Monday 27 February 2017

Suomen palkituimmat pienpanimot; osa 2. Harhaanjohtavaa, vai peräti kieroa mainontaa?

Saimaan Juomatehtaalle on annettu vuonna 2013 HBF:n (Helsinki Beer Festival) "Vuoden Siideri" -palkinto; voittajasiideri tuolloin oli "Cidre Sec Brutal".

Kyseessä olevaa siideriä ei kuitenkaan ollut valmistettu Saimaan Juomatehtaalla Mikkelissä, vaan Panimoravintola Bruuverissa, Helsingissä.

Samaisilla festivaaleilla Saimaan Juomatehdas palkittiin myös kahdesta oluesta: "Papa Laine's Parade IPA" & "Buddy Bolden's IPA". Näitäkään oluita ei ollut pantu Saimaan Juomatehtaalla Mikkelissä, vaan Panimoravintola Bruuverissa, Helsingissä.

Saimaan Juomatehdas sai v. 2014 HBF:n "Vuoden Olut" -palkinnon "Django & Steven Pale Ale" -oluella. Kuten arvata saattaa, tätäkään olutta ei ollut pantu Saimaan Juomatehtaalla Mikkelissä, vaan panimoravintola Bruuverissa, Helsingissä.





Sunday 26 February 2017

Suomen palkituimmat pienpanimot

HBF siintää jo horisontissa! Ei siis kulune montaakaan viikkoa, kun Saimaan Juomatehdas jälleen virittelee räyhäkkäät mainoslakanansa Suomen palkituimpana panimona, tahi jotain sinne päin.

Tuossa alla on joitakin tositteita Saimaan Juomatehtaan jonkin vuoden HBF:ssa kahmimista palkinnoista.

Kysynkin, kuinka moni kuvaan liittyvistä palkituista tuotteista oli pantu Saimaan Juomatehtaalla Mikkelissä? Entä missä ne kuvaan liittyvät tuotteet, joita ei ollut valmistettu Saimaan Juomatehtaalla Mikkelissä, oli tehty ja kuka ne oli tehnyt?


Seuraava City-lehden juttu ja siinä toimitusjohtaja Jussi Laukkanen valottavat asiaa.



Sunday 19 February 2017

Fast ones; The inventor of Jazzz, Swing & Stomp

When ever, either talking about or playing Jazz, in my, the blogger's notion, we should always start with and from Mr. Jelly Roll Morton, the piano king of New Orleans; he is, undoubtedly, an American classicist and national hero in a fine form.

Jelly Roll Morton, Ferdinand Joseph LaMothe by birth name, was born in New Orleans, Louisiana, around 1885 and died in Los Angeles, California, in 1941.

Jelly Roll started his career in Good Old N.O. as a pianist. He played piano in the French Quarter, Storyville area, also known as "The District". It comprised thirty eight blocks where flourished the brothels, a.k.a. "mansions", and around them, cabarets, saloons and gambling joints on 24/7-basis.

Right from the start, Morton was a prolific composer. He wrote, and performed, utility music to entertain the wealthy guests drinking champagne and enjoying good time on the whole with the "handsome women" employed by the mansions under supervision of the Madame of the house. Josie Arlington's and Lulu White's Mahogany Hall were certainly two of the most famous and fanciest mansions. It has been widely cited, over and over, that Jelly Roll played piano the way that made guests, and the handsome women accompanying them, feel comfortable. And as Jelly was regarded as one of the best, he certainly worked for the best mansion and was well paid. Those were the good old early years of the 1900's preceding the WW1, the period in France called the "belle époque".

New Orleans had harbored, for a long time, the marching band or street band tradition which gradually transformed into jazz-bands which proliferated all over the town; there were negro bands and white bands galore, engagements and gigs were many.

