Section from chapter 1938: New Respectability   [ return to introduction ]

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By Mervyn Cooke • 325 illustrations,
82 in full color • 256 pages • 8-1/2 x 8-1/2"
Cloth • ISBN 0-7892-0399-5 • U.S. $45.00
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Goodman's epoch-making appearance at Carnegie Hall in January 1938. His band includes Gene Krupa (drums, far left), who quit soon after to become a leader in his own right. [ view larger image ] (The Frank Driggs Collection)
How to Get to Carnegie Hall

January 1938 marked a significant turning point in the history of jazz. Benny Goodman's appearance at New York's Carnegie Hall was the first occasion on which jazz was performed at a prestigious concert hall rather than in nightclubs and ballrooms. The event's sell-out success ensured that paying audiences would continue to enjoy professionally organized jazz concerts at classical venues in years to come. It is not surprising that this tradition was initiated by a white band: Goodman's mixed-race trio and quartet (• p. 84) could only be included in the program as a vaudeville-style interlude. But Goodman integrated musicians from Count Basie's and Duke Ellington's black bands into the show, and from 1943 Ellington's orchestra itself made annual appearances at the historic venue, performing a series of large-scale "symphonic" works (• p. 104). Billie Holiday's two concerts at Carnegie Hall in 1948 (• p. 118) broke all their box-office records.

Goodman carefully organized his 1938 concert to demonstrate the historical evolution of jazz styles, and included a parody of the Original Dixieland Jazz Band's crude early recordings (• p. 37) along with a spirited tribute to Louis Armstrong (• p. 56), as well as a lengthy jam session on Fats Waller's "Honeysuckle Rose." (When asked how long he required for an intermission, the nonplussed Goodman replied, "How long does Mr. Toscanini take?") Goodman's second appearance at Carnegie Hall, on 6 October 1939, with markedly different musicians, featured a light-hearted satirical interpretation of "T'ain't What You Do, It's the Way that You Do It"--which aped the styles of certain of his competitors--and his pseudo-Baroque hit "Bach Goes to Town."

In 1978, the sixty-nine-year-old Goodman fronted a much younger band in a concert at Carnegie Hall to celebrate the fortieth anniversary of his original appearance. The program on that night included a powerful rendering of Jelly Roll Morton's "King Porter Stomp," in the same arrangement by Fletcher Henderson (• p. 71) that had become virtually the signature tune of the swing era four decades earlier (• p. 82).