Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Robert Sage Wilber was born on March 15, 1928 in New York City. He became interested in jazz at the age of three when his father brought home a recording of Duke Ellington’s song Mood Indigo. In 1935, the family moved to the affluent suburb of Scarsdale, New York. At the age of thirteen he began formal clarinet study under his first teacher, Willard Briggs. He began listening to jazz from New Orleans, Kansas City, and Chicago by Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong, Jelly Roll Morton, Eddie Condon, and Frank Teschemacher. He played jazz in high school and with his friends formed a hot club, listening and jamming to records and graduated from high school in 1945.
Set on becoming a musician he attended the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York in 1945. After one term however, Bob dropped out and moved back to New York City to hang out on 52 Street and in Greenwich Village. He formed the Wildcats, with pianist Dick Wellstood and trombonist Eddie Hubble and they became the first jazz group in New York to do what Lu Watters and Turk Murphy had been doing on the Coast. They played the music of the Hot Five, the Red Hot Peppers and the Creole Jazz Band. The group performed regularly at Jimmy Ryan’s club over the next two years and was recorded in 1947 by Ramp-art Records.
Wilber worked with some of the best traditional jazz musicians of the era, including Muggsy Spanier, Baby Dodds, Danny Barker, Bud Freeman, Pee Wee Russell, George Wettling, Jimmy McPartland, Wild Bill Davison, and James P. Johnson. Fascinated with Sidney Bechet, in 1944 at sixteen, he met Bechet through Mezz Mezzrow and became Bechet’s pupil. He began studying both clarinet and soprano saxophone under his tutelage and eventually lived with him for several months.
Bob recorded for Columbia Records, Commodore, and Circle with Bechet and with his own group in the late 1940s. 1948 saw him forming a trio and playing Dixieland at intermissions at the Savoy Café in Boston, Massachusetts. Eventually, he expanded the band to a sextet and gained a strong following in the city, leading to opportunities in New York City.
Clarinet and soprano saxophonist Bob Wilber, who continued playing right up until 2017, transitioned on August 4, 2019 at age 91 in Chipping Campden, England.
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Three Wishes
The Baroness queried Nelson Boyd what would his three wishes would be and his response was:
- “Well, the first one, I would like to have freedom – through money.”
- “Then, I would like to make some people happy.”
- “Then, I’d like to be true to God.”
*Excerpt from Three Wishes: An Intimate Look at Jazz Greats ~ Compiled and Photographed by Pannonica de Koenigswarter
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Mahlon Clark was born on March 7, 1923 and raised in Portsmouth, Virginia. He started out in vaudeville as a child, however, as a teenager he became a big band musician playing for the Ray McKinley and Will Bradley bands, among others.
Relocating to California during World War II and after serving in the armed forces, found employment at Paramount Pictures where he performed music on many movie soundtracks.
In 1962 Mahlon was hired by Lawrence Welk to join his orchestra and his television show. For six years he played both the clarinet and saxophone on the weekly show and on stage when the Musical Family went out on tour.
Leaving the Welk organization in 1968, Clark continued to perform on many more movie soundtracks and with numerous artists such as Frank Sinatra and Madonna.
Clarinetist and saxophonist Mahlon Clark transitioned on September 20, 2007 at the age of 84.
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Three Wishes
Baroness Pannonica approached Teddy Edwards and as the conversation ensued she asked him if he was given three what would he wish for. His answered:
-
- “I wish peace.”
- “Love.”
- “And health.”
*Excerpt from Three Wishes: An Intimate Look at Jazz Greats ~ Compiled and Photographed by Pannonica de Koenigswarter
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Leslie Richard Condon born February 23 1930 in Kennington, London, England of Irish stock, took up the trumpet in his late teens. Largely self-taught, he worked with local dance bands before doing his national service, when he played for the Eager Beavers at RAF Wroughton, Wiltshire.
Turning professional in 1952, he played with the usual round of palais bands and then took to the sea as a member of Geraldo’s Navy. Working as a musician on Cunard liners crossing the Atlantic allowed him to worship at the feet of the great exponents of bebop on New York’s 52nd Street. Originally a conventional jazz player, like others of the second wave of modernists he was bowled over by bebop, forging an eloquent style of his own, building on what he knew of Dizzy Gillespie, Fats Navarro and Miles Davis.
In 1954, he became a founder member of British bebop pioneer Tony Crombie’s new band, playing alongside trumpeter Jimmy Deuchar and trombonist Ken Wray. Despite having little formal musical education, he was a valued composer and arranger, contributing to the Crombie band book and recording with the drummer for Decca in 1955. He also began to record and solo regularly with bands led by Vic Lewis and Hayes, before joining drummer Tony Kinsey’s successful quintet.
Condon was among the local players added to form Woody Herman’s (Anglo-American) Herd when the veteran US bandleader toured the UK in 1959. He formed a rewarding friendship with Herman’s lead trumpeter Reunald Jones, formerly a key member of the Count Basie orchestra.
He went on to have a year-long association with Jamaican alto-saxophonist Joe Harriott, famous for his pursuit of “free form” jazz alongside his more structured pieces. He went on to work with a dazzling array of local movers and shakers, recording with the Hayes and Tracey big bands and performing with just about every other significant jazz modernist of the day. An active studio musician, he played for radio and television shows, recorded with singer Georgie Fame and appeared on the Beatles’ Revolver album. His theatre work included a two-year stint with the musical show Bubbling Brown Sugar and a visit to South Africa in 1981, accompanying the singer Jack Jones.
Dental problems forced Condon to cease playing the trumpet in 1990, after which he confined himself to playing the piano at home, composing and studying music. Trumpeter Les Condon, one of the modern players, transitioned on October 30 2007.
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