Phantom Dancer :: 12:00pm 4th Jul 2023
Charlie Christian is this week’s Phantom Dancer feature artist. He was an American swing and jazz guitarist and a key figure in the development of bebop and cool jazz. He gained national exposure as a member of the Benny Goodman Sextet and Orchestra from August 1939 to June 1941. His single-string technique, combined with amplification, helped bring the guitar out of the rhythm section and into the forefront as a solo instrument.
The Phantom Dancer is your weekly non-stop mix of swing and jazz from live 1920s-60s radio and TV every week.
LISTEN to this week’s Phantom Dancer mix (online after 2pm AEST, Tuesday 4 July) and weeks of Phantom Dancer mixes online at, at https://2ser.com/phantom-dancer/
SWING
In 1939, Christian auditioned for John Hammond, who recommended him to bandleader Benny Goodman.
Goodman invited him to a show that evening at the Victor Hugo restaurant in Los Angeles. The bandleader called “Rose Room”, a tune he assumed Christian did not know. However, Christian knew the tune and took an unprecedented twenty choruses of improvisation; Goodman hired him as a member of the band as a result. In the course of a few days, Christian went from making $2.50 a night (he’d been playing electric guitar in mid-West bands since 1936) to $150 a week.
Christian joined the newly formed Goodman Sextet in September 1939, which included Lionel Hampton, Fletcher Henderson, Artie Bernstein and Nick Fatool and which you’ll hear in live broadcasts on this week’s Phantom Dancer.
By February 1940 Christian dominated the jazz and swing guitar polls and was elected to the Metronome All Stars. In the spring of 1940, Goodman laid off most of his band, but he kept Christian.
COOL
His work on the Goodman sextet sides “Soft Winds”, “Till Tom Special”, and “A Smo-o-o-oth One” show his use of few well-placed melodic notes. His work on the Sextet’s recordings of the ballads “Stardust”, “Memories of You”, “Poor Butterfly”, “I Surrender Dear” and “On the Alamo” and his work on “Profoundly Blue” with the Edmond Hall Celeste Quartet (1941) show hints of what was later called cool jazz. Although credited for very few, Christian composed many of the original tunes recorded by the Benny Goodman Sextet.
BOP
Christian was an important contributor to the music that became known as bop, or bebop. Some of the participants in early after-hours affairs at Minton’s Playhouse, an after-hours club located in the Hotel Cecil at 210 West 118th Street in Harlem where bebop was born, credit Christian with the name bebop, citing his humming of phrases as the onomatopoetic origin of the term.
Kenny Clarke claimed that “Epistrophy” and “Rhythm-a-Ning” were compositions by Christian, which Christian played with Clarke and Thelonious Monk at Minton’s jam sessions. The “Rhythm-a-Ning” line is heard on “Down on Teddy’s Hill” and behind the introduction on “Guy’s Got to Go” from the Newman recordings. It is also a line from Mary Lou Williams’s “Walkin’ and Swingin'”.Clarke further commented that Christian first showed him the chords to “Epistrophy” on a ukulele.
In the late 1930s Christian contracted tuberculosis which killed him in February 1942 .
STYLE
The Gibson ES-150, the guitar model most associated with Christian Christian’s solos are frequently described as “horn-like”, and in that sense he was more influenced by horn players such as Lester Young and Herschel Evans than by early arch-top guitarists like Eddie Lang.
In the brief period Christian played with Goodman he influenced not only guitarists but other musicians as well. The influence he had on “Dizzy” Gillespie, Charlie Parker, Thelonious Monk and Don Byas can be heard on their early bop recordings “Blue ‘n’ Boogie” and “Salt Peanuts”. Other musicians, such as the trumpeter Miles Davis, cited Christian as an early influence.
4 July PLAY LIST
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Play List – The Phantom Dancer
107.3 2SER-FM Sydney
LISTEN ONLINE Community Radio Network Show CRN #605 |
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107.3 2SER Tuesday 4 July 2023 |
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Set 1
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Randy Brooks | |
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Open + Hallelujah!
