Salty Dog by Jelly Roll Morton
Salty Dog lyrics
That one had a name, that was the �Salty Dog.� That�s
the �Salty Dog� . . .
Do you know the words to some of that?
Huh? No, er, that wasn�t mentioned in there . . .
�Let me be your salty dog . . .�
Yeah . . . No � it�s the �Salty Dog.�
Old salty dog,
Old salty dog,
Old salty dog.
That�s about all the names there. That�s all, all the
words there was.
Old salty dog,
Old salty dog.
That�s the way that Bill Johnson used to play � him and
his three-piece organization. Er, Bill Johnson�s a
brother-in-law of mine � and is older than I am � very,
very good-looking boy in those days. And my, and how
did the girls take to him, and those bad chords on the
bass fiddle. My, [laughs] they really taken to him, I�m
tellin� you.
Was he the one that took the first jazz to New York?
Er, yeah, Bill Johnson was the first one that taken the
first jazz band into the city of New York. Er, they
played the Palace Theater. Well, I�m a little bit ahead
of my story.
[inaudible comments]
Er, Bill . . . Bill wanted to come to California and,
er, in the meantime, he wrote my wife a letter, and she
financed the trip. He had a band. He�d composed this
band formerly of some of the Tuxedo Orchestra, which
was Freddie Keppard�s old original orchestra, which was
the first combination of what is known now as a
Dixieland combination. But, of course, this band was
augmented a bit � from the Dixieland combination. They
had added, then, the guitar and the bass fiddle. Of
course, Bill seen the opportunity, so he got into the
band and got the bass fiddle and got the band for
himself.
So he . . . we�s financed the trip and came to Los
Angeles. On entering Los Angeles, they made such a
tremendous success that the Pantages Circuit signed
them up immediately. That was the year of nineteen-
thirteen. And they made the trip throughout the country
of the Pantages Circuit, which was the largest circuit
at that time in the world. And through this trip they
came East, and they came into Chicago in early
nineteen-fourteen. I happened to be there myself, with
a similar combination of what Freddie Keppard used to
have, which was considered a Dixieland . . . which is
considered now a Dixieland combination.
They came to Chicago and turned the town upside down.
Caused my trumpet player to quit, which was considered
the best trumpet player in Chicago at the time. His
name was Armstrong.
What?
But not Louie Armstrong. [laughs] It was John Armstrong
of Louisville, Kentucky. And John couldn�t play that
kind of trumpet. And I had been teachin� him a little
bit, and he was little stubborn, and when Freddie
played, he wanted to hit me with a rack. When I mean a
rack, that is something that�s very . . .
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