Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Sam Butera was born on August 17, 1927 and raised in an Italian-American family in New Orleans, Louisiana where his father ran a butcher shop and played guitar in his spare time. Hearing the saxophone at seven for the first time at a wedding, with his father’s encouragement he began to play.
His professional career blossomed early, beginning with a stint in big band drummer Ray McKinley’s orchestra directly after high school. At eighteen Butera was named one of America’s top upcoming jazzmen by Look magazine and by his early twenties, he had landed positions in the orchestras of Tommy Dorsey, Joe Reichman, and Paul Gayten.
As the big band era wound down Sam re-settled in New Orleans, where he played regularly at the 500 Club for four years. The club, owned by Louis Prima’s brother, was the connection that led him to his Las Vegas, Nevada collaborations with Prima and Keely Smith.
Prima transitioned from big band to Vegas and the Sahara and called Butera to assemble a band posthaste. They drove from New Orleans to Las Vegas and without a name on opening night in 1954 when Prima asked Butera before a live audience he responded spontaneously, “The Witnesses”, and the name stuck, remaining the bandleader for more than twenty years.
Noted for his raucous playing style, his off-color humor, and the innuendo in his lyrics, he also wrote arrangements, composed music. Sam is widely regarded as the inspiration for the vocal style of fellow New Orleans-born jazz singer Harry Connick, Jr. He went on to appear on television and in movies. Tenor saxophonist Sam Butera transitioned from pneumonia in Las Vegas on June 3, 2009 at the age of 81.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Jesse Alexandria Stacy was born on August 11, 1904 in Bird’s Point, Missouri, a small town across the Mississippi River from Cairo, Illinois. His first piano teacher was Mabel Irene Bailey, who played piano for silent movies. In 1918 Stacy moved to Cape Girardeau, Missouri. He received his only formal music training with Clyde Brandt, a professor of piano and violin at Southeast Missouri State Teachers College, now Southeast Missouri State University while holding down a job sweeping Clark’s Music Store.
By 1920, Stacy was playing piano in Peg Meyer’s jazz ensemble at Cape Girardeau High School, the Bluebird Confectionery, and the Sweet Shop. Schoolmates called them the Agony Four. By 1921, the band was known as Peg Meyer’s Melody Kings and started touring the Mississippi River on the Majestic and other riverboats.[6]
The early 1920s saw Jess moving to Chicago, Illinois where he performed with Paul Mares, leader of the New Orleans Rhythm Kings, playing Chicago-style jazz. In 1935, Benny Goodman asked him to join his band, then moved to New York City, and spent 1935–39 with the Benny Goodman Orchestra, including a Carnegie Hall concert in 1938, where he played an unplanned piano solo during Sing, Sing, Sing (With a Swing). After leaving the Goodman Orchestra, he joined the Bob Crosby Orchestra and the Bob Crosby Bob-Cats.
Moving to Los Angeles, California in 1950 his career declined to club work and after a drunken woman spilled beer in his lap he announced he was quitting the music business and retired from public performances. He worked as a salesman, warehouseman, postman, and for Max Factor cosmetics before being rediscovered. He played for Nelson Riddle on the soundtrack of The Great Gatsby in 1974, was invited to play at the Newport Jazz Festival in New York and was asked to record twice for Chiaroscuro, in 1974 and 1977, Stacy Still Swings.
After his brief revival in the 1970s, he again retired from music and lived with his third wife, Patricia Peck Stacy, for forty-five years. Pianist Jess Stacy ,who won the DownBeat magazine piano poll in 1940 and was inducted posthumously into the Big Band and Jazz Hall of Fame in 1996, transitioned from congestive heart failure in Los Angeles on January 1, 1995.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Dan “Slamfoot” Minor was born August 10, 1909 in Dallas, Texas, and played trombone for a local church orchestra in his teens before joining local band the Blue Moon Chasers. In 1927, his first major professional engagement was as a member of Walter Page’s Blue Devils.
In 1929 Minor joined the Blues Syncopaters led by Ben Smith, and during this period he also worked in bands led by Earl Dykes, Gene Coy, Lloyd Hunter and Alphonse Trent. By 1931 he joined the Bennie Moten band, remaining after Moten’s death in 1935, when its leadership was taken over by Count Basie, and stayed with the Basie orchestra until 1941. During that period he performed at the From Spirituals to Swing concerts in New York City in 1938 and 1939.
However, Dan tended to be overshadowed by other trombonists such as Benny Morton and Vic Dickenson, and rarely took solos. He joined the Buddy Johnson band in 1942, and also played around that time with Cab Calloway. He worked with Mercer Ellington in 1945, and also recorded and played with Lucky Millinder and Willie Bryant.
After the 1940s, through to the 1960s, he continued to perform occasionally on a freelance basis. Trombonist Dan Minor transitioned in New York City on April 11, 1982 at the age of 72.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Wik Horn was born on August 9, 1943 in Amsterdam, Netherlands. Classically trained piano education for 4 years starting at 10, when he was 14 he started to play classic jazz with his younger brother trumpeter Fred.
After playing in several school bands he formed his first real band in 1965,The Court Town Rhythm Kings. The band played authentic old jazz in the way of Oliver, Morton, early Armstrong, Williams, Beiderbecke and Half Way House.
The band broke up in 1972 due to moving members and Wik moved from The Hague to resettle in Amsterdam. There along with his brother they founded in 1973 as Madam Zenja and Her Jazz Horns in 1973, together with singer Zenja Damm, recording two albums, Changes and Was It A Dream. From 1974 to 1980 he was president of the oldest and famous Jazzclub in Holland, the Haarlemse Jazz Club. Many of the great American musicians who came to Europe and Amsterdam performed there.
Settling in the little village of Leiderdorp between Amsterdam and The Hague, he spent some time in advertising and public relations. He started the jazz club De Wagenschuur from 1984 to 1994 and a new band, Swingin’ Crash, that started as a little swing ensemble but grew within a year into a small big band.
He went on to write charts and arrangements for the band and well as compose, song texts and write a little booklet for special occasions like the 60th anniversary of the The Hague Jazz Club. Pianist Wik Horn retired but has continued to have a life filled with music, writing and painting.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Warren Covington was born on August 7, 1921 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and played with Isham Jones in 1939, then with Les Brown in 1945-46 and Gene Krupa in late 1946. Following this he became a staff musician for CBS radio.
By the end of the decade he was working with Ralph Flanagan and again in the mid Fifties. He played briefly with Tommy Dorsey but by 1956 he replaced Eddie Grady as leader of the Commanders, a Decca recording and touring band which lasted until the middle of 1957. Covington recorded two albums and one single with this band.
Post Tommy Dorsey’s sudden death in 1956, the band continued under the direction of Jimmy Dorsey. However, Tommy’s estate took back his arrangements and approached Warren to form a new Tommy Dorsey band, which he led, touring and recording for Decca, into 1961. Among his hits with the Dorsey band was Tea for Two Cha Cha, which sold over one million copies and was awarded a gold disc.
A player who also occasionally played, with a variety of the baritone horn, baritone and tenor saxophone, Covington participated in the big bands of Charles Mingus, Randy Weston, Bobby Hackett, and George Benson on recordings, and also a number of film soundtracks.
Big band trombonist Warren Covington, who was also an active session player, arranger and bandleder, transitioned on August 24, 1999 in New York.
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