The fifteenth March, 2005, marked the thirtieth anniversary of the death of the legendary Scottish jazz clarinettist Sandy Brown. I don't use the word 'legendary' lightly. A lot of musicians world-wide would concur with this terminology.
Sandy was born in India in 1929 of Scottish parents but spent most of his choldhood and subsequent early years in Edinburgh. Sandy claimed in his writings, put out in the McJazz Manuscripts, that his mother was Indian, but his friend pianist/drummer Stan Greig (part of his original Edinburgh band and cohort later in London) has stated 'this was just one of Sandy's stories'. I met Stan in Melbourne at the Fiftieth Jazz Convention in 1995 and he reiterated those opinions to me over a liquid lunch.
Sandy's early band, I suppose, was similar to most Revivalist groups at that time, Following the Armstrong Hot Five, King Oliver's Creole Jazz Band, Jelly Roll Morton, Clarence Williams style of Hot Jazz. The early Twenties white music or the later Condon sound in Edinburgh was covered by the Alex Welsh/Archie Semple crew (another story perhaps).
Sandy displayed the hot spikey clarinet of Johnny Dodds. His jazz partner for life, Al Fairweather, followed the dictum of the young Louis and remains one of the best exponents of getting inside the ground-breaking Armstrong of the Twenties (along with Bent Persson [Swedish trumpet player - click here or click here to listen] and our own Bob Barnard [Australian cornet player - click here or click here to listen]). Not for Al the later 'Hello Dolly' bit - indeed in his latter years when appearing as a guest with other bands, Al would say to the leader: 'I don't sing or tell jokes". Sandy made up for Al's shy reticence. In some ways he was larger than life. A gifted writer and raconteur extraordinaire.
In 1954 both musicians went down to London. Humphrey Lyttelton helped them get known although Humph admitted that on hearing Al play he had to do a bit of 'wood shedding'. Sandy's initial London band stayed pretty well within 'Trad' boundaries but like Humph, had the Aussie trait of writing original tunes. One of Sandy's great interests was incorporating West African High Life music (Whilst based in Edinburgh he had played some gigs in Paris opposite a band of African drummers). So in 1955 he recorded the first of a series of High Life tunes that he had composed - 'Africa Blues' and 'African Queen'. The latter was a hit, and as Humph has stated 'struggled into the lower half of the hit parade before it fell back exhausted'. It swings, and has great solos from Sandy, Al and the trombone player - one John R.T. Davies. On its own merits it owes nothing to Bogart or Hepburn!
It was obvious that musicians like Sandy and Al would find the confines of the traditional field a bit constricting, so accordingly they moved into the then emerging Mainstream scene in which Humph and Bruce Turner were involved.
Around this time during my Merchant Navy years, I often saw the duo at the 100 Club. Their repertoire by that time (circa 1960) encompassed all sorts of material from Oliver to Art Blakey; Basie to Benny Golson, plus of course their original compositions. Some of those appeared on a great LP called 'Doctor McJazz'. They included 'Harlem Fats' - obviously for Mr Waller (a version recorded by Bob Barnard in Canada), 'Wee Jimmy' (a Scottish mate of theirs), and 'Portrait of Willie Best' (seemingly a character played by the actor Stepan Fetchit who took the part of a 'negro' in some of the old films).
Sandy had a career in acoustic engineering and therefore didn't have to rely on jazz for a living. When the Beat movement more or less destroyed the Jazz Scene in the late Sixties, he still appeared with various groups and made the odd broadcast. He even appeared on a record with fellow Scot trombonist George Chisholm featuring the music from the show 'Hair'. At the same time he appeared with Avant Garde musicians in a session which included a 'Suite Sandy Brown'. As far as I know this was not recorded.
A long way from Johnny Dodds or the West End Cafe where his band played in Edinburgh in the Fifties. Ill health caught up with him in the Seventies and he died in 1975 drinking whisky and watching Scotland lose to England in a rugby match. Perhaps that was the last straw, and he said 'stuff it!'.
Although time has passed he is still remembered by the faithful. Once asked how there were so many good Scottish jazz musicians he said something along the lines that 'The bagpipes were a fact of life'. Two things I recall - his announcement at the end of a set in any club: 'You are welcome to join us at the bar in the interval but not at our expense'; and another was when a guy approached him asking if he would play 'Stranger on the Shore' and Sandy politely said that it wasn't in their repertoire. As the guy walked away, Sandy pointed his clarinet like a rifle and shot him in the back.
He had a few critics. Clarinettist Buddy De Franco thought his style was 'primitive'. British writer Benny Green had similar views, but in his playing days he was a very ordinary saxophone player. I go along with Roger Bell's comment to me a few years back when I broached the subject. Roger intimated 'the most original voice in the UK we heard' and that's despite him being mates with the great Humph.
So there you have it. A unique voice stilled too early - not the first time that happened. Although in his latter years he could evoke the breathy style of Jimmy Guiffre's modernism or the angular strains of Pee Wee Russell, for me it's the Dodds heat of the 1955 'Nothin' Blues' with the gutteral vocal that remains in my mind. 'Busy Doin' Nothin', Nothin's What I Want To Do'. Hardly! Sandy's life was the opposite, full to the brim. To quote an antipodean phrase: 'Onya Sandy'.
This article by Bill Brown in Victoria, Australia was written in 2005 for the Victorian Jazz Archive in Melbourne: www.vicjazzarchive.org.au