Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Orrin Keepnews born March 2, 1923 in Bronx borough of New York City and graduated from Columbia University with a degree in English in 1943. And was subsequently involved in bombing raids over Japan in the final months of World War II before returning for graduate studies at Columbia in 1946.
While working as an editor for the book publishers Simon & Schuster he moonlighted as editor of The Record Changer magazine in 1948 and by 1952 along with the magazine’s owner Bill Grauer, produced a series of reissues on RCA Victor’s Label “X”. The following year they founded Riverside Records, which was originally devoted to reissue projects in the traditional and swing jazz idioms.
Signing pianist Randy Weston was the label’s first modern jazz artist, who helped them to begin paying attention to the current jazz scene. Their most significant early move came in 1955, when they were made aware of the availability of Thelonious Monk, who was leaving Prestige and from this point, the label concentrated on the burgeoning modern jazz scene.
Keepnews produced significant young artists as Bill Evans, Cannonball Adderley, Wes Montgomery, Johnny Griffin, Jimmy Heath and was soon rivaling Blue Note and Prestige as a New York independent jazz label. In 1961, Keepnews produced what many regard as one of the greatest live jazz recordings of all time with the Bill Evans Trio, Sunday At The Village Vanguard and Waltz For Debby. However, in 1963 Grauer died of a heart attack and a year later the company was bankrupt, closing the Riverside doors. Not to be trumped, Keepnews founded Milestone Records in ’66 and released albums by McCoy Tyner, Joe Henderson, Lee Konitz and Gary Bartz. 1972 saw him in San Francisco as jazz A&R for Fantasy Records who bought both Riverside and Milestone masters.
Returning to freelancing he opened the doors of Landmark Records in 1985 that eventually passed to Muse Records in 1993. Over the course of his career he has won several Grammy Awards, including Best Album Notes and Best Historical Album; was given the Trustees Award for Lifetime Achievement, received an NEA Jazz Masters Lifetime Achievement Award in 2011 in the field of jazz.
He continued to be responsible for extensive reissue compilations, including the Duke Ellington 24CD RCA Centennial set in 1999 and Riverside’s Keepnews Editions series. Orrin Keepnews, writer and record producer, passed away on March 1, 2015 in El Cerrito, California.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Ron Jefferson was born on February 13, 1926 in New York City and began as a tap dancer before taking up the drums. He quickly became a fixture on the postwar bop scene collaborating, touring and/or recording with Lester Young, Coleman Hawkins, Charles Mingus, Freddie Redd, Teddy Edwards and Roy Eldridge to name a few.
He also spent a number of years as a sideman with Oscar Pettiford, and working with Charlie Rouse and Julius Watkins forming the Jazz Modes in 1957. After two years the trio split up and Ron signed on with Les McCann prior to moving to Los Angeles in 1962. It was there he cut his debut album as a leader titled “Love Lifted Me” on the Pacifica label.
In addition to playing behind Groove Holmes, Zoot Sims, Carmell Jones and Joe Castro, Ron also toured with Roland Kirk’s “Jazz and People’s Movement”, spent a number of years in Paris working with Hazel Scott, taught music for the U.S. Embassy and in 1976 he cut “Vout Etes Swing!” for the Catalyst label.
Upon returning to New York, Jefferson hosted the cable TV series Miles Ahead with fellow musician John Lewis. Despite a steady work schedule, he never attained the visibility or renown of many of his contemporaries, and after a brief illness drummer Ron Jefferson died in Richmond, Virginia on May 7, 2007.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Thomas S. McIntosh was born February 6, 1927 in Baltimore, Maryland and studied at the Peabody Conservatory. During his time in the Army band he played trombone, followed by a move to New York in 1956 where he played with Lee Morgan, Roland Kirk, James Moody, Art Farmer and Benny Golson. During this period he also graduated from Julliard.
By 1961 he was composing “The Day After” for trumpeter Howard McGhee and two years later for Dizzy Gillespie’s “Something Old, Something New” album. The following year his composition “Whose Child Are You?” was performed by the New York Jazz Sextet, of which he was a member.
Working with Thad Jones and Mel Lewis in the late Sixties, as a leader McIntosh recorded Manhattan Serenade and worked with earl Coleman, Jerome Richardson, Billy Taylor, Frank Foster, Eddie Williams, Gene Bertoncini, Bobby Thomas and Reggie Workman. He arrange for Bobby Timmons and Milt Jackson, working as a sideman with the later and also Oliver Nelson and Shirley Scott.
Tom gave up jazz and moved to Los Angeles and began a long and successful career composing for film and television writing music for such films as The Learning Tree, Soul Soldier, Shaft’s Big Score, Slither, A Hero Ain’t Nothin’ But A Sandwich and John Handy. In 2008 he was honored by the National Endowment for the Arts as a Jazz Master. Trombonist and composer Tom McIntosh passed away in his sleep at age 84 on July 26, 2017.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Don Goldie was born Donald Elliott Goldfield on February 5, 1930 in Newark, New Jersey. While still a young boy, Goldie had started learning the violin, the trumpet, and the piano, and he was good enough on the trumpet to earn a $1,000 scholarship to the New York Military Academy, later studying with the New York Philharmonic’s Nathan Prager.
After Army service he relocated to Miami, Florida in 1954 winning the Arthur Godfrey’s Talent Scout Award. This was followed with a gig with Bobby Hackett in New York and subsequent engagements and recording work with Lester Lanin, Neal Hefti and Jackie Gleason.
Catching the attention of Jack Teagarden, he joined the band in 1959 and was a part of Teagarden’s first Roulette recording “At The Roundtable”. Over the next three years he distinguished himself as a soloist and sharing the vocals including a perfect impersonation of Louis Armstrong.
After leaving the group, Don led his own band for a time, but by the late ’60s was working with Jackie Gleason in Miami Beach, as well as playing jazz and pop gigs of his own. He cut albums for Chess Records’ Argo offshoot and the Verve label in the early ’60s, and in the 1970s reemerged with his own Jazz Forum label, for which he cut a string of eight LPs, each dedicated to the works of a single composer. He released his final LP, “Don Goldie’s Dangerous Jazz Band” on the Jazzology label in 1982.
With declining health, mostly associated with diabetes, he was forced into retirement and on November 25, 1995 trumpeter Don Goldie committed suicide.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Red Prysock was born Wilburt Prysock on February 2, 1926 in Greensboro, North Carolina. One of the early Coleman Hawkins influenced saxophonists he played in both jazz and rhythm and blues worlds.
He first gained attention playing with Tiny Bradshaw’s band, playing the lead sax solo on his own composition “Soft”, which was a 1952 hit. He also played with Roy Milton and Cootie Williams. While with Tiny Grimes and his Rocking Highlanders, Prysock staged a memorable sax battle with Benny Golson on “Battle of the Mass”.
In 1954, he signed with Mercury Records as a bandleader and moving to R&B had his biggest instrumental hit, “Hand Clappin” in 1955. That same year, he joined the band that played at Alan Freed’s stage shows. He also played on several hit records by his brother and vocalist Arthur Prysock in the 1960s.
Red Prysock released five albums for Mercury and another two for Forum Circle and Gateway record labels. He passed away of a heart attack on July 19,1993 in Chicago, Illinois at the age of 67.
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