Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Ralph Peterson, Jr. was born on May 20, 1962 in Pleasantville, New Jersey into a family of drummers, having four uncles and a grandfather as drummers. He began on percussion at age three and was raised in Atlantic City where he played trumpet in high school and worked locally in funk groups. He applied to Livingston College Rutgers for drums but failed the percussion entrance exam and enrolled as a trumpeter instead.
In 1983 he joined Art Blakey’s Jazz messengers as the second drummer, playing with him for several years. He has worked with Terence Blanchard. Donald Harrison, Walter Davis, Tom Harrell, Out of the Blue, Branford Marsalis, David Murray, Craig Harris, James Spaulding, Roy Hargrove, Jon Faddis, Dewey Redman, George Colligan, Stanley Cowell, Mark Shim, Betty Carter, Charles Lloyd, Wynton Marsalis and many, many others.
After living in Canada for some time he returned to Philadelphia where he worked further with Fo’Tet and also recorded as Triangular Too with Uri Caine. He also led a group Hip Pocket with whom he played trumpet. He has recorded 15 albums as a leader and another six with Uri Caine and David Murray.
Drummer Ralph Peterson has taught at Philadelphia’s University of the Arts, currently teaches at Berklee College of Music in Boston, Massachusetts and continues to perform, record and tour.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Stu Williamson was born on May 14, 1933 in Brattleboro, Vermont and is the younger brother of jazz pianist Claude Williamson. The trumpeter relocated to Los Angeles in 1949 and became a regular on the West Coast scene. He played with Woody Herman, Mel Lewis-Pepper Adams Quintet, Elmo Hope, Lennie Niehaus, Billy May and Charlie Barnet the first half of the Fifties.
Williamson played a significant role in Stan Kenton’s Orchestra, Howard Rumsey’s Lighthouse Café All-Stars and Terry Gibbs’s Dream Band. Between 1954 and 1958 Williamson played intermittently with Shelly Manne and was a ubiquitous session player up until 1968.
Although he had a beautiful, rich, round tone and his ability to create melodic solos full of invention, power and clarity gave him the opportunity to front small groups and big bands. Disappearing from the jazz scene after battling drug addiction for much of his life, including for years after he left the music. Trumpeter Stu Williamson passed away on October 1, 1991 in Studio City, California.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
William “Red” Garland was born in Dallas, Texas on May 13, 1923. Showing an early interest in music, he began his musical studies on the clarinet and alto saxophone but switched to the piano. Garland spent copious amounts of time practicing and rapidly developed into a proficient player. A short early career as a welterweight boxer did not seem to hurt his playing hands and he fought a young Sugar Ray Robinson before making the switch to a full-time musician.
Garland’s trademark block chord technique, a style that would influence many forthcoming pianists in the jazz idiom and a commonly borrowed maneuver in jazz piano today, was unique and differed from the methods of earlier block chord pioneers such as George Shearing and Milt Buckner. His block chords were constructed of three notes in the right hand and four notes in the left hand, with the right hand one octave above the left. The right hand played the melody in octaves with a perfect 5th placed in the middle of the octave.
After WWII he performed with Roy Eldridge, Coleman Hawkins, Charlie Parker and Lester Young. He found steady work in Boston, New York and Philadelphia and by the late 40s he was touring with Eddie Vinson at the same time that John Coltrane was in Vinson’s band. His creativity and playing ability continued to improve, though he was still somewhat obscure. By the time he became a pianist for Miles Davis he was influenced by Ahmad Jamal and Charlie Parker’s pianist Walter Bishop.
Red Garland found fame in 1955 when he joined the Miles Davis Quintet along with John Coltrane, Philly Joe Jones and Paul Chambers and together they recorded several Prestige albums such as Workin’, Steamin’ Cookin’ and Relaxin’, that would later influence the free jazz movement. He would go on to play on ‘Round About Midnight and Milestones but would be eventually be fired by Miles.
In 1958 Garland formed his own trio. Among the musicians the trio recorded with Pepper Adams, Nat Adderley, Ray Barretto, Kenny Burrell, Eddie “Lockjaw” Davis, Jimmy Heath, Harold Land, Leroy Vinnegar and many others to numerous to list.
Red released some 46 albums as a leader, recording sessions for Prestige, Fantasy, Galaxy, Jazzland, Keystone, Xanadu, Alfa, Moodsville and New Jazz record labels. He sat in as a sideman for such greats as Arnett Cobb, Art Pepper, John Coltrane and Phil Woods.
Stopping his playing professionally for a number of years in the 1960s when jazz lost popularity to rock and roll, he returned to Dallas to care for his mother. Pianist Red Garland recorded sparsely through the 70s but continued recording and performing until his death of a heart attack on April 23, 1984 at the age of 61.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Mickey Bass was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on May 2, 1943. By the time he was nine years old he had just about every record that ‘Bird’ ever cut, not to mention living in an atmosphere that was permeated by ‘Dizzy Gillespie, Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Sarah Vaughan, Billie Holiday and Miles Davis.
1961 saw Bass matriculating through Howard University in an atmosphere hostile to jazz, failing along with classmates Harold Vick, Marion Brown and Charles Tolliver, due to the playing of jazz being forbidden on campus. Two years later he landed in New York City, getting his early breaks with Hank Mobley, Sonny Rollins and Bennie Green. His first session was with Lee Morgan on The Sixth Sense that included on of his compositions and arrangements of “Mickey’s Tune”.
As an educator from 1975 to 1978, Mickey taught Acoustic Bass & Jazz Improvisation at “The Ellington School of The Arts”, Washington, D.C. and Director of the Jazz Ensemble. He also taught in New York City for the Jazzmobile.
He has performed and recorded with John Coltrane, Charlie Parker, Freddie Hubbard, Art Blakey, Lee Morgan, Jackie McLean, Bobby Timmons, Gloria Lynne, Jimmy McGriff, Curtis Fuller, Hank Mobley, Billy Eckstine, Reuben Wilson, Chico Freeman and John Hicks among others. He led a sextet called The Cooperation, composed A Chant Blu, One For Trane, Meditation, Gayle’s Groove and Siempre Me Amor, and has cut three sessions as a leader for Chiaroscuro and Early Bird labels.
Hard bop bassist Mickey Bass, who was also an arranger and educator who also plays saxophone and has been active on the jazz scene for more than 40 years, continued to perform, compose and record until his transition on February 3, 2022.
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Freddie Douglas Waits was born on April 27, 1943 in Jackson, Mississippi. He played flute early on and majored in flute in at Jackson Street College but soon turned to drums as a profession. His earliest gigs were with blues artists including Memphis Slim and John Lee Hooker followed by performing soul music.
By 1962 Waits was in Detroit playing with the Jimmy Wilkins Orchestra, then the Johnny Winter band. A move to Los Angeles put him with the Gerald Wilson Orchestra before relocating to New York in the mid-‘60s. This period began some of his most important musical collaborations with Sonny Rollins, Andrew Hill, McCoy Tyner, Lee Morgan, Pharoah Sanders, Gene Harris and Max Roach.
Freddie was a founding member of M’Boom, the group Colloquim and during the Eighties played with Bill Dixon and Cecil Taylor. A respected sideman, he never led a recording session. However, he left a legacy of music along with his son, drummer Nasheet Waits.
Hard bop and post-bop drummer Freddie Waits passed away on November 18, 1989 in New York City.
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