Big Bill Broonzy - In Concert (With Graeme Bell & His Australian Jazz Band) (2002)

"Get Out Of Here" was the bell band's opener. The rest of the first set includes two tunes from the classic jazz period in "Muskrat Ramble" and "High Society", together with "Big Chief Battle Axe" which is associated with Bunk Johnson. "Kansas City Stomps" is a Jelly Roll Morton tune and is given a fine rolling treatment. To complete the set, we have Graeme Bell's original composition, "Bull Ant Blues". "High Society" with which the set finished is, of course, a march and the mobile members of the band performed it while marching round the stage. Big Bill opens with "John Henry". Leroy Carr's "In The Evening" is a song that demands and gets an evocative performance in contrast to the joyful tunes that finished the set, "I Feel So Good" and the popular song "Who's Sorry Now". On his second set, Big Bill returned to the classic blues with "Trouble In Mind" and then the folk/blues standard "Keep Your Hands Off Her" extolling the virtues of his lady and warning off any predatory males. His set is completed by the arrival of the Bell band for the novelty number "Mama Don't Allow". Graeme Bell shows his ragtime skills on "Black And White Rag" in a nicely paced version before the band's drummer is featured on cornet with the Ellington favourite "It Don't Mean A Thing". The concert closed with "When The Saints" on which the vocal is shared between Lazy Ade and Big Bill.