[78-L] Jazz violin, mostly Hernan Oliva

[Steven C. Barr]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "yves francois" <aprestitine at yahoo.com>
>   I saw that Michel Warlop has been mentioned (and should be mentioned 
> more than Stéphane IMHO, though I think SG did age very well, like a fine 
> wine, I think between playing with Shearing and playing better violins* a 
> lot of the early problems seem to be eliminated), he is , along w Svend 
> Asmussen one of my favorite violin players, however, we missed one on this 
> thread Hernan Oliva. Oliva was in the first Aleman Quintet when he came 
> back to Argentina (the second combo's violin player was not in the same 
> class IMHO), but if you really want to hear some of the greatest jazz 
> violin on record check the Louis Vola Quintet's from about 1945 and then 
> the fantastic sides he recorded with Ahmed Ratip's band from the later 
> 1940's. The Ratip band had Booker Pittman on alto sax (and some clarinet 
> as well, though some of the clarinet is by Edwin Morgan, another fine 
> jazzman), as well as Ratip's rather more American styled guitar work and 
> Oliva. It is probably some
> of hardest swinging jazz recorded in Argentina, and I wonder why this 
> music has not made the international reissue programs (have them on 
> private CD's and also by now many of the 78's), if you can check them , 
> great, just know that Oliva (and Pittman) leave by early 1949, so don't go 
> off buying the last few Victor's or the TK's for them on it (though they 
> are still good music, indeed one of them is an Astor Piazzolla 
> composition). BTW Oliva ended up with the Chinini brothers and trumpeter 
> Julien Roth in Jazz Casino, another good Argentine jazz band in the 50's , 
> before doing smaller groups.
>   Anyone likes Juice Wilson? One of my favorite records are the 2 records 
> he recorded with Noble Sissle in 1929 then ... off to Malta and in the 
> books (or NOT in the books sort to speak) rather like piano player Tommy 
> Chase, one record and ... out (or maybe he recorded non jazz violin in 
> some obscure Maltese studio, or perhaps backing some Maghreb vocalist in 
> the 40's, I can fantasize, can I?). One other I did not see, Darnell 
> Howard, sounds good in the early 30's Hines records ("Cavernism"), I could 
> go on, but not every Edgar Sampson needs to be remembered for his violin 
> work (though I do like "House Of David Blues" an excellent record all 
> around by Henderson 1931)...
> Yves Francois
>
> * in a previous post I mentioned "Fit As A Fiddle", where a 1933 French 
> jazz band (Gregor) has a violin solo that sounds midway between Warlop and 
> Grappelli , general thought it that Stephen borrowed Michel's violin, for 
> it has some of Michel's tone (Stéphane Grappelli  records in the 30's have 
> a "thin" tone IMHO compared to Warlop, however the trio of violins w 
> South, it is Warlop that is the odd man out), guess it depends on the 
> amount of libation conbsumned on those sessions (I personally think 
> Stéphane sounds better on the 1934/5 Ultraphones than the 1936 HMV's)
>
Picked up a Warlop disc on the Canadian HMV-Victor 150xxx series back
c.1978/9...IIRC, it features Django and (IIRC) Grappelli (can't recall if 
that
data came from a discography?!)...!

VERY pleasant surprise!!

...stevenc