Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Leonard “Red” Balaban was born in Chicago, Illinois on December 22, 1929 to Barney Balaban, former president of Paramount Pictures. By the Fifties he was residing in the Florida panhandle, working as a farmer and playing in regional ensembles. He moved to New York City in the mid-1960s and held a regular gig at the Dixieland jazz club Your Father’s Mustache.
He worked extensively as a sideman, for musicians such as Wild Bill Davison, Eddie Condon, Gene Krupa, Dick Wellstood, and Kenny Davern. He opened the third incarnation of Eddie Condon’s Jazz club on W. 54th Street after arranging permission for using Eddie’s name from Condon’s widow. He co-led the house band with Ed Polcer from 1975, with whom he later shared ownership of the club. Other musicians in this outfit included Vic Dickenson, Warren Vache, and Connie Kay. The club closed in the mid-1980s.
Tubist, sousaphonist, gui Red Balaban, who also played banjo, stand-up bass, slide trombone, ukulele and rhythm guitar, transitioned on December 29, 2013 at his lakefront home in West Haven, Connecticut.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Red Balaban was born Leonard Balaban on December 22, 1929 in Chicago, Illinois. Moving the family to New York, he completed his early education at the Ethical Culture School. After graduating from Milford Academy in Connecticut, he graduated from Brown University.
Moving south to the panhandle, he raised breeding cattle on a farm in Bonifay, Florida and as a musician, he was a sideman, bandleader, and club owner. He played in regional ensembles from the 1950s, Red went on to hold a regular gig from 1966 at the Dixieland jazz club Your Father’s Mustache in New York City.
Balaban worked extensively as a sideman, for musicians such as Wild Bill Davison, Eddie Condon, Gene Krupa, Dick Wellstood, and Kenny Davern. He co-led Eddie Condon’s house band with Ed Polcer from 1975, and noted musicians in this outfit included Vic Dickenson, Warren Vache, and Connie Kay, before the club closed in the mid-1980s.
Tubist and sousaphonist Red Balaban, who also played banjo, stand-up bass, slide trombone, ukulele, and rhythm guitar, passed away after a brief illness seven days past his 84th birthday on December 29, 2013 in Milford, Connecticut.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Ray Anderson was born on October 16, 1952 in Chicago, Illinois. An independent jazz trombonist and trumpeter he began training with the Chicago Symphony trombonists then spent time studying in California. By 1973 he was in New York freelancing and four years later joined Anthony Braxton’s group, then with Barry Altschul.
By the late ‘70s his influence was growing, he was leading his own groups, working with George Gruntz’s Concert Jazz Band and over the next twenty years began taking an occasional good-humored vocal singing two notes at the same time.
Anderson also plays the sousaphone, is a master at multiphonics and a supportive sideman has recorded and performed with David Murray, Charlie Haden, Dr. John, Bennie Wallace, Henry Threadgill, John Scofield and Sam Rivers among others. He also received a grant from the National Endowment For The Arts for a series of solo trombone concerts.
While pushing his sound into the future, Anderson has frequently returned to his early love of New Orleans music for inspiration as he continues to perform, record and tour. Since 2003 he has taught and conducted at Stony Brook University.
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More Posts: sousaphone,trombone,trumpet