To be taken with a pinch of salt (looks like a great read, though, such a character):

'Orleans musicians were always looking for novelty effects to attract the public, and many of the most important things in jazz originated in some guy's crazy idea that we tried out for a laugh or just to surprise the folks.

Mutes came in with King Oliver, who first just stuck bottles into his trumpet so he could play softer, but then began to use all sorts of mutes to give his instrument a different flavor. And I, myself, by accident, discovered the swats on drums. Out in Los Angeles I had a drummer that hit his snares so loud that one night I gave him a couple of fly swatters for a gag. This drummer fell in with the joke and used them, but they worked so smooth he kept right on using them. So we have "the swats" today-a nice soft way to keep your rhythm going.'

Mister Jelly Roll: the fortunes of Jelly Roll Morton By Alan Lomax

Taken from a series of interviews conducted by Lomax, which are available as a CD box set (IIR).

The novelty thing rings true and Morton, despite being a bragger, had an annoying habit of being able to back up a lot of his claims...there was usually a grain of truth to them. However, more likely, if you ask me, that the tradition started in New Orleans during the teens of the last century. I've come across a few throw-away remarks to that effect in drum method books, but nothing to back them up.

Some interesting stuff coming up...well, if you're a brush-nerd like me! (stay tuned)

Gerry – I think I’m following you around this great internet “Diggin Dodds”! While I was at RedHotJazz I ran up on the video of Ben Bernie at the link below. I only watched the first one, at the top of the list, and noticed that the drummer appears to switch to a brush in his right hand about 1:14. They say this was shot in late 1924 or early 1925. Your probably aware of this already, but if not here it is.

http://www.redhotjazz.com/berniephonofilm.html

I've got a metal shelled snare that I'm going to put some tradional style heads on as a tribute to Baby Dodds.

He sure does! If you enlarge the video it is grainy but you get a clear shot of the brush in his right hand and the basic beat he is playing. After the brushes he switches to timpani mallets.

Those are excellent videos!

David

510, yes I was aware of the vid. Well done for finding it, though. As I said about the Louis Armstrong clip I linked to, it's not the earliest film in existence showing brushes, but it best represents the approach that dominated the swing era (albeit modified in many cases).

A lot of popular 'jazz' during the 20s was merely tarted-up dance music coming more from the European tradition. This seems to be reflected in the pattern played by the drummer in the Ben Bernie film. It does show that there was a whole other school of playing, however. So, yes, you're right: it does deserve attention.

I've been busy trying to find out more about these other 'schools'. I've managed to establish a connection between the Chicago-Dixie scene and brushes coming out of New Orleans, but it's not as exciting as you think:

"The first pair of brushes I ever had were given to me by Louis Cotrelle" [sic], said Singleton. I studied Cotrelle's work a lot during the early days. But Louis didn't care about brushes, so he gave them to me. They were the first pair of brushes I ever saw in my life. Before that, you had to get your soft effects by controlling your touch with the sticks"

From: The Great Jazz Drummers by Ron Spagnardi, William F. Miller.

The more senior Cottrell was a huge influence on all the New Orleans drummers who left for Chicago. However, Zutty Singleton didn't leave for that city until 1925, so this event could have happened as late as the mid-20s. And if Cottrell didn't much care for brushes, he might only have bought them because they were the latest fad. In short, it doesn't prove anything (yet).

Cottrell was based in New Orleans, but he did make it to Chicago and played there between the years 1916 to 1918. It could well be that a band leader asked him to use swats during that time and the tradition started then. Probably a similar scenario to the one Jelly Roll Morton mentions: Morton's story rings true, and I'm sure it happened like that, but it was probably something he saw in New Orleans/Chicago - he was there in 1913, briefly, before moving to California - and then copied. It could also be, however, that he's telling the truth. Unfortunately, he's not a reliable witness: he made so many outrageous claims during his lifetime that it's difficult to sort out what is fact and what is fiction. Humphrey Littleton points out in one of his books that I'm reading at the moment, that Morton had nothing to gain by praising the other musicians from New Orleans as he didn't get on with most of them, so all the stuff about the sound effects is likely to be true...in which case, perhaps the brushes claim is too.

Although there are ways to prise more info from Google book searches when no preview is available, there are limits. I pieced together the following fragments from a book called New Orleans jazz: the end of the beginning‎ by Barry Martyn, but don't know who was doing the talking:

'Pete Bocage's session, but the boy that recorded Jim just wanted it like the old days - that's what he said. The sock cymbal came in around the early …It was called "the snow shoe". Then came the "Low Boy" and later the regular sock like I use now. The wire brushes came into use in the '20s. I had 'em with Sam Morgan's band.'

The book was written in the 60s and was a compilation of interviews with 'old-timers'. The fragment seems to suggest that brushes weren't the norm in New Orleans until the 1920s, whereas they were obviously around earlier:

Wire brushes were used during World War I, but the date of origin is unknown.

Percussionist‎ - Page 111

Percussive Arts Society - Music - 1976

I'm still digging...

Below is a link to this School Band webpage. I had to blow this photo up when I viewed it (I used 400% in your browser window Internet Explorer). It looks possible that the snare player is playing brushes. It looks like the object in his left hand spreads out into a brush shape on the drum side and his grip could be a brush kind of thing. They may have needed a softer volume in class rooms. “Your mileage may vary”.

http://www.utc.edu/Faculty/William-Lee/bandresearch.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bodhrán

It was the first thing that came into my head...who knows, but probably a little too early to be a brush.

Gerry - If this is in response to the picture I posted just above your post here, then you are not seeing the snare he is playing that is in the standard contemporary snare position (probably on a stand) of today. He isn’t playing the drum on it's edge behind him. Look at his right hand it is playing the drum I’m referring to. You can just see the hoop shine and a little below that on the snare he is playing with both hands. just above the shine is where the fan of the brush is and he's got that in his left hand (there is another shine a little further up where the fan attaches to the handle). Do you see the dark handle in his left hand angled down towards the drum? That's what I'm talking about. You need to enlarge (blow up) the image to help see.

510, the resolution of my screen isn't great when the pic is blown-up to that extent, so I honestly couldn't say. I somehow doubt that it is a brush, though. The time-line that the Percussive Arts Society gives - (US entry to) WWI - is about right. I can't find any evidence of there ever having being a 'school' of brush-playing in New Orleans before then. Even after the war, brushes only seem to make an appearance in that city during the 1920s, along with the rest of the US. By the end of the 20s they start becoming mainstream, which is when recordings featuring brushes regularly appear.

It makes total sense, really. The drum manufacturers would have cashed in earlier had there been a huge demand from drummers for fly-swats. Find the earliest advert for brushes from a drum manufacturer, add a few years for a trend to develop and there's your answer. WWI is about right.

Only my opinion, but that's what all the evidence I've seen/read so far, points to.

Gerry - I guess your view is that brushes were first used in Jazz (and that may some day be proven, and I'm hoping it is proven by you. Rock On!). "Sound Recording" history might give that impression but with all the musical entertainment that pre-dated recordings (as I mentioned in an earlier post, traveling shows, dances, silent movies and more...the earliest Jazz performers played those shows, and other engagements, where they came into contact with a variety of performers and techniques) the first brush use may have been developed in another genre of music entertainment. Back then it was all show business. As for the timeline, you posted patents for those similar Fly Swats from 1899 and 1908, and whisk brooms and others, have already been discussed here. Brushes would have likely already become popular before the drum companies would have offered them, so fly swatters would have been used before that. Photos would be very good evidence before the time of sound recordings and video. IMHO

Unless that 1910 photo I posted above shows that drummer playing brushes.