Sidney Bechet on Stamps

This article features jazz legend Sidney Bechet on stamps from around the world. It is the latest of my articles about jazz musicians on stamps, make sure to check out my main article about jazz stamps. This article features one of the very earliest masters of jazz music, the New Orleans saxophone and clarinet player, Sidney Bechet. He even recorded months before Louis Armstrong. However, unlike Armstrong, Bechet took a long time to earn the recognition he deserved, and even then it was largely outside of the United States. Indeed, his home country has yet to feature Becht on a postage stamp.

Sidney Bechet

Sidney Bechet was born in 1897 in New Orleans into a Creole family. His older brother was an amateur trombone player and lead a band, which led Bechet to learn several musical instruments. Finally, he specialized on the clarinet and began playing with his brother’s band (some say at the age of six). Bechet would study with some of the earliest jazz clarinetists including Louis Nelson Delisle and Goerge Baquet.

Bechet learned to play in the improvisational jazz style of New Orleans jazz, with the clarinet being one of the three most important instruments alongside the cornet and trombone. He began traveling professionally in 1914, as New Orleans jazz artists became nationally famous and audiences clamored to hear them. Then, in 1919, he went to New York City and joined Will Marion Cook’s Syncopated Orchestra. That group soon set sail for Europe. During this trip abroad, Bechet discovered the straight soprano saxophone, and added it to his repertoire, become especially proficient on the instrument.

In Europe, Bechet was a star among his band. A Swiss classical conductor, Ernest Ansermet, even wrote a tribute to Bechet, linking him to the genius of Bach. In September of 1925, Bechet, along with other musicians that included Josephine Baker, went to France, appearing in Paris, then beginning a continental wide tour.

Controversy

Unfortunately, Bechet’s time in Europe was not all laudits. In 1928, back in Paris, Bechet was involved in some kind of conflict that led to him accidentally shooting a woman. Bechet claimed he was trying to shoot a man that had insulted him, but in any case, it led to his imprisonment for nearly a year. When he was released, he was deported back to New York City. However, this was soon after the stock market crash and there was little work for a now convict musician. Bechet was able to join the Noble Sissie Orchestra, which took him on a tour to Germany and Russia.

Finally, in 1932, Bechet made his way back to New York City and started leading a band alongside Tommy Ladnier. This began a prolonged period in the 1930s and through World War II in which Bechet remained in the United States. Fantastically, Bechet was even in a group with Willie “The Lion” Smith, which recorded some of the earliest pieces of “Latin jazz” combining traditional Latino rhythms and dance forms with the jazz idiom.

However, it was difficult to make a living playing jazz, especially early New Orleans jazz, in the age of Swing music. Bechet opened up a tailor shop along with his partner Ladnier. So, in 1950, Bechet once again moved back to France. His appearance at the Paris Jazz Fair that year caused a sensation and his career in France took off.

Bechet remained in France for the rest of his life, recording on French labels, and marrying a French woman. He died in 1959 on his 62nd birthday of lung cancer and is buried in a local cemetary in Garches.

The Stamps

It is surprising that Bechet has not been on a U. S. stamp, especially as probably should have been included in the jazz legends set of 1995. Yet, it makes great sense that he appears on so many stamps from other parts of the world, especially the Francophone world, which so readily adopted him and his music. The earliest stamp featuring Bechet is from Chad. In October of 1971, the country issued three stamps featuring American jazz artists: Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, and Sidney Bechet. This was a few months after Armstrong died and it marked the beginning of a rush for countries, especially in Africa, to issue stamps featuring jazz musicians.

Similarly, in 1972, Gabon came out with a set of three postage stamps featuring Black American artists. This set included Armstrong, the pop singer Nat King Cole, and Bechet. This is the first stamp that shows Bechet playing an instrument, the soprano saxophone with which he became widely associated.

Another French-speaking, former colony of France, issued a Sidney Bechet stamp in 1984. This stamp, a little more caricaturish, shows a clarinet and a portrait of Bechet. It was one of a pair of stamps featuring American jazz artists, the other portrayed Duke Ellington.

Of course, many of these stamps were made for western collectors and not for domestic production. By the 1980s, jazz musicians were popular on stamps from a whole variety of countries that were really looking for ways to make money from westerners. St. Vincent and The Grenadines is one of the big culprits when it comes to these stamps. Indeed, in 1989, Bechet was a part of a whole set from that country featuring American jazz artists.

Much more attractive is are se-tenant stamps of Bechet that come from Gambia in 1998.

That same year, St. Vincent and the Grenadines once again created a set featuring jazz musicians. This Sidney Bechet stamp is considerably better than their earlier attempt in the 1980s.

France

Finally, and a bit surprisingly, it took until 2002 for Bechet to appear on a French postage stamp. The country has had a rich and thriving jazz scene since the 1920s, and Bechet was an adopted star within the country. It seems like he would have been on a stamp much earlier. However, it was only in 2002 when he was included in a set of jazz stamps from the country. These stamps are the design of Raymond Moretti, who in the 1960s was an illustrator for a set of jazz LPs. His stamp designs are rather abstract and modern, yet you can clearly see Bechet on the left hand side of the stamp.

Here is one of my favorite Sidney Bechet recordings, the song “Blue Horizon.” Enjoy