Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Adolphus Anthony Cheatham, better known as Doc Cheatham was born on June 13, 1905 in Nashville, Tennessee. Growing up without jazz, he was introduced by early recordings and touring bands of the late 1910s. Abandoning family plans to be a pharmacist to play music, he retained the name Doc and started with the soprano and tenor saxophone in addition to trumpet in the African American Vaudeville theatre.
He toured the TOBA circuit (Theatre Owners Booking Association) accompanying blues singers but it wasn’t until his move to Chicago and hearing King Oliver that his focus turned to jazz. A year later Louis Armstrong added his influence on Doc’s playing. Cheatham went on to play with Ma Rainey, worked in the big bands of Bobby Lee, Wilbur de Paris, Chick Webb, Sam Wooding, Cab Calloway, Fletcher Henderson, Benny Carter, Claude Hopkins and Teddy Wilson through the 30s and 40s.
By the late 40s into the 50s Doc play in New York City Latin bands of Ricardo Ray, Marcelino Guerra, Perez Prado and Machito. In the 60s he led his own band for five years then worked with Benny Goodman. In the 70s he began singing after scatting during a Paris recording session, was well received and he continued to sing for the rest of his life.
Cheatham created his best work after the age of 70, winning a Grammy with Nicholas Payton and Butch Thompson for the Verve Record release of “Doc Cheatham and Nicholas Payton”. Trumpeter, singer and bandleader Doc Cheatham continued playing until two days before his passing on June 2, 1997, eleven days shy of his 92nd birthday.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Shelly Manne was born Sheldon Manne in New York City on June 11, 1920. His father and uncles were drummers, he got tips from drummer Billy Gladstone as a teenager and soon he rapidly developed his style in the 52nd Street clubs in the late 30s and 40s. He got his first professional job with the Bobby Byrne Orchestra and was soon recording with Coleman Hawkins, Charlie Shavers, Don Byas, Duke Ellington, Johnny Hodges, Harry Carney and Rex Stewart.
Manne rose to stardom when he became part of the bands of Woody Herman and Stan Kenton in the late 1940s and early 1950s, winning awards and developing a following at a time when jazz was the most popular music in the United States. When the bebop movement began to change jazz in the 1940s, Manne loved it and adapted to the style rapidly, performing with Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, Flip Phillips, Charlie Ventura, Lennie Tristano and Lee Konitz.
In the early 1950s, Manne left New York, settled permanently on a ranch outside Los Angeles, where he and his wife raised horses. This began his important role in the West Coast school of jazz, performing on the Los Angeles jazz scene with Shorty Rogers, Hampton Hawes, Red Mitchell, Art Pepper, Russ Freeman, Frank Rossolino, Chet Baker, Leroy Vinnegar and many others.
Shelly led a number of small groups that recorded under his name and leadership, recording his now famous live Black Hawk sessions and for Contemporary Records. He played in styles of Dixieland, swing, bebop, avant-garde jazz and fusion, as well as contributing to the musical background of hundreds of Hollywood films and television programs, collaborating with Henry Mancini on such films as Breakfast At Tiffany’s, Hatari and The Pink Panther and tv shows like Peter Gunn and Mr. Lucky.
Shelly Manne passed away of a heart attack on September 26, 1984 shortly before the popular revival of interest in jazz had gained momentum.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Dicky Wells was born William Wells on June 10, 1907 in Centerville, Tennessee but came to fame playing trombone as Dicky or Dickie Wells. He moved to New York City in 1926 and joined the band of Lloyd Scott.
He played two stints with Count Basie between 1938-1945 and 1947-1950. Dickie also played with Cecil Scott, Spike Hughes, Fletcher Henderson, Benny Carter, Teddy Hill, Jimmy Rushing, Buck Clayton and Ray Charles.
In his later years, Wells suffered a severe beating that affected his memory, but he recovered and continued to perform. He played frequently at the West End jazz club at 116th and Broadway, most often with a band called “The Countsmen”, led by alto saxophonist Earle Warren, his colleague from Count Basie days. His trademark was a “pepper pot” mute that he made himself.
Jazz trombonist Dickie Wells died on November 12, 1985, in New York City. Shortly after his death, his family donated his trombone to Rutgers University.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Billie Pierce was born Wilhelmina Goodson on June 8, 1907 in Marianna, Florida. She was born into a family of pianists with both parents and seven-sisters playing, notably her sister Ida Goodson.
Early in the 1920s, Billie played with Bessie Smith and later in the decade played in the bands of Alphonse Picou, Emile Barnes and George Lewis. By the 1930s she was playing the Blue Jay Club, where she met trumpeter De De Pierce; the two fell in love, married, and co-led their own ensemble, which served as the house band at Luthjen’s Dance Hall in the 1950s.
She played in the Preservation Hall Jazz Band and was a regular on the New Orleans jazz scene in the 1950s through the early Seventies. Pianist and singer Billie Goodson died on September 29, 1974 in New Orleans, Louisiana at the age of 67.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Sidney De Paris was born on May 30, 1905 in Crawfordsville, Indiana, the younger brother of trombonist Wilbur De Paris. A distinctive trumpeter who fit into both New Orleans jazz and swing settings, he was particularly expert with mutes. He was also a versatile musician, playing tuba, cornet, flugelhorn and singing from time to time.
From 1926 on into the Sixties, Sidney worked with Charlie Johnson’s Paradise Ten, Don Redman, Zutty Singleton, Benny Carter, Art Hodes, Jelly Roll Morton and Sidney Bechet. He recorded on the famed Panassie sessions of 1938 and as a leader recorded some highly enjoyable and freewheeling sessions in the Forties for Commodore and Blue Note.
He played with his brother Wilbur’s New New Orleans Jazz Band through the ’50s before ill health forced his retirement in the 1960s. Trumpeter Sidney De Paris passed away on September 13, 1967 in New York City.
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