Each Friday I pick a song–new, old, borrowed, blue–that’s been on my mind and in my ears, and write a short post about it.

This is “I Thought I Heard Buddy Bolden Say” by Jelly Roll Morton:

Jelly Roll Morton — “I Thought I Heard Buddy Bolden Say”

I’ve been rereading some essays by Luc Sante this week, including his excellent short piece, “I Thought I Heard Buddy Bolden Say,” which is part history, part speculation, and one hundred percent interesting, all about Buddy Bolden, funk, jazz, and more. Recordings of Buddy Bolden’s music don’t exist, and Jelly Roll Morton’s are the first recordings of this song to be made. The lyrics of the Buddy Bolden version were never written down either, so nobody quite knows how they went, but it seems a shame that this particular version doesn’t contain the phrase “Funky Butt,” which serves as the focal point, or at any rate, a guiding motif, in Luc Sante’s essay, which by the way, is available in his excellent collection, Kill All Your Darlings.