Morton was probably the first who started systematically arranging and orchestrating, mainly his own piano compositions for the traditional New Orleans-style band set up making him quite close as America's first Jazz composer. He was the first jazz big shot to leave New Orleans while it was still in full swing. Jelly went to California, he was in New York in 1911 while his colleagues happily jammed at home... WW1 suddenly closed down The District, a lot of boys lost their living, and, had to go up the river to the Midwest; that's the way Jazz came to Chicago, propagated to New York...
The roaring 1920's took full swing, with prohibition, gangsters, booze, gambling, flappers, dancing, and, jazz galore...

Morton was well prepared since he was and had already established himself up in The North when his colleagues were only arriving down to the scene. He was running his Red Hot Peppers band and was the best selling recording artist for the Victor company and making big money, as long as it lasted... His business card from Chicago days reads: "Jelly Roll" Morton, king of jazz pianists, composer of many popular numbers such as "Jelly Roll Blues, Wolverine Blues, Mr. Jelly Lord, Big Foot Ham, Millenburg Joys, King Porter Stomp, Kansas City Stomp, ... , New Orleans Blues and many others [!]; And from later New York days: Jelly Roll Morton's Orchestra, Originator of JAZZ-STOMP-SWING, VICTOR ARTIST, World's Greatest Hot Tune Writer, Music Furnished For All Occasions, Nothing too Large, Nothing too small, 15 pieces or less. The cards really speak for themselves!

Morton's obsessive notion was that jazz piano must always be an imitation of a band; for him it certainly meant: The tarditional New Orleans -style jazz band! The imitation comprises the left hand standing for the riffing rhythm and base line (drum(s), tuba and/or string bass, trombone) whereas the right hand takes care of the breaking solo instruments like cornets & trumpets, saxophones, clarinets etc. The younger generation musicians certainly thought quite the otherwise in the 1930's, but, that is another story...

The one below is the solo piano version of Morton's composition Kansas City Stomp played (cut) by himself on a player-piano roll; this is quite the authentic way he sounded playing for the guests & handsome women at Lulu White's Mahogany Hall...




The next one is the orchestrated version recorded by Morton's band; pay attention to Jelly Roll's resolute idea of  piano as an imitation of a band...





The one below makes it quite clear that Morton's legacy is doing well in his home town New Orleans, Kansas City Stomp here played by the Tuba Skinny, led by a charming lady, Shaye Cohn, cornet.





Good jazzzz & dancing outdoors; wait at least until the drummer makes her stylish & coooool enrée, and,some dancers, some dancers!




... Should there be any hop heads over there, can't help adding the next one; it takes place at the beer garden of Abita Brewing Company.




... Where Jelly Roll insisted piano to be an imitation of a band, Bryan Wright is a perfect imitation of Jelly Roll at the grand piano below.



... And how about the duo version of Kansas City Stomp below; drums impart quite hilarious flavor.






Saturday 18 February 2017

Aki Kaurismäki quits whereas Kaljatehdas taistelee

Aki Kaurismäki has announced he relinquishes filmmaking whereas film noir piece "Kaljatehdas taistelee" [working title] is well under way and high swell starring Arde, the high society blogger et al. ...

Conflict



Grandstanding & trash-talking



Happier life over there



Will be released sometime in the future.

Thursday 16 February 2017

Kolkki Olut by Maku Brewing

Immaculate pale maltiness, clean estery fruitiness, just a subtle pinch of hoppiness in flavor. First mouthful certainly confirms the verdict: balanced, moderately bitter hopped and fruity lager; damn, this is Steam Beer! See on the back of the can, it is: "Kolkkiolut-Steam Lager".

By the way, there is definitely no way hiding off-flavors of any kind or origin down in beer like this (of this type)!

Fu***n' good just as quaffer lacking absolutely all unnecessary ornamentation and luster.


Fast ones; on & with Bix Beiderbecke

When ever it comes to the guys who really made the great dance orchestras of the roaring 1920's swing and stomp, Bix Beiderbecke incontrovertibly pertained to the elite of the cadre together with names like Jimmy & Tommy Dorsey, Frankie "Tram" Trumbauer, Gene Krupa, Don Murray, Steve Brown, Eddie Lang, Joe Venuti, Spiegle Willcox et al.

