Trombonist Charlie Green's bluesy solo over a rhythmic vamp in a 1924 recording of W. C. Handy's The Gouge of Armour Avenue has been quoted dozens of times in subsequent recordings, although not usually acknowledged. A few months after this recording session, trombonist Jake Frazier quoted Green's solo in Get Yourself a Monkey and Make Him Strut His Stuff with the Kansas City Five. Kid Ory quoted it again in a 1926 recording with Louis Armstrong and His Hot Five of The King of the Zulu's, and Dicky Wells copied the solo almost exactly in Symphonic Scronch with Lloyd Scott and his orchestra in 1927. Over time, Green's solo has undergone a process of transformation through multiple performers, so that the melody has become a standard term in the jazz vocabulary rather than a specific reference to a particular nameable musical source. The extensive history of quotation of Green's solo fits into larger patterns of borrowing in early jazz recordings; a cornet solo by Joe Oliver on 1923 recordings of Dipper Mouth Blues was also quoted by other musicians. A partial list of later recordings that either quote Green's melody or feature "extended solo cadenzas" or vamps is included.

Sources: Charlie Green: Trombone solo in 1924 Vocalion recording of W. C. Handy's The Gouge of Armour Avenue (136-39).

Index Classifications: 1900s, Popular

Contributed by: Paul Killinger