JAZZ BLUES 78 Casey Bill Weldon Slide Guitar Talking to Myself Vocalion 03407

$

56

Casey Bill Weldon – Can’t You Remember / Talking To Myself

Hawaiian Guitar Wizard

Vocalion 03407

Vocal Blues, Piano, Steel Guitar and Guitar accomp.

comes in original sleeve!

VG

My Grading Key: (records are visually graded)

Everybody tends to grade differently so here’s what my abbreviations mean:

G – rough copy. May have scratches, or has some flaw that affects playability or causes skipping

VG – record may play with some noise, and has some visual marks on record, but should play without skips

VG+ – a very clean record with only a few light surface marks here and there

VG++ – same as NM. Looks almost like a new record with lots of shine and no scratches

Please note that shipping is not $4. eBay does not allow shipping to be higher on records, but I cannot afford shipping and packing materials in the US for $4. US shipping will be $8. International rates are available. Payment by Paypal.

For years I worked at an archive here in Indiana and once a year our librarian weeded through the collections and sorted out the duplicates. We then held a sale, which I attended two years ago (this is not likely to happen ever again, btw). I usually collect 45s and LPs, with an emphasis on honky-tonk and rockabilly music, but the archive’s sales are usually dominated by 78s. At the last sale, I was blown away by what I found. No country, but some amazing music. In the first box I found dozens of early jazz, hot jazz (whatever you want to call it) 78s on Victor, Puritan, Okeh, Paramount, Vocalion, Blue Note, Folkways, Asch, Bluebird, Columbia, Brunswick as well as numerous one-offs and smaller independent labels. I was stunned! In that first box were 78s by Charlie Johnson and his Paradise Band, King Oliver and his Orchestra, Connie’s Inn Orchestra, Clarence Williams’ Blue Five, Jelly Roll Morton’s Red Hot Peppers, Ma Rainey, New Orleans Rhythm Kings, the Louisiana Sugar Babes, Dixieland Jug Blowers, Napoleon’s Emperors, Ed Lang, Bessie Smith, etc. There were also numerous blues 78s by Blind Willie Johnson, T-Bone Walker, Leadbelly, Big Bill Broonzy and even “atomic” gospel recordings by the Golden Gate Quartet. Then of course there were the amazing recordings of the usual early jazz suspects: Duke Ellington and his Cotton Club Orchestra, Benny Goodman, Oran “Hot Lips” Page, Original Dixieland Jazz Band, Fats Waller, Hoagy Carmichael (our local hero), Fletcher Henderson, Johnny Dodds’ Black Bottom Stompers, Louis Armstrong and his Orchestra and also with his Hot Five. In later boxes I even found some Blue Note 78s, some Folkways recordings as well as some field recordings by John A. Lomax.

The sad news? I couldn’t buy it all. The great news? I bought a lot of it. The sadder news? I’m broke and have to sell it. A few amazing things about these records: 1.) Since their arrival in the archive (usually a donation from a well-known jazz collector), they have been stored in upright position, in sleeves, in a temperature-controlled environment (I believe in the 60 degrees range). 2.) Once in control of the archive, these records are never played more than once (to transfer the files digitally), using the most up-to-date audio equipment to meet preservation standards. 3.) Most of these records, because they were donated by serious collectors.

I do not own a proper needle to play these and thus, the 78s listed here are visually graded. Records will be carefully packaged and bounded by cardboard for padding and safe shipping. Due to the fragility of 78s, insurance is required. After the auction closes I will inform you of the insurance price (whatever the USPS charges) based on your total purchase price. Please do not pay for your item until you have received an invoice from me. I do offer combined shipping for multiple purchases. For overseas bidders, please ask for shipping quotes before bidding. Payment by Paypal only…Domestic USPS Media Mail is $8.00 and $1.00 for each additional item purchased (plus insurance).

Please also see my other auctions as I am also selling many more Jazz 78s.

more on Mr. Weldon

Casey Bill Weldon (December 9, 1909 – 1960s?) was an American country blues musician,[1] born in Pine Bluff, Arkansas who later lived and worked in Chicago was known as one of the great early pioneers of the slide guitar.[2] He played upbeat, hokum and country blues tunes, both as a solo artist and as a member of the Memphis Jug Band. Playing a National steel guitar flat on his lap Hawaiian style, "Casey Bill" Weldon's was known as the "Hawaiian Guitar Wizard". He was married to Memphis Minnie in the '20s with the two making influential recordings together in the late '20s. Weldon played in medicine shows before beginning his recording career in 1927 for Victor.

In 1927 Weldon made a recording with Charles Polk and other members of what would become the Memphis Jug Band for Victor Records. In October of that year, Victor brought them to Atlanta where they recorded several sides, including "Kansas City Blues". In 1930, the last year of the Memphis Jug Band's contract with Victor, the band recorded 20 sides. The contract ended after a final recording session in November 1930 in Memphis just before the financial crash of the 1930s bankrupted Victor.[3] Weldon went on to cut over 60 sides for Victor, Bluebird, and Vocalion. He was also an active session guitarist appearing on records by Teddy Darby, Bumble Bee Slim, Peetie Wheatstraw, and Memphis Minnie. On Memphis Minnie's last recording for Bluebird Records in October 1935, Weldon accompanied her for the first time. He played on two sides, "When the Sun Goes Down, Part 2" and "Hustlin' Woman Blues." [4] He scored solo hits with his two most well known songs, "Somebody Changed the Lock on My Door" and "We Gonna Move (to the Outskirts of Town)."

In October 1927, when the Victor field recording unit visited Atlanta, Georgia, he recorded two sides, including a chilling, haunting song called "Turpentine Blues", which would have left him immortalized if he had never recorded again.[citation needed] He did not enter another recording studio until eight years later, when he laid down many recordings for Vocalion Records. Weldon also played with Charlie Burse and the Picanniny Jug Band and the Brown Bombers of Swing. Considering the fact that most slide guitarists of the era went unrecorded, Weldon maintains a healthy amount of recorded material for aficionados to appreciate.

After his divorce from Memphis Minnie, he married blues singer Geeshie Wiley. They disappeared from the public eye soon after and he stopped recording by 1938. His date of death is unknown, though assumed to be sometime in the 1960s