Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Mel Powell was born Melvin Epstein on February 12, 1923 in The Bronx, New York City to Russian Jewish parents. He began playing piano at age four, taking lessons from, among others, Nadia Reisenberg. His passion for baseball was shattered with a hand injury that turned him to music. His dream of being a concert pianist was also shattered when his older brother took him to see jazz pianist Teddy Wilson play and later to a concert featuring Benny Goodman. By 14, he was performing jazz professionally around New York City.
As early as 1939, he was working with Bobby Hackett, George Brunies, and Zutty Singleton, as well as writing arrangements for Earl Hines. In 1941 he changed his last name from Epstein to Powell, shortly before joining the Benny Goodman band. His style was rooted in the stride style that was the direct precursor to swing piano. His composition The Earl, dedicated to Earl Fatha Hines, one of hi’s piano heroes, was recorded sans drums. Two years with Goodman, led to a brief stint with the CBS radio band before Uncle Sam came calling in 1943 for World War II where he played with Glenn Miller’s Army Air Force Band to the end.
In Paris, France he played with Django Reinhardt, returned briefly to Goodman, then moved to Hollywood and ventured into providing music for movies and cartoons, played himself in the movie A Song Is Born, appearing along with many other famous jazz players, including Louis Armstrong. After developing muscular dystrophy his traveling musician career ended, so he devoted himself to composing.
During the Fifties, he enrolled at the Yale School of Music, recorded the jazz album Thigamigig, became an educator, and was a founding dean of the California Institute of the Arts in Valencia, California. After serving as Provost of the Institute from 1972 to 1976, he was appointed the Roy O. Disney Professor of Music and taught at the institute until shortly before his death. The Pulitzer Prize-winning American composer, pianist, and educator Mel Powell passed away on April 24, 1998 in Sherman Oaks, California.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Brian Lemon was born on February 11, 1937 in Nottingham, England to parents who were semi-professional dance-band violinists who both worked for the cigarette manufacturer John Player & Sons. Inspired by Fats Waller and later by Art Tatum and Teddy Wilson, he studied the piano with Reg Conroy, a local teacher, and was soon proficient enough to perform in palais bands in his home city.
By the mid-1950s, at 19, he moved to London and joined Freddy Randall’s group. After that, he worked with George Chisholm and Kenny Baker. Over the years, Brian worked with Benny Goodman, Charlie Watts, Scott Hamilton, Buddy Tate, Milt Jackson, Ben Webster, and Digby Fairweather. He led an octet that played songs by Billy Strayhorn.
For 10 years from 1994 Lemon recorded a sequence of 27 albums for Zephyr, with seven as leader. Zephyr was set up by retired businessman John Bune to record Lemon’s work. Adelaide Hall recorded an album with The Brian Lemon Half-Dozen. A rare copy is at the British Library.
After the development of severe osteoarthritis in his handsLemon retired from music around 2005. Pianist and arranger Brian Lemon passed away on October 11, 2014.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Erskine Butterfield, born February 9, 1913 in Syracuse, New York and began playing piano at an early age when his family moved to Newark, New Jersey, where he later studied piano. In the 1930s, he regularly appeared on radio, including WOR in New York City, and played with Noble Sissle’s orchestra. He made his first sound recording and reproduction in 1937 on the Variety record label.
In 1938, he signed with Decca Records for which he recorded over forty titles between 1940 and 1942, many of which were released. Butterfield was called the Singing Vagabond of the Keys by the Chicago Defender in 1939. He was innovative in utilizing black and white musicians together in his combo, which included session musicians such as clarinetist Jimmy Lytell, guitarist Carmen Mastren, and Haig Stevens on bass.
1939 saw Butterfield signing with Joe Davis of Beacon Records, with whom he would maintain a long term relationship. However, in 1943 he was drafted but continued to play in a group, recorded eight titles for Joe Davis under the name Erskine Butterfield and his Blue Boys in ‘44 and cutting V-Discs in 1945.
