Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Herb Bushler was born on March 7, 1939 in New York City and played piano and tuba in his youth before picking up double bass. Classically trained in bass he has performed with symphony orchestras in this capacity.
In 1966 he began a longtime association with ballet and film composer Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson. Herb played with The Fifth Dimension in the 1960s. He worked extensively in jazz idioms in the 1960s and 1970s, including with David Amram, Ted Curson, Blossom Dearie, Tony Williams, and Paul Winter.
He first played with Gil Evans in 1967 and the association would continue on and off until 1981. During the 1970s Bushler recorded sessions with Enrico Rava, Joe Farrell, Ryo Kawasaki, David Sanborn and Harold Vick. He also worked with Dee Dee Bridgewater, Billy Harper, Les McCann, Enrico Rava, Joe Chambers, and Howard Johnson.
Bassist Herb Bushler, whose composition Herbs was recorded by David Sanborn, at 85 years old continues to occasionally play both double bass and electric bass.
Jazz Poems
SNAKE-BLACK SOLO For Louis Armstrong, Steve Cannon, Miles Davis & Eugene Redmond with the music up high boogaloo bass down way way low up & under eye come slidin on in mojoin on in spacin on in on a riff full of rain riffin on in full of rain & pain spacin on in on a sound like coltrane my metaphor is a blues hot pain dealin blues is a blues axin guitar voices whiskey broken niggah deep in the heart is a blues in a glass filled with rain is a blues in the dark slurred voices of straight bourbon is a blues dagger stuck off in the heart of night moanin blike bessie smith is a blues filling up the wings of darkness is a blues & looking through the heart a dream can become a raindrop window to see through can become a window to see through this moment to see yourself hanging around the dark to see through can become a river catching rain feeding time can become a window to see through Quincy Troupefrom Jazz Poems ~ Selected and Edited by Kevin Young
More Posts: book,classic,collectible,history,jazz,library,poet
Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Colin Thomas Purbrook was born February 26, 1936 in Seaford, East Sussex, England and learned piano from the age of six from his father, who was also a professional pianist. As an eleven year old, in 1947 he won three Challenge Cups at the Brighton Music Festival. He went on to study music at the Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge. As well as playing piano, he also played the trombone with the Cambridge University Jazz Band.
Leaving Cambridge in 1957 he joined Sandy Brown’s quintet on double bass for a six-month period at the popular Oxford Street 100 Club. He played piano for three years with Al Fairweather’s All Stars, and also played with Kenny Ball, both as a pianist, trumpeter and double bassist. In the early 1960s he worked with Kenny Baker, Ian Carr, Tony Coe, Bert Courtley, Jimmy Deuchar, Wally Fawkes, Alan Ganley, Derek Hogg, Dudley Moore, John Picard, Don Rendell, Ronnie Ross, and Ronnie Scott.
In 1961 he worked alongside composer and musician Charles Mingus on the music score for the film All Night Long which was eventually released in 1962. Later in the decade he continued working with Brown and Coe, as well as with Brian Lemon, Humphrey Lyttelton, and Phil Seamen on drums. He played piano for the BBC 2’s music programme Jazz 625 with Dakota Staton and the Keith Christie All Stars respectively and was a member of Benny Goodman’s sextet when the clarinetist recorded a special gala performance for BBC2 in 1964.
He often played with drummer Phil Seamen, joining his trio during the late 1960s and early ’70s. Colin was a frequent sideman for Americans touring the UK, and worked over the course of his career with Chet Baker, Ruby Braff, Benny Carter, Doc Cheatham, Eddie Lockjaw Davis, Art Farmer, Dexter Gordon, Barney Kessel, Howard McGhee, James Moody, Annie Ross, Zoot Sims, and Buddy Tate. He was involved with the production of a number of stage plays from the 1970s through the 1990s. He led trios and quartets into the 1990s, took up a couple of residencies as a solo pianist, and continued to tour and appear on radio and television and, despite the fact that he began to suffer from rheumatoid arthritis in 1995.
Pianist, double bassist, trumpeter and songwriter Colin Purbrook, who also led his own smaller and larger ensembles, died in London, England of cancer on February 5, 1999.
More Posts: double bass,history,instrumental,jazz,music,piano,songwriter,trumpet
Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Jan Verwey was born on February 24, 1936 in Vlissingen, The Netherlands. A self-taught harpist, he created his own style on this characteristic instrument. He is the only one who plays octaves on the harmonica.
Very much a bebopper and his unique self-developed instrumental technique, he boldly brings about his desired harmony and melody to his solo’s. During his first visit to the United States in 1990 he was immediately rushed into the recording studio by producer Bill Goodwin, Phil Woods drummer, to record The Dutch Connection which led to a performance at the North Sea Jazz Festival in the Netherlands.
In 1991 he was back in the States being the only European invited to play at the festival Celebration Of The Arts in Watergap, as a soloist. He also gave a duo concert with pianist Hod O’brien who recorded with Chet Baker at The Dearhead Inn. In 2007 he was playing at festivals in Medicine Hat and Calgary in Canada. He has toured Europe, playing in Copenhagen, Denmark as well as Frankfurt, Hamburg, Dusseldorf, Rhede and Darmstadt in Germany.
He has a nomination for the Pall Mall Export Award, was a guest soloist with the Metropole Orchestra, in addition to guest performances on television- and radio shows. As a composer he has written for television series, documentaries and commercials.
He has recorded eight albums as a leader with his last being his 2019 The Music of Horace Silver. Harmonica player Jan Verwey, who plays bebop and cool jazz, continues to perform.
More Posts: bandleader,harmonica,history,instrumental,jazz,music
Daily Dose Of Jazz…
John Maxwell Collie was born on February 21, 1931 in Melbourne, Australia. In 1946 he first heard professional jazz listening to Graham Bell’s lunchtime concerts at The New Theatre Melbourne. By 17 he was playing with a local band and shortly after leading it.
When he received the invitation by cable to take the trombone chair in the Melbourne New Orleans Jazz Band that was on tour in Europe, Max accepted and in 1962 arrived in England. He toured Europe until the band went back to Australia a year later, however, he decided to stay and joined the London City Stompers, becoming leader after a year. In 1966 he formed Max Collie’s Rhythm Aces and that band, notwithstanding the collapse of the UK jazz scene flourished.
The group released their first record in 1971 and in 1975 they won the World Championship of Jazz in traditional jazz against fourteen competing North American jazz bands in Indianapolis, Indiana.
He would go on to tour Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Norway and Japan and create a theater show. This show, Max Collie’s New Orleans Mardi Gras, which included Ken Colyer and Cy Laurie, turned out to be the most successful jazz show in British jazz history. Trombonist Max Collie died on January 6, 2018, at the age of 86.
More Posts: bandleader,history,instrumental,jazz,music,trombone