My favorite Jazz greats
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Louis Armstrong grew up poor in a single-parent household. He was 13 when he celebrated the New Year by running out on the street and firing a pistol that belonged to the current man in his mother's life. At the Colored Waifs Home for Boys, he learned to play the bugle and the clarinet and joined the home's brass band. They played at socials, picnics and funerals for a small fee. At 18 he got a job in the Kid Ory Band in New Orleans. Four years later, in 1922, he went to Chicago, where he played second coronet in the Creole Jazz Band. He made his first recordings with that band in 1923. In 1929 Armstrong appeared on Broadway in "Hot Chocolates", in which he introduced Fats Waller's "Ain't Misbehavin', his first popular song hit. He made a tour of Europe in 1932. During a command performance for King George V, he forgot he had been told that performers were not to refer to members of the royal family while playing for them. Just before picking up his trumpet for a really hot number, he announced: "This one's for you, Rex."Hot Five Hot Seven his Jazz his standards his duets- Music Artist
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On Saturday, June 15th, 1996, an era in jazz singing came to an end, with the death of Ella Fitzgerald at her home in California. She was the last of four great female jazz singers (including Billie Holiday, Sarah Vaughan, and Carmen McRae) who defined one of the most prolific eras in jazz vocal style. Ella had extraordinary vocal skills from the time she was a teenager, and joined the Chick Webb Orchestra in 1935 when she was 16 years old. With an output of more than 200 albums, she was at her sophisticated best with the songs of Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart, of George Gershwin, and of Cole Porter. Her 13 Grammy awards are more than any other jazz performer, and she won the Best Female Vocalist award three years in a row. Completely at home with up-tempo songs, her scat singing placed her jazz vocals with the finest jazz instrumentalists, and it was this magnificent voice that she brought to her film appearances. Her last few years, during which she had a bout with congestive heart failure and suffered bilateral amputation of her legs from complications of diabetes, were spent in seclusion.- Actor
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Artie Shaw played ukulele at ten and began as an alto saxophonist at the age of twelve. While still in his teens he formed his first band, the Bellevue Ramblers which performed at local gigs. He took up the clarinet in 1926 and spent several years honing his talent playing for various local bands in Florida and Ohio, often doubling up as an arranger and tenor sax player. He arrived in New York in 1929, participated in numerous recording sessions and quickly established a reputation for technical excellence on his chosen instrument. In his 1952 autobiographical book "The Trouble with Cinderella" he described himself as a mediocre talent who improved himself through countless hours of rehearsal. That self-critique notwithstanding, Shaw was a consummate perfectionist, almost to the point of obsession. He was unconventional, highly literate and often difficult to deal with. He hated 'annoying fans', eschewed fame for its own sake, avoided publicity whenever possible and rarely did encores. He was also a gifted musician, able to draw a richer, cleaner sound out of his instrument than any other contemporary clarinet player. Artie himself recalled "I didn't play clarinet. I played music".
Shaw formed his first band in 1936 (featuring a string quartet) but was unhappy with the result, disbanded and the following year set up a full-size conventional swing orchestra (three trumpets, two trombones, four saxes, four rhythm). He had his first million selling success for Bluebird Records with a Jerry Gray arrangement of the Cole Porter song "Begin the Beguine" which quickly became a swing standard and established the band as one of the best in the business. On October 26 1938, the Shaw orchestra opened at the Blue Room of the Hotel Lincoln on New York's Eighth Avenue, complete with a coast-to-coast radio hook up. More hits followed with "Yesterdays", "Out of Nowhere", "Nightmare" (his theme), "Softly As in A Morning Sunrise" and "Any Old Time" (famous for a magnificent vocal by Billie Holiday). Artie himself acquired the sobriquet "King of the Clarinet" as opposed to his perennial rival Benny Goodman who was known as "the King of Swing" (incidentally, this 'rivalry' was entirely orchestrated by publicists -- there was never any genuine ill-will between the two). Shaw later recalled "We weren't playing dance music. Our music was for listening primarily......If we had wanted to play just dance music, I could have saved myself an awful lot of money on some of the sidemen I paid". Those sidemen over the years included jazz greats like drummer Buddy Rich (whom Artie referred to as the band's 'spark plug'), Georgie Auld, Johnny Best, Ray Conniff and Billy Butterfield . Shaw also consistently hired top notch singers, foremost among them Helen Forrest, Kitty Kallen, Peg La Centra and Bea Wain. Sadly, Billie Holiday's tenure with the band was short-lived. Issues with racial discrimination came to a head at various New York concert venues and on radio broadcasts, forcing her to quit.
