Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Thomas Mossie McQuater was born on September 4, 1914 in Maybole, Ayrshire, Scotland. Showing early signs of musical talent and largely self-taught, he began on the cornet but by the age of 11 was a regular member of the Maybole Burgh Band. The brass band won several competitions in the late 1920s and they played at local events and dances.
Turning professional in his teens, Tommy got a regular position with Louis Freeman’s Band, which played at Greens Playhouse in Glasgow. In 1934, at 20, he was offered a job with one of London, England’s most renowned bands, the Jack Payne Orchestra, playin in London and Paris, France. His next stint was with the Lew Stone Band and made the classic recording of Pardon Me, Pretty Baby.
In the 1940s, after joining The Squadronaires, he worked with the BBC Showband in 1945. He often performed with John McLevy in the 1970s and 1980s. In his later years, he concentrated his energy playing around the Ealing Jazz Festival. Trumpeter, flugelhornist and cornetist Tommy McQuater passed away on January 20, 2008 in London, England at the age of 93.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Herman “Trigger” Alpert was born on September 3, 1916 in Indianapolis, Indiana. Attending Indiana University, he studied the bass and soon after was playing with guitarist Alvino Rey in New York City. In the early 1940s he toured with the Glenn Miller band and his enthusiastic playing style can be witnessed during a 1941 performance of In The Mood in Sun Valley Serenade.
During the rest of the decade, he worked with Louis Armstrong, Roy Eldridge, Ella Fitzgerald, Bud Freeman, Woody Herman, Jerry Jerome, Bernie Leighton, Ray McKinley, Frank Sinatra, and Muggsy Spanier. In the 1950s and early 1960s, he recorded as a sideman with Don Elliott, Coleman Hawkins, Gene Krupa, Mundell Lowe, Buddy Rich, Artie Shaw, and the Sauter-Finegan Orchestra.
Until the late 1960s, Trigger was a member of the CBS Orchestra and the CBS band for the television series the Garry Moore Show with Carol Burnett and the Barbra Streisand television specials My Name Is Barbra and Color Me Barbra.
Alpert wrote two instructional books: Walking the Bass in 1958 and the Electric Bass in 1968. He recorded a single album as a leader titled Trigger Happy on the Riverside label in 1956.
Retiring from music in 1970, he made his longtime interest in portrait photography a full-time profession. Bassist Trigger Alpert passed away on December 21, 2013 at an assisted living facility in Jacksonville Beach, Florida.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
George F. Clarke was born on August 28, 1911 in Memphis, Tennessee. He attended Manassas High School, where he was Jimmie Lunceford’s pupil before joining the orchestra and playing with Lunceford until 1933.
Relocating to Buffalo, New York, there he played with Guy Jackson, Lil Armstrong and Stuff Smith in 1935. He and Smith worked together again on tour in 1939-1940 and in the recording studio. Returning to Buffalo, Clarke led an ensemble at a local club from 1942 to 1954.
Following this he moved to New York City and worked with Wild Bill Davis and Jonah Jones, and toured internationally in Europe in 1959 with Cootie Williams and Africa with Cozy Cole in 1962. He was occasionally active through the ‘60s in New York City. Tenor saxophonist George Clarke passed away in September 1985 in the Bronx, New York.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Fritz “Freddie” Brocksieper was born on August 24, 1912 in Constantinople, Turkey, the son of a Greek-speaking Jewish woman and a German engineer who was able to get through National-Socialism as an essential swing musician.
Considered a leading figure of early European big-band jazz, by 1930 was working in Nuremberg and Berlin in the 1930s. By World War II he was playing around Germany with different people, the Goldene Sieben (Golden Seven), Benny De Weille, Willy Berking, and the radio orchestra of Lutz Templin, just as in the National-Socialist propaganda band Charlie and His Orchestra.
After the war he led various bands in Stuttgart, Munich, and Berlin, Germany and also played in American officers’ clubs. With his bands Freddie made it to the front page of Stars and Stripes. Beginning in 1957 Bavarian radio regularly broadcast live concerts from his studio in Munich.
Brocksieper continued performing into the 1960s and 1970s, and was awarded a Deutscher Schallplattenpreis in 1980. From 1964 he played mainly in trios, and often with American soloists in Europe. His drumming style was influenced by Gene Krupa. He recorded with his own ensembles, both large and small, in the late 1940s. From 1964 he played mainly in trios and with visiting American soloists. Drummer Freddie Brocksieper passed away on January 17, 1990.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Kjeld Bonfils was born on August 23, 1918 in Copenhagen, Denmark. He was one of the figures involved in the Golden Age of Danish jazz in the 1930s.
During the Nazi occupation of Denmark from 1940 to 1945, jazz was discouraged by the regime, but Bonfils played with Svend Asmussen in Valdemar Eiberg’s band, as well as elsewhere. Jazz became a symbol of the underground and political protest.
Pianist and vibraphonist Kjeld Bonfils, who was hailed as one of the best soloists of his day, passed away on October 13, 1984 at age 66.
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