Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Charles Pervis Harris was born in Alexandria, Virginia and raised in Baltimore, Maryland on January 9, 1916. He studied violin before switching to bass in high school. He played professional dates while studying education at what is now Coppin State College. He went on to work at the Royal Theater in Baltimore after graduating.
Joining Lionel Hampton in 1941, he played with him for several years and was one of three bassists in Hampton’s ensemble, one of his bandmates being Charles Mingus. Harris did some recording with Dizzy Gillespie in the 1940s as well. Fatigued from touring he returned to Baltimore in 1949.
Soon after he worked in a band called Three Strikes and a Miss, again at the Royal Theater. While working there Nat King Cole heard him and asked him to join his trio. During his tenure with the vocalist, Charlie performed on some of Cole’s best-known tunes, such as Unforgettable, Route 66, It’s Only A Paper Moon, Sweet Lorraine and Mona Lisa. During the 1956-57 season he performed on Nat’s tv show on NBC.
After leaving the band he returned to Baltimore and remained there, playing, teaching, and working as a furniture salesman. Double bassist Charlie Harris died from cancer on September 9, 2003 at Bon Secours Hospital.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Bobby Battle was born on January 8, 1944 and grew up in Detroit, Michigan. He moved to New York City in 1968, playing with Roland Kirk and Pharoah Sanders shortly after his arrival.
He studied at New York University from 1972 to 1975. He played with Don Pullen and Sam Rivers through the late 1970s, and worked often with Arthur Blythe in the 1980s and 1990s. He also worked with Kenny Dorham, Sonny Stitt, and Sonny Fortune. He worked as a duo with Jimmy Ponder in 1987.
Battle’s only release as a leader is The Offering, issued in 1990 on Mapleshade, on which Battle leads a quartet with David Murray, Larry Willis, and Santi Debriano. As a sideman he recorded four albums with Arthur Blythe and four with Don Pullen.
Drummer Bobby Battle, who occasionally played saxophone, died on December 6, 2019 in his hometown.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
William “Keg” Purnell was born on January 7, 1915 in Charleston, West Virginia. He studied at West Virginia State College from 1932 to 1934, and played with the Campus Revellers while there. He toured for a year with King Oliver in 1934, then freelanced with his own trio in the late 1930s. In 1939, he worked with Thelonious Monk.
By the end of the decade and into the 1940s Keg was playing in the bands of Benny Carter, Claude Hopkins, and Eddie Heywood. He also recorded with Rex Stewart, Teddy Wilson, and Willie “The Lion” Smith. Late in his career he played with Snub Mosley in 1957 and subsequently on.
Drummer Keg Purnell, whose influences included Chick Webb and Big Sid Catlett died on June 25, 1965 at the age of 50.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Vernon Brown was born on January 6, 1907 in Venice, Illinois. He began his career as a jazz trombonist playing in St. Louis, Missouri with Frankie Trumbauer in 1925, and then moved through a variety of groups at the end of the 1920s and into the 1930s, including those of Jean Goldkette, Benny Meroff, and Mezz Mezzrow.
In 1937 Brown joined Benny Goodman’s orchestra, remaining there until 1940. While only soloing occasionally with Goodman, this association got him well known. The Forties saw him performing with Artie Shaw, Jan Savitt, Muggsy Spanier, and the Casa Loma Orchestra. In the 1940s, Brown switched focus from swing to Dixieland, playing often in studio recordings and working with Sidney Bechet.
Brown performed with Louis Armstrong and his All Stars for the ninth Cavalcade of Jazz concert in 1953 at Wrigley Field in Los Angeles, California. The concert also featured that day were Roy Brown and his Orchestra, Don Tosti and His Mexican Jazzmen, Earl Bostic, Nat “King” Cole, and Shorty Rogers and his Orchestra.
He led his own band in the Pacific Northwest in 1950 and did reunion tours with Goodman in that decade. He worked with Tony Parenti in 1963, and remained a studio musician into the early-1970s
Trombonist Vernon Brown, who later in his life lived in Roslyn Heights, New York, died in Los Angeles on May 18, 1979.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Oscar Klein was born on January 5, 1930 in Graz, Austria. His family fled the Nazis when he was young. He became known for older jazz like swing and Dixieland.
In the early Sixties he joined the famous Dutch Swing College Band in the Netherlands as first trumpeter and he is to be found on several of their recordings.
He played with Lionel Hampton, Joe Zawinul, Jerry Ricks and others. In 1996 he was honored by the Austrian President Thomas Klestil
Trumpeter Oscar Klein, who also played clarinet, harmonic and swing guitar, died on December 12, 2006 in Baden-Württemberg, Germany.
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