Nothing if not mercurial, Shaw folded the band at the peak of its popularity and left suddenly for self-imposed exile in Mexico. He stayed only a couple of months, gigging with local musicians and collecting traditional songs. Back in the U.S. in January 1940, he began work on the musical Second Chorus (1940). The film was a rare failure for its star Fred Astaire and Shaw also recalled it as the worst movie he ever made. On the positive side, he cut two hugely successful recordings of songs he had unearthed in Mexico: "Frenesi" and "Adios, Mariquita Linda". His new band now included a string section and a sextet nucleus which would become known as "Artie Shaw and His Gramercy Five". This incarnation, too, only lasted a few months as did the one which succeeded it. Fed up with celebrity, Artie enlisted in the U.S. Navy in April 1942 and eventually assembled the Rangers, a 17-piece orchestra which toured the Pacific theatre from Pearl Harbour to Guadalcanal. The band performed in jungles and aircraft hangars, surviving seventeen bombing attacks from Japanese aircraft while en route from island to island. In November 1943, Shaw was medically discharged and later hospitalised with a severe case of nervous depression. His wartime band was taken over by saxophonist Sam Donahue. It retained its popularity with service personnel and recorded many successful V-discs. Meanwhile, Shaw recuperated in Hollywood and eventually put together another 17-piece outfit which featured Barney Kessel on guitar, Dodo Marmarosa on piano and arrangements by Ray Conniff. Among the big selling hits for this group were "S'Wonderful" and "Ac-Cent-Tchu-Ate the Positive". After switching his record affiliation to Musicraft, Shaw added more strings and woodwinds. He recorded several excellent Cole Porter tracks with Mel Tormé and his vocal group, the Mel-Tones. Again, the venture merely lasted a year. For Artie Shaw "the personal price was too great. I wanted to do other things. And I just didn't have the temperament to stay on the scene too long". His final throw of the dice was the creation of a band playing bop-style jazz in 1949. It failed to find much of an audience and Shaw decided to call it a day. By the mid-50s, he had forsaken the instrument which made him famous and turned to writing. He even authored a novel about three failed marriages, titled "I Love You. I Hate You. Drop Dead". He may have had certain insights, since his unsettled private life seemed to mirror his career: married eight times, his wives have included actresses Ava Gardner, Lana Turner and Evelyn Keyes.
Shaw came out of retirement on rare occasions, notably at a London concert in June 1992 in which some of his music was performed by Bob Wilber.- Music Artist
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Billie Holiday was a true artist of her day and rose as a social phenomenon in the 1950s. Her soulful, unique singing voice and her ability to boldly turn any material that she confronted into her own music made her a superstar of her time. Today, Holiday is remembered for her masterpieces, creativity and vivacity, as many of Holiday's songs are as well known today as they were decades ago. Holiday's poignant voice is still considered to be one of the greatest jazz voices of all time.
At the age of 18 and after gaining more experience than most adult musicians can claim, Holiday was spotted by John Hammond and cut her first record as part of a studio group led by Benny Goodman, who was then just on the verge of public prominence. In 1935 Holiday's career got a big push when she recorded four sides that went on to become hits, including "What a Little Moonlight Can Do" and "Miss Brown to You." This landed her a recording contract of her own, and then, until 1942, she recorded a number of master tracks that would ultimately become an important building block of early American jazz music.
