Daily Dose Of Jazz…
William “Billy” Root was born March 6, 1934 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and was raised in a musical family, his father played drums in Philadelphia ensembles.
Root began playing professionally in the early 1950s, with Roy Eldridge, Hal McIntyre, Red Rodney, Bennie Green, and Buddy Rich. Later in the decade he worked extensively with Stan Kenton and with Rodney, as well as with Clifford Brown, Dizzy Gillespie, Hank Mobley, Lee Morgan, and Curtis Fuller.
He led his own ensembles from the late 1950s. In the 1960s he performed with Al Grey and Dakota Staton, and in 1968 settled in Las Vegas, Nevada. Saxophonist Billy Root played the casinos for the next two decades before retiring.
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The Jazz Voyager
The Jazz Voyager is off to the Queen City to visit Creaux at 1901 Vine Street, Cincinnati, OH 45202. This stylish, New Orleans–inspired outpost features craft cocktails, Cajun-Creole dishes, and live music. Serving up feeling good and enjoying the moment atmosphere, the founders brought the fun, bold culture of Southern Louisiana.
Jazz, blues, and funk fill the air on Friday and Saturday nights depending on the week’s schedule. The venue is decorated with portraits of musicians such as Aretha Franklin, Tom Petty, Billie Holiday, B.B. King and Prince.
This Saturday from 8:30 to 11:30 this voyager is checking out the Ethos Jazz Quintet. The club is closed Sunday through Tuesday, 4:00 ~ Midnight on Wednesday and Thursday, and 2:30 am on Friday and Saturday. For more information 513-208-4466
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Bill Pemberton was born William McLane on March 5, 1918 in New York City and played violin as a child before switching to bass. From 1941 to 1945 he was a member of Frankie Newton’s orchestra and then went on to work with Herman “Ivory” Chittison, Mercer Ellington, Eddie Barefield, and Billy Kyle later in the 1940s.
During the Fifties, he worked with Art Tatum and Rex Stewart, and from 1966 to 1969 was Earl Hines’s bassist, including for international tours and at the 1967 Newport Jazz Festival and Monterey Jazz Festival.
He also worked with Buck Clayton in 1967. In 1969 he joined the JPJ quartet alongside Budd Johnson, Oliver Jackson, and Dill Jones, and remained with the group until 1975. Simultaneously he played with Ruby Braff, Max Kaminsky, and Vic Dickenson. He rejoined Hines in 1977, playing in Europe with him and Benny Carter. Into the Eighties, he played with Panama Francis, Bill Coleman, and Doc Cheatham.
Double-bassist Bill Pemberton passed away on December 13, 1984 in New York City.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Donald Percy Rendell was born in Plymouth, England on March 4, 1926 and raised in London where his father, Percy, was the musical director of the D’Oyly Carte Opera Company; his mother Vera was also a musician. He attended the City of London School, to which he gained a choral half-scholarship and during school was evacuated during the Second World War to Marlborough College, where he heard jazz for the first time.
Rendell began playing the piano at the age of five but switched to saxophone in his teens. While working for Barclay’s Bank, he left to become a professional musician and began his career on alto saxophone but changed to tenor saxophone in 1943. During the rest of the 1940s, he was in the bands of George Evans and Oscar Rabin. Beginning in 1950, he spent three years in the Johnny Dankworth Septet and performed with Billie Holiday in Manchester, England, before playing in the bands of Tony Crombie and Ted Heath.
After touring in Europe with Stan Kenton, he played in Cyprus with Tony Kinsey, then Don was a member of Woody Herman’s Anglo American Herd in 1959. During the late 1950s and early Sixties, he led bands, including one with Ian Carr that lasted until 1969, one with Barbara Thompson in the 1970s, and as the sole leader in the 1980s and 1990s. In particular, the Rendell-Carr Quintet gained an international reputation, performing in France at the Antibes Festival and was the Band of the Year for three years in succession in the Melody Maker poll. He performed in festivals in England and France as well as working with Michael Garrick and Brian Priestley.
He taught at the Royal Academy of Music for three years in the early 1970s, at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama beginning in 1984 and wrote instruction books on flute and saxophone. Don Rendell, who played soprano saxophone, flute, clarinet and was also an arranger, passed away after a short illness at the age of 89 on October 20, 2015.
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Three Wishes
Jimmy Cobb is asked of his three wishes by Baroness Pannonica and he responded by saying:
- “That the musicians would get as much money as they’re supposed to get when they work.”
- “Good health for me, or some sh*t like that, forever. I wish to be an old man and play through all of it.”
- “Straighten the world out.”
*Excerpt from Three Wishes: An Intimate Look at Jazz Greats ~ Compiled and Photographed by Pannonica de Koenigswarter
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