Scat Scat with a Baseball Baaaat

“One day I went too the mooooon, playing a trumpet with a big baloooon. Heel on toe, foot in yo noseee.” - Author Mike Harris, hey I can scat too

Scat is the old new black. Suit, clean head to toe, with all black shoes as if you were the president.

But man, when you widdle, and wrangle, and swanggg, that crowd will be moving and grooving and don't know what they doin.

Louis Armstrong was far from your typical jazz all - star. This cat was sum special.

He brought a raspy voice, joy that lite up the room, and he had that little gap when he smiled.

Scat is the instrument from your voice. It bellows up from your belly then bursts out from your mouth.

If you look up the lyrics, scatting words won't be there, because it's all improv, made up from the style from within.

Man oh man and that trumpet sound! I'm a trumpet player myself, not like Louis but I did a few jig and jags in my time.

Even when he was up in years and docs told him to fold, not Louis. That cat, kept on singing.

I wouldn't be surprised if his raspy singing voice may of lead him to his demise. If so he went out playing his horn and scattin.' The barber shops now got tunes to play, so what they planin' about?

For years, I always loved jazz. First it was playing in the grade school jazz band. It just sounded cool, improvising your music, while letting that sound connect to the tune. John Coltrane started his own technique and it's known today as the Coltrane Changes.

Coltrane changes, also known as the ‘Major Third Tonic relationship’ is a harmonic movement where instead of one tonic center, we have 3, which divide the octave into 3 equal parts, for example in the key of C, the other tonic centres would Ab, and E.

Coltrane's technique is an anchor for jazz and yes that includes scattin. It's like a buidling foundation. It may seem out of order and at times just disorganized, but the foundation is solid and you won't fall from the 15 to the first flo. See here, Coltrane is anotha brotha that changed up the track. You can't buy that style, you can't create it, all you can do is admire and copy it.

That style, a black, a brown style. Was created in the morning time flapjacks on the table. Created when all your kinfolk spent the night at grandma's and you slept in the front. Where I'm from we called it a palate.

Where I'm from, music is essential. From the pen's tappin on the lunch room tables to the big music halls where Coltrane and Luis were singing. This music, this thing called Jazz is a beckon, a light of our existence.

I don't know where it truly started. Cause it could of started years ago, way before the slave trade. Just singing and swinging for the village. But when it came to the United States, despite letdowns, these musicians had a way of telling stories in spite of the pain they wore on their faces.

It's something about this jazz, that we as black folk brought to the front ground. It's like we had the game down from the jump and all we needed was a chance. We have stories too, we want to dance in the halls, we want to lift up our black brothers and sisters that are so constantly wronged. We want to sing, we want to improvise, cause where we from, we creators, we is innovators.

These cats was coming up to Chicago from the South. Louisiana place of Jazzy folk and the South turned them into legends.

So, it doesn't matter who the best is at scattin, who ever you pick. Ella or Badu, cause my boy Louis created that swangg that you so desperately want to sing.

Scat on brotha, I ain't mad at you. Talk that talk, and swang to the music. Scat in the Burbs, and go scat in the city. All in all, scattin is a black thing.