Holiday recorded about 100 new recordings on another label, Verve, from 1952 to 1959. Her voice became more rugged and vulnerable on these tracks than earlier in her career. During this period, she toured Europe, and made her final studio recordings for the MGM label in March of 1959. Billie Holiday, a musical legend still popular today, died an untimely death at the age of 44. Her emotive voice, innovative techniques and touching songs will forever be remembered and enjoyed- Actress
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One of the brightest, most tragic movie stars of Hollywood's Golden Era, Judy Garland was a much-loved character whose warmth and spirit, along with her rich and exuberant voice, kept theatre-goers entertained with an array of delightful musicals.
She was born Frances Ethel Gumm on 10 June 1922 in Minnesota, the youngest daughter of vaudevillians Ethel Marian (Milne) and Francis Avent "Frank" Gumm. She was of English, along with some Scottish and Irish, descent. Her mother, an ambitious woman gifted in playing various musical instruments, saw the potential in her daughter at the tender age of just 2 years old when Baby Frances repeatedly sang "Jingle Bells" until she was dragged from the stage kicking and screaming during one of their Christmas shows and immediately drafted her into a dance act, entitled "The Gumm Sisters," along with her older sisters Mary Jane Gumm and Virginia Gumm. However, knowing that her youngest daughter would eventually become the biggest star, Ethel soon took Frances out of the act and together they traveled across America where she would perform in nightclubs, cabarets, hotels and theaters solo.
Her family life was not a happy one, largely because of her mother's drive for her to succeed as a performer and also her father's closeted homosexuality. The Gumm family would regularly be forced to leave town owing to her father's illicit affairs with other men, and from time to time they would be reduced to living out of their automobile. However, in September 1935 the Gumms', in particular Ethel's, prayers were answered when Frances was signed by Louis B. Mayer, mogul of leading film studio MGM, after hearing her sing. It was then that her name was changed from Frances Gumm to Judy Garland, after a popular '30s song "Judy" and film critic Robert Garland.
Tragedy soon followed, however, in the form of her father's death of meningitis in November 1935. Having been given no assignments with the exception of singing on radio, Judy faced the threat of losing her job following the arrival of Deanna Durbin. Knowing that they couldn't keep both of the teenage singers, MGM devised a short entitled Every Sunday (1936) which would be the girls' screen test. However, despite being the outright winner and being kept on by MGM, Judy's career did not officially kick off until she sang one of her most famous songs, "You Made Me Love You," at Clark Gable's birthday party in February 1937, during which Louis B. Mayer finally paid attention to the talented songstress.
Prior to this her film debut in Pigskin Parade (1936), in which she played a teenage hillbilly, had left her career hanging in the balance. However, following her rendition of "You Made Me Love You," MGM set to work preparing various musicals with which to keep Judy busy. All this had its toll on the young teenager, and she was given numerous pills by the studio doctors in order to combat her tiredness on set. Another problem was her weight fluctuation, but she was soon given amphetamines in order to give her the desired streamlined figure. This soon produced the downward spiral that resulted in her lifelong drug addiction.
In 1939, Judy shot immediately to stardom with The Wizard of Oz (1939), in which she portrayed Dorothy, an orphaned girl living on a farm in the dry plains of Kansas who gets whisked off into the magical world of Oz on the other end of the rainbow. Her poignant performance and sweet delivery of her signature song, 'Over The Rainbow,' earned Judy a special juvenile Oscar statuette on 29 February 1940 for Best Performance by a Juvenile Actor. Now growing up, Judy began to yearn for meatier adult roles instead of the virginal characters she had been playing since she was 14. She was now taking an interest in men, and after starring in her final juvenile performance in Ziegfeld Girl (1941) alongside glamorous beauties Lana Turner and Hedy Lamarr, Judy got engaged to bandleader David Rose in May 1941, just two months after his divorce from Martha Raye. Despite planning a big wedding, the couple eloped to Las Vegas and married during the early hours of the morning on July 28, 1941 with just her mother Ethel and her stepfather Will Gilmore present. However, their marriage went downhill as, after discovering that she was pregnant in November 1942, David and MGM persuaded her to abort the baby in order to keep her good-girl image up. She did so and, as a result, was haunted for the rest of her life by her 'inhumane actions.' The couple separated in January 1943.
