Beyond the Liner Notes - August 17, 2018 - Paris 1920s

This episode of Beyond the Liner Notes focuses on the music of Paris in the 1920s.  With the coming of black Americans to Paris to fight in World War I, came jazz and American popular dances like the charleston and black bottom.  Dance and music clubs sprang up around Paris include Chez Bricktop owned and operated by American Ada "Bricktop" Smith who had an Irish father and black mother.  Her nickname came from the fact that this black woman had natural red hair.  She owned and ran clubs throughout the 1920s (Chez Bricktop opened in 1924) and hosted parties for many notables including the young American composer Cole Porter who loved to party.  Cole Porter came to France to serve in the French Foreign Legion (a role that is highly debated) and after the war married a rich woman and threw parties the entire time he was in France during all of the 1920s.  His parties were extravagant and scandalous, with "much gay and bisexual activity, Italian nobility, cross-dressing, international musicians and a large surplus of recreational drugs".  Cole Porter's first real hit on Broadway was a musical called "Paris" which premiered in 1928.   The songs for the show included "Let's Misbehave" and one of his best-known songs, "Let's Do It".  "Let's Misbehave" was eventually cut from the musical but both songs are still parts of the great American songbook even today.  One of the stars of the French stage during the 1920s was Josephine Baker whose premiere in a Paris review involved a costume of only bananas.  She also loved to party and was also had an admittedly fluid sexuality which included a long relationship with Ada "Bricktop" Smith. 

Paris was also at the cutting edge of concert music and dance.  There were still memories of the riot that broke out at the premiere of Stravinsky's "Rite of Spring" in May, 1913 which was produced by Sergei Diaghilev.   In 1923 Francis Poulenc received a commission from Sergei Diaghilev for a full-length ballet score for which he decided that the theme would be a modern version of the classical French fête galante.  Fête galante are paintings of well dressed individuals in very pastoral settings.  This work, Les biches, was an immediate success, first in Monte Carlo where it premiered in January 1924 and then in Paris in May, under the direction of André Messager; it has remained one of Poulenc's best-known pieces of music.

French composer, Erik Satie premiered a ballet in 1924 called Mercure (Mercury, or The Adventures of Mercury). The original scenery and costumes were designed by a young Spanish artist working in Paris, Pablo Picasso and the choreography was by Léonide Massine, one of the leading dancers and choreographers in the 1920s, who also danced the title role. Subtitled "Plastic Poses in Three Tableaux", it was an important link between Picasso's Neoclassical and Surrealist phases and has been described as a "painter's ballet."

After hearing jazz in Paris, composer Darius Milhaud  went to the United States in 1922 and in his words heard "authentic" jazz for the first time, on the streets of Harlem.  This  left a great impact on his musical outlook. In 1923 he completed his composition La création du monde (The Creation of the World), using ideas and idioms from jazz, cast as a ballet in six continuous dance scenes.  This work is considered by many the epitome of jazz inspired classical music of the 1920s Europe.




















































  • 11:02am Charleston by Paul Whiteman and His Orchestra on The Charleston (Stardust Records), 2009
  • 11:04am The Black Bottom by The Temperance Seven on 33 Not Out (Upbeat Recordings), 1990
  • 11:09am Let's Do It by Billie Holiday and Her Orchestra on 100 Greatest Big Hits of the 1920's (Inspired By the Hit TV Series (Six Week Smile), 2013
  • 11:12am Let's Misbehave by The Bluebirds on The Roaring 20s: Rare Original 1920s Recordings (Vintage Music Productions), 2009
  • 11:16am Dinah by Joséphine Baker on The Charleston (Stardust Records), 2009
  • 11:19am La conga Blicoti by Joséphine Baker on J'ai deux amours (Arkadia Chansons), 1997
  • 11:29am Les Biches,:Finale by Junichi Hirokami & Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra on Poulenc: Les Biches Suite for Orchestra (RLPO Live), 2000
  • 11:33am Mercure: I. Ouverture by New London Orchestra & Ronald Corp on Satie: Parade & Other Works (Hyperion Records), 1989
  • 11:35am Mercure: V. Entrée et danse de Mercure by New London Orchestra & Ronald Corp on Satie: Parade & Other Works (Hyperion Records), 1989
  • 11:35am Mercure: XIII. Finale by New London Orchestra & Ronald Corp on Satie: Parade & Other Works (Hyperion Records), 1989
  • 11:41am La Création Du Monde Op. 81a by Leonard Bernstein & Orchestre national de France on Milhaud: la Création Du Monde, Le Boeuf Sur Le Toit & Saudades Do Brasil (Sony), 2006
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