis' sax solo is a show-stopper, as is the guitar solo by Cornell Dupree (no relation). On bass it's Jerry Jemmott, and the drummer is none other than Bernard "Pretty" Purdie, often called the world's most-recorded drummer. A non-musical highlight of the clip is when Champion Jack tries to sneak a few gulps of his beer while he apparently thinks he's off-camera during the sax solo (or maybe he just doesn't care). _Love_ how he just keeps playing with his right hand.
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