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Not THAT Prince

ANYway…

During Count Basie’s so-called Kansas City years, he had the opportunity to play with Benny Moten’s band, amd even taken over the direction of it due to some internal problems.

This era in Basie’s career is very important in that this is when he enrolled a certain hep cat called Lester Young who -just like JazzCat Jaz, played the tenor sax.  together, Basie and Young gave us what is no doubt Basie’s signature piece, One O’Clock Jump [favourite of many a Swing Cat].  But that is material for another post.

This was also the time when some of Count Basie’s personnel -having some time off from the band, formed a small ensemble called the Kansas City Five.  When Young joined the band,  also joined the small ensemble, which for obvious reasons  became the Kansas City Six.  Add a new member and what do we get? Why, the Kansas City Seven, of course.

They made some recordings and this beauty came out of those sessions.

What? what’s the song about? I’m glad you asked.  I did a little research and came up with this interesting piece of intel.

Six Cats and a Prince original recording

Here’s the personnel that recorded the song:

Buck Clayton on trumpet, Lester Young on tenor sax, Dicky Wells (sometimes Dickie Wells) on trombone, Freddie Greene on guitar, Rodney Richardson on bass, Jo Jones on drums AND “Prince Charming” on piano [quotation marks are theirs].  Get it? Six [Jazz] Cats and a Prince?

So, here it is.  Enjoy!

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