Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Don D.T. Thompson was born in Drumheller, Alberta on September 19, 1932. He played saxophone and clarinet at twelve and began promoting his own jazz concerts, Jammin’ the Blues, in Edmonton at 17. Moving to Toronto, Canada in 1952, he toured Canada and the United States from 1954 to 1958 with Anne Marie Moss.

Save for a period in 1965 and 1966 with the Lionel Hampton Orchestra in the United States, Thompson was a mainstay of the Toronto jazz scene through the 1960s. During the early 1960s, he led singer Tommy Ambrose in a big band ensemble. He appeared regularly at the First Floor Club with small groups and a big band from 1959 until 1965, and was seen in the NFB’s Toronto Jazz with a quintet.

He performed on many CBC TV pop music shows, Club Six and Music Hop and played in several Toronto studio orchestras. In 1961 he recorded as a member of the Pat Riccio Big Band in Ottawa and 1963 saw him with pianist Wray Downes and trombonist Rob McConnell. He also released a record as part of a quintet that included trumpeter Fred Stone.

After touring for ten years beginning in 1971 and recording with pop singer Anne Murray, he returned to jazz. In 1981 moving away from his early bebop-based style he landed on a simpler, full-toned, melodic approach in the manner of a Stanley Turrentine. D.T. wrote and recorded several jazz themes; his pop-song arrangements appear on albums by Murray, John Allan Cameron and Gordon Lightfoot.

Saxophonist, composer, and arranger Don D.T. Thompson passed away in Vancouver, Canada on March 21, 2004.

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Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Bobby Nichols was born on September 15, 1924 in Boston, Massachusetts. He began playing trumpet when he was nine and later attended the New England Conservatory. His biggest job before joining the military was as a trumpeter with Vaughn Monroe’s Orchestra from 1940 to 1943, impressive for a 15-year old. Joining the Army in 1943 he became a member of the Glenn Miller Army Air Force Band and during its two years of existence, his advanced swing solos gave the huge group much of its jazz credibility.

After his discharge, staying busy for the next 15 years, Bobby never became known to the general public. He worked with Tex Beneke between 1946-47, led his own group, and worked with Ray McKinley in 1948. After playing with Tommy Dorsey in 1951, he became a longtime member of the Sauter-Finegan Orchestra from 1952-61 and a studio musician. When the Sauter-Finegan big band eventually broke up, having never led his own record date, he slipped completely into obscurity.

Trumpeter Bobby Nichols, who at nineteen exhibited fire in his playing but never made it big despite his many solos, at 95 years old is sought by collectors of the Glenn Miller Army Air Force Band recordings, died in 1975 in Aruba.

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Three Wishes

Baroness Pannonica inquired of Stan Getz that if granted three wishes what would he ask for and he told her: 

1. 1. “Justice.”

   2. “Turth.”

   3. “Beauty..”

*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…

Harry Percy South was born on September 7, 1929 in Fulham, London, England. Coming into prominence in the 1950s, he subsequently performed with Joe Harriott, Dizzy Reece, Tony Crombie, and Tubby Hayes. In 1954, he was in the Tony Crombie Orchestra, together with Dizzy Reece, Les Condon, Joe Temperley, Sammy Walker, Lennie Dawes, and Ashley Kozak.

After returning from a nine-month stint in Calcutta, India, with the Ashley Kozak Quartet, he spent four years with the Dick Morrissey Quartet, where he both wrote and arranged material for their subsequent four albums.

Forming his own jazz big band in 1966, featuring UK musicians Hayes, Dick Morrissey, Phil Seamen, Keith Christie, Ronnie Scott, and Ian Carr, and recorded an album for Mercury Records. In the mid-1960s, he began working with British rhythm & blues singer and organist Georgie Fame, with whom he recorded the album Sound Venture. At that time he was also composing and arranging for Humphrey Lyttelton, Buddy Rich, Sarah Vaughan, and Jimmy Witherspoon.

Working for a time as the musical director to Annie Ross, Harry later branched out into session work, writing themes for television and music libraries, and having written the scores for the Pete Walker films, he is also credited with the arrangements for Emerson, Lake & Palmer, again arranged for Annie Ross and Georgie Fame in collaboration on what was to be Hoagy Carmichael’s last recording, In Hoagland.

Pianist, composer, and arranger Harry South, who was honored with the CD Portraits ~ The Music of Harry South released by the National Youth Jazz Orchestra, passed away on March 12, 1990 in Lambeth, London at age 60.

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Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Clifford Edward Thornton III was born on September 6, 1936 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania into a musical family, his uncle pianist Jimmy Golden and his cousin, drummer J. C. Moses. He began piano lessons when he was seven-years-old, and studied with trumpeter Donald Byrd during 1957 after Byrd had left Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers, and also that he worked with 17-year-old tuba player Ray Draper and Webster Young. Following a late 1950s stint in the U.S. Army bands, he moved to New York City.

In the early 1960s, Clifford lived in the Williamsburg area of Brooklyn, New York in an apartment building with other young musicians, including Rashied Ali, Marion Brown, and Don Cherry. He performed with numerous avant-garde jazz bands, recording as a sideman with Sun Ra, Archie Shepp, Pharoah Sanders, and Sam Rivers.

During the Seventies, Thornton and others were affected by the compositional ideas of Cecil Taylor, was active in the Black Arts Movement, and associated with Amiri Baraka and Jayne Cortez. This musical and artistic network provided him with a variety of perspectives on ideas such as black self-determination, performance forms, outside playing, and textural rhythm; and giving him access to performers who would provide the abilities some of his later compositions required.

He was included in the dialogue around the developing thought of political artists, including Shepp, Askia M. Touré, and Nathan Hare, as well as the journals Freedomways and Umbra. As an educator, he taught world music at Wesleyan University and created an Artists-in-Residence on campus, giving the academic world-music community exposure to Sam Rivers, Jimmy Garrison, Ed Blackwell, and Marion Brown. He arranged performances by Rashied Ali, Horace Silver, McCoy Tyner, and numerous others

Trumpeter, trombonist, activist, and educator Clifford Thornton, who played free and avant~garde jazz in the 1960 and ‘70s, passed away on  November 25, 1989.

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