Word: tsfasman
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Jazz is no newcomer to the U.S.S.R. It has just been on a long vacation. In 1925 pudgy New Orleans Saxophonist Sidney Bechet gave Moscow its first jam session, so enthralled a young music student named Aleksandr Tsfasman that he quit Moscow Conservatory, formed his own combo, took to wearing green and maroon suits. Even the stolid Soviet government got into the act. It formed a 43-piece U.S.S.R. Jazz Band, released top Trumpeter Andrei Gorin from prison (his crime: insulting a Communist Party official), ordered him onto the bandstand. Then, as abruptly as it began, the jazz era died...
Since the Soviet Government lists jazz music as "vulgar," "demoralizing," few good Communists have heard jazz orchestras. But tourists in Moscow may hear jazz at the tourist hotels. One of the best is at the Grand Hotel where Leader Alexander ("Sasha") Tsfasman, "Russia's Paul Whiteman," postures, stamps and waves his baton. His "Moscow Boys" blare out an acceptable version of jazz. Few Communists go to hear...
...close, airless clubroom the Moscow Boys took up their instruments and played jazz as they had never played before. They played a waltz, then several French and English foxtrots. The young workers, most of whom were hearing jazz for the first time, were exhilarated but confused. Then Tsfasman called for "Ho Hum," popular three years ago in the U. S. When it was finished the audience cried for an encore. Jazzman Tsfasman had all but won his case. He ended with a rumba...
...Youth L e a g u e's newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravada, suggested that young workers who could not "resist the appeal of the bourgeois dance" confine their depravity to their homes. Finally the Moscow Conservatory's Music Professor Konnus pulled a long face and gravely approved Tsfasman's jazz...
Alexander Tsfasman stands for jazz in Russia. Some of his compositions: "Jolly Blues." "Sky Trot/' "Willy Brest...
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