Tain't Nobody's Bus'ness If I Do - piano accompaniment

100 years ago, Thomas Waller recorded this piano accompaniment with Sara Martin on December 1st 1922 at the Okeh recording studio in New York.

Although records state his piano solos Muscle Shoal Blues and Birmingham Blues were recorded the previous month, Fats always maintained that this Sara Martin recording was his very first recording. This is a transcription of the entire performance so we can hear the young Fats, only 18 at the time, in all his youthful, exuberant brilliance.

Fats released a piano-roll performance of the song a year later and would reprise it much later with His Rhythm in 1942.

All his "tricks" are on show here: irrepressible swing, full rich left-hand tenths, bluesy ornamentation, boundless creative invention and, most notably here than in his later style, much use of the left-hand "drop" effect where the usual left-hand "Oom Pahs" are playfully misplaced creating an exciting syncopated off-beat effect.

Here are the notes as best I can but being such an old recording, balance issues made the transcription process rather difficult. Always listen to the original as the ultimate source of performance:

   • 'Tain't Nobody's Bus'ness If I Do (fe...  

Youtube.com noteman