Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Paul Jackson was born in Oakland, California on March 28, 1947 and began playing bass at the age of nine. By age 14, he performed with the Oakland Symphony Orchestra and went on to study at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music.
He recorded five albums as a leader, eleven albums with Herbie Hancock, five with The Headhunters. He played on recording sessions with Sonny Rollins, Stanley Turrentine, Azteca, Eddie Henderson, Harvey Mason, The Pointer Sisters, Santana, Shawn Phillips, Stomu Yamashta between 1972 and 1977.
Electric bassist Paul Jackson passed away on March 18, 2021 at age 73 in a hospital near Tokyo, Japan, ten days before his 74th birthday.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Miriam Klein was born on March 27, 1937 in Basel, Switzerland and gained fame as a singer for the first time when she appeared on the scene in Paris, France with Pierre Michelot, Don Byas and Art Simmons in the 1950s. After education at the music school in Vienna, Austria she returned to Switzerland and has sung in the group of her husband Oscar Klein since 1963.
In the 1960s and 1970s, she gained international fame when she released her 1973 album Lady Like. The album was dedicated to Billie Holiday and performed with Roy Eldridge, Dexter Gordon and Slide Hampton. She also recorded music with Albert Nicholas in 1971 and Wild Bill Davison in 1976.
In 1977, Miriam worked with Fritz Pauer’s trio and in 1978 with Roland Hanna and George Mraz in her album By Myself. In 1981/82, she toured with Kenny Clarke, Hanna and Isla Eckinger. In 2001, she took part in My Marlin, the album of her son David Klein. Vocalist Miriam Klein remains active.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Maurice James Simon was born March 26, 1929 in Houston, Texas. Studying the saxophone in high school he was a classmate of Eric Dolphy during the 1945-46 school year. He appeared on an early 1945 Los Angeles, California recording led by Russell Jacquet along with Teddy Edwards, Charles Mingus, Bill Davis and Chico Hamilton.
1948 saw him again with Jacquet as leader, in an all-star band recording in Detroit, Michigan along with Sonny Stitt, Leo Parker, Sir Charles Thompson, Al Lucas and Shadow Wilson.
He went on to join the Gerald Wilson Orchestra that also had Snooky Young, Red Kelly and Melba Liston as members. In 1950 he recorded for Savoy Records backing Helen Humes in a big band with Dexter Gordon, Ernie Freeman, Red Callender and J.C. Heard.
He also played with Fats Domino, Papa John Creach, Big Maybelle, Faye Adams, Bumble Bee Slim, Percy Mayfield and B. B. King. In the 1970s he worked with the Duke Ellington orchestra. Baritone and tenor saxophonist Maurice Simon passed away on August 6, 2019.
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The Quarantined Jazz Voyager
As social distancing and wearing masks continues to be our current state of affairs I had this thought of how this much we have seen in our lifetime, especially those of us who were born in the middle of the 20th century. So going into my music room I pulled down from the stacks Out of This World, a studio album by saxophonist Teddy Edwards. The album was recorded in Denmark on December 5, 1980 for the SteepleChase label. It was originally released with six tracks in 1981, however, the 1995 compact disc reissue added a seventh track. The session was produced by Nils Winther.
Track List: 57:30 All compositions by Teddy Edwards except where noted.
- No Name No. 1 ~ 6:00
- April Love ~ 6:47
- Out of This World (Harold Arlen, Johnny Mercer) ~ 11:07
- Summertime (George Gershwin, DuBose Heyward) ~ 8:29
- That’s All (Bob Haymes, Alam Brandt) ~ 8:00
- Cheek to Cheek (Irving Berlin) ~ 6:05
- Summertime [alternate take] (Gershwin, Heyward) ~ 10:48 Bonus track on CD reissue
- Teddy Edwards – tenor saxophone
- Kenny Drew – piano
- Jesper Lundgaard – bass
- Billy Hart – drums
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Austin Percy Brice Jr. was born on March 25, 1923 in New York City. He started his professional career began around the end of World War II, when he played with Benny Carter, Mercer Ellington, Luis Russell, and Eddie Cleanhead Vinson. Playing frequently in Harlem during the early 1950s he worked with Tiny Grimes, Oscar Pettiford, Tab Smith, Lucky Thompson, and Cootie Williams. In addition to leading sessions at Minton’s Playhouse, he also played with Billy Taylor from 1954 to 1956, George Shearing between 1956 to 1958, sharing screen time in the film The Big Beat, and Kenny Burrell 1958–59.
He played behind Sarah Vaughan on tour from 1959 to 1961, then became Harry Belafonte’s drummer for most of the 1960s, but he also worked with Ahmad Jamal, Carmen McRae and Mary Lou Williams in that decade. He led a group called the New Sounds in the early 1970s, and worked with Sy Oliver and Illinois Jacquet.
Though he led a group that was active in the ’70s, the somewhat anti-jazz vibe lent to the drummer’s decision to concentrate on Broadway orchestra work, settling in for long runs on two hot shows, Eubie and Bubbling Brown Sugar. He was also active accompanying the tap group the Copasetics. He was a first~ call musician for jazz festivals and recording sessions.
The repertoire of the Percy Brice Duo with Tom Smith features songcraft from the ’20s through the ’50s. Drummer and bandleader Percy Brice, also known by his nickname Big P, passed away in November 2020 at the age of 97.
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