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Trombone Blues

Trombone Blues

Bessie Smith

1921

AvailableBluesJazz

Lyrics

Well, doggone if yonder ain't old Henry.

Yeah, here I is.

You know,

I ain't seen you since you had the

flu-anna.

Oh, gal, you means the flu-inna. See,

listen here, Kelly.

I wanna-

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

What you call me Kelly for?

Kelly's a man's name.

Why do you do it?

I called you Kelly because you reminds me

of a fella I know named

Kelly. You know, you and him

are both great musicians.

Youse both plays the same instrument.

I don't understand what you mean.

Why, sure you've heard about Mr. Jazz

and the honky-tonky tunes

he always plays.

Yeah?

But I know well a fella

that has what it takes to shake your weary

blues away.

What's he got?

Talk about music masters,

just go down to the hall,

and you'll find out

that Kelly is the king of them all.

For the minute

that he starting to play,

everybody in the place begins to

sway.

Stop a minute. Cease this. Yeah, yeah,

yeah.

Now I know what you mean.

Kelly's the new trombone player in

town.

Oh, I sees that you

is using the thinking anatomy

that habitate

your cranium.

Oh, very singular.

I'll let you know about that later.

But say, does Kelly play like this?

That's it. Keep it up.

Keep it up. Don't you dare to-

Stop.

Lordy, how your trombone's moaning

and a-sneezing and a-groaning.

Don't you let it drop. Let her go,

nice and slow, on a raggy

strain.

You can have anything you choose

if you will

play the blues over and over

again.

Slide.

[trombone playing] Honey, slide.

When you start jazzing on your loving

trombone, why, you make her quake,

her shake her shoulders and moan.

Slide.

[trombone playing] Kelly, slide.

[trombone playing] Why,

there'll be a riot if

you ever refuse to play the trombone.

Gal, you plays a mean trombone.

Ain't it so? You know,

you oughta be able to play a trombone.

Why?

'Cause you got a big mouth.

A big mouth, huh?

Yours ain't no buttonhole.

No, but when the good Lord

was cutting yours,

if he'd have made another cut, he'd

have cut your head off.

That's all right about my mouth. But say,

listen here, Kelly.

You is good at sliding the trombone,

but how is you on

technique?

[laughs] Why, I speaks it fluently.

Speaks it? I'm gonna try you out. What

is four, four, six,

eight?

Why, that ain't technique, fool.

That's history.

Well, doggone. I can't fool you, can I?

You know,

when I was talking about technique,

what I shoulda said was there

a, a, a conspirato agitato.

You tell 'em ragtime. I'm syncopated.

All right, let's go. Slide.

[trombone playing] Kelly, slide.

When you start jazzing on your loving

trombone,

you make me think about my dear old Dixie

home. Slide.

[trombone playing] Kelly, slide.

[trombone playing] Why,

there'll be a riot if you ever

refuse to play the

trombone.

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