By this time, Judy had starred in her first adult role as a vaudevillian during WWI in For Me and My Gal (1942). Within weeks of separation, Judy was soon having an affair with actor Tyrone Power, who was married to French actress Annabella. Their affair ended in May 1943, which was when her affair with producer Joseph L. Mankiewicz kicked off. He introduced her to psychoanalysis and she soon began to make decisions about her career on her own instead of being influenced by her domineering mother and MGM. Their affair ended in November 1943, and soon afterward Judy reluctantly began filming Meet Me in St. Louis (1944), which proved to be a big success. The director Vincente Minnelli highlighted Judy's beauty for the first time on screen, having made the period musical in color, her first color film since The Wizard of Oz (1939). He showed off her large brandy-brown eyes and her full, thick lips and after filming ended in April 1944, a love affair resulted between director and actress and they were soon living together.
Vincente began to mold Judy and her career, making her more beautiful and more popular with audiences worldwide. He directed her in The Clock (1945), and it was during the filming of this movie that the couple announced their engagement on set on January 9, 1945. Judy's divorce from David Rose had been finalized on June 8, 1944 after almost three years of marriage, and despite her brief fling with Orson Welles, who at the time was married to screen sex goddess Rita Hayworth, on June 15, 1945 Judy made Vincente her second husband, tying the knot with him that afternoon at her mother's home with her boss Louis B. Mayer giving her away and her best friend Betty Asher serving as bridesmaid. They spent three months on honeymoon in New York and afterwards Judy discovered that she was pregnant.
On March 12, 1946 in Los Angeles, California, Judy gave birth to their daughter, Liza Minnelli, via cesarean section. It was a joyous time for the couple, but Judy was out of commission for weeks due to the cesarean and her postnatal depression, so she spent much of her time recuperating in bed. She soon returned to work, but married life was never the same for Vincente and Judy after they filmed The Pirate (1948) together in 1947. Judy's mental health was fast deteriorating and she began hallucinating things and making false accusations toward people, especially her husband, making the filming a nightmare. She also began an affair with aspiring Russian actor Yul Brynner, but after the affair ended, Judy soon regained health and tried to salvage her failing marriage. She then teamed up with dancing legend Fred Astaire for the delightful musical Easter Parade (1948), which resulted in a successful comeback despite having Vincente fired from directing the musical. Afterwards, Judy's health deteriorated and she began the first of several suicide attempts. In May 1949, she was checked into a rehabilitation center, which caused her much distress.
She soon regained strength and was visited frequently by her lover Frank Sinatra, but never saw much of Vincente or Liza. On returning, Judy made In the Good Old Summertime (1949), which was also Liza's film debut, albeit via an uncredited cameo. She had already been suspended by MGM for her lack of cooperation on the set of The Barkleys of Broadway (1949), which also resulted in her getting replaced by Ginger Rogers. After being replaced by Betty Hutton on Annie Get Your Gun (1950), Judy was suspended yet again before making her final film for MGM, entitled Summer Stock (1950). At 28, Judy received her third suspension and was fired by MGM, and her second marriage was soon dissolved.
Having taken up with Sidney Luft, Judy traveled to London to star at the legendary Palladium. She was an instant success and after her divorce from Vincente Minnelli was finalized on March 29, 1951 after almost six years of marriage, Judy traveled with Sid to New York to make an appearance on Broadway. With her newfound fame on stage, Judy was stopped in her tracks in February 1952 when she became pregnant by her new lover, Sid. At the age of 30, she made him her third husband on June 8, 1952; the wedding was held at a friend's ranch in Pasadena. Her relationship with her mother had long since been dissolved by this point, and after the birth of her second daughter, Lorna Luft, on November 21, 1952, she refused to allow her mother to see her granddaughter. Ethel then died in January 1953 of a heart attack, leaving Judy devastated and feeling guilty about not reconciling with her mother before her untimely demise.
