While a strong historic document, many narratives of Bix are timeless. There are the slick haircuts, suits and uniforms of the band photos of the 1910s and 20s, as well as the sartorial time capsule of the late 70s, all eye-watering neck ties and scarves matching patterned shirts, bold blazers, upholstery and pearls. We see the raucous highs of the Roaring 20s and Prohibition and the era of trains, and the constant friction of racial segregation in the jazz bands and venues. Through the film BIX, Berman tells the story of the rise of jazz as a new popular music on the boats up the Mississippi from New Orleans to Chicago, and the influence of radio broadcasting on moving the home of jazz to New York City. The film’s subtitle is a quote from contemporary cornetist and admirer Louis Armstrong, however his most revealing insight is in describing the toll this life took on Bix: “they crowded him too much with love”, and that “Bix died of everything”.Īs with all the finest documentaries, a razor focus on one story shines light on a world of other things. The role of his alcoholism, dependence and attempted rehabilitation grows throughout the film as interviewees’ discreet references to gin and ‘feeling under the weather’ accumulate. This desire to play, literally at any cost (in this instance $107 in 1920s money), tracked through in how he spent his time between concerts: welcoming visitors and admirers into his rooms, playing at any invitation, and staying up all night drinking and jamming in the speakeasies. Having then arrived at the hotel before the rest of the band, he took a quick rest and slept through the whole thing. Running late one morning, Bix boarded the wrong train, and to avoid missing that evening’s gig chartered a private plane at great expense to make it to the right town on time. Even the stories recounted by his friends with the most joy reveal tragedy at their core: of musical scores of bandmates which have “Wake up Bix” scrawled on them at key moments, or of his madcap attempts not to miss a gig. The driving energy in his life was to play, and it was both the source of his success and his undoing. He is thrown out of a string of schools and universities across the Midwest, but via Chicago, Detroit and a slew of Great Lakes resorts, eventually finds himself an indispensable prized soloist with the best band in the country, the Paul Whiteman Orchestra. His underdog story begins as a naturally gifted musician who couldn’t read music, learning to play from listening to the bands on the boats coming down to the Mississippi river levee in Davenport, Iowa, and bargaining to buy a used cornet from his friend Fritz Putzier. There are the records he cut, and an archival parade of staged band photos, but there is precious little video footage of him playing, and no print or recorded interviews. ![]() ![]() ![]() As a high-achieving musician celebrated by his contemporaries, Bix’s mystery draws from the minimal documentation that exists.
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