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Herb Flemming was born Nicolaiih El-Michelle of North African descent on April 5, 1898 in Butte, Montana. He studied music and played mellophone and euphonium before switching to trombone. During World War I he was a member of James Resse Europe’s 15th New York National Guard Band and then Europe’s 369th U.S. Infantry Band in France in 1917.

Post war Flemming studied at the Frank Damrosch Conservatory playing cello followed by study at the St. Cecilia Academy in Florence and the University of Rome. By 1921 he was playing with Fred Tunstall, recording with Johnny Dunn, then joining Sam Wooding and Bobby Lee’s band in Philadelphia. In the 1920s he joined Lew Leslie’s Blackbirds show, which toured London and Paris toward the end of the decade.

Herb formed his own band, the International Rhythm Aces, in Europe around 1930, while continuing to work with Wooding. They collaborated in Berlin, then found work accompanying Josephine Baker. He would go on to play in Buenos Aires, Paris, Shanghai, Calcutta and Ceylon. By the mid-thirties he would play in Sestto Carlin’s Society Orchestra in Italy and interpret for the 1936 Olympic Games in Germany.

In the late 30s Herb Fleming returned home playing with Earl Hines, Fats Waller, and Noble Sissle prior to a move to California and working for the Internal Revenue Service. In the Forties he freelanced around New York, worked with Red Allen, moved to Spain, recorded with Walter Bishop Jr. and Albert Nichols. Returning to New York City, vocalist and trombonist Herb Fleming passed shortly afterward on October 3, 1976.

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