After the funeral, Judy signed a film contract with Warner Bros. to star in the musical remake of A Star Is Born (1937), which had starred Janet Gaynor, who had won the first-ever Academy Award for Best Actress in 1929. Filming soon began, resulting in an affair between Judy and her leading man, British star James Mason. She also picked up on her affair with Frank Sinatra, and after filming was complete Judy was yet again lauded as a great film star. She won a Golden Globe for her brilliant and truly outstanding performance as Esther Blodgett, nightclub singer turned movie star, but when it came to the Academy Awards, a distraught Judy lost out on the Best Actress Oscar to Grace Kelly for her portrayal of the wife of an alcoholic star in The Country Girl (1954). Many still argue that Judy should have won the Oscar over Grace Kelly. Continuing her work on stage, Judy gave birth to her beloved son, Joey Luft, on March 29, 1955. She soon began to lose her millions of dollars as a result of her husband's strong gambling addiction, and with hundreds of debts to pay, Judy and Sid began a volatile, on-off relationship resulting in numerous divorce filings.
In 1961, at the age of 39, Judy returned to her ailing film career, this time to star in Judgment at Nuremberg (1961), for which she received an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress, but this time she lost out to Rita Moreno for her performance in West Side Story (1961). Her battles with alcoholism and drugs led to Judy's making numerous headlines in newspapers, but she soldiered on, forming a close friendship with President John F. Kennedy. In 1963, Judy and Sid finally separated permanently, and on May 19, 1965 their divorce was finalized after almost 13 years of marriage. By this time, Judy, now 41, had made her final performance on film alongside Dirk Bogarde in I Could Go on Singing (1963). She married her fourth husband, Mark Herron, on November 14, 1965 in Las Vegas, but they separated in April 1966 after five months of marriage owing to his homosexuality. It was also that year that she began an affair with young journalist Tom Green. She then settled down in London after their affair ended, and she began dating disk jockey Mickey Deans in December 1968. They became engaged once her divorce from Mark Herron was finalized on January 9, 1969 after three years of marriage. She married Mickey, her fifth and final husband, in a register office in Chelsea, London, England on March 15, 1969.
She continued working on stage, appearing several times with her daughter Liza. It was during a concert in Chelsea, London, England that Judy stumbled into her bathroom late one night and died of an overdose of barbiturates, the drug that had dominated her much of her life, on June 22, 1969 at the age of 47. Her daughter Liza Minnelli paid for her funeral, and her former lover James Mason delivered her touching eulogy. She is still an icon to this day with her famous performances in The Wizard of Oz (1939), Meet Me in St. Louis (1944), Easter Parade (1948), and A Star Is Born (1954).- Composer
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Dave Brubeck Quartet is known for Baby Driver (2017), Inland Empire (2006) and Silver Linings Playbook (2012).- Music Artist
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Nat King Cole was born Nathaniel Adams Coles (he later dropped the "s" in his surname) in Montgomery, Alabama. He received music lessons from his mother and his family moved to Chicago when he was only five, where his father, Edward James Coles, was a minister at the True Light Baptist Church and later Pastor of the First Baptist Church. At 12, he was playing the church organ. At age 14, he formed a 14 piece band called the Royal Dukes. Nat was a top flight sandlot baseball player at Wendell Phillips high school in Chicago.
His three brothers, Ike, Frankie, and Eddie Cole, also played the piano and sang professionally. Nat was an above-average football player in high school. His sister, Evelyn Cole, was a beautician in nearby Waukegan, Illinois. In 1939 he formed the King Cole Trio after his publicist put a silver tin-foiled crown on his head and proclaimed him "King". He later toured Europe and made a command performance before Queen Elizabeth II.
