Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Eli Robinson was born on June 23, 1908 in Greenville, Georgia. After working in Cincinnati, Ohio in bands led by Speed Webb, Zack Whyte and also worked with McKinney’s Cotton Pickers. In 1935 he made his first recordings with Blanche Calloway.

1936 saw Eli moving to New York City, where he became a member of the Teddy Hill and Willie Bryant big bands and the Mills Blue Rhythm Band. Three years later he played with Roy Eldridge and joined the big band of Lucky Millinder.

Beginning in 1941, he spent several years as a member of the Count Basie Orchestra. He returned to working with Millinder, then joined Buddy Tate in 1954.

Trombonist and arranger Eli Robinson never recorded as a leader, and passed away on December 24, 1972 in New York City.

More Posts: arranger,history,instrumental,jazz,music,trombone

Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Bernard Francis McGann was born June 22, 1937 in Granville, Sydney, Australia. He first came to prominence as part of a loose alliance of modern jazz musicians who performed at the El Rocco Jazz Cellar in Kings Cross, Sydney in the late 1950s and early 1960s. He had an enduring collaboration with drummer John Pochee.

During the 1960s McGann performed with rock and pop groups and as a session musician. In the 1970s he was a member of the Sydney rock-soul band Southern Comfort, and in 1974, he was a founding member of jazz group, The Last Straw. Between 1980 and 1982, he played with visiting US jazz artists, including Freddie Hubbard, Lester Bowie, and Dave Liebman.

Studying in New York on a grant from The Australia Council in 1983, Bernie went on to tour in 1988 both Australia and the USA with the Australian Jazz Orchestra, and was a featured artist in award-winning documentary film Beyond El Rocco.

Alto saxophonist Bernie McGann, who won several awards including four ARIA Music Awards between 1993 and 2001, passed away on September 17, 2013, following complications from heart surgery. He was 76.

More Posts: bandleader,history,instrumental,jazz,music,saxophone

Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Chuck Anderson was born in Chicago, Illinois on June 21, 1947. He began guitar lessons at the age of 14 and by 1963, he was teaching guitar and playing in a band.

At the age of 19, he began studies with Dennis Sandole, who was notable for his association with John Coltrane, James Moody, Michael Brecker, Pat Martino and Jim Hall.

In 1969, Anderson was offered the staff guitar job at the Latin Casino in Cherry Hill, New Jersey. The Latin was a popular venue before gambling came to Atlantic City. During that period, he accompanied and performed with Bobby Darin, Billy Eckstine, and Peggy Lee, playing fourteen shows a week.

By 1973 Chuck had returned to jazz and formed the Chuck Anderson Trio with Al Stauffer on bass and Ray Deeley on drums. Four years later, he was the staff guitar job at Valley Forge Music Fair in Devon, Pennsylvania.

During the years leading up to the Eighties he worked with Nancy Wilson, Michel LeGrand, and Anthony Newley. In the years that followed, he concentrated on teaching, composing, and session work.

He has written a column, The Art and Science of Jazz, for the web magazine All About Jazz. Guitarist, educator, composer, and author Chuck Anderson continues his career in music.

More Posts: author,composer,educator,guitar,history,instrumental,jazz,music

Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Bob Howard was born Howard Joyner on June 20, 1906 in Newton, Massachusetts, He began singing in New York City night clubs in the mid-1920s and began recording in 1931 under his real name for Columbia Records.

Under the name Bob Howard, he played New York’s Park Central Hotel, Famous Door, Hickory House and other clubs as well as theaters. Signed to Decca Records in 1934 he recorded a series of hot small group swing records between 1935 and 1938. His studio groups included Benny Carter, Buster Bailey, Rex Stewart, Ben Webster, Teddy Wilson, Russell Procope, Cecil Scott, Cozy Cole, Bunny Berigan, Artie Shaw, and Babe Russin among others. Unfortunately on these Decca recording sessions he did not play piano, only sang.

Embarking on several European tours as a solo performer in the middle and late 1930s, Bob also had his own radio series in New York. From 1936 to 1947 he performed in a handful of short films, and 1959 saw him acting in an episode of Perry Mason.

In 1948, Howard hosted The Bob Howard Show on CBS, making him the first Black man to host a regularly broadcast network TV show. The program was cancelled after 13 episodes. He also was a regular performer on Sing It Again on CBS-TV in 1950 – 1951.

Relocating to Las Vegas, Nevada and Los Angeles, California for a time, he returned East. Pianist and vocalist Bob Howard  passed away on December 3, 1986 in the Bronx, New York.

More Posts: bandleader,history,instrumental,jazz,music,vocal

Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Albert King was born on June 19, 1912 in Panama and raised in Kingston, Jamaica where he attended Alpha Boys School. During the 1930s he led his own band, Bertie King and his Rhythm Aces, one of Jamaica’s foremost dance orchestras.

Leaving the island in 1936, he sailed to England on the same ship as his friend Jiver Hutchinson. Once in London he joined Ken Snakehips Johnson’s West Indian Dance Band, then played with Leslie Hutchinson’s band. He also worked with visiting American musicians including Benny Carter, George Shearing and Coleman Hawkins.

In 1937, while in the Netherlands he recorded four sides in the Netherlands with Benny Carter, and the next year he recorded with Django Reinhardt in Paris, France. In 1939 he joined the Royal Navy. He left the Navy in 1943 and formed his own band, also working and recording with Nat Gonella.

Returning to Jamaica in 1951, he assembled his own band, the Casa Blanca Orchestra, playing in the mento style. With no Jamaican record labels at this time, he arranged for his recordings to be pressed in a plant in Lewisham, England, owned by Decca Records. Bertie returned a number of times to the United Kingdom, working and recording with Kenny Baker, George Chisholm, Chris Barber, Kenny Graham and Humphrey Lyttelton. During this period in his career he toured Asia and Africa with his own band and played and recorded in London with some of the leading Trinidadian calypsonians.

King went on to lead the Jamaica Broadcasting Corporation house band in the 1950s. His sidemen included Ernest Ranglin and Tommy Mowatt. He recorded extensively with this outfit, until 1965 when he moved to the USA. His last known public performance was in New York City in 1967. Clarinetist and saxophonist Bertie King passed away in 1981.

More Posts: bandleader,clarinet,history,instrumental,jazz,music