"Tell Me" Original Dixieland Jazz Band (Columbia (U.K.), 1920)

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Nick LaRocca, c, dir: Emile Christian, tb / Larry Shields, cl / Billy Jones, p / Tony Sbarbaro, d.
English Columbia Graphophone Co. Studios,
London, 8 Jan. 1920.

76752-2 “Tell Me” (Max Kortlander) Col 804

Transferred with 3.0ML lateral stylus via 3.0ML VM95SP cartridge and an Audiotechnica AT-LP120 Turntable. Declicked and given light EQ by Colin Hancock. Disc from Colin Hancock Collection. Discographical Information from Rust’s “Jazz Records,” DAHR, H. O. Brunn’s “The Story of the Original Dixieland Jazz Band,”Jonathan David Holmes, and Colin Hancock. Images from Louisiana Digital Archive and Colin Hancock Collection.

On April 16, 1919 the Original Dixieland Jazz band began recording for the English Columbia Graphophone Company. The band initially cut their regular original repertoire, and these records sold well enough for the band to not only be re-engaged by the label for several more sessions, but also to cut popular material of the day rather than just their usual hits. Interestingly enough, as time went on pianist J. Russell Robinson had to return to the states, and he was replaced by English pianist Billy Jones. Jones himself had learned ragtime and jazz piano playing from an African American musician visiting London in the early 1910s, which he recalled in a 60s interview:

“Yes I learned this particular style of playing yearsa before the dixieland band arrived here…a colored boy came early 1914 and I picked up the real style from him. That’s why when the Original Dixieland Band arrived and claimed it was all their own…their own compositions, their own style…I thought and really knew very differently. And LaRocca definitely claimed it was his music. White people’s music. He had brought it from New Orleans to Chicago to New York and eventually to Europe, and it must be White music. He was very, very, very anti-negro…anyway I was playing at a club on Bond Street and they were drafted there to alternate with me, with my little band, and we got on very well with us and one day LaRocca approached me as said, “Billy would you like to sit in with us,” and I said “why what’s the idea?” Well he said, “our pianist Russell Robinson wants to go back home, his wife isn’t well and we want a replacement. So I thought well, I love the sound of the music and I would welcome the opportunity. I said yes, certainly. And sure enough, we got along very well.”

Indeed, Jones was an easy fit for the band, with his rolling piano style. With the addition of Jones and the already present substitution of Emile Christian in place of Eddie Edwards on trombone, the band had a much more light and gliding sound than their previously recorded output, and as such the English Columbias are quite desirable musically. These sides are often more reminiscent of the work of the Halfway House Orchestra or the New Orleans Rhythm Kings than the band’s earlier work.


“Tell Me,” sounds like it could be a lost Halfway House side, and LaRocca in particular plays some of his sweetest cornet lines. Listen also for Christian’s lyrical trombone lines which are long and wide.