Jug band
A jug band is a band employing a jug player and a mix of conventional and homemade instruments. These homemade instruments are ordinary objects adapted to or modified for making sound, like the washtub bass, washboard, spoons, bones, stovepipe, jew's harp, and comb and tissue paper. The term jug band is loosely used in referring to ensembles that also incorporate homemade instruments but that are more accurately called skiffle bands, spasm bands, or juke (or jook) bands (see juke joint) because they do not include a jug player.[1]
Original bands[edit]
Jug bands from Louisville, Kentucky, were the first to record. The violinist Clifford Hayes's Old Southern Jug Band recorded as early as 1923.[2] Whistler & His Jug Band, often making use of a nose whistle, first recorded in September 1924 for Gennett Records.[3] Earl McDonald's Original Louisville Jug Band and Dixieland Jug Blowers were also among the first to record. The vaudeville-blues singer Sara Martin and "The Blue Yodeler", Jimmie Rodgers, both employed these bands for their recordings. Louisville bands often used whiskey jugs and were more jazz-oriented, a melding of string band and ragtime influences. Jug bands made street performances, played at parties, and began entertaining on riverboats on the Ohio River around 1900 and first appeared at the Kentucky Derby in 1903.
Jug bands from the Memphis area were more firmly rooted in country blues, hokum, and earlier African-American music traditions. Will Shade's Memphis Jug Band and Gus Cannon's Jug Stompers recorded for Ralph Peer, starting in 1927,[4] many great songs that became the basis for the later jug band revival, including "Stealin'," "Jug Band Music," "On the Road Again," "Whoa, Mule," "Minglewood Blues," and "Walk Right In". Many songs had "blues" in the title, including "Coal Oil Blues" and "Lumpy Man Blues," but were not traditional 12-bar blues.[5]
The Memphis Jug Band and Gus Cannon's Jug Stompers featured harmonica played by Will Shade and Noah Lewis, respectively. Other bands from the Memphis area were Jack Kelly and His South Memphis Jug Band,[6] Jed Davenport and Dewey Corley's Beale Street Jug Band, and Noah Lewis's Jug Band. Ma Rainey's tub-jug band featured the first recordings of the slide guitarist Tampa Red, who later formed his own Hokum Jug Band. Big Bill Broonzy and Memphis Minnie cut a few sides each backed up by their own jug bands; Memphis Minnie also sang and played with the Memphis Jug Band. Memphis jug band music is closely associated with Memphis blues.
The Cincinnati Jug Band recorded for Paramount Records in 1929, with Stovepipe No. 1 on the stovepipe.[7]
The Seven Gallon Jug Band, including Clarence Williams on jug and Willie "The Lion" Smith on piano, recorded for Columbia Records in 1929.[8]
The Birmingham Jug Band, including Jaybird Coleman and Big Joe Williams, and King David's Jug Band recorded for Okeh Records in 1930 in Atlanta, Georgia.[9]
Daddy Stovepipe and Mississippi Sarah recorded for Vocalion Records in 1931.
The 1930s depression and the devastating effect of radio on record sales reduced the output of jug band music to a trickle. The last sides by Cannon and the Memphis Jug Band were made in 1930 and 1934, respectively. Cannon and Will Shade were recorded again in 1956 by Sam Charters on a field trip for Folkways Records. The sound of the washboard and tub bass, however, lasted well into the 1940s as an integral part of the "Bluebird beat" in Chicago. Bukka White's "Fixin' to Die", recorded in Chicago in 1940, is driven by a syncopated washboard backup.