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Jerry Wald Orchestra
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‘Spotlight Bands’
AFRS Re-broadcast 20 Oct 1944 |
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The Song is You
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Jerry Wald Orchestra (voc) Mick Merrick |
‘Spotlight Bands’
AFRS Re-broadcast 20 Oct 1944 |
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Blues Concerto
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Jerry Wald Orchestra
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‘Spotlight Bands’
AFRS Re-broadcast 20 Oct 1944 |
| GI Jive + It Had To Be You | Jerry Wald Orchestra (voc) Ginny Powell |
‘Spotlight Bands’
AFRS Re-broadcast 20 Oct 1944 |
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Set 2
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Glenn Miller | |
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Moonlight Serenade (theme) + Beer Barrel Polka
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Glenn Miller Orchestra
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Glen Island Casino
New Rochelle WEAF NBC Red NYC 14 Jun 1939 |
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The Lamp is Low
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Glenn Miller Orchestra (voc) Ray Eberle
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Glen Island Casino
New Rochelle WEAF NBC Red NYC 14 Jun 1939 |
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Jumping Jive
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Glenn Miller Orchestra (voc) Marion Hutton + Band
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Glen Island Casino
New Rochelle WEAF NBC Red NYC 14 Jun 1939 |
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Hold Tight + Moonlight Serenade (theme)
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Glenn Miller Orchestra (voc) Marion Hutton
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Glen Island Casino
New Rochelle WEAF NBC Red NYC 14 Jun 1939 |
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Set 3
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Charlie Christian | |
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Breakfast Feud
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Benny Goodman Sextet
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Comm Rec
NYC 13 Jul 1941 |
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Seven Come Eleven
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Benny Goodman Sextet
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Peacock Court
Hotel Mark Hopkins KFRC Mutual San Francisco 28 May 1940 |
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Sheik of Araby
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Benny Goodman Sextet | Cocanut Grove Ambassador Hotel KHJ Mutual Los Angeles 12 Apr 1940 |
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Six Appeal
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Benny Goodman Sextet
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Peacock Court
Hotel Mark Hopkins KFRC Mutual San Francisco 4 Jun 1940 |
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Set 4
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Stan Kenton | |
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Open + Trajectories
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Stan Kenton Orchestra
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‘Innovations in Modern Music for 1950’
Radio Transcription |
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Lonesome Road
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Stan Kenton Orchestra (voc) June Christy
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‘Innovations in Modern Music for 1950’
Radio Transcription |
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The Cuban Episode
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Stan Kenton Orchestra
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‘Innovations in Modern Music for 1950’
Radio Transcription |
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Set 5
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Buzz Adlam | |
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Anchors Aweigh (theme) + If I Were a Bell
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Buzz Adlam Orchestra (voc) Tony Martin
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‘Navy Star Time’
Radio Transcription Los Angeles 1950 |
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La Vie en Rose
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Buzz Adlam Orchestra (voc) Tony Martin
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‘Navy Star Time’
Radio Transcription Los Angeles 1950 |
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In a Little Spanish Town
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Buzz Adlam Orchestra
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‘Navy Star Time’
Radio Transcription Los Angeles 1950 |
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I Don’t Care if the Sun Don’t Shine + Close
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Buzz Adlam Orchestra (voc) Tony Martin
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‘Navy Star Time’
Radio Transcription Los Angeles 1950 |
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Set 6
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Eddie Condon | |
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Blues ‘Round My Head
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Woody Herman (cl and voc)
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‘Town Hall Jazz Concert’
WJZ Blue NYC 27 Jan 1945 |
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Ensemble Blues
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Eddie Condon
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‘Town Hall Jazz Concert’
WJZ Blue NYC 21 Oct 1944 |
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Indiana
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Billy Butterfield
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‘Town Hall Jazz Concert’
WJZ Blue NYC 27 Jan 1945 |
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September in the Rain
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Eddie Condon
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‘Town Hall Jazz Concert’
WJZ Blue NYC 25 Nov 1944 |
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Set 7
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1940s Women Singers | |
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Small Hotel
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Ella Logan
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‘Jubilee’
AFRS Hollywood Feb 1945 |
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Come To Baby Do
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Lena Horne | ‘Jubilee’ AFRS Hollywood Oct 1945 |
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Embraceable You
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Effie Smith
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‘Jubilee’
AFRS Hollywood Feb 1945 |
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Haunted Town
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Lena Horne
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‘Jubilee’
AFRS Hollywood Oct 1945 |
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Set 8
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Miles Davis | |
| Open + Walkin’ |
Miles Davis
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‘Bandstand USA’
Birdland
WOR Mutual NYC 3 Jan 1959 |
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SHARE
PLAYLIST
Jerry Wald Orchestra Open + Hallelujah
Jerry Wald Orchestra The Song is You
Jerry Wald Orchestra Blues Concerto
Jerry Wald Orchestra GI Jive
Jerry Wald Orchestra It Had to be You
Glenn Miller Orchestra Moonlight Serenade
Glenn Miller Orchestra Beer Barrel Polka
Glenn Miller Orchestra The Lamp is Low
Glenn Miller Orchestra Jumping Jive
Glenn Miller Orchestra Hold Tight
Benny Goodman Sextet Breakfast Fued
Benny Goodman Sextet Seven Cum Eleven
Benny Goodman Sextet Sheik of Araby
Benny Goodman Sextet Six Appeal
Stan Kenton Orchestra Open + Trajectories
Stan Kenton Orchestra Lonesome Road
Stan Kenton Orchestra The Cuban Episode
Buzz Adlam Orchestra Anchors Aweigh
Buzz Adlam Orchestra If I Were a Bell
Buzz Adlam Orchestra La Vie En Rose
Buzz Adlam Orchestra In a Little Spanish Town
Buzz Adlam Orchestra I Don't Care if the Sun Don't Shine
Woody Herman Blues 'Round My Head
Eddie Condon Ensemble Blues
Billy Butterfield Indiana
Eddie Condon September in the Rain
Ella Logan Small Hotel
Lena Horne Come to Baby Do
Lena Horne Haunted Town
Effie Smith Embraceable You
Miles Davis Open + Walkin'
