Ladies and Gentlemen...the TIGER RAG!
When dealing with jazz, there are lot of songs which are constantly pulled up by bands as a way of showing off their massive skillz and proving their committment to jazz history. On one end of the scale, there are the likes of "Summertime", "My Funny Valentine" and any number of Duke Ellington composition to be played "soulfully" and bore everyone to tears but make themselves seem terribly, terribly clever...
On the other end of the scale is "Tiger Rag", which what a band plays when they simply want to tear the place apart with speed, crazy solos and making animal noises. Of course, "Tiger Rag" has far more significance to it than that...let's start at the beginning...
The origins of "Tiger Rag" are highly disputed to this day - regardless, the song comes from New Orleans and was one of the first true jazz standards, perhaps THE first if you take into account that most other songs played by jazz bands were either traditional folk numbers, ragtime compositions or pop songs. "Tiger Rag" is a rag no doubt, but it is too simplisitic and repetitive for the classic ragtime style of Scott Joplin. On the other hand, it's too weird and crazy to fit into the folk/country rag grouping. It's a song which lives to be improvised upon - I doubt there is anyone who has heard the song played without improvisation and it might not even sound any good without it. The main hook of the song is "growl" of the tiger in the chorus - usually provided by trombone - which is often contrasted with the band members chanting "HOLD THAT TIGAH!" over and over until the audience is driven into an absolute fury!
Now, the largest majority consensus on the composition of the tune levels it with the group that first recorded it - the Original Dixieland Jazz Band.
It was the first song recorded by the ODJB, but not the first released - regardless, when people first heard this song being blasted out of their gramophones in 1917, they must have been scraping their brains off the back of the wall:
You get the jist. Since this record was released, the song has always been credited to the band members, Nick La Rocca, Eddie Edwards, Henry Ragas, Tony Sbarbaro, and Larry Shields with Harry DaCosta writing lyrics. But numerous people have claimed the song's origins go back much further. Jelly Roll Morton claimed to have written it at one point, advancing on an old french quadrille - while it is probably a lie to say he wrote it, it probably does have its origin as a french quadrille. It may go back as far as the 19th century and others have mentioned recalling the song as being played for a long time around New Orleans. It's very likely that the ODJB heard various parts played around the city and integrated it into a whole which was the later imitated version.
And if you will let me wax lyrically for a moment, let emphasise to you how this record would have been taken in 1917 - there was simply nothing like this, NOTHING. People have slagged the ODJB for not being black but my god, you cannot believe how this psychotic music sounded when they first let it loose upon an unsuspecting nation. Music had never been improvised like this before, nor had it ever been played at such insane tempos or volumes. It makes the rock 'n roll and punk revolutions look tame by comparison.
Their version was heavily imitated - there 136 cover versions by 1942 alone. All of them were essentially used by the respective artists as an attempt to show off their prowess in dazzling, fiery style and give the audience something to really rocked to. This should not mean that "Tiger Rag" is placed down when compared to the likes of "Summertime", it just serves a different purpose.
It would be impossible to go through all the great versions, so let me just stick to a few:
In 1932, his royal Satchness, Louis Armstrong got ahold of the tune and performed it during a tour in Germany - compare this with the ODJB version to understand how far Louis advanced jazz since 1917. It's so fast it almsot becomes a blur and Louis' solo takes the song so far from its original melody as to make it almost unrecognisable:
It was - and is - also a big string-based number. Django Reinhardt and Stephane Grapelli's guitar and violin-based version is probably how the song is best known today...
As well as another more fingerstyle version by the great Chet Atkins:
Then there was Duke Ellington's 6 minute long version from the early 30's. This version has less improvisation than most New Orleans versions bascially because it's a version from the North and as such is more of a swing arrangement. Doesn't matter, because when it's this loud, fast and furious, all's right with the world:
Finally, since it's impossible to list all the great versions of "Tiger Rag" - and since my personal favourite 8 minute version by the Preservation Hall Jazz Band seems not available on YouTube - let's end with the Washboard Rhythm Kings, whose manic version is a rare version that features the original lyrics:
The "Tiger Rag" kicked off the jazz age, an era of sex-fuelled hedonism with jazz was its aphrodisiac of choice. As the song plays, you can almost hear women tearing their dresses of to the hips, men slicking back their hair, homosexuals jumping out of the closet, bootleggers filling up their kegs and everyone going batshit in the nightclubs and speakeasies in an ecstatic, almost religious orgy of jazz fuelled mania. You can hear the KKK reeling in horror, the Catholic church crying into their alter wine and the older generations screaming for the amorality of it all! This was JAAAAAAZZZZ, man! And "Tiger Rag" was and IS it's anthem! Modern jazz musicians may have forgotten about it in favour of "respectability", but it was this that was grand artistic statement of the 20th century! It was a shotgun in the face of the Western world, a hand grenade in the camps of fascism and conservatism, the final death knell for the Victorian era and a herald for a new age! Highbrow and lowbrow, they all cry now: "PLEASE PLAY THAT TIGER RAG FOR ME!"
