Daily Dose Of Jazz…
John Aaron Lewis was born in LaGrange, Illinois on May 3, 1920 but was raised in Albuquerque, New Mexico. He learned classical music and piano from his mother starting at the age of seven, then continued his musical training at the University of New Mexico and also studied anthropology. He served in the Army stationed in France during World War II and during his three-year tour of duty he met and performed with Kenny Clarke. Together they formed a band and in the bop style, John composed and arranged.
After the war he went to New York where he found work in the 52nd Street clubs with Allen Eager, Hot Lips Page and others. This led to him joining dizzy Gillespie’s bop-style big band and further developing his skill as a composer and arranger while matriculating through the Manhattan School of Music. He soon returned to Europe on tour, remained a continued to write and study piano. By ’48 he was back in the States playing with Charlie Parker, Illinois Jacquet, Lester Young, Miles Davis and Ella Fitzgerald.
Lewis, vibraphonist Milt Jackson, drummer Kenny Clarke, and bassist Ray Brown had been the small group within the Gillespie big band that played their own short sets when the brass and reeds needed a break. This led to the foursome forming a full-time working group in 1950, known at first as the Milt Jackson Quartet. After replacing Brown with Percy Heath the name was changed to the Modern Jazz Quartet and assuming the role of musical director from 1954 to 1974, John oriented it toward a quiet, chamber style of music that found a balance between his gentle, almost mannered compositions and Jackson’s more elemental writing and playing.
Over a long and illustrious career, John directed the School of Jazz at the Music Inn, was musical director for the Monterey Jazz Festival from 1958 to 1982, taught at City College of New York and Harvard University, rejoined the re-formed MJQ, led his own sextet, founded the American Jazz Orchestra, participated in Re-Birth of the Cool, was involved in various Third Stream Projects all while continuing to teach, compose and perform.
John Lewis, conservative bop pianist, composer, arranger and musical director for the Modern Jazz Quartet passed away in New York City on March 29, 2001.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
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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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Charles Mingus Jr. was born on April 22, 1922 in Nogales, Arizona of Chinese, English, African and Swedish heritage. His mother allowed only church-related music in their home, but Mingus developed an early love for jazz, especially the music of Duke Ellington. He first studied trombone, later adding cello, which prepared him for the double bass in high school. He studied five years with H. Rheinshagen, principal bassist of the New York Philharmonic and compositional techniques with Lloyd Reese.
Beginning in his teen years, Mingus was writing quite advanced pieces incorporating elements of classical music. A number of them were recorded in 1960 with conductor Gunther Schuller and released as “Pre-Bird”, referring to Charlie “Bird” Parker. Mingus was one of many musicians whose perspectives on music were altered by Parker into “pre- and post-Bird” eras.
Gaining a reputation as a bass prodigy, his first major professional job was playing with former Ellington clarinetist Barney Bigard. This followed by a tour with Louis Armstrong in 1943 that led to his recording in a band led by Russell Jacquet that included Teddy Edwards and Chico Hamilton. He went onto record with Howard McGhee and into the late ‘40s played with Lionel Hampton’s band performing several of his pieces.
A popular Mingus trio had Red Norvo and Tal Farlow in tow in the early 50s with considerable acclaim but his mixed heritage caused problems with club owners and he left the group. Charles was briefly a member of Ellington’s band until his temper got him fired. He went on to record and play with Max Roach, Bud Powell, Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, Pepper Adams, Jaki Byard, Horace Parlan, Booker Ervin, John Handy, Charles McPherson, Eric Dolphy and Johnny Coles among others through the Sixties and into the next decade. By the mid-1970s, Mingus was suffering from Lou Gehrig’s disease that eventually stopped his playing, leaving him to continue composing and supervising recordings prior to his death on January 5, 1979 at age 56 in Cuernavaca, Mexico.
Composer, bandleader, bassist and civil rights activist Charles Mingus left a legacy of an autobiography, Mingus Big Band, Mingus Dynasty, Mingus Orchestra, the Charles Mingus High School Competition, the catalogue of Mingus compositions in the Music Division of the New York Public Library and the collected papers of Charles Mingus housed at the Library of Congress in Washington, DC.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Charles Anthony Williams was born April 17, 1942 in Camden, New Jersey. His father was a bassist and his teacher, preparing lessons for him each day, stringing his bass and demanding practice everyday after school.
Nicknamed Buster, he started his professional career in Philadelphia in 1959 working with Jimmy Heath, then went on to play and record with the Gene Ammons – Sonny Stitt quintet from 1960-61. Leaving the quintet he moved to Los Angeles and played behind Betty Carter, Sarah Vaughan and Nancy Wilson through the decade. He also worked with The Jazz Crusaders, Bobby Hutcherson/Harold Land Quintet and Miles Davis.
In 1969, Williams moved to NYC, joined the Herbie Hancock Mwandishi Sextet and for the next three years doubled on acoustic and electric bass. In the ‘70s he worked with Mary Lou Williams and the Ron Carter Quartet and in 1975 released his debut album “Pinnacle”. Since the ’80s, Williams has appeared as a sideman on a significant number of sessions with notable jazz instrumentalists and vocalists, Chet Baker, Kenny Barron, Dexter Gordon, Carmen McRae, Illinois Jacquet, Frank Morgan, McCoy Tyner, Shirley Horn, Woody Shaw, Stanley Cowell and the list continues.
With opportunities to lead his own sessions being rare, in 2008 Buster began releasing a series of live albums exclusively for download through his company, Buster Williams Productions. A solid supportive player, he has made subtle swing, a precise rhythm and superb technique the landmark of his playing.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Junko Onishi was born April 16, 1967 in Kyoto, Japan and studied piano at Berklee College of Music. She then moved to New York City where she played with Joe Henderson, Betty Carter, Kenny Garrett and the Mingus Dynasty but has also worked with Jackie McLean, Holly Cole, Billy Higgins and many others.
Primarily playing in the post-bop genre, Junko cites her influences as Duke Ellington, Thelonious Monk and Ornette Coleman but one can hear McCoy Tyner, Kenny Kirkland and Mulgrew Miller’s influences in her playing. As a leader she has recorded nine albums on Blue Note Records label Somethin’ Else.
Choosing to study and practice she stopped performing in the late Nineties and when her mentor, Jaki Byard passed away she stopped playing completely for two years. Redeveloping her technique Onishi returned to playing and started a gym regimen to help her cope with the physical rigors of playing.
She appears in the 1997 documentary “Blue Note: A Story Of Modern Jazz playing the song “Trinity” and “Quick” from her album Play, Piano, Play: Junko Onishi Trio in Europe. In 2009 she released her Blue Note album “Musical Moments” followed by her Verve large band project “Baroque”. She continues to perform, record and tour worldwide.
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