FW: [jazz_guitar] Ken Burns "Jazz"

I'm forwarding this little parody -- it made me laugh!

-----Original Message-----
From: danadler@rcn.com [mailto:danadler@rcn.com]
Sent: Monday, January 29, 2001 10:51 AM
To: jazz_guitar@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [jazz_guitar] Ken Burns "Jazz"

Sorry about this off-topic, but it's too funny (sad?) not to forward.

I guess we guitarists shouldn't complain, there was a 2-second
segment on Charlie Christian in one episode...

-Dan

> Presenting Ken Burns' 144-hour Extremely Important
> documentary, "Jazz."
>
> Fade up on a grainy old photograph of a man in a three-piece
> suit, holding
> a cornet. Or a bicycle horn, it's hard to tell.
> Narrator: Skunkbucket LeFunke was born in 1876 and died in
> 1901. No one
> who heard him is alive today. The grandchildren of the people
> who heard him
> are not alive today. The great-grandchildren of the people
> who heard him
> are not alive today. He was never recorded.
> Wynton Marsalis: I'll tell you what Skunkbucket LeFunke
> sounded like. He
> had this big rippling sound, and he always phrased off the
> beat, and he
> slurred his notes. And when the Creole bands were still playing
> De-bah-de-bah-ta-da-tah, he was already playing
> Bo-dap-da-lete-do-do-do-bah!
> He was just like gumbo, ahead of his time.
> Announcer: LeFunke was a cornet player, gambler, card shark,
> pool hustler,
> pimp, male prostitute, Kelly Girl, computer programmer,brain
> surgeon and he
> invented the internet.
>
> Stanley Crouch: When people listened to Skunkbucket LeFunke,
> they heard
> Do-do-dee-bwap-da-dee-dee-de-da-da-doop-doop-dap. And they
> knew even then
> how deeply profound that was.
>
> Announcer: It didn't take LeFunke long to advance the art of
> jazz past its
> humble beginnings in New Orleans whoredom with the addition
> of a bold and
> sassy beat.
> Wynton: Let me tell you about the Big Four. Before the Big Four,
jazz
> drumming sounded like BOOM-chick-BOOM-chick-BOOM-chick. But
> now they had
> the Big Four, which was so powerful some said it felt like a
> Six. A few
> visiting musicians even swore they were in an Eight.
>
> Stanley: It was smooth and responsive, and there was no knocking and
> pinging, even on 87 octane.
>
> Wynton: Even on gumbo.
>
> Announcer: When any musician in the world heard Louis
> Armstrong for the
> first time, they gnawed their arm off with envy, then said the
angels
> probably wanted to sound like Louis. When you consider a
> bunch of angels
> talking in gruff voices and singing "Hello Dolly," you
> realize what a stupid
> aspiration that is.
>
> Gary Giddy: Louis changed jazz because he was the only cat going
> Do-da-dep-do-wah-be-be, while everyone else was doing
> Do-de-dap-dit-dit-dee.
>
> Stanley: And that was very profound.
>
> Marsalis: Like gumbo.
>
> Stanley: Uh-huh.
>
> Matt Glaser: I always have this fantasy that when Louis performed in
> Belgium, Heisenberg was in the audience and he was blown away
> and that's
> where he got the idea for his Uncertainty Principle.
>
> Marsalis: Because the Uncertainty Principle, applied to jazz,
> means you
> never know if a cat is going to go Dap-da-de-do-ba-ta-bah or
> Dap-da-de-do-bip-de-beep.
>
> Wynton: Louis was the first one to realize that.
>
> Stanley: And that can be very profound.
>
> Stanley: I thought it was a box of chocolates...
>
> Announcer: The Savoy Ballroom brought people of all races colors
> andpolitical persuasions together to get sweaty as Europe
> moved closer and
> closer to the brink of World War II.
>
> Savoy Dancer: We didn't care what color you were at the Savoy. We
only
> cared if you were wearing deodorant.
>
> Stanley: Wynton always wears deodorant.
>
> Glaser: I'll bet Arthur Murray was on the dance floor and he
> was thinking
> about Louis and that's where he got the idea to open a bunch of
dance
> schools.
>
> Stanley: And that was very profound.
>
> Giddy: Let's talk about Louis some more. We've wasted three
> minutes of this
> 57-part documentary not talking about Louis.
>
> Wynton: He was an angel, a genius, much better than Cats.
>
> Stanley: He invented the word "Cats."
>
> Wynton: He invented swing, he invented jazz, he invented the
> telephone,the
> automobile and the polio vaccine.
>
> Stanley: And the internet.
>
> Wynton: Very profound.
>
> Announcer: Louis Armstrong turned commercial in the 1930s and
> didn't make
> any more breakthrough contributions to jazz. But it's not PC
> to point that
> out, so we'll be showing him in every segment of this series
> to come, even
> if he's just doing the same things as the last time you saw him.
>
> Glaser: I'll bet Chuck Yeager was in the audience when Louis
> was hitting
> those high Cs at the Earle Theater in Philadelphia, and
> that's what made him
> decide to break the sound barrier.
>
> Stanley: And from there go to Pluto.
>
> Wynton: I'm going to make some gumbo-
>
> Stanley: BOOM-chick-BOOM-chick-BOOM-chickSS
>
> Giddy: Do-yap-do-wee-bah-scoot-scoot-dap-dap...That's what
> all the cats were
> saying back then.
>
> Announcer: In 1964, John Coltrane was at his peak, Eric Dolphy was
in
> Europe, where he would eventually die, the Modern Jazz
> Quartet was making
> breakthrough recordings in the field of Third Stream Music,
> Miles Davis was
> breaking new barrier with his second great quintet, and
> Charlie Mingus was
> extending jazz composition to new levels of complexity. But
> we're going to
> talk about Louis singing "Hello Dolly"instead.
>
> Stanley: Louis went,
> Ba-ba-yaba-do-do-dee-da-bebin-doo-wap-deet-deet-do-da-da.
>
> Wynton: Sweets went,
> Scoop-doop-shalaba-yaba-mokey-hokey-bwap-bwap-tee-tee-dee.
>
> Giddy: I go, Da-da-shoobie-doobie-det-det-det-bap-bap-baaaaa...
> Announcer: The rest of the history of jazz will be shown in fast
> forward and will occupy exactly seven seconds. --There, that
> was it. Now
> here are some scenes from Ken Burns' next documentary, a
> 97-part epic about
> the Empire State Building, titled "The Empire State Building."
> "It is tall and majestic. It is America's building. It is the Empire
> State Building. Dozens of workers gave their lives in the
> construction of
> this building."
>
> Matt Glaser: I'll bet that they were thinking of Louis as
> they were falling
> to their deaths. I have this fantasy that his high notes inspired
the
> immenseness of the Empire State Building.
>
> Wynton Marsalis: I'll bet most people who'd fall off the Empire
State
> Building would go "Aaaaaahhhh!" But these cats went:
>
> "Dee-dee-daba-da-da-bop-bop-de-dop-shewap-splat!"
>
> "That's next time on PBS"
>

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