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John Mitchell

There are a few details in the life span of the vintage jazzman which are simply because ordinary simply because his name. There’s, for instance, his decision to change from banjo to electric guitar; this is a move apparently every picker within a jazz combo or dance music group made sometime through the ’30s, as though they all had been following purchases from some type of anti-banjo diocese. When his lifetime was last recognized by jazz analysts, John Mitchell was functioning being a building superintendent in NEW YORK, a pretty common occupation regardless of the bravura implied by its shortened type, “very.” Mitchell the very, not to end up being confused with a great many other performers who’ve exactly the same name, after that slipped out of view — the tenants in his building might have known where he’s, but actually that can not be assumed in line with the norm of associations between Manhattan renters and their building superintendents. Looking for work in European countries with expatriate jazzmen such as for example pianist and arranger Sam Wooding and reed participant Willie Lewis was a choice for performers who have been unhappy with musical work possibilities in america — and they have remained a choice although the titles from the bandleaders possess changed. But there’s something that occurred to Mitchell while gigging in European countries in the 10 years before the Second Globe War that hardly any American jazz music artists experienced: he was captured and kept being a prisoner of the 3rd Reich. This unlucky development occurred pursuing Mitchell’s decision to keep the Lewis music group and suspend loose in holland, a very poor idea after the surprise troopers emerged marching in. Mitchell’s professional profession began in NEW YORK in the first ’20s. He strummed banjo accompaniments within a music group led by Johnny Dunn, which proved helpful behind vocalist Edith Wilson. For a little more than a season from 1922 Mitchell was an associate from the Plantation Orchestra, even though he still left this group before it went off on the Uk tour, he do manage to ensure it is abroad with Wooding within the springtime of 1925. The Wooding clothing stayed busy before early ’30s, and Mitchell became a member of up for what ended up being ten years with Lewis. Shackled with the Gestapo from 1941 through 1944, Mitchell was after that repatriated and joined up with the Jimmie Lunceford music group through 1946. After this he progressed into a part-time participant, after that left music totally. A somewhat regular early jazz accompanist on either electric guitar or banjo, Mitchell’s shows can be found on reissue series by Dunn, Lunceford, Expenses Coleman, and Jelly Move Morton, amongst others.

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