Talk:Benny Goodman
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[edit] contradictions
"The notion of a "hot" band playing in such rarified environs was, for the time, absurd. Regulars of Carnegie Hall were the upper crust of society, and looked down upon the Swing dance craze spreading across the nation."
"This concert has been regarded by some as the most significant concert in jazz history. After years of work by musicians from all over the country, jazz had finally been accepted by main stream audiences."
those two passages are irreconciliable. benny goodman was ALREADY successful, the "swing dance CRAZE" was already "spreading", countless jazz bands made a fine living during the same years. so why would the success of a single "upper crust" venue concert signify the "mainstream" "acceptance" of jazz?
it doesn't signal that at all. the statements are completely and utterly wrong.
Probably, as in other areas of human society and civilization, the acceptance of an otherwise popular phenomenon in an otherwise very distinguished environment signals the break-down of a "taboo". I would say this is the sgnificance of the Carnegy concert. brian stormen 03:33, 14 September 2007 (UTC)
[edit] January 16, 1938 and Carnegie Hall
1938 in music says: "Benny Goodman refuses to play Carnegie Hall because black members of his orchestra are banned." but here it states: "his band made a famous appearance at Carnegie Hall." Which version is correct?--Hhielscher 04:36, 20 May 2005 (UTC)
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- Goodman's concert at Carnegie Hall in 1938 was the first jazz concert at Carnegie and one of the greatest jazz concerts ever. The recording of the concert was first issued in the 1950s and has been reissued several times since, most recently in 1999 (the first issue concert in its entirety). I just corrected the 1938 in music article. The Carnegie Hall concert probably deserves its own section within the Benny Goodman article, since it is considered to be a watershed moment for jazz. Maybe I'll get around to it someday ... Drumsac 23:22, 9 November 2005 (UTC)
[edit] Benny and bebop
Here it says: "He embraced bebop in the late 1940s and early 1950s with less commercial success, although the recordings he made in that style for Capitol Records were very highly praised by jazz critics." Is this true? I've always heard that Goodman hated bebop, and I've never heard of any critically praised Goodman bebop sides. Drumsac 23:22, 9 November 2005 (UTC)
Goodman *never* came to terms with bebop, although as a technician he undoubtably regarded its speed and chord changes as a challenge to be mastered, and as a commercial bandleader he recognised its (gradual) public acceptance...but he, personally, never liked it. Come to that, he didn't like quite a lot of pre-bop compositions, either: there can be few jazz players whose performances on record make it so obvious when they are not at home with a number. Listen to Goodman agonising on "I Must oasdk;f1937: Teddy Wilson with Billie Holiday): it's obvious that Goodman *hates* the tune - in that key, anyway. The same goes for all his stuff with Wardell Grey and Stan Hasselgard, when Goodman adopts a "cool", bloodless tone and phrasing that he surely cannot have beleived in. Presumably he thought he was being "modern". In fact, he was always best in the role of "hot" Chicagoan clarinetist: and at that, he was insurpassible.
Sixty years later it's hard to see what the problem was between swing and bebop. I don't think Goodman hated bop. Also, who is "Wilson" in the section on bebop. The writer says Goodman hired "Wilson" to be in his band. 67.11.169.152 23:52, 23 March 2007 (UTC)
'Undercurrent Blues' is a recent (say in the last 10 years) album of BG Bebop on Capitol. It's interesting for Wardell Gray, Hasselgard, and Fats Navarro. Some of the 'ob-bla-dee' vocal stuff is crap. BG generally sounds great, but he soon retreated to his comfort zone of Big Band Swing (Most notably on 'BG in Hi-Fi"). --SeanO 21:20, 29 March 2007 (UTC)
[edit] YouTube links
This article is one of thousands on Wikipedia that have a link to YouTube in it. Based on the External links policy, most of these should probably be removed. I'm putting this message here, on this talk page, to request the regular editors take a look at the link and make sure it doesn't violate policy. In short: 1. 99% of the time YouTube should not be used as a source. 2. We must not link to material that violates someones copyright. If you are not sure if the link on this article should be removed or you would like to help spread this message contact us on this page. Thanks, ---J.S (t|c) 04:04, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
I play the clarinet. I have to study Benny Goodman. I think his music is really cool!
If the You Tube link is to Stage Door Canteen, I don't think it matters, because Stage Door fell into the public domain a really long time ago. 67.11.169.152 23:54, 23 March 2007 (UTC)
[edit] "He was the most important performer of popular music in the twentieth century."