He had a highly-rated TV show in the 1950s but it was canceled (by Cole himself) as no companies could be found that were willing to sponsor the show. He was a big baseball fan and had a permanent box seat at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles. He met his wife Maria Cole (a big-band singer) at the Zanzibar nightclub in Los Angeles through Eddie 'Rochester' Anderson show. Her parents opposed her decision to marry Cole, claiming he was "too black". They married, nonetheless, in 1948, and had two daughters, Caroline and Natalie Cole. On April 10, 1956, at Birmingham, Alabama, he was attacked by six white men from a white supremacist group called the White Cizizens Council during a concert and sustained minor injuries to his back. Cole appeared in several movies, the last of which was Cat Ballou (1965), starring Lee Marvin.
Cole received 28 gold record awards for such hits as "Sweet Lorraine", "Ramblin' Rose" in 1962, "Too Young" in 1951, "Mona Lisa" in 1949 and Mel Tormé's "Christmas Song". His first recordings of the Christmas Song included the lyrics, "Reindeers really know how to fly" instead of "reindeer really know how to fly", a mistake later corrected by Capitol Records. He was also a composer and his song "Straighten Up and Fly Right" was sold for $50.00. A heavy smoker, he died of lung cancer.- Actor
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The King of Swing! Famed clarinetist, composer ("Stompin' at the Savoy") and conductor, educated at the Lewis Institute in Chicago and a student of Schillinger and Schoepp. He was a clarinetist with the orchestras of Bix Beiderbecke, Jules Herbuveaux, Arnold Johnson and Ben Pollack, and also played in Broadway theater orchestras. He began to lead his own orchestras in 1934 at the Billy Rose Music Hall, then conducted the orchestra on the weekly radio program "Let's Dance" in 1934-1935, and played at numerous hotels, colleges and theaters. Expanding his musical efforts, he performed in chamber music concerts, later touring throughout the US, Europe, the Far East, South America and the USSR and made many recordings. Joining ASCAP in 1945, his chief musical collaborators included Count Basie, Harry James, Mitchell Parish, Andy Razaf, Edgar M. Sampson, Chick Webb, and Teddy Wilson. Some of his other popular songs and instrumental compositions include "Lullaby in Rhythm," "Don't Be That Way," "Seven Come Eleven," "Flying Home," "Two O'Clock Jump," "Air Mail Special," "Dizzy Spells," "If Dreams Come True," "Georgia Jubilee," "Four Once More," and "The Kingdom of Swing".- Music Artist
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Miles Davis, famous jazz trumpeter, composer and bandleader, was born 26 May 1926 in Alton, Illinois. He moved to New York in 1944 and studied at Juilliard. He left school and entered the jazz society of New York, meeting such famous musicians as Thelonious Monk, Charlie Parker and Charles Mingus. His record debut came in 1946. Miles soon became a major figure of jazz. He changed the directions of jazz several times, recording albums such as "Birth Of The Cool" (1949) which started the cool-jazz era, "Milestones" (1953), "Kind Of Blue" (1959) which was the beginning of modal jazz, orchestral jazz masterpieces such as "Porgy And Bess" (1958) and "Sketches Of Spain" (1961), "In A Silent Way" (1968) and "Bitches Brew" (1969) - the first jazz/rock fusion albums. He collaborated with famous jazz players such as: Bill Evans, John Coltrane, Chick Corea, Philly Joe Jones, Joe Zawinul, Paul Chambers, Herbie Hancock, Wayne Shorter, John McLaughlin, Keith Jarrett and others. He retired from music in 1975 due to hip problems as well as his problems with drug addiction. He recovered and returned to music in 1980, collaborating with producer Marcus Miller and recording new, intriguing albums such as electronic-driven Tutu or Amandla, as well as Spanish-flavored music for Siesta (1987). Miles Davis is now arguably one of the greatest and most important jazz musicians of all time.- Music Artist
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John Coltrane was born on 23 September 1926 in Hamlet, North Carolina, USA. He was a music artist and composer, known for Adrift (2018), Vanilla Sky (2001) and Zodiac (2007). He was married to Alice Macleod and Juanita Grubbs. He died on 17 July 1967 in Huntington, Long Island, New York, USA.- Music Department
