Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Cecil Scott was born in Springfield, Ohio on November 22, 1905 and played clarinet and tenor saxophone as a teenager with his brother, drummer Lloyd Scott. They played together as co-leaders through the end of the 1920s, holding residencies in Ohio, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and in New York City at the Savoy Ballroom. Among the members of this ensemble were Dicky Wells, Frankie Newton, Bill Coleman, Roy Eldridge, Johnny Hodges and Chu Berry.
By 1929 Cecil took full music control over the group in 1929, though Lloyd continued to manage the group. However, he was seriously injured in an accident in the early 1930s that temporarily sidelined his career. After recovery, he would play in different groups through the Thirties with Ellsworth Reynolds, Teddy Hill, Clarence Williams and Teddy Wilson accompanying Billie Holiday.
The early 1940s saw Scott playing with Albert Socarras, Red Allen, and Willie “The Lion” Smith prior to reassembling his band that hired at times Hot Lips Page and Art Hodes and towards the end of the decade worked with Slim Gaillard.
In 1950 Cecil disbanded the group, worked with Jimmy McPartland as a sideman, occasionally led groups and continued to play as a sideman up until the time of his death on January 5, 1964 in New York City. The clarinetist, tenor saxophonist and bandleader is credited on some 75 albums.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Charlie “Fess” Johnson was born on November 21, 1891 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He led an ensemble called the Paradise Ten and played in Harlem clubs like Small’s Paradise between 1925 and 1935.
Though Charlie was an accomplished pianist very rarely did he eve solo on his recording sessions and as a unit never achieved the reputation is so deserved. It was noted later that the band rivaled Duke Ellington and anyone else and employed a number of notables like Sidney DeParis, Charlie Irvis, Dicky Wells, Benny Waters and Benny Carter, who also wrote arrangements for the band.
He led the ensemble until 1938 then his musical endeavors freelancing in various ensembles around New York City until he retired in the 1950s due to health issues. Pianist and bandleader Charlie Johnson, who nickname “Fess” it is assumed was shortened from Professor, passed away in Harlem Hospital on December 13, 1959 in New York City.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Geoffrey Keezer was born in Eau Claire, Wisconsin on November 20, 1970 to music teachers. He began studying piano at the age of three and by 1989 at 18, after one year of study at Berklee College of Music he joined Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers.
His professional career has spanned many projects and genres such as performing Gershwin’s Rhapsody In Blue with the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra, composing commissioned pieces for the Carnegie Hall Jazz Band, Saint Joseph Ballet, Mainly Mozart Festival in San Diego, Scottish National Jazz Orchestra, and the Nancy Zeltsman Marimba Festival all while releasing a dozen albums as a leader and touring.
Geoffrey has received the Chamber Music America’s 2007 New Works grant, has appeared as a sideman on countless recording sessions, has played bass in a rock band, contributed artwork to David W. Mack’s comic “Kabuki”, and has performed with world-class musicians Joshua Redman, Diana Krall, Christian McBride, Barbara Hendricks, Kenny Barron, Chick Corea, Benny Green, Joe Locke and Mulgrew Miller.
Keezer’s “Live in Seattle”, a collaboration with vibes player Joe Locke, won the Golden EarShot Award for “Concert of the Year” and his latest musical adventure, Áurea, is a Grammy nominated, multinational Afro-Peruvian jazz recording featuring the hottest players from New York City and Lima, Peru. In 2013 he released his latest solo project Heart Of The Piano, continues to lend his talents to educate at such institutions of higher learning as the New School, the Brubeck Institute, Indiana University, the Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz and others, all while continuing to arrange, perform, record and tour both as a leader and sideman.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Clairdee was born on November 19th in Tucson, Arizona but was raised in Denver, Colorado. She grew up harmonizing and dancing with her sisters and brothers in a show biz minded family, taking to improvising naturally. She formed a four-part vocal group in high school, but it wasn’t until after college that she focused on jazz.
She listened and learned from pioneering jazz vocalists such as Carmen McRae, Sarah Vaughan and Betty Carter but it was veteran Hammond B3 organist William “Big Daddy” Sailes who took her under his wing and taught her a repertoire of standards and how to develop arrangements to suit her voice.
Moving to the Bay Area in 1986, Clairdee performed various styles of music over the next decade but by the mid 90s settled into jazz working with Eddie Henderson, John Handy, Roland Hanna and Allen Farnham.
Influenced by Shirley Horn, Nancy Wilson, Joe Williams, Johnny Hartman, Billy Eckstine and Nat King Cole she developed a style that made each song she interprets hers, allowing her to stir an emotion. As an educator she conducts master classes around the country and continues to perform and record.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Sheila Jordan was born Sheila Jeanette Dawson on November 18, 1928 in Detroit, Michigan but grew up in Summerhill, Pennsylvania. By the age of 28 she returned to Detroit and began playing piano and singing semi-professionally in jazz clubs. She worked a trio that composed lyrics to Charlie Parker’s arrangements, who influenced her greatly.
In 1951, she moved to New York and started studying harmony and music theory with Lennie Tristano and Charles Mingus and married pianist Duke Jordan a year later. By the 60s she was gigging and doing session work in Greenwich Village and around town in various clubs; and in 1962 was discovered and recorded by George Russell on his album The Outer View. That led to her recording Portrait of Sheila in 1962 that was sold to Blue Note.
Over the next decade Sheila withdrew from music, supported herself as a legal secretary but by the mid 70s was working again with musicians like Don Heckman, Roswell Rudd, Lee Konitz and Steve Kuhn. She has had a notable career as a solo artist since then with her ability to improvise entire lyrics, although success has been limited.
Jordan has been an Artist In Residence teaching at City College, worked in an advertising agency, recorded for Steeplechase, ECM, Home Eastwind, Grapevine, Palo Alto, Blackhawk and Muse record labels. She has performed and recorded with George Gruntz, Steve Swallow, Carla Bley, Harvie Swartz and Bob Moses among others and as a songwriter continues to work in both bebop and free jazz mediums.
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