Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Ronnie Lang was born July 24, 1929 in Chicago, Illinois. Sometimes spelled Ronny, his professional début was with Hoagy Carmichael’s Teenagers. He went on to play for a year with Earle Spencer in 1946, then with Ike Carpenter, and Skinnay Ennis the following year.
Gained attention during his two tenures with Les Brown’s Orchestra between 1949–50 and 1953 to 1956, he recorded with the Dave Pell Octet in the mid-1950s. During this time he moved to California and attended Los Angeles State College of Applied Arts and Sciences studying music and woodwinds.
By 1958 he had become a prolific and busy studio musician in Los Angeles, often employed by Henry Mancini. Ronnie played the iconic sax melodic line in Bernard Herrmann’s score for the 1976 movie Taxi Driver. He also recorded with Pete Rugolo, Bob Thiele, and Peggy Lee.
Alto saxophonist Ronnie Lang, who also played flute and clarinet in the bop, progressive, big band, swing idioms, is now retired at 92.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Danny Barcelona was born on July 23, 1929 in Waipahu, a community of Honolulu, Hawaii. A self taught percussionist, by the age of 18 in his final year in high school, he was already playing music with trombonist, singer, and bandleader Trummy Young, joining his Hawaii All-Stars in the early Fifties. When Young left to join Louis Armstrong’s combo in 1952, he assumed leadership of the band, a sextet known as the Hawaiian Dixieland All-Stars. They would tour the Hawaiian Islands, Japan and the rest of the Far East.
Danny was introduced to Louis Armstrong by Young in 1956 and upon his recommendation, in 1958 at the age of 27 became Armstrong’s drummer for 15 years. As a Filipino-American, Armstrong would frequently introduce him to audiences as The Little Filipino Boy, then follow up by calling himself the Little Arabian Boy.
He appears on more than 130 of Armstrong’s recordings including Hello, Dolly! and What a Wonderful World. He toured with Armstrong and Young around the world until illness took Armstrong and he returned to Hawaii. There he became a longtime performer at the Hilton Hawaiian Village Hotel, and worked for many years at Harry’s Music Store and the Easy Music Center.
In 1979, he returned to the mainland and settled with his family in Monterey Park, California. Drummer Danny Barcelona transitioned in Monterey Park on April 1, 2007, due to complications from cancer at the age of 77.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Dick Collins was born Richard Harrison Collins on July 19, 1924 in Seattle, Washington into a musical family where several of his parents and grandparents were professional musicians. He attended Mills College in 1946–47, where he studied music formally under Darius Milhaud, and moved with Milhaud to Paris, France for the next academic year. As a student at Mills, he first met Dave Brubeck, and while in Paris he played with Hubert Fol and Kenny Clarke.
Returning to the States he landed in San Francisco, California where he began playing with Brubeck in his Bay Area-based octet, then completed his bachelor’s degree in music at San Francisco State College. In the 1950s he performed and recorded with Charlie Barnet, Charlie Mariano, Nat Pierce, Paul Desmond, Cal Tjader, and Woody Herman. By 1957 Dick was working with Les Brown, an association that continued for nearly a decade that included worldwide tours.
In 1965, Collins took a position as a music librarian, which he held through 1967, and took a second position from 1971 to 1986, mostly receding from active performance. In later years, he still occasionally performed live or recorded, including with Nat Pierce, Mary Ann McCall, and Woody Herman.
Trumpeter Dick Collins transitioned on April 19, 2016 in Hesperia, California, at the age of 91.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Donald Neff Bagley was born on July 18, 1927 in Salt Lake City, Utah and received formal training on the double bass. He went on to study in Los Angeles, California and played in 1945 with Shorty Sherock and Wingy Manone, and in 1948 with Dick Pierce.
During the early Fifties from 1950 to 1953, and sporadically thereafter, Bagley played with Stan Kenton. HIs time with Kenton, A Study for Bass by Bill Russo and Bags by Bill Holman were written to feature Bagley’s playing. By 1954 he was fronting his own ensembles. His session work between 1950 and 1952, Don worked extensively with Nat King Cole, Maynard Ferguson, and Dexter Gordon. He played in Europe with Zoot Sims, Lars Gullin, Frank Rosolino, and Åke Persson. He would go on to work with Les Brown, Jimmie Rowles, Shelly Manne, Pete Fountain and Phil Woods. In 1957 and 1958, he recorded three albums under his own name.
The Sixties saw him playing with Ben Webster and Julie London. Into the 1970s and 1980s he worked with Burt Bacharach while composing and arranging for film and television, including the scores to Mama’s Dirty Girls, The Manhandlers, The Swinging Barmaids, The Student Body, Young Lady Chatterley and Sacred Ground.
Double bassist, composer and arranger Don Bagley transitioned of natural causes on July 26, 2012 at the age of 85.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Kitty White was born Kitty Jean Bilbrew on July 7, 1923 in Los Angeles, California. Raised in a musical family, her parents were singers, and her uncle was a well-known vaudevillian and disc jockey. Her twin sister, Maudie Jeanette, also sang and briefly worked with Duke Ellington’s revue, Jump for Joy, but never pursued an active career. Their mother, known as A.C. Bilbrew, organized an all-black chorus that performed in the 1929 film Hearts of Dixie.
She started her career at the age of sixteen as a singer and a pianist, appearing in local nightclubs around Los Angeles. Branching out she opened at the Black Orchid in Chicago, Illinois and was introduced to the executives of Mercury Records, where she became a recording artist.
Kitty picked up her catchy jazz name legitimately by marrying songwriter Eddie White in the 1940s. She moved to Palm Springs, California in 1967 and sang at the Spa Hotel for sixteen years.
Recording mostly on the West Coast, she worked with Buddy Collette, Gerald Wiggins, Chico Hamilton, Bud Shank and Red Callender. She sang many demo recordings for her friend, Los Angeles blues composer Jessie Mae Robinson, including I Went To Your Wedding, a No. 1 hit for Patti Page in 1953. She was also the sole female voice on Elvis Presley’s song Crawfish from the King Creole film soundtrack.
Vocalist Kitty White, who recorded eight albums as a leader and had two compilations released, transitioned in Palm Springs, at the age of 86 on August 11, 2009 after suffering a stroke.
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