Music: July Records

Sidney Bechet is a brown-skinned old-timer from New Orleans, who looks like expansive Mr. Toad in The Wind in the Willows. Last month he did something that was in its way as fantastic as any of the acts of Kenneth Grahame's capricious batrachian. Last week Victor issued a record of The Sheik of Araby played by a six-piece ensemble, in which Mr. Bechet plays all six pieces.

After painstaking rehearsals, Mr. Bechet went to the Victor studios with his tenor and soprano saxophones, string bass, drums, clarinet. The piano was already there. He recorded each instrument's part separately, listening to and recording...