Ten 10" Albums I still play (occasionally). 2: Vic Dickenson Septet Vol. 1

Listening today, nearly 70 years on, it initially, made me wonder what all the fuss was about. Well, I think it was possibly because it was one of the first albums where Stanley Dance came up with the label mainstream as opposed to swing. It may not seem important now but, back then, swing meant big band flag-wavers whereas mainstream drew attention to those musicians caught in between the traditionalists, the big bands and the boppers.

Most of the musicians here had dipped their toes into some, if not all, of the waters.

Braff went on to play with Goodman, Dickenson was ex-Basie, the self-knighted Thompson took his own Basie-take into bopland and, whilst Edmund Hall had no affinity to bop - few clarinetists had - he knew his place and, in that place he reigned supreme. Page, the rock behind Basie's early discs is equally solid here. I don't know too much about guitarist Steve Jordan or drummer Les Erskine but they do the business with the end result being a session that proved that genres only exist as an example of the futility of genres. I'm not going to quote Duke's much used phrase that there are only two kinds of music - you know the rest - but instead to say that there is a lot of music that is worth listening to in between the good and the bad.

Braff is the most interesting, some might say the most obnoxious, of the horns but, irrespective of his, I'm told, abrasive personality he was the most identifiable trumpet player to emerge back in the early 1950s. Nobody sounded like him - and he knew it! 

Dickenson likewise. That growl sound he got told you who was blowing trombone and there was no grounds for error unless you wondered if Kid Ory had taken some lessons from Trummy Young.

Two tracks: Jeepers Creepers and Russian Lullaby. As I said earlier, my first reaction, upon listening again, was, is this what I've built a shrine to for all these years? But, as the music enveloped me, I knew - this was the truth as I heard it back then - maybe it still is ... Lance.

Ruby Braff  (cornet); Vic Dickenson (trombone); Edmund Hall (clarinet)* Sir Charles  Thompson (piano); Steve Jordan (guitar); Walter Page (bass); Les Erskine (drums).

* Inexplicably Hall's name is missing from the front cover!