Albert Nicholas Eccentric Stomp?
  • 17 years ago
Eccentric Stomp? Nicholas 1964

Albert Nicholas!
In this 1964 French originated clip from the famous jazz club St Germain de Pres they feature Albert ( misspelled) Nichols. A French bandleader invites Albert Nicholas on his day off to join the band for a tune. (Any one knows who this band is. Claude Luter?)
They go smoothly in a tune unknown to me (Any one knows?)
Of course Albert's playing is the pure early New Orleans approach.

I had the honour to play once with Nicholas in 1966. With my Dutch band The Dixieland Seven ( somewhere om dailymotion as well) we won a national radio competition and the first price was a concert with Albert Nicholas as special guest in the Kurhaus Concert Hall in Scheveningen.

Albert Nicholas was born in New Orleans on May 27th, 1900, and died in Basle, Switzerland on September 3rd, 1973.
One of the mellowest of New Orleans clarinettists, he played with all the early stars in his home town, served for three years in the U.S. Navy, where his comrades included Zutty Singleton and Charles Bolden. Was back in New Orleans in 1923 and lead his own band which included Luis Russell and Barney Bigard. By early 1925 all three were working with King Oliver's Dixie Syncopaters, but Nicholas eventually left to go to the Far East with Jack Carter's band. Rejoining Russell in 1928, he stayed with the band for ten years then left to work in New York City, part of the time there was spent playing in John Kirby's quartet, then with Louis Armstrong's big band (where he played tenor) and then in 1939 with Jelly Roll Morton.
By 1945 he was working with Art Hodes, Buck Johnson and later (1948) with Ralph Sutton's Trio at Jimmy Ryan's club.
He settled in France in 1953 and, like his childhood friend Sidney Bechet, maintained a solo career until his passing.