Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Gerry Hemingway was born March 23, 1955 in New Haven, Connecticut. He graduated from Foote School in New Haven and studied under Alan Dawson. In 2000 he received a Guggenheim Fellowship for his work in music composition.
He was a member of the Anthony Braxton quartet from 1983 to 1994. He has also performed with Ernst Reijseger, Anthony Davis, Earl Howard, Leo Smith, George E. Lewis, Ray Anderson, Mark Helias, Reggie Workman, Michael Moore, Oliver Lake, Marilyn Crispell, Christy Doran, John Wolf Brennan, Don Byron, Cecil Taylor, and Cuong Vu.
He has recorded on over one hundred albums for the labels Clean Feed, Enja, hatArt, Palmetto, Random Acoustics, and Tzadik. Avant~garde drummer and composer Gerry Hemingway, who owns his own record label Auricle,continues to pursue his musical endeavors.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Tommy Chase was born on March 22, 1947 in Manchester, England and was largely self taught. He turned professional in the mid 1960s and after working in night clubs and on cruise liners settled in London, England in 1973.
Through the 1980s and ’90s he led his own straight ahead hard driving bebop groups with some success in the clubs and at the first Soho Jazz Festival. He used young musicians, notably sax player Alan Barnes, guitarist Dave Cliff and bassiat Andy Cleyndert. He recorded as a leader and as a collaborator with Ray Warleigh. He worked with Art Themen and Harry Becket as well as accompanying visiting Americans including Al Haig, Jon Eardley and Joe Albany.
A forceful drummer very much in the hard hitting style of Art Blakey, many musicians commented on his skill and timing. Quitting the music scene early in 1999, he played his final gig at the Jazz Cafe in Camden.
Drummer and bandleader Tommy Chase, recorded seven albums as a leader, transitioned on December 2, 2018.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Miff Görling was born Uno Görling on March 21, 1909 in Stockholm, Sweden. He took his nickname from trombonist Miff Mole and got his start late in the 1920s with the Frank Vernon Orchestra, where he played until 1932.
He then worked with Arne Hülphers, Gösta Jonsson, Seymour Österwall, and Gösta Säfbom before organizing his own ensemble in 1938 and led bands well into the 1950s. He also did arrangement and composition work for other jazz groups as well as for popular Swedish musicians.
Bandleader, trombonist, arranger, and composer Miff Görling transitioned on February 24, 1988 in Stockholm.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Santo J. “Sonny” Russo was born on March 20, 1929 in New York City, New York and grew up in a musical family, both his father and grandfather were professional horn players. He first played piano and violin, and played with his father’s group at age 15, before settling on the trombone.
The consummate sideman, through the late Forties he started out playing with Buddy Morrow in 1947, Lee Castle in 1948, Sam Donahue in 1949, and Artie Shaw in 1949–50. The 1950s saw him performing with Art Mooney, Tito Puente, Jerry Wald, Tommy Tucker, Buddy Rich, Ralph Flanagan, the Sauter-Finegan Orchestra, Neal Hefti, Jimmy Dorsey, Tommy Dorsey, and Maynard Ferguson.
For a short period during the mid-1950s Russo found work in the bands of various Broadway shows, then in the late 1950s and 1960s he worked with Louie Bellson, Machito, Bobby Hackett, Benny Goodman, and Doc Severinsen. From 1969to 1972 he was a member of The Tonight Show orchestra, and he worked with Frank Sinatra from 1967 to 1988.
He played on Urbie Green’s 21 Trombones, soloed on numerous others, and toured with The World’s Greatest Jazz Band. Sonny recorded extensively with Jimmy Rushing, Tony Bennett, Lena Horne, Perry Como, Dinah Washington, Liza Minnelli, Elvis Presley, Paul Anka, Ray Charles, Steve Lawrence, and Eydie Gorme. He performs on the soundtracks to the films The Godfather, The Godfather II, Goodfellas, and Sophie’s Choice, and in 1971 on The Tonight Show he shared the stage with Louis Armstrong, playing the solo on Someday You’ll Be Sorry.
A fixture in the recording studios for radio and television, he was a regular in the Orchestra for Jerry Lewis’s Muscular Dystrophy Telethon in New York City. Always in demand he continued to work with Lewis on his one-man show, toured around the world with Sinatra who announced his playing a trombone solo on the tune I’ve Got You Under My Skin.
He has also done many gigs with the likes of Al Cohn, Zoot Simms, Mousey Alexander, and Milt Hinton. Trombonist Sonny Russo, a graduate of the Manhattan School of Music, transitioned on February 23, 2013.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Christopher Brubeck was born on March 19, 1952 in Los Angeles, California to pianist and composer Dave Brubeck. By the age of twenty he was joining his father and brothers Darius and Daniel in The New Brubeck Quartet.
Having toured for about 30 years in a group called Triple Play, he joined with guitarist Joel Brown and singer and harmonica virtuoso Peter Madcat Ruth, and swung jazz Louisiana style. He was a member of New Heavenly Blue, Chris also participated and recorded as a keyboardist/trombonist/guitarist in 1970’s Educated Homegrown.
In 1999, Chris and his brother Daniel joined with other musicians to form The Brubeck Brothers Quartet, having previously partnered with Andy LaVerne and released a 1972 album, The Brubeck-LaVerne Trio. He has performed with Mike DeMicco and Chuck Lamb.
In 2003, Chris played his first Concerto for Bass Trombone and Orchestra with the Czech national Symphony Orchestra in Prague, Czech Republic. A year later, he composed his own concerto titled, The Prague Concerto for Bass Trombone and Orchestra. Many of his classical compositions still contain strong hints of the jazz influence of his father.
Grammy nominated electric bassist, bass trombonist and pianist Chris Brubeck continues to pursue his musical explorations.
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