Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Gorni Kramer was born Francesco Kramer Gorni on July 22, 1913 in Rivarolo Mantovano, Lombardy, Italy. Learning music at a very young age, thanks to his musician father. The first instrument he learned how to play was the accordion, with which he performed as a child in his father’s band.

He studied double bass at the Conservatory in Parma, Italy and obtained his diploma in 1930. He started working as a musician for dance bands and in 1933 at 20, he formed his own jazz group. This new American musical genre was forbidden by the Italian fascist regime, but Gorni got to know it thanks to some fellow musicians who worked on board the liners connecting Europe and North America.

In the middle of the Thirties he became a successful songwriter, composing hit songs through the Thirties. In spite of his songs’ popularity, Gorni and his orchestra were still ignored by the Italian state radio EIAR, who boycotted them because they played jazz.

During World War II he worked with Natalino Otto, a singer also banned by EIAR because of swing and wrote one of her greatest hits. In 1949 he started working for Garinei and Giovannini, a very famous duo of impresarios who authored and produced musical comedies, an association that lasted ten years.

Kramer debuted on television in 1957 with Il Musichiere music show, composing the show’s theme song with other shows ensued. In the mid-1960s he gradually reduced his public performances, but he continued to work as a music publisher and a TV author.

Songwriter, bassist and bandleader Gorni Kramer transitioned from a heart attack on October 26, 1995 in Milan, Italy.

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Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Arnold Fishkind was born July 20, 1919 in Bayonne, New Jersey, and grew up in Freeport, Long Island, New York where he met and began a lifelong friendship with Chubby Jackson. At age 7 Fishkind began learning violin, and played in The Musical Aces, a local band of budding musicians. By age 14 he was playing bass.

Fishkind had his first professional gig with Bunny Berigan in 1937. Following this he played with Jack Teagarden, Van Alexander, and Les Brown in the early Forties. After serving three years in the armed forces during World War II he met and played with pianist Lennie Tristano in New York, but by the fall he left to go to Hollywood to play with Charlie Barnet. During this experience he played alongside Stan Getz.

Returning to New York City from 1947 to 1949 he played with Tristano, then at the end of the decade recorded with Lee Konitz and on Johnny Smith’s Moonlight in Vermont. He also continued to play with Barnet, and played with Benny Goodman^.

By the 1950s he found much work as a session musician, for radio, television and pop musicians including Frankie Laine. His career at ABC lasted fifteen years and included appearances in the Andy Williams Show in 1961. Fishkind became well known enough during this time to be mentioned by Jack Kerouac in his novel Visions of Cody.

Rock and Roll having decimated the market for jazz musicians in New York City, Fishkind moved from New York City back to California. In California he found work with the Dean Martin and Bob Hope television shows and some substitution engagements on the Tonight and Merv Griffin television shows, as well as some recording and film work.

He toured with Les Brown and Lena Horne, while continuing to record into the 1980s, playing with Frank Scott. Ultimately he moved to Palm Desert, California, where he was able to join the celebration of his friend Chubby Jackson’s 80th birthday. In his latter years, Fishkind became an ordained minister at Family Life Church in Palm Desert.

During his career he performed swing and bebop jazz, television, jingles, and even western themed music. He worked with Ella Fitzgerald, Stan Hasselgard, Peanuts Hucko, Charlie Parker, Shorty Rogers, Butch Stone and Jerry Wald. Bassist Arnold Fishkind, sometimes credited as Arnold Fishkin and who appeared on over 100 albums, transitioned on September 6, 1999 in Palm Desert, California.

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Daily Dose Of jazz…

Ernest Shepard, Jr. on July 19, 1916 in Beaumont, Texas and played in territory bands in Texas in the 1930s and soon after worked in California in the bands of Phil Moore and Gerald Wilson.

For a short time he played in a quintet with Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie in 1945. Later that year he recorded as a vocalist with Lem Davis and worked with Eddie Heywood in 1945-1946.

In the Fifties he worked with Slim Gaillard, Gene Ammons, Sonny Stitt, and Johnny Hodges, but played little in the latter half of the decade. In 1962 he became a member of Duke Ellington’s band and accompanied him on tours of Europe through 1964.

He worked with Paul Gonsalves in 1963 and Johnny Hodges in 1964 then moved to Germany in 1964. He took up work as a session musician for studio recordings, radio, and television.

Double-bassist and vocalist Ernest Shepard transitioned on November 23, 1965 in Hamburg, West Germany.

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Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Lemuel A. Davis was born in Tampa, Florida on June 22, 1914. He started playing alto saxophone in high school and worked in semi-pro bands before moving to New York City in the early Forties. There his career started with pianist Nat Jaffe. He went on to play with the Coleman Hawkins Septet in 1943 and with Eddie Heywood’s group.

Throughout the 1940s, he played in a variety of jazz groups. Lem composed the bebop tune Lem Me Go in 1946 and recorded it with Eddie Safranski’s All Stars along with Vido Musso, Sanford Gold and Denzil Best. Then in 1953 he appeared on Buck Clayton’s The Hucklebuck recording. He continued playing in New York City throughout the 1950s, recording four albums with Buck Clayton between 1954 and 1956. He recorded little thereafter.

Alto saxophonist Lem Davis, mostly associated with swing music, transitioned on January 16, 1970 in New York City.

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Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Booker Collins was born on June 21, 1914 in Roswell, New Mexico. Emerging from the New Mexico Military Institute to play in Bat Brown’s Band, a territory band. By the mid-’30s he was keeping very good company playing with pianist Mary Lou Williams and Her Kansas City Seven, cutting sides with her when he was only 16. In 1934, his break came when he got into the band of Andy Kirk and His Clouds Of Joy, staying for the next decade and playing alongside Williams in the rhythm section. Kirk’s hiring replaced the tuba with the double bass.

Booker’s final job of note was with Chicago, Illinois guitarist and drummer Floyd Smith as part of his trio, a stint that lasted from 1946 until the early ’50s, when this great bass man finally laid his big instrument down in terms of full-time playing. He made a few appearances at festival occasions in the ensuing decades but was in Chicago’s recording studios in the late ’50s cutting sides for independent labels.

Returning to performing he joined a combo called the Shades of Rhythm to backup blues singer Mad Man Jones on the demanding Come Here. Collins’ involvement with this group of shifting personnel began in 1952 when he was part of a version that took the risk of cutting sides for the Chance label.

He also performed and recorded with Bert Johnson and the group Six Men And A Girl. Little is known about the death of double bassist Booker Collins who also played the valve trombonist and tuba. It appears he faded into obscurity.

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