Bix, birthday boy (and Flora tattoo #3)

Leon "Bix" Beiderbecke (1903-1931)

Today is the 109th birthday of Leon "Bix" Beiderbecke, an American "hot jazz" legend who's been dead for 81 of those years. Bix was an alcoholic who never took a legal drink in his life. He was underage when Prohibition commenced in 1919, and died before it was repealed in 1933.

Jim Flora, who loved jazz, rendered a caricature of this revered cornetist on a 1947 Columbia Records 4-disc set. Last week we issued a limited edition fine art print of the illustration. Despite his brief, sordid life, Beiderbecke was one of the most influential musicians of the 1920s, the only decade commonly identified with a specific strain of music — "The Jazz Age." Bix lived it, and helped define it.

P.S. Bix and Flora also helped define this man's arm:

Photo: Julie Belcher/Yee-Haw Industries

Bix & Tram print released

Today we launch a new limited edition fine art print of a classic mid-century Flora album cover. Bix and Tram was one of the artist's earliest record sleeve illustrations, issued by Columbia in 1947 on a 78 rpm 4-disc set. The cover features outlandish caricatures of two legendary bandmates from the 1920s "hot jazz" scene: cornetist Leon "Bix" Beiderbecke and saxophonist Frankie Trumbauer.

Despite what appear to be mutant facial and cranial features, in fact these figures look exactly like Bix and Tram! Bix was scarlet-complexioned due to his overindulgence of bathtub gin, and Trumbauer was green from showering in money. Little-known historical facts. No need to thank us. Come back often.

The work has been issued in a limited edition run of 25 hand-numbered prints. Prices will increase as the edition sells down.

Bix @ 5 score + 7

Columbia Coda, April 1952, listing 7" discs featuring recordings of legendary jazz cornetist Bix Beiderbecke, born this date in 1903. The page is crowned with a Flora horn. At the time this circular was published, Beiderbecke would have been a relatively young age 49—if he hadn't died 21 years before (which was 17 years before the introduction of the 7" disc). We wrote about Bix @ 106, chronicling his enormous musical significance as well as his self-destructive predilections.

Bix @ 106

Leon Bix Beiderbecke was born today in 1903. Beiderbecke, a cornetist (caricatured above left by Flora in 1947) and pianist, was a stylistic catalyst in the formative years of jazz. Bix and trumpeter Louis Armstrong were the two most pivotal horn players of the 1920s, though their approaches differed markedly. Beiderbecke has been described as the first real modernist in jazz, though that doesn't explain his enduring appeal. (Each year when the calendar flips to February 10, WKCR radio in New York devotes a full day to his complete recordings.) Beiderbecke's historic magnitude prevails despite the fact that the "young man with a horn" drank himself to death at age 28, and his entire recording career spanned just six and a half prolific years. Music consumed Bix, while Bix consumed bathtub gin. As author Richard Hadlock wrote, Bix "was both an artist and a speakeasy entertainer, both a middle-class mama's boy and a nomadic bum, both a star performer and a jobless horn player."

What was in Bix's brew? Trumpeter Randy Sandke explains: "With the advent of prohibition in January 1920, the simple act of taking a drink containing alcohol became a criminal offense. Bootleg liquor became a witch's brew that could contain poisonous ingredients. A sample sold in the streets of Harlem was taken to a lab and analyzed. It was found to contain wood alcohol, benzene, kerosene, pyridine, camphor, nicotine, benzol, formaldehyde, iodine, sulphuric acid, soap, and glycerin. People who consumed this hazardous concoction often experienced dizziness, blackouts, hair loss, fluctuations in weight, advanced aging, partial blindness and paralysis. It is known that Bix exhibited most if not all of these symptoms." Despite these alcoholic maladies, Bix's complexion was reportedly less scarlet than Flora's portrait.

"Tram" was C-melody saxophonist Frank Trumbauer, with whom Bix made some of his most monumental recordings. A 4-cd box set with the same title as the Flora 78 album above contains all of their essential recordings. Bix was a legendary artist who often recorded with lesser talents and behind dreary vocalists, and the apparent filler on this collection simply reflects Beiderbecke's varied gigs. However, when teamed with high-caliber players like Trumbauer, multi-instrumentalist Adrian Rollini, guitarist Eddie Lang, and violinist Joe Venuti, Beiderbecke's stature is magnified, his reputation self-evident. Seek out his extended solo on "I'm Coming Virginia" by the 1927 Trumbauer Orchestra. It's scary beautiful.

Gary Giddins said: "Beiderbecke's originality made him one of the first white jazz musicians to be admired by black performers. Louis Armstrong recognized in him a kindred spirit, and Rex Stewart exactly reproduced some of his solos on recordings. Beiderbecke's influence on such white players as Red Nichols and Bunny Berigan was decisive. Although he was largely unknown to the general public at the time of his death, he acquired an almost legendary aura among jazz musicians and enthusiasts."

Bix was born and raised in Davenport, Iowa. Flora also grew up in the midwest (Bellefontaine, Ohio), and caught the jazz bug as a youth. "We had dancebands that came through all the time and they were mostly like Red Nichols and Bix Beiderbecke," Flora told interviewer Angelynn Grant in 1990. "Beiderbecke recorded less than 100 miles away from Bellefontaine, in Indiana. His label, Gennett Records, was in Hammond, Indiana, which was about 75-80 miles from Bellefontaine. So that was the tradition there."