Originally designed as a response to the rapidly changing creative world of 2020 amidst the unprecedented COVID disruptions; The Summer Chores was created as a motivational tool for home use over the summer months for students and teachers alike, the intension being that the performer plays all the parts to each piece while learning and experimenting how to record themselves, learn how to make a click-track, how to multi-track, mix, video-edit and more….
Composed in 1925 and was originally entitled "Queen of Spades". It was recorded in Chicago by Morton and “His Red Hot Peppers” in 1926. This recording has many features that are typical of the New Orleans style and was written for a line-up of trumpet, clarinet and trombone, piano, banjo, bass and drums. Morton practiced what he preached and managed to incorporate in one short piece an original work derived from multi-thematic ragtime structures, accompanied by a percussive "slapped" bass used to help keep time, trombone counter-melody tailgating, stomps, breaks, stoptime, backbeat, two-beat, four-beat, riffs, and rich variations of melody and dynamics of volume; all the elements of jazz that he understood so well.
