FATS WALLER – 1939 | The Classics Chronological Series – 973 (1997) FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

This is worth having just for the sake of the "London Suite," a set of six piano impressions conceived, composed and recorded in England during the summer of 1939. The music is as much about Fats Waller's Harlem as it is about that older metropolis on the other side of the Atlantic. There are gentle moments of deep reflection, a bluesy portrait of the red light district and a healthy dose of full-tilt Harlem/London stride piano at its hottest. It's a musical lexicon of the artist's every mood. "Piccadilly" runs like hot butter. "Chelsea" is precious as dew clinging to long blades of sweet grass. The beautiful "Soho" seems like an ennobled version of "Stompin' at the Savoy." "Bond Street" is more working class, almost as if patterned after the rhythms of feet on pavement. "Limehouse" is all delicacy, and "Whitechapel" disarmingly somber. Fats finished up his English adventure with two performances on pipe organ, then attempted a quick tour of mainland Europe. Passing through Germany, he stepped off the train for a beer and met up with a team of goose-stepping Nazis! Re-boarding as swiftly as possible, Fats could not be persuaded to budge from his seat until the locomotive had escorted him permanently off of German soil. Waller was well-informed: "That rascal Hitler don't like my kind of music!" Back in New York, Americans were consuming his records as fast as he could make them. Fats said that he heard the melody he used for "Honey Hush" in bird songs at dawn after staying up all night walking through London. "Anita" was written in honor of his beautiful wife. He poured equal amounts of humor and musical dexterity into "What a Pretty Miss" and especially "You Meet the Nicest People in Your Dreams." The session of August 10, 1939 is notable for a sultry version of Waller's early hit, "(When You) Squeeze Me," and a splendid ensemble setting of "Bond Street" from the "London Suite." It would have been wonderful if they'd adapted all six movements for this band, but there wasn't time. And Fats didn't even make it to the age of forty. "Abdullah" is a fine example of Tin Pan Alley's penchant for ethnic confusion; the subject of this song was apparently the "king of Amazoola" who "took a trip to Honolulu" where, of course, he became infatuated with a Polynesian woman named Lulu. Luckily, Fats and His Rhythm make wonderful sense out of this inane exercise. Three sides cut on November 3, 1939 round off this chronology nicely: "It's You Who Taught It to Me" begins with a strange group vocal, while "Suitcase Susie" depicts a young lady who traveled extensively and then "married the guy next door." "Your Feet's Too Big" is deservedly famous, but seems to have been made after the version used in a short film. Anyone who listens to both renditions will agree that on this Bluebird recording, Fats appears to be trying to re-create the spontaneously clever things he said on the film soundtrack, right down to the pedal extremities being "obnoxious" and that famous last line: "one never knows, do one?" arwulf arwulf  
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