This is not a fact, it's opinion. Elvis, Sinatra, the Beatles, and Michael Jackson all have a claim to this as well. And that's if we limit 'popular music' to music from English-speaking countries. --SeanO 20:04, 19 February 2007 (UTC)
- It's getting annoying indeed. I have given the user an official warning on his Talk page. From now on, increasingly higher warnings can be given, possibly resulting in an admin user blocking him at one point. TheDJ (talk • contribs • WikiProject Television) 00:48, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
Wasn't the 20th Century this funny time period in England and the United States, when there were so many fashions, music styles, literary styles, art movements, everyone thought that everything was the end, that the art form of the moment could never be topped, and yet something different was always around the bend. Just a thought. -Feeling nostalgic for 1900-1999. 01:59, 19 March 2007 (UTC) About "He was the most important performer of popular music in the twentieth century": Isn't there room for an opinion on here? At least whoever wrote it, is enthusiastic about BG. 67.11.169.152 00:59, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
"He was the most important..." was added again and I removed it, before I saw this discussion. 165.189.169.190 (talk) 19:07, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
- Actually, i think that was added around the same time as the case discussed here., we just all never noticed it apparently Thanks for being so alert on such a thing. --TheDJ (talk • contribs) 20:28, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
[edit] Charlie Christian section
I added the Charlie Christian section with the quote and I need to add some text around it. Give me a day or so and it'll be there. :) 67.11.169.152 03:09, 23 March 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Outside sources
I added more outside sources so the article didn't come across as personally written by one person. 67.11.169.152 23:49, 24 March 2007 (UTC) All the comments on here, besides mine, seem to have ended around 2005, anyone have any comments, favorable or negative about the additions? 67.11.169.152 20:46, 29 March 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Birthname and Ancestry
According to Firestone's biography of BG, Benny was born Benjamin David Goodman, not Beno Guttman. His parents are Jewish and from what is now Poland and Lithuania, not Hungary. If there are better sources that prove otherwise, let's discuss them here. --SeanO 08:03, 1 April 2007 (UTC)
The "Beno Guttman" story is the first I've heard of it. 67.11.169.152 19:39, 2 April 2007 (UTC)
It's shown up on the page twice now. I'm hoping this will be the end of it. --SeanO 20:29, 2 April 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Cleanup and tips
I see there are a couple of people interested in this article. I happen to have it on my watchlist, due to some vandalism in the past, but am not really interested in writing anything. However I noticed the changes and figured I would do some cleanup. I converted most of the sources into wikipedia references style. I've also removed a reference to a usenet posting, a source which in general is NOT reliable enough for wikipedia. As a matter of fact that might go for more of the links. That should be checked.
Other things you can do:
- expand the lead-in section of the article. It really doesn't do the man justice at the moment.
- there are a "LOT" of quotations now. quotations should be used sparsely. If you can write it in your own words, then that is better. You don't always need to explicitely QUOTE something as long as the prose reference to the information is sourced.
- please read Wikipedia:Manual of Style (biographies) and some of biographies that made it as Featured article. This will show what type of article is expected. For instance: AC/DC Frank Black Mariah Carey Phil Collins and Celine Dion.
--TheDJ (talk • contribs • WikiProject Television) 22:53, 2 April 2007 (UTC)
I added a lot of the quotes, you're right. I just wanted a quick way to make the article sound less like it was written by one person who didn't use any sources. I was trying for a more objective tone. I'll try to (or I'm sure someone will) blend the quotations or paraphrase them more into the body of the work. Also I don't have the James Lincoln Collier book available at my library where I live, so I was unable to find the sources. But I didn't want to go in and delete another person's work either. So if anyone has access to the Collier book, maybe they could help out.67.11.169.152 01:45, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Palomar ballroom and 'Jitterbug'
Article reads: "Over the nights of the engagement, a new dance labelled variously as the "Jitterbug" captured the dancers on the floor, and a new craze had begun.[9] Onlookers gathered around the edges of the ballroom floor. Within days of the opening, newspapers around the country were headlining stories about the new phenomenon that had started at the Palomar. Goodman was finally a nationally known star, and the Swing Era began, led by Goodman. Following this the big band era exploded."
This may be a correct portrayal of a 'sourced' article, but that does't make it accurate to the history of swing music and dancing. It is far more likely that (black and/or white) dancers who were 'in the know' about Lindy Hop, which had been evolving in big city black communities for about a decade found the combination of Fletcher Henderson and Berrigan perfectly suited to their style and introduced it to a largely white, 'foxtrot' audience. This event may have spurred the popularity of the dance style or brought it a more mainstream stamp of approval. To say it was a new dance and it was a new phenomenon, and that it 'began' the Swing Era is definitely misleading.
