While New York big band jazz was heating up, big bands of a different stripe shredded their way through the Midwest. After Storyville shutdown in New Orleans in the teens, musicians migrated north-to Chicago, but also to several towns strung along the Might Mississippi river, a central artery through big band territory. Even in the teens, New Orleans jazz had drifted upriver to northern cities, carried by riverboat bands and 78 rpm records.
During the mid-20s, while Fletcher Henderson's Orchestra was on the rise in New York, dozens of famous and not-so famous big bands tore up stages in San Antonio, Dallas, Oklahoma City, Tulsa, Memphis, St. Louis, and Omaha. These competitive, regional bands were known as territory bands, and their members were loyal, sticking together so they could make to the next town and earn a few dollars.
Benny Moten (1894-1935)
Moten was a ragtime pianist who formed a band in Kansas City and first recorded in 1923 with a six-piece New Orleans-style lineup. By 1924, he was back in a studio, this time in Camden, New Jersey with an expanded 10-piece ensemble-only two pieces shy of Fletcher Henderson's big band across Hudson river in New York City.
Moten's music grew out of early jazz and blues, with impromptu head arrangements (short melodic themes) that led into extended improvisational jams. Moten's band had a buoyant rhythm section that served as a model for great big band rhythm sections over the next two decades.
The early Moten Band is well represented on Bennie Moten: 1923-1932 (Best of Jazz). After 1929 Moten served mostly as a leader, turning piano duties over to Bill "Count" Basie, and eventual legend who modeled his own 1935 band after Moten's. Setting a new high standard for big band jazz, Moten's ensemble made its last and best recordings in New Jersey in 1932. Arrangements by Saxophonist Eddie Barefield and guitarist Eddie Durham alternated welling ensemble passages with sizzling solos by trumpeter Oran "Hot Lips" Page, saxophonists Ben Webster, and others.
Other Territory Bands
Other territory bands swung hard with that loose, wide-open blues feel. Recording was not common in the Midwest; so much of this music (with the exception of Moten's on RCA) is not well documented. Even though their recorded legacies were small, their reputations still loom large even today.
Troy Floyd
Troy Floyd's nine piece San Antonio ensemble had tight arrangements and a smooth, less bluesy feel than its peers, as captured on recordings from 1928 and 1929.
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