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Oscar Peterson, the famous jazz musician, started his recording career in the mid 40s with records for RCA. As member of the group "Jazz at the Philharmonic" he started touring in the 50s and continued until late in the 60s. During this time he made also numerous recordings for various labels. He has recorded with the great jazz legends such as Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald, Count Basie, Duke Ellington and Charlie Parker.- Music Department
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Django Reinhardt was born on 23 January 1910 in Liberchies, Wallonia, Belgium. He was a composer and actor, known for The Matrix (1999), Gattaca (1997) and The Matrix Revolutions (2003). He was married to Sophie Ziegler. He died on 16 May 1953 in Fontainebleau, Seine-et-Marne, France.- Music Department
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Composer ("It Don't Mean a Thing if It Ain't Got That Swing", "Sophisticated Lady", "Mood Indigo", "Solitude", "In a Mellotone", "Satin Doll"), pianist and conductor, holder of an honorary music degree from Wilberforce University and an LHD from Milton College, Duke Ellington led his own orchestra by 1918, and came to New York in 1923, appearing at the Cotton Club between 1927 and 1932. Making his first European tour in 1933, he followed with his annual Carnegie Hall concerts between 1943 and 1950, and then a Middle East tour (under the auspices of the State Department), including an appearance at the International Fair in Damascus in 1963. His stage scores include "Jump for Joy" and "Beggars Holiday" (Broadway). He made many records.
Joining ASCAP in 1953, his chief musical collaborators included Billy Strayhorn, Irving Mills, Mitchell Parish, Mann Curtis, Barney Bigard, Henry Nemo , Bob Russell, Don George, Lee Gaines , Paul Francis Webster, Edgar De Lange, Johnny Hodges, Cootie Williams, Juan Tizol and his own son, Mercer Ellington. His other popular song and instrumental compositions include "Blind Man's Buff", "Creole Love Call", "Black and Tan Fantasy", "I Let a Song Go Out of my Heart", "Rockin' in Rhythm", "Caravan", "Pyramid", "Creole Rhapsody", "Don't Get Around Much Anymore", "I Got It Bad and That Ain't Good", "I'm Beginning to See the Light", "In a Sentimental Mood", "East St. Louis Toodle-oo", "Birmingham Breakdown", "Black Beauty", "Flaming Youth", "Awful Sad", "The Duke Steps Out", "Saturday Night Function", "Old Man Blues", "Ring Dem Bells", "Drop Me Off in Harlem", "Daybreak Express", "Delta Serenade", "Reminiscing in Tempo", "In a Jam", "Clarinet Lament", "Echoes of Harlem", "Dusk on the Desert", "Lost in Meditation", "Blue Reverie", "I've Got to Be a Rug Cutter", "Please Forgive Me", "Chatterbox", "Harmony in Harlem", "If You Were in My Place", "Skronch", "Braggin' in Brass", "Blue Light", "Buffet Flat", "The Gal from Joe's", "Subtle Lament", "Old King Dooji", "Boy Meets Horn", "Stevedore's Serenade", "You Gave Me the Gate and I'm Swinging", "Grievin'", "The Sergeant Was Shy", "Tootin' Through the Roof", "Rumpus in Richmond", "Jack the Bear", "Me and You", "Flaming Sword", "Harlem Air Shaft", "Bojangles", "Portrait of Bert Williams", "Do Nothin' Till You Hear from Me" (Concerto for Cootie), "Kind of Moody" (Serenade to Sweden), "Morning Glory", "Blue Goose", "Cotton Tail", "Conga Brava", "Chocolate Shake", "Rocks in My Bed", "San Juan Hill", "Crescendo in Blue", "Diminuendo in Blue", "Dusk", "C Jam Blues", "Main Stem", "I Didn't Know About You", "Just a-Sittin' and a-Rockin'", "Jazz Convulsions", "I'm Just a Lucky So and So", "The Blues", "Come Sunday", "Magenta Haze", "Just Squeeze Me", "Happy-Go-Lucky Local", "Takle Love Easy", "Tomorrow Mountain", "I'm Gonna Go Fishin'", "Money Jungle", "Prelude to a Kiss", "Jump for Joy", "I'm Checking Out, Goom-Bye", "The Mooche", "Warm Valley", "Blue Serge", "I Wish I Was Back in My Baby's Arms", "Lament for a Lost Love", "It Shouldn't Happen to a Dream", "Afro-Bosso", "In the Beginning, God" and "Christmas Surprise".- Actor
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Lester Young was one of the most important saxophone players in jazz. He got a fine and soft tone with his horn, and it became very famous in the late 1930s. He played in the Count Basie orchestra and recorded with Basie his first recordings in 1936. He was a close friend of singer Billie Holiday and recorded many songs with her and Teddy Wilson for Columbia Records. He quit the Basie band in 1940 and started his freelance career.
