John Lewis & The American Jazz Orchestra: The Music of Jimmie Lunceford

Jimmy Lunceford liner notes

The witty, ebullient music of Jimmie Lunceford was a world onto itself during the Swing Era. With its dynamic backbeat and bravura arrangements of unlikely songs, the Lunceford band possessed exceptional charm -- it could seem calculating and ingenuous at the same time. Yet because it was short-lived and so much a part of its period, the Lunceford approach is often overlooked by modern listeners. One reason, perhaps, is its penchant for fey singers and novelty songs, which require a taste for irony if not whimsy. What Lunceford occasionally lacked in profundity, however, he made up for with "three P's" of his own: Punctuality, Precision, and Presentation. He had the nattiest show band of the day, with smartly tailored musicians waving derby mutes and tossing their instruments into the air, but he never lapsed into the fake party-hat conviviality of the cornpone hacks whose ensembles were known as Mickey Mouse bands. On the contrary, Lunceford used his three P's to augment the elements of great jazz: swing, audacious writing, and heady solos. To these he added the suggestion of a Panglossian conviction that the music he celebrated (American music in all its motley) was as good as music could be.