Jocelyn Curry

Art & Joie de Vivre

The New Wonders: Lettering for a Unique Band

November 23, 2025

Did I need a deep plunge into a new blog site, right when such a time-consuming challenge really didn’t fit into my crowded calendar? The answer, no surprise, is “no” but at least I was able to navigate the mind-befuddling process of transferring the data from my old platform to this new, AI-enhanced version of good ol’ WordPress. My previous experience of working on good ol’ WordPress wasn’t stellar, so I’m hoping to improve my relationship with it asap. So far I have been able to upload my seasonally appropriate squash painting! But now, HOW do I get rid of “Hello World!” which was placed there by Good Ol. I’m not sure about this, but I think Good Ol’s default tips will stay on this, my First Post until I figure out how to discretely remove them without being told “This is not a good idea.” At least I got my squash up on this new site for your viewing pleasure! Happy Thanksgiving :-).

Scan

Over the years, I've done a lot of artwork for my daughter's bands. When the gifted trumpet and cornet player Mike Davis from her current band (Emily Asher's Garden Party) decided to lead a traditional jazz band of his own, the need for a "period style" logo came up. Mike Davis' The New Wonders, also located in New York Cityspecializes in playing American jazz from the 20's and 30's. Mike was asked to find some typography from the era that might be used as an inspiration for a hand lettered style. He located old Victrola ads that spoke to him and that served me well as a model to use. Some rather rustic, irregular wooden type was used for these magazine ads.

Using a Speedball nib with ink on rough paper, followed by some digital texturing, I created this lettering for The New Wonders' eponymous first CD release. The lettering echos the spacious Victrola logo at the bottom of the page. In traditional calligraphic studies, the model for my lettering is called Foundational. FYI, most book typography is based on what are called Roman letters (as opposed to Gothic or Italic, for example).

TNW final 300 dpi CD copy

I added the linear motif that was created with the same Speedball nib. 

 

 

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