All these boys were hot, and white, jazz musicians. To make their living, they just had to shine on the surface of the great dance orchestras, factory bands of the time like Jean Goldkette and Paul Whiteman bands; they really did, both things and were lavishly paid though playing just a few bars here and there. When they did, take solos, usually stupid dance tunes and arrangements got a couple of bars of hot jazzy pep up; the thing that flappers expected, and, insisted.

This one below is a pretty good example of what we're talking about. Idolizing by Jean Goldkette band recorded in 1927. Bix Beiderbecke makes some lovely bars with his Conn Victor cornet just between the unison intro and the vocal part which certainly is swell stupid lyrics of/for the time's flappers.



The next one is Sweet Sue by Paul Whiteman's band recorded in 1928. This is a superb demo of the fashion Beiderbecke's solo work saves otherwise silly semi-symphonic arrangement of the rubbishy dance music of those days. Bix's cornet solo comes after the vocal part, immediately following the tempo-breaking trumpet unisono-intro. Just stunningly lovely phrasing, soft and mellow tone, with derby hat over the Conn Victor's bell as it has been told.







The third one below, Lonely Melody by The Whiteman orchestra (1928) features in a beatiful manner Bix's sharper angle of attack, the snotty (over here we may say "räkäinen") Bix, both in phrasing and tone. The solo begins immediately after, the more or less, rubbishy unison semi-symphonic intro by the entire band and is quite distictive! When it comes to the matter of distinctiveness of artists on the whole, regardless of the instrument, I, the blogger, immediately go down to some of my compatriots: Kirill "Kirka" Babitzin, Rauli "Badding" Somerjoki, Olavi Virta and Albert Järvinen.



Fortunately, these guys recorded also jazz, under their own names, certainly with best possible formations and far reaching artistic liberty; the one below is a pretty good example.






Renaissance genius, craft beer snob & star blogger Arde before Bix's home in Synnyside of Queens.



Just couldn't help adding the lovely home-video above from the good old 20's; it's about the same time Andania borne sax virtuoso Wilfred H. Tuomikoski taught some lessons to our "Dallape"-guys on how to phrase jazzzz down here in Helsinki, on the shores of his ancestors. Sylvester Ahola, band fellow of Bix and radio amateur, certainly is a story of his own and in his own right...


By the way, Bix was born in Davenport, Iowa...



Good old days, some notes!

Wednesday 15 February 2017

Jäätynyttä oksennusta, craftkaljaa ja tylsää mieltä

Professori V.A. Koskenniemi taisi jossakin puheessaan vuonna 1942 todeta, että "Isänmaamme on yksi suuri kalmisto." Tämän kirjoittajan mielestä Suomi vuonna 2017 on jäätynyttä oksennusta nokkivien varisten, Kahdeksan surmanluodin Pasien&Reiskojen, tylsämielisten metsäläisten maa. Taloutemme on euroalueen heikoin bkt:n muutoksella loka-joulukuussa 2016 mitattuna.

Nokiakin lienee ollut pelkkä vahinko, jonka me vähämieliset metsäläiset itse sössimme. Jos Putin päättäisi tehdä krimit, voisimme olla sentään suurvallan peräreikä.

"Craft-olutskenemme" on hilpeää myötähäpeää herättävää näpertelyä. Umpitollo kansamme ja harvaan asuttu degeneroituva metsäläisvaltiomme jää kulttuuris-demografisesti toivottoman kauas siitä kriittisestä massasta, joka on terveen ja toimivan craft-olutskenen edellytys! Väkeä 5,5 miljoonaa, pääosin hajallaan turvesoiden äärellä, maalaispaskahuussien ja hyttysiä kuhisevien metsien siimeksessä, jumalan seljän takana. Pääkaupunkikin rujo saluunakylä, jonka väestö asuu pääosin radan varren getoissa...