In 1944 he went into the army and this point in his life was dramatic; racial problems were rife and endemic in the army at that time, and Young wound up getting arrested. After this, he started to drink and his appearances in the stand wasn't as good as the times with Basie and Holiday. Nevertheless, he made fine recordings in the late 1940s on Alladin Records--for example, the famous "D.B Blues" and "Jumpin' with Symphony Sid". He signed a contract with Verve Records in the 1950s. His last recording was on March 4, 1959, in Paris. After this trip to Paris, he arrived on March 14 in New York and died the day after, of a complication of cirrhosis.- Music Department
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Born in San Francisco on July 17, 1928, Vince Guaraldi graduated from Lincoln High School and then San Francisco State College. Guaraldi was already performing while in college in such venues as the Black Hawk and Jackson's Nook, sometimes with the Chubby Jackson/Bill Harris band, other times in combos with Sonny Criss and Bill Harris. He did minor gigs as well, such as weddings. Guaraldi's first recorded work can be heard on "Vibratharpe," a 1953 release by the Cal Tjader Trio. In 1955, he put together his own trio: longtime friend Eddie Duran on guitar and Dean Reilly on bass--and tackled North Beach's bohemian-hungry club, where his piano work became a huge attraction. It soon came to be recognized as the Guaraldi sound. The original Vince Guaraldi Trio, with Eddie Duran and Dean Reilly, can be heard on two genuinely pleasant releases: "The Vince Guaraldi Trio" (1956) and "A Flower is a Lonesome Thing" (1957). Guaraldi toured in 1956 with Woody Herman's third Thundering Herd, replacing Nat Pierce on piano for one season.
Inspired by the 1959 French-Brazilian film Black Orpheus (1959) (Black Orpheus) Guaraldi hit the studio with a new trio: Monty Budwig on bass, Colin Bailey on drums--and recorded his own interpretations of Antonio Carlos Jobim's haunting soundtrack music. The 1962 album was called "Jazz Impression of Black Orpheus," which was released on then-owner Saul Zaentz's Fantasy Records, and "Samba de Orpheus" was the first selection released as a single. Combing the album for a suitable B-side number, Guaraldi's producers finally made a new version of a modest original composition titled "Cast Your Fate to the Wind," which became a smash hit, and won the 1963 Grammy for Best Instrumental Jazz Composition. However, Guaraldi's greatest fame came from scoring A Charlie Brown Christmas (1965) in 1965, based on Charles M. Schulz's "Peanuts" comic strip, and he continued to score all the Peanuts television specials till his death.
On February 6, 1976, while waiting in a motel room between sets at Menlo Park's Butterfield's nightclub, Guaraldi died of a sudden heart attack at the age of 47.- Music Department
- Composer
- Actor
Thelonious Monk was born on 10 October 1917 in Rocky Mount, North Carolina, USA. He was a composer and actor, known for The Omega Man (1971), La La Land (2016) and Die Hard with a Vengeance (1995). He was married to Nellie Monk. He died on 17 February 1982 in Englewood, New Jersey, USA.