The Bix Legend

An article in the July/August 1956 issue of  Record Research.

Comments

• Bix does not play in the “Too Busy” recording by Charley Straight.
• The trumpet player in Nat Shilkret’s “That’s My Weakness Now” is probably Mike Mosiello.
• The other recordings where Bix is claimed to be present are probably faulty recollections.
• Home movies of the Whiteman band in the Whiteman Lodge, University Studio, CA were made by a man named Bob Cook on June 28, 1929. [Evans and Evans] Some scenes are included in Brigitte Berman’s documentary “Ain’t None of Them Play Like Him Yet.”
• Noel Higby is described as a close associate of Bix. I did not find his name in any of the Bix biographies.
• The ODJB recording of “Tiger Rag” given to the Institute for Jazz Studies by Bix’s mother is probably an error. Bix’s mother gave the IJS a test pressing of the Wolverines “Tiger Rag.”
• Trumbauer did not put down on paper Bix’s piano compositions. Bill Challis did.
• Bix mentions a clarinet [sic] player (“the best boy I’ve ever met”) in his letter of Nov 20, 1922, to Nick LaRocca. Nick wrote to Phil Evans in 1960 with the information that Artie Seaburg was the clarinet player. Tony Spargo also mentions the friendship between Bix and Artie.
• Indeed, Philippe Brun was strongly influenced by Bix in the 1920s.
• Goodkette denied having a deal for a Vitaphone short.

I am grateful to Rob Rothberg for kindly sending scans of the two pages.