Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Ronald Edward Cuber was born on December 25, 1941 in Brooklyn, New York. In 1959 he was playing tenor saxophone when he joined Marshall Brown’s Newport Youth Band at eighteen, but switched to the baritone. His first notable work was with Slide Hampton in 1962 and then went with Maynard Ferguson the following year until 1965. George Benson recruited him for a year in ‘66 to 1967.
As a leader he was known for hard bop and Latin jazz, the latter with Eddie Palmieri, As a sideman he played outside the genre with B. B. King, Paul Simon, Eric Clapton, J. Geils Band, and one of his most spirited performances is on Dr. Lonnie Smith’s 1970 Blue Note album Drives. He was also a member of the Saturday Night Live Band.
Ronnie played with Frank Zappa on the live album Zappa in New York, which was recorded in 1976. He went on to gain membership in the Lee Konitz nonet from 1977 to 1979.He was a member of the Mingus Big Band from its inception in the early 1990s until his death. He performed as an off-screen musician for the movie Across the Universe.
Baritone saxophonist Ronnie Cuber, who also played soprano and tenor saxophones, clarinet and flute, died at the age of 80 on October 7, 2022 in his New York’s Upper West Side studio from internal injuries sustained after a fall that could not be treated due to overwhelming Covid patients at the start of the pandemic.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
John Josephus Hicks Jr. was born December 21, 1941 in Atlanta, Georgia, the eldest of five children. As a child he moved around the United States as his father, Rev. John Hicks Sr, took up jobs with the Methodist church. His mother was his first piano teacher after he began playing at six or seven in Los Angeles, California. He took organ lessons, sang in choirs and tried the violin and trombone. Once he learned to read music around the age of 11, he started playing the piano in church.
His development accelerated once his family moved to St. Louis, Missouri when Hicks was 14 and he settled on the piano. Attending Sumner High School and played in schoolmate Lester Bowie’s band, the Continentals, which performed in a variety of musical styles. Hicks worked summer gigs in the southern United States with blues musicians Albert King and Little Milton with the latter providing his first professional work in 1958.
He studied music in 1958 at Lincoln University in Pennsylvania, where he shared a room with drummer Ronald Shannon Jackson. He also studied for a short time at the Berklee School of Music in Boston, Massachusetts before moving to New York in 1963.
In New York, John first accompanied singer Della Reese, then went on to play with Joe Farrell, Al Grey, Billy Mitchell, Pharoah Sanders, Jimmy Witherspoon, Kenny Dorham and Joe Henderson before joining Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers in 1964. From 1965 to 1967 he worked on and off with vocalist Betty Carter, then joined Woody Herman’s big band, where he stayed until 1970, playing as well as writing arrangements for the band.
From 1972 to 1973, Hicks taught jazz history and improvisation at Southern Illinois University. From the 1970s onward he had a prolific career as a leader recording his debut in England followed by fifty-three more albums and as a sideman he recorded 300.
Towards the end of his life, he taught at New York University and The New School in New York. In 2006 John played in a big band led by Charles Tolliver, recorded his final studio album On the Wings of an Eagle.
Pianist, composer and arranger John HIcks, whose collection of papers, compositions, video and audio recordings are held by Duke University, died from internal bleeding on May 10, 2006.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Judi Marie Canterino was born on December 18, 1942 in New York City, New York. She began her musical training at the age of seven with classical piano and performed at the Juilliard School of Music through her thirteenth year. Then she turned her studies to voice, training classically through high school.
At 19 she turned her attention to jazz singing and was introduced to Lennie Tristano, with whom she began studying. As part of my jazz training, she would listen to Lennie Tristano perform at the Half Note. Early in her career she sat-in at the club with Zoot Sims, Al Cohen, Wes Montgomery, Buddy Tate, Bud Johnson, Jimmy Rushing, Van Dickenson, Major Holly, Milt Hinten, Doc Cheatham, Roy Eldridge, Ross Thompkins, Bobby Hackett and others.