See the primary source interviews (for Ken Burns' Jazz) of Frankie Manning and Norma Miller of Whitey's Lindy Hoppers for support of this point at the bottom of page 19 as follows..."Norma: The Stone Age. Well, the Stone Age, I think musicians began to want people to sit down and listen to his, to their music. Particularly Artie Shaw, Benny Goodman. They wanted to do concert-style performances and they didn't want people to jump up and dance in front of them while they were playing their music. And I always had the idea, Frankie, that of all the bands, now you know, every band that came out of the Savoy Ballroom always took Lindy Hoppers with them. Benny Goodman never did. I always said, I thought, he just didn't like us. Because how could anybody dare go into the Paramount Theater, or someplace like that, and don't take Lindy Hoppers. He never, he wanted people to listen to his music. Now, from what the story I get, when Benny Goodman was playing the Paramount Theater, and the kids got up and started dancing in the isles and everything, I understand that he was the one that said they looked like a bunch of jitterbugs. And I heard that was how the phrase got, 'cause we were Lindy Hoppers. We didn't get the jitterbug phrase until afterwards, when, 'til the white Bobbysockers did it at the Paramount Theater. And that's what's, I always had the idea he didn't want dancers with him. That's competition. Wherein Chick Webb never went out and didn't have Lindy Hoppers with him."
After reading the cited source for the statement in the Wiki article, I have even more doubts about its veracity. The writer of the BBC article is distinguishing between the dramatic aerial-laden Lindy Hop seen in the movies, competitions, or Jam Circles versus what was actually danced on crowded social floors. The BBC article is comparing 'East-Coast' style (a ballroomified evolution of Lindy) to 'performance' Lindy. It is an apples to oranges comparison and indicates a lack of depth in knowledge of swing dance technique, styles, and history. Lindy has both 'leaning in' and 'leaning out' postures and leads with one's partner in its social, dance hall form both currently and historically. Trust the word of Norma Miller above who lived through it.
--Natureboykm 19:11, 12 April 2007 (UTC)natureboykm --Natureboykm 22:36, 13 April 2007 (UTC) | update
[edit] James Lincoln Collier and the profession of David Goodman
"As a memember of the Benny Goodman family, first of all, I second what was said earlier about the name Benjamin David Goodman being the correct one, with his father David from Poland and mother Dora Rezinsky from Kauna Lithuania, all under the rule of Russia at that time.
I understand that James Lincoln Collier's biographies are controversial which is why I think it is safe to air my disagreement with him about a couple things. First of all, Benny was indeed the first of the family to earn money through music, but I think it is unfair to say that the other brothers were only through him able to gain success. They were accomplished musicians and businessmen too, not to mention his sister Ethel, who managed Benny for at least a while. I hope Collier's quote will not stay forever in this article for while it is important to give Benny credit for his generosities, a career as long as the other Goodmans had could not have been sustained only on generosity.
Secondly, David Goodman, my great Grandfather, was officially listed (I forget where) as a tailor by profession, but that is how it is told in most biographies. There was a bad time in which he worked in lard which gave rise to the story Benny told, but that was an exception, not the rule. He was quite proud of his news stand, in fact, that he was able to acquire later on." 66.7.86.115 04:11, 20 April 2007 (UTC)justfure
[edit] Carnegie Hall concert
There seems to be contradictions within this section...the section in question states that it was Benny Goodman's Sister-In-Law that found the recordings and brought them to his attention...In the actual recordings Benny Goodman states that it was "one of my daughters" that brought the recordings to his attention after finding it in a closet after 12 years. Another curiousity is that Benny Goodman states that "we didn't know how many people would be on hand until we got there"...when this article states that the concert had sold out "weeks" before. The other question is that in the recording Benny Goodman states that one copy of the recording was made for him and the other for the Library of Congress...while the article states that one recording was made for Benny Goodman and the other for Albert Marx's wife Helen Ward.
This section of the article seems to be referenced well, which adds to my confusion...perhaps someone can clear these seemingly contradictory statements up. Thanks. LeMaster 22:45, 28 August 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Forays into the Classical Repertoire
There is some discrepancy between this article and the article on Reginald Kell regarding Goodman seeking tutorship from Kell.
Kell: mentions 1948 and acceptance in 1952. Goodman: mentions 1949.
This needs to be cleared up. brian stormen 13:22, 18 September 2007 (UTC)
I think I cleared it up daniel meirsman 21:48, 29 September 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Franny Beecher
Franny Beecher, later of Bill Haley & His Comets fame, worked with Goodman's group in the 1940s. I'm trying to track down a source I can cite, but if any Goodman experts have a source handy, I think this is an interesting a notable bit of information to add to the article. 23skidoo (talk) 19:45, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
