In 1922, five high-school teens started a jazz revolution. All attended Austin High School on Chicago's West Side and were mad about jazz—the jazz that was drawn to the city from New Orleans in 1920. That's because Prohibition led to bootlegging, organized crime, and speakeasies and clubs run by gangsters who needed dynamic, high-energy music to keep patrons drinking. The Austin High Gang, as they became known, loved New Orleans jazz but gave it a peppy bounce, making it ideal for dances like the Charleston. [Photo above from left, Frank Teschemacher, Jimmy and Dick McPartland, Bud and his brother,the actor Arny Freeman, in Chicago,1923]
The Austin High Gang consisted of Jim Lanigan on bass, Jimmy McPartland on cornet, his older brother Dick McPartland on banjo and guitar, Frank Teschemacher on alto saxophone, and Bud Freeman on C-melody saxophone and tenor saxophone. They began playing dance halls and events, and caught the ear of others who wanted to play the new sound: Guitarist Eddie Condon, drummers Gene Krupa and Dave Tough, clarinetist Frank Teschmacher and Pee Wee Russell, pianist Joe Sullivan and others.
Also attracted to the new jazz sound were heavy hitters Bix Beiderbecke, Red Nichols, Benny Goodman, Miff Mole, Jack Teagarden (above) and Tommy and Jimmy Dorsey. All favored the hot sound rather than the sweet pop found in hotel ballrooms. By the late 1920s, many of the Austin High Gang had moved to New York and were recorded playing what became known as Chicago hot jazz.
In 1939, George Avakian was working for Decca and pushed to release and write the liner notes to jazz's first album—Decca Presents an Album of Chicago Jazz. It consisted of six 78s. Three bands were featured on the 78s: one led by Eddie Condon, one led by Jimmy McPartland, and one led by George Wettling. Each contributed four songs.
In 1992, Avakian decided to revisit the jazz style of his first album. The recording session he put together featured Dick Hyman (piano), Peter Ecklund and Dick Sudhalter (cornet), Jon-Erik Kellso (trumpet), Dan Barrett (trombone), Kenny Davern and Dan Levinson (clarinet), Ken Peplowski (tenor saxophone), Vince Giordano (bass saxophone), Howard Alden and Marty Grosz (banjo), Bob Haggart and Milt Hinton (bass) and Tony DeNicola and Arnie Kinsella (drums). [Photo above of George Avakian in the late 1940s by William P. Gottlieb]
After the recording session, Avakian's partner in the venture, Seymour Solomon, backed out, likely due to the project's mounting costs. Avakian paid for the album's recording out of pocket and then shopped it around to record labels. There weren't any takers, or at least there weren't any that were willing to make Avakian whole. So he shelved it.
In 2017, clarinetist and early-jazz master Dan Levinson visited an ailing Avakian at The Esplenade, an assisted-living facility on West End Avenue. He convinced Avakian to let him put out the album but told him that he doubted he'd be able to recoup Avakian's original expenses. Avakian said he didn't care about the money, only that music he loved from the start reached listener's ears. He gave Levinson his blessing. Avakian would die in November of that year.
In July 2020, Dick Hyman (above) called Levinson. He said he had been listening to Avakian's tape and raved about how good the music sounded. Freshly inspired, Levinson called Bryan Wright of Rivermont Records, who agreed to put it out. Now, 100 years after the Austin High Gang formed, 83 years after Avakian recorded his Chicago Jazz album for Decca, and 30 years after the Chicago jazz sound was revisited by three different all-star ensembles for a record that never was, the album will finally be released on July 15.
The music on the album—George Avakian Presents: One Step to Chicago, the Legacy of Frank Teschemacher and the Austin High Gang—is fantastic. Deliciously frantic and crazily contrapuntal, you can hear the joy of the era's youth. Women had just won the right to vote, body-hugging fashion was in vogue, faster dancing styles were surging and sexual freedom had arrived. Also baked into the raucous music is the sunny vision that emerged with the end of World War I and a U.S. economy that was beginning to surge.
The songs on Avakian's original 1939 Decca album were Nobody's Sweetheart, Friar's Point Shuffle, There'll Be Some Changes Made, Someday Sweetheart, China Boy, Jazz Me Blues, Sugar, The World Is Waiting for the Sunrise, Bugle Call Rag, I Wish I could Shimmy Like My Sister Kate, the Darktown Strutters' Ball and I've Found a New Baby.
The tracks on the new release recorded in 1992 are One Step to Heaven, Sugar (That Sugar Baby o' Mine), I've Found a New Baby, China Boy, Liza, Shim-Me-Sha-Wabble, The Darktown Strutters' Ball, Wabash Blues, Nobody's Sweetheart, The Jazz Me Blues, Baby Won't You Please Come Home, Wolverine Blues, Indiana and Farewell Blues.
As you can see, there's only a four-song overlap. I'm assuming this was to avoid mimicking the original and to give the three ensembles some room to spread its Austin High wings. The music reflects an era of hedonism, excess and happiness. I'm afraid we'll have to wait a bit longer for those feelings to return.
JazzWax tracks: You'll find George Avakian Presents; One Step to Chicago, the Legacy of Frank Teschemacher and the Austin High Gang (Rivermont) on July 15 here.
JazzWax clips: Proud to say that JazzWax was chosen by Rivermont to premiere a track from the upcoming album: Nobody's Sweetheart, which is available today at Spotify and other platforms. Here's the song (dig Dick Hyman!)...
Here's the original Decca Chicago Jazz version of the song by Eddie Condon and His Chicagoans...
And here's a segment on Bud Freeman and the rise of Chicago jazz...