After World War II, Erskine formed a trio and toured extensively, but his music style was less successful commercially. He recorded for a number of small labels in the late 1940s, after which his recording activity dropped off. In 1956, however, he again recorded a number of titles for Joe Davis with a reformed group, Butterfield and his Blue Boys, including musicians such as Sam “The Man” Taylor on saxophone and Panama Francis on drums. He made appearances on The Nat King Cole Show, The Tony Martin Program and The Jo Stafford Show.
His light swing and traditional piano phrases resulted in some of his songs, such as Lovin’ Man and Because Of You, being used in film soundtracks. Pianist, singer, bandleader and composer Eskine Butterfield, credited with helping to invent the style of cocktail piano, passed away on July 11, 1961 in New York City.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Irving A. Aaronson was born in New York on February 7, 1895 and learned to play the piano from Alfred Sendry at the David Mannes School for music. By age 11 he played accompaniment in silent movie theaters called nickelodeons. In 1921 he co-wrote a hit song, Boo-Hoo-Hoo.
When his band was signed with the Victor label, the band name was changed to Irving Aaronson and his Commanders. From 1926 to 1929, the band recorded for the label and had a notable success with Let’s Misbehave in 1927. The band appeared in Cole Porter’s Broadway musical Paris, in 1928 and broadcasted on KFWB in Hollywood, California in 1929.
In 1935, he starred in the Irving Aaronson Orchestra radio program on NBC. The band toured movie theatres and ballrooms across the US before calling it quits in the mid-1930s, But his band had included at various times musicians such as Phil Saxe, Joe Gillespie, Artie Shaw, Gene Krupa, Tony Pastor, and western movie actor Fuzzy Knight was the band’s drummer in the late Twenties.
By the time he turned 45, Irving was working as a musical director for MGM studios. He remained there in that capacity, voicing for television Mr. Nobody in the MGM’s animation Betty Boop for President and as an assistant to producer Joe Pasternak, until his death from a heart attack. Pianist, bandleader and composer Irving Aaronson passed away in Hollywood, California on March 10, 1963 at the age of 68. His most popular song, The Loveliest Night of the Year, was not recorded with his band but was adapted by Aaronson in 1950 for the Mario Lanza film The Great Caruso.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Floyd George Smith was born on January 25, 1917 in St. Louis, Missouri and learned to play the ukulele as a child before taking up guitar. As a teenager he studied music theory and spent his early career in territory bands, playing in groups such as Eddie Johnson’s Crackerjacks, the Jeter-Pillars Orchestra, the Sunset Royal Orchestra, the Brown Skin Models, and Andy Kirk’s 12 Clouds Of Joy. His composition Floyd’s Guitar Blues, recorded with Andy Kirk’s orchestra in 1939, has been claimed as the first hit record to feature a blues solo on electric guitar.
Enlisting during World War II, Floyd was stationed in Britain as a sergeant and he had the fortune to meet and play with Django Reinhardt in Paris. Following the war, he rejoined Andy Kirk’s band before forming his own small ensembles. He went on to play with Wild Bill Davis in the 1950s, recorded occasionally with drummer Chris Columbo’s bands during the late 1950s and early 1960s. He would later settle in Indianapolis, Indiana and formed his own jazz trio.
The 1970s, had Smith moving into writing songs and record production, working with Dakar/Brunswick Records in Chicago, for which he recorded a few singles. He produced two albums with R&B star, Loleatta Holloway for Aware Records of Atlanta, as well as two unreleased with John Edwards, who later became the lead singer of the Detroit Spinners. He produced two Top 10 R&B hits on Aware with Edwards and Holloway.
In the late 1970s, he produced tracks on several albums with Loleatta Holloway for Gold Mine/Salsoul Records, managed and later married her. Guitarist Floyd Smith, sometimes credited as Floyd Guitar Smith passed away in Indianapolis, Indiana on March 29, 1982 at the age of 65.
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