Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Bernard Sylvester Addison was born on April 15, 1905 in Annapolis, Maryland. At an early age, he learned mandolin and violin, and after moving to Washington, D.C. in 1920 he played banjo, initially with Claude Hopkins.
Moving to New York City he worked with Sonny Thompson and recorded for the first time in 1924. During the 1920s, he dropped the banjo for the acoustic guitar. The 1920s and 1930s saw Bernard playing with Louis Armstrong, Adelaide Hall, Fletcher Henderson, Bubber Miley, Art Tatum, and Fats Waller. Addison recorded with Red Allen, Coleman Hawkins, Horace Henderson, Freddie Jenkins, Sara Martin, Jelly Roll Morton, and Mamie Smith.
In 1936, John Mills of the Mills Brothers died, and Addison replaced him on guitar. For two years he toured and recorded with the Mills Brothers, increasing his popularity. After departing the Mills Brothers, he had little trouble finding work. He went on to record with Benny Carter and Mezz Mezzrow.
He played with Stuff Smith and recorded with Billie Holiday. In 1940, he recorded with Louis Armstrong and Sidney Bechet. He began to lead bands until he was drafted during World War II. In the late 1950s, he reunited with Henderson and played guitar for the Ink Spots. He performed at the Newport Jazz Festival with Eubie Blake in 1960 and recorded a solo album as a leader, Pete’s Last Date, and unfortunately was reissued under the name of saxophonist Pete Brown.
Guitarist Bernard Addison, who spent the remaining thirty years of his career teaching, died on December 18, 1990 at 85 in Rockville Centre, New York.
More Posts: guitar,history,instrumental,jazz,music
Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Greg Fugal was born on April 14, 1991 and started playing when he was twelve, receiving a zephyr saxophone from his great aunt. He began on alto then eventually played on all three saxophones.
He initially learned the classical genre but was introduced to jazz in his junior high years. Fugal became involved in a band that was organized outside of high school and called themselves the Rum House Jazz Mafia or R.H.J.M. as a baritone player in that band.
Having moved several times Greg played at three different high schools. Those schools being Uintah, Lehi, and Westlake high school, all based in Utah. During his senior year he was first chair and section leader and was rewarded the Louis Armstrong Jazz Award.
Graduated from Westlake High School in 2010, saxophonist Greg Fugal now plays for The Utah Valley University Jazz Band.
More Posts: history,instrumental,jazz,music,saxophone
Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Matt Lavelle was born on April 11, 1970 in Paterson, New Jersey and began his music career with Hildred Humphries, a swing era veteran who played with Count Basie and Billie Holiday.
Playing in ensembles led by Sabir Mateen since 2002, three years later Matt began study with Ornette Coleman. He has been a member of the Bern Nix Quartet since 2010 and recorded with Giuseppi Logan the same year.
In 2011 he created the 12 Houses Orchestra. Lavelle is also a visual artist inspired by his Grandfather Fritz Kluber. He is author of the Substack No Sound Left Behind. Matt published a book titled New York City Subway Drama and Beyond, in 2011. In 2013 he published a short story titled The Jazz Musician’s Tarot Deck.
He has recorded nineteen albums as a leader, and another forty-five as a sideman with Nix and Logan as well as Sumari, Eye Contact, Daniel Carter, Bern Nix, Giuseppi Logan, Matana Roberts, William Hooker, Francois Grillot, Steve Swell, Sabir Mateen, Ras Moshe, Assif Tsahar, William Parker, Charles Waters, Barry Chabala, Earth People, Allen Lowe, D3, Julie Lyon, Tom Cabrera, The Cooperative Sound, Stars Like Fleas, Eric Plaks, and Pete Dennis.
Trumpeter Matt Lavelle, who also plays flugelhorn, alto and bass clarinet, continues to perform, record and tour.
More Posts: author,bandleader,clarinet,flugelhorn,history,instrumental,jazz,music,trumpet
Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Jerzy “Duduś” Matuszkiewicz was born on April 10, 1928 in Jasło, Poland and began playing jazz as a youth. He founded a jazz club at the YMCA in Kraków, Poland at age 20. and played with the orchestra of Kazimierz Turewicz.
A music enthusiasts club, Melomani, was founded in 1947 at the Łódź YMCA, a hang-out of nonconformist thinkers during the late 1940s. Moving to Łódź, Poland to study at the new Łódź Film School, he became part of the club and joined the sessions. After only a few concerts, the YMCA was closed due to promoting imperialist ideology using jazz music.
Jerzy founded and led a band in 1950, playing saxophones and clarinet with Marek Szczerbiński-Sart, trumpeter Andrzej “Idon” Wojciechowski, drummer Witold “Dentox” Sobociński, Marian and Tadeusz Suchocki and pianist Andrzej Trzaskowski and bassist Witold Kujawsk. Being separated from Western jazz by the Stalinist regime, they played a repertoire that did not compare to Western standards.
The band was offered space to practise at the Film School, performed informal concerts at the Film School, as well as in bars and private events, once a week. When they received an invitation to play a concert in Warsaw, Poland at the Academy of Fine Arts, they named themselves Melomani.
In 1952, pianist Krzysztof Komeda joined the band and expanded their performance reach. They played at the first jazz festival in Sopot, Poland in 1956. 1958 saw them as the first Polish jazz band invited to perform at the National Philharmonic in Warsaw. The group disbanded that same year.
Until 1964 he performed both in Poland and abroad. The following year he began to mainly compose and conduct music for movies and commercials. Moving to Warsaw with his wife, Grażyna, saxophonist, pianist, composer and bandleader Jerzy Matuszkiewicz died on July 31, 2021 at 93.
More Posts: composer,history,instrumental,jazz,music,piano,saxophone
Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Michael James Hashim was born on April 9, 1956 in Geneva, New York. He began playing saxophone while in elementary school, then played with Phil Flanigan and Chris Flory as a high schooler. He worked with both into the middle 1970s.
In 1976 he toured with Muddy Waters and played with the Widespread Depression Orchestra, which he would later lead. Michael formed his own quartet in 1979, which has included Dennis Irwin, Kenny Washington, and Mike LeDonne as sidemen. In 1980 he toured with Clarence Gatemouth Brown.
Hashim played in New York City in the early 1980s with Roy Eldridge, Jo Jones, Brooks Kerr, Sonny Greer, and Jimmie Rowles. From 1987 he worked often with Judy Carmichael. The Nineties saw him touring China in 1992, and was one of the first jazz musicians ever to do so.
He worked with Flory through the 1990s, and toured North America and Europe regularly. In 1990 with his quartet he recorded Lotus Blossom, an album of Billy Strayhorn songs. In 1998 expanded this ensemble into 11 members as the Billy Strayhorn Orchestra.
Alto and soprano saxophonist Michael Hashim has been a member of the Raymond Scott Orchestra, a mainstay in the George Gee Orchestra, performs with The Microscopic Septet and continues to record as a leader and sideman..
More Posts: history,instrumental,jazz,music,saxophone