Her style came from mentorship of those previously mentioned and the influences of singers Jimmy Rushing, Billie Holiday, Maxine Sullivan, Rosemary Clooney, Anita O’Day and Frank Sinatra. She took time off from performing to raise a family but remained active in the jazz world, resuming her career with guitarist Joe Puma. She’s appeared around New York and New Jersey.
I have been working with jazz greats Warren Vache, Scott Hamilton, Norman Simmons, Chuck Folds, Clark Terry, Mark Shane, Rio Clemente, Joe Cocuzzo, Phil Bodner, Spanky Davis, Bucky Pizzarelli, Kenny Daverne, Kenny Asher and before their deaths, the great Doc Cheatham and Red Richards.
Her debut as a leader was titled Gee Baby and her sophomore project is Live At Maureen’s jazz Cellar. Vocalist Judi Marie Canterino, the Swing Jazz Singer, is still taking the stage to this day.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Jim Hession was born on December 10, 1947 in Pasadena, California, where he studied piano with composer Oscar Rasbach. By the time he turned twenty he was a fixture in the traditional jazz scene, with his incredibly accurate two-handed piano style. He was a founding member of the Maple Leaf Club, receiving his degree in composition from the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA), where he studied under Paul Chihara and Lalo Schifrin.
Jim met and began recording with Eubie Blake and while recording with Eubie Blake in New York City he began exploring more contemporary jazz venues, while retaining his handle on traditional jazz styles like ragtime, stride and boogie-woogie.
He met his future wife Martha while they were attending UCLA, where she was studying piano and voice. She began singing professionally with Jim and started a professional association with the Walt Disney Company in 1967 until relocating to the Gulf Coast in 2003.
Over the years they have performed with such luminaries as Teddy Wilson, Al Hirt, Bob Crosby, Johnny Guarnieri, Max Morath, Shelton Brooks, Gregory Hines, Savion Glover, and Disney songwriters the Sherman Brothers. They have acquired an incredible knowledge of the history of American music and hold 85,000+ pieces, one of the largest privately-held collections of original sheet music in the United States.
They have lectured at many colleges and educational venues across the country. The couple have performed as a jazz duo, headlined the American Jazz Quintet, appeared on television, produced stage shows, and historical lectures. Pianist Jim Hession and Martha Hession continue to bring a level of talent and versatility not often found on the music scene.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Bob Smith was born on December 9, 1945 in Columbus, Ohio and was the first child of a young pair of Swing Kids. Growing up he listened to the radio and records playing big band instrumentals and vocals. He became familiar with Glenn Miller, Benny Goodman, Artie Shaw, Jimmy Dorsey, Count Basie, Duke Ellington and the Andrews Sisters in the family’s Ohio State University campus area apartment.
By the time he turned ten he had rented a metal clarinet from a local shop and started his entrance into the music industry. Two years later Bob began lessons on the clarinet with David Hite and at Columbus Linden-McKinley high school joined the dance band by learning to play baritone saxophone. This was followed by the purchase of a Selmer Mark VI alto and fell in love.
Attracting national attentionhe as a member of the dance band in 1961-62 the band was invited those two years to the Stan Kenton National Stage Band Camps as a featured guest band. They enjoyed the thrills of being rehearsed by Stan Kenton, Buddy DeFranco, Buddy Morrow, John LaPorta, Don Jacoby, Buddy Baker and others. Then Kenton and DeFranco took them to Chicago’s McCormick Place to perform for the Midwest Band and Orchestra Directors Convention.
At the Ohio State University School of Music he majored in Music Education and alto saxophone was his major instrument. Smith added bass clarinet, contrabass clarinet, tenor and bass saxes to his arsenal of instruments.
He taught instrumental music in southern and northwest Ohio and privately in Columbus and Toledo, Ohio. Along with being an educator Bob spent the majority of his working career in business sales, retiring in 2008. Over the decades alto saxophonist Bob Smith has played in numerous big bands in Ohio and currently performs in Toledo’s Swingmania All-Stars, a band that never recorded an album or a song.
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