Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Neal Hefti was born on October 29, 1922 in Hastings, Nebraska, outside Omaha and was a child of the jazz age. His mother, a music teacher, started piano lessons at the age of 3, becoming well versed in theory and harmony by the time he took up the trumpet at 11. He was already writing arrangements, having taught himself by trial and error in high school and was supplying local dance bands with music well before he graduated. After winning several school prizes, he was to start making a living as a jazz trumpeter in the big bands of Charlie Barnet and Charlie Spivak.
After travelling to California with Spivak to make a film, Hefti stayed on the West Coast, joined Woody Herman’s band as a trumpeter in 1944 and his arranging began to take precedence over his playing. Hefti married, moved back to New York and began writing in every genre and for all sizes of ensembles, becoming adept at using small forces to create a big sound. He arranged for Count Basie both in octet and big band configurations making Neal became one of his principal writers. He went on to write numerous compositions for Harry James in the late 40s and 50s designed to feature the leader’s trumpet and the band’s star drummer Buddy Rich.
Hefti fronted his own band in the Fifties, contributed to some of Frank Sinatra’s most popular albums, including “Frank Sinatra and Swinging Brass”, which he also produced. From the early 1960s onwards, he was increasingly involved in the world of films and television, winning a Grammy award for his Batman theme. Hefti was a brilliant composer and arranger who created the scores for many other television shows and films, notably the two Neil Simon movies The Odd Couple and Barefoot in the Park. His score for Harlow included the song “Girl Talk” that has become a jazz standard.
However, in 1978 after his wife’s passing, he ceased to write and record new music. Nevertheless, because Basie continued to commission other writers to replicate his style, his effect on big band arranging and on film scores remained extremely influential. Trumpeter, composer, songwriter and arranger Neal Hefti, who contributed to the genres of swing and big band along with scores for the film and television industries, passed away in Toluca Lake, California on October 11, 2008.
Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Andrew W. Bey was born October 28, 1939 in Newark, New Jersey. Although he received piano and singing lessons later on, he began playing by ear at the age of three. In the early 50s Andy got his initial professional exposure working on a television show “Startime” with Connie Francis and sang for Louis Jordan. He went on to form a trio with sisters Salome and Geraldine called “Andy and The Bey Sisters”. They recorded various sides and released two albums on the Prestige label and one on RCA. The group parted in 1965.
In the Seventies he worked with the Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Orchestra, collaborated with musicians like Stanley Clarke and also did notable work with Horace Silver and Gary Bartz. Later he recorded an album titled “Experience And Judgment” which had Indian influences. After that period he returned to hard bop and also recorded covers of music by non-jazz musicians.
In 1994, openly gay, Andy was diagnosed HIV-positive, but as of yet it has not interrupted his career. Colleague Herb Jordan assisted him with a resurgence of his recording career with “Ballads, Blues, & Bey” in 1996, returning him to prominence. Since then he has released five additional albums with his latest 2013 offerings titled “Chillin’ With Andy Bey” and “World According To Andy Bey”. Vocalist and pianist Andy Bey continues to perform, record and tour.
Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Babs Gonzales was born Lee Brown on October 27, 1919 in Newark, New Jersey and he and his brothers were all called Babs. He studied piano at a young age and learned to play drums. He sang in clubs; wore a turban in Hollywood in the late 1940s, calling himself Ram Singh; worked as a chauffeur for Errol Flynn; called himself Ricardo Gonzales (Mexican rather than ‘Negro) so as to get a room in a good hotel.
Gonzales was a pioneer in the scat vocalese style who did what he could to popularize bop. He had stints with Charlie Barnet and Lionel Hampton’s big bands, and then led his own group Three Bips & a Bop from 1946 to1949, recording for Blue Note during 1947- 1949, including the earliest version of “Oop-Pop-A-Da”, later covered by Dizzy Gillespie. Among his sidemen on these dates were Tadd Dameron, Tony Scott, Roy Haynes, James Moody, J.J. Johnson, Julius Watkins, Art Pepper, Wynton Kelly, Don Redman and Sonny Rollins making his recording debut.
When Capitol Records decided to flirt with bop around 1950, Babs was voicing the sessions. He worked with James Moody; recorded with Jimmy Smith, Johnny Griffin, and Bennie Green, who was one of the first Americans to perform at Ronnie Scott’s club in London as early as 1962. Spending a lot of time in Europe Babs was considered quite a colorful jazz personality there. A hard-working promoter of jazz, he also published three autobiographies; “I Paid My Dues — Good Times”, “No Bread” and “Movin’ On Down De Line”.
Babs Gonzales, who used his voice as a musical instrument incorporating slang, strange and funny new words in rhythmically complex phrases died on January 23, 1980. He would later become more of a cult figure, leaving a recorded legacy that is considered collector’s items for the die-hard bop aficionados. Though his place in jazz history is often blurred, he was present during the bop revolution and was ever the consummate hipster.
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From Broadway To 52nd Street
The Most Happy Fella opened at the Imperial Theatre on May 3, 1956 with Jo Sullivan, Robert Wede and Art Lund in the starring roles performing music composed by Frank Loesser. The musical ran for 676 performances and rendered unto jazz the classic tune Joey, Joey, Joey.
The Story: Rosabella comes to Napa Valley to marry the handsome young man who sent her his picture and proposed by mail. Certain that she has found someone to really love her, she soon discovers that Joe is just a hired hand and the man who proposed is Tony, an aging Italian vintner. He sent Joe’s picture fearing that one of himself would have disheartened her. The shock sends Rosabella into Joe’s arms. Eventually she realizes that Tony is an honorable, loving man. When he offers to accept not only her but the baby she is now pregnant with, she comes to love him.
Broadway History: Off-Broadway shows, performers, and creative staff are eligible for awards from the New York Drama Critics’ Circle Award, the Outer Circle Critics Award, the Drama Desk Award, the Obie Award (presented since 1956 by The Village Voice), the Lucille Lortel Award (created in 1985 by the League of Off-Broadway Theatres & Producers), and the Drama League Award. Although Off-Broadway shows are not eligible for TonyAwards, an exception was made in 1956 (before the rules were changed), when Lotte Lenya won for “Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Musical”, for the Off-Broadway production of The Threepenny Opera.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Warne Marion Marsh was born October 26, 1927 in Los Angeles, California into an affluent family, his father was a cinematographer, mother a violinist and his aunt May Marsh an actress.
Tutored by Lennie Tristano and, along with Lee Konitz became one of the pre-eminent saxophonists of the Tristano-inspired “Cool School”. Of all of Tristano’s students, Marsh came closest to typifying Tristano’s ideals of improvised lines, in some respects, even transcending the master himself. He often recorded in the company of other Cool School musicians, and remained one of the most faithful to the Tristano philosophy of improvisation. His distinctively pure tone without the inflections popular among many other tenor saxophonists at that time such as honks, growls, etc. set him apart from other Lester Young and Ben Webster-influenced saxophonists.
Warne’s rhythmically subtle lines are immediately recognizable and have been called by Anthony Braxton as “the greatest vertical improviser.” In the 1970s he gained renewed exposure as a member of Supersax, a large ensemble that played orchestral arrangements of Charlie Parker solos. Marsh also recorded one of his most celebrated albums, “All Music”, with the Supersax rhythm section during this period.
Marsh died onstage at the Los Angeles club Donte’s on December 18, 1987, in the middle of playing the tune “Out of Nowhere”. Though he remains something of a cult figure among jazz fans and musicians, his influence has grown since his death. Younger players such as Mark Turner have borrowed from his music as a way of counterbalancing the pervasive influence of John Coltrane.
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