Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Harry “Sweets” Edison was born on October 10, 1915 in Columbus, Ohio but spent his early childhood in Kentucky, getting his first introduction to music by his uncle. Moving back to Columbus at age 12, he started playing trumpet with local bands.
In 1933, he became a member of the Jeter-Pillars Orchestra in Cleveland, went on to play with the Mills Blue Rhythm Band followed by Lucky Millinder. In 1937 he moved to New York joining Count Basie’s Orchestra playing alongside Buck Clayton, Lester Young (who named him Sweets), Buddy Tate and Jo Jones among others.
Edison came to prominence in the Basie band as a soloist and as a composer and arranger for the band. He spent 13 years with Basie until the band was temporarily disbanded in 1950. He then pursued a varied career as leader of his own groups, freelancing with other orchestras and traveling with Jazz At The Philharmonic.
In the early 1950s, he settled on the West Coast and became a highly sought-after studio musician, making important contributions to recordings by such artists as Billy Holiday, Frank Sinatra and Ella Fitzgerald. In 1956 he recorded the first of three albums with tenor great Ben Webster.
Through the 60s and 70s Harry worked in many orchestras on TV shows, including Hollywood Palace and The Leslie Uggams Show, specials with Sinatra; prominently featured on the sound track and album of Lady Sings The Blues, was musical director for Redd Foxx, toured Europe and Japan.
Jazz trumpeter Harry “Sweets” Edison, the first tribute Honoree from the Los Angeles Jazz Institute, and twice Los Angeles Jazz Society’s tribute Honoree in 1983 and 1992, passed away on July 27, 1999.
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Daily Dose OF Jazz…
George Wein was born on October 3, 1925 in Boston, Massachusetts. As a youth he was a jazz pianist and while studying at Boston University led a small group, playing professionally around the Boston area. In 1950 he opened a jazz club and record label called Storyville.
In 1954 Newport residents Louis and Elaine Lorillard invited him to organize a festival in their hometown of Newport, Rhode Island, with funding to be provided by them; the subsequent festival was the first outdoor jazz festival in the United States, becoming an annual tradition. Wein went on to start a number of festivals in other cities, including the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, the Playboy Jazz Festival in Los Angeles and the Newport Folk Festival. In the 60s he set up Festival Productions, a company dedicated to promoting large-scale jazz events.
Pioneering the idea of corporate sponsorship, his “Schlitz Salute to Jazz” and “Kool Jazz Festival” were the first jazz events to feature title sponsors. His JVC Jazz Festivals are worldwide hosting New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Paris, Warsaw and Tokyo.
Wein has received a wide array of honors for his work with jazz concerts being honored at the White House by both Presidents Carter and Clinton. He has also received the Patron of the Arts from the Studio Museum in Harlem, France’s Legion d’Honneur and appointed Commandeur de L’Ordre des Arts et Lettres and named a Jazz Master by the National Endowment for the Arts to name a few.
He has written his autobiography, Myself Among Others: A Life in Music, received honorary degrees from the Berklee College of Music and the Rhode Island College of Music, is a Lifetime Honorary Trustee of Carnegie Hall and sits as a distinguished member of the Board of Directors Advisory committee of The Jazz Foundation of America.
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Roy Ayers was born on September 10, 1940 in Los Angeles, California and grew up in the epicenter of southern California Black music scene known as South Park, now called South Central. He received his first set of mallets at age five from Lionel Hampton thus leading him to the vibraphone.
He studied music attending Central Avenue area schools Wadsworth elementary, Nevins Middle and Thomas Jefferson High that also graduated Dexter Gordon. He became part of the West Coast jazz scene in the early ‘60s, played withCurtis Amy as well as Herbie Mann for four years and recorded his first album West Coast Vibes in 1963 and several albums for Atlantic Records as a post-bopper. It was during this period that he became exposed to new styles of music outside bebop.
The 70s saw the advent of jazz funk and Roy was there to help pioneer its rise. With highly successful soundtracks like “Coffy” Ayers went on to record “Mystic Voyage”, “Everybody Loves The Sunshine”, “Running Away” and a string of hits throughout the decade. By 1980 he had teamed with Fela Kuti releasing Afrobeat “Music of Many Colors, went on to produce Sylvia Striplin’s “Give Me Your Love”, and released several albums on the Ichiban label. He collaborated on the Stolen Moments: Red, Hot+ Cool project, turned his attention to house music, founded two record labels – Uno Melodic and Gold Mink, and currently is the feature of the documentary called the Roy Ayers Project.
Roy Ayers, vibraphonist, vocalist, keyboardist, producer, jazz, funk and soul composer has recorded over 50 albums during his long and prolific career and he continues to perform, record and tour.
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Daily Dose OF Jazz…
George Mraz was born Jiří Mráz on September 9, 1944 in Pisek Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia, now the Czech Republic. He began his musical studies on violin at age seven and started playing jazz in high school on alto saxophone. He attended the Prague Conservatory in 1961 studying bass violin and graduating in 1966. During that time he was performing with the top jazz groups in Prague.
His first introduction to jazz was through the Voice Of America radio and Louis Armstrong which opened him to a vast new world of possibilities across the ocean. After finishing his studies George moved to Munich and played clubs and concerts throughout Germany and Middle Europe with Benny Bailey, Carmel Jones, Leo Wright, Mal Waldron, Hampton Hawes, Jan Hammer and others.
Mraz was greatly influenced by Ray Brown, Scott LaFaro, Paul Chambers, and Ron Carter. In 1968 he ventured to Boston on a scholarship to the Berklee School of Music and played at Lennie’s on the Turnpike and the Jazz Workshop with such artists as Clark Terry, Herbie Hancock, Joe Williams and Carmen McRae. By ’69 he was playing with Dizzy Gillespie and then on the road with Oscar Peterson for two years followed by a six- year residency with the Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Orchestra.
From the late seventies on he worked with Stan Getz, New York Jazz Quartet, Chet Baker, Hank Jones, Paul Motian, Zoot Sims, Bill Evans, John Abercrombie, Joe Lovano, Carmen McRae, Joe Henderson, Tommy Flanagan and the list of jazz luminaries is to long to elaborate. He was a member of the New York Jazz Quartet and Quest. Bassist and alto saxophonist George Mraz continues to perform, record and tour.
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Jerry Dodgion, born August 29, 1932 in Richmond, California, played alto saxophone in middle school and began working around the San Francisco area in the Fifties. He played in bands with Rudy Salvini, John Coppola, Chuck Travis and Gerald Wilson. He worked with the Vernon Alley Quartet, accompanying Billie Holiday in 1955.
Dodgion also played with Benny Carter and Red Norvo in the 50s, Benny Goodman and Oliver Nelson in the Sixties, Thad Jones, and Mel Lewis from 1965-1979, as well as Herbie Hancock, Duke Pearson, Blue Mitchell, Count Basie and Marian McPartland, as well as Etta Jones, Johnny Hammond, Yusef Lateef, Shirley Scott and numerous others.
A long career as a sideman, Jerry recorded up to 2004 only two dates as leader or co-leader: two tracks in 1955 for Fantasy Records with Sonny Clark on piano and an album in 1958 for World Pacific together with Charlie Mariano.
Dodgion’s first true release as a bandleader came in 2004 with an ensemble called The Joy of Sax, featuring saxophonists Frank Wess, Brad Leali, Dan Block, Jay Brandford, Mike LeDonne, Dennis Irwin and Joe Farnsworth. The saxophonist and flautist continues to perform and record.
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