Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Eldon Payne was born in Morristown, Tennessee on April 25, 1957. He graduated cum laude from the University of Tennessee in Knoxville with a B.S. in Business Administration in 1979. Then he moved to Tampa, Florida in the spring of 1980.
Retiring from Delta Air Lines with twenty five years of service in 2008, Eldon performed during that period with the University of Tennessee Campus Band, Tampa Bay Buccaneer Band, Shades of Blue, Boulevard Jazz Orchestra, The Mostly Pops Orchestra, Helios Jazz Orchestra, Cigar City Big Band, Swing Sound Orchestra, Frankie D. New York Orchestra, Clearwater Community Jazz Band, Sun City Center Big Band, George Carroll Big Band, Gulf Bay Big Band, Ten O’clock Big Band, Frank Parsons Band, Ed Geimer Big Band, Encore IV Big Band, and The Sarasota Jazz Project.
Over the course of his career Payne has performed at several Florida clubs and festivals as well as backing the likes of Margo Rey, Denise Moore, Kathy Kosins, Michael Lynche, Bryan Hughes, Lorri Hafer, Chuck Wansley, Whitney James, Alexis Cole and the late Kevin Mahagony.
Trombonist Eldon Payne, who never recorded as a leader, continues to perform and record as a sideman and studio musician.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Walt Yoder was born on April 21, 1914 in Hutchinson, Kansas. A piano player from age ten, he switched to bass as a teenager. Early in the 1930s he worked in the bands of Joe Haymes, Tommy Dorsey, and Jimmy Dorsey.
Yoder played with Woody Herman in the Isham Jones band in the middle of the 1930s. After this ensemble dissolved in 1936, Herman formed a new group with five of Jones’s former sidemen, including Walt. He remained with Herman through 1942 and played with him again in 1947-48.
Following his tenure with Herman, Yoder played with Ben Pollack, Russ Morgan, Bob Crosby, and Red Nichols. He did some works as a bandleader and in the studios near Los Angeles later in his life, playing into the 1970s.
Double bassist Walt Yoder, best known for his association with Woody Herman, died on December 2, 1978 in Los Angeles, California.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Roy Assaf was born on April 10, 1982 in Beersheba, Israel and studied at Tel Aviv Conservatory. Coming to America he continued his studies at Berklee College of Music in Boston, Massachusetts and then migrated to New York City and while earning his Master of Art at the Manhattan School of Music, he established his reputation as one of the most sought-after young pianists in the New York jazz scene.
After a meeting with legendary bassist and producer John Lee soon found Roy touring around the world and playing the most prestigious festivals, clubs, and concert halls with the Dizzy Gillespie All Stars, a band that included James Moody, Jimmy Heath, Paquito D’Rivera, Roy Hargrove, Lewis Nash, Randy Brecker, Antonio Hart, and other jazz masters.
Before long, Assaf was getting calls from some of the world’s most influential contemporary jazz bands that included the Slide Hampton Sextet, The Mingus Big Band, Steve Turre’s bands, Roberta Gambarini Quartet, David Sanborn Group, Claudio Roditi Quartet, and many others.
In 2012, he released his debut album, Respect, on Jazz Legacy Productions accompanied by bassist Reuben Rogers and drummer Greg Hutchinson. The following year he formed a trio with Raviv Markovitz on bass and Jake Goldbas on drums and together they began to establish the unique voice of the Roy Assaf Trio.
Pianist and composer Roy Asssaf, who has released two albums and has won several awards including one from ASCAP, a Eubie Blake and two from DownBeat and others, continues to perform across the globe.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Arne Gunnar Valter Hülphers was born April 4, 1904 in Trollhättan, Sweden. Early in his career he played at the club Felix-Kronprinsen from 1924 to 1927, and played in dance bands into the early 1930s.
He founded his own ensemble in 1934 which became one of Sweden’s most important jazz big bands. They toured Europe and recorded until 1940. Sidemen in his group included Miff Görling, Zilas Görling, and Thore Jederby.
Later in his career, he concentrated more on popular musical styles; he led an orchestra in which Fred Bertelmann played. Pianist and bandleader Arne Hülphers died on July 24, 1978 in Norrköping Municipality, Sweden.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
William James Finegan was born on April 3, 1917 in Newark, New Jersey and grew up in a household full of piano players. While growing up in Rumson, New Jersey, he attended Rumson-Fair Haven High School, and taught orchestration to schoolmate Nelson Riddle. He studied piano with Elizabeth Connelly, piano and musicianship with flautist/alto saxophonist Rudolph John Winthrop., and spent time studying at the Paris Conservatory.
He had his first professional experience leading his own piano trio before being offered a job as a staff arranger for Glenn Miller after Tommy Dorsey bought a copy of his Lonesome Road and recommended him. Finegan remained with Miller until 1942 and arranged such hits as Little Brown Jug, Sunrise Serenade, Song of the Volga Boatmen, Stardust, A Nightingale Sang in Berkley Square and Jingle Bells. He arranged these songs in collaboration with Glenn Miller, but also arranged music for films in which the band appeared in the early Forties. He then worked off and on for Tommy Dorsey from 1942 to 1952.
In the late Forties Bill studied in New York City, then lived in Europe from 1948-1950 where he studied with Darius Milhaud and Valérie Soudères. After returning to the States in 1952, along with Eddie Sauter formed an ensemble, the Sauter-Finegan Orchestra, which remained active until 1957.
Following this collaboration, Finegan found work in advertising, writing music for commercials. In the Seventies, he arranged for the Glenn Miller Orchestra and Mel Lewis’s orchestra. He taught jazz at the University of Bridgeport in the 1980s. He wrote arrangements for cornetist Warren Vaché and the vocal group Chanticleer until his death in 2008.
Pianist, composer and arranger Bill Finegan died from pneumonia on June 4, 2008 in Bridgeport, Connecticut at the age 91.
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