Join us on June 10, 2023 from noon to 3:00 p.m. for an afternoon of picnicking, dancing, and relaxing on the lawn at Durham’s Orchard Park, with live music by your hosts, the Mint Julep Jazz Band. Inspired by the Jazz Age Lawn Party in New York and similar events in Boston and Richmond, this began as a socially distanced event in 2021 to great success following a long pandemic winter. Now an annual event, the Orchard Park Jazz Picnic draws jazz fans, vintage enthusiasts, regional swing dancers, and passersby who decide to derail that dog walk and join the fun.
This event is free and open to the public. We will have a virtual and physical tip jar for the band – if you’d like to tip in advance, you can Venmo to @Laura-Windley or PayPal to caab241@hotmail.com.
In the event of inclement weather, all updates will be posted in the Facebook event. If we have to cancel, this event will be rescheduled for a later date.
Thanks so much to Alexandrea Lassiter of Copper Key Photo for the incredible photos from last year!
We were pleasantly surprised to find our vinyl records were delivered this week, as we weren’t expecting them until May. You can pick up a copy on our Bandcamp page or message us in advance if you’d like to purchase an LP at one of our shows. Thanks again to our Kickstarter backers who made this dream a reality!
CDs! We have them! If you would like a physical copy of our new album Watch the Birdie, you can order one from our Bandcamp page, in all its glory. We splurged for the eco case and we have actual liner notes for you to read about the making of this album. Shout out to CIH Studios for the incredible album artwork, it’s thematic perfection.
This past weekend the Mint Julep Jazz Band premiered three new music videos as part of the California Balboa Classic’s virtual event, CalBal Live! The event reached out to 5 bands/bandleaders to create brand new recordings for the event, compiled remotely due to the COVID-19 pandemic, including Michael Gamble and the Rhythm Serenaders, Gordon Au’s Grand Street Stompers, the Jen Hodge All-Stars, Keenan McKenzie and the Riffers, and the Mint Julep Jazz Band. We hope you enjoy these new-to-us tunes, here’s the scoop on each song, the sponsors, and the musicians for each recording:
COWBELL SERENADE
If you say CalBal three times fast it might come out sounding like cowbell at the end – hence this tune is a pun on the event’s nickname. We’d been looking for pitched cowbells for years, online an at music stores, and it took a pandemic Zoom cocktail hangout for the topic of almglocken to come out. Thanks to Jonathan Stout for the suggestion, we think they worked out great! Here’s our rendition of Johnny Blowers’ Cowbell Serenade, sponsored by Gary Chyi.
I’M GONNA SIT RIGHT DOWN AND WRITE MYSELF A LETTER
This is an original arrangement of I’m Gonna Sit Right Down and Write Myself a Letter, written by Lucian Cobb, with vocals inspired by the Boswell Sisters. Thanks so much to Kevin Wang, Lian Tarhay, Ursula Hicks, Kevin Nguyen, Matt Mitchell, and Jennifer Reed, all swing dancers in Austin and Dallas, Texas, who joined forces to sponsor this song for CalBal Live.
When we started talking to the CalBal Live organizers it became clear that they were excited about everything the bandleaders proposed and were up for funding big band charts. While the Mint Julep Jazz Band isn’t a big band, Lucian really wanted to do a big band song because it would be fun to put together. He had already transcribed Raggin’ the Scale (from an Ella Fitzgerald and her Famous Orchestra live recording from the Savoy Ballroom) for Michael Gamble and the Rhythm Serenaders Orchestra and Michael gave his blessing for us to record Lucian’s transcription, so here we are! Thanks so much to Pasadena Balboa and Jam for sponsoring Raggin’ the Scale, this song is an absolute blast.
The Global Trickeration Project was created by the organizers of the International Lindy Hop Championships to celebrate Norma Miller‘s 100th birthday and her signature choreography. The project invited dancers from all over the world to learn Norma’s Trickeration routine, film it, and send it to ILHC to be included in a tribute to Norma at the International Lindy Hop Championships. Norma’s legacy and dancing live on as the Queen of Swing continues to inspire us today and talk about her legacy following her passing last year.
Traditionally, Trickeration is done to Count Basie’s recording of “Jive at Five,” but the dancers in Lyon, France opted to use our recording of this fantastic tune for their choreography – thanks and cheers! Here’s to Norma!
We are excited to announce a double-nighter on the southern coast/Cape Fear area of North Carolina, which is a new area for us and I know some people are very excited to have us in their town for a little hot jazz listening and rug-cutting!
On Friday, January 10, 2020 we’ll be at the Hannah Block Historic USO in Wilmington, NC for a swing dance hosted by the Cape Fear Swing Dance Society – join us from 7:30 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. for dancing in this historic venue. Admission is $15.00. For more information visit the CFSDS website.
On Saturday, January 11, 2020 we will do a rare sit-down concert for Brunswick Community College’s Odell Williamson Auditorium in Bolivia, NC. We’ll plan a program of interesting tidbits and tasty tunes for your listening ears. For more information and to purchase advance tickets, visit the auditorium’s concert series website.
The next two weekends are packed with great dancing and music and we’re excited to be a part of all of it! On July 6, 2019, find us at the historical Glen Echo Spanish Ballroom for the inaugural Red, White, & Bal, a Balboa Workshop weekend hosted by Capital City Swing. We’ll be performing from 9 p.m. to midnight – for more information, visit the event website.
On July 13, 2019, our hometown of Durham, NC is the backdrop for the Triangle Swing Dance Society’s first full-fledged Lindy Hop workshop weekend, the Bull City Swingout. We’ll be performing at another historic ballroom, the Durham Armory, from 8:00 p.m. to 11:30 p.m. For more information, visit the BCS website.
Check out this video of collegiate shag dancers Gabriela Novellino, Pedro Naine, Eloisa Amanda Pino Klohn from Santiago, Chile, dancing to the Mint Julep Jazz Band’s recording of “Six Jerks in a Jeep” – like it and share it, because it’s their submission for a contest to win passes to the Barcelona Shag Festival!
We’ll be making our DCLX debut this year, performing at Glen Echo Park’s Spanish Ballroom for the Saturday late night (i.e. the wee hours of Sunday morning) from 1:00 a.m. to 4:00 a.m., following the main Saturday dance with the Jonathan Stout Orchestra. I know it’s late, but the dancing will be amazing all weekend, with 9 bands performing throughout the weekend – join us in DC the weekend of April 205-28, 2019!
Check out this video from Saturday night at Hot Rhythm Holiday, from some brave soul navigating the dance floor during our performance of Watch the Birdie (with an arrangement inspired by Martha Raye’s version from the movie Hellzapoppin’) – enjoy!
Mint Julep Jazz Band 