Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Otis Johnson was born on January 13, 1908 in Richmond, Virginia. He began his career in the late 1920s, working with Gene Rodgers, Henri Saparo, Eugene Kennedy, and Charlie Skeete. In 1929 he joined Luis Russell’s band, and rejoined Kennedy’s group before working with Benny Carter in 1934. He played with Charlie Turner and Willie Bryant in the mid-1930s.
Toward the end of the decade he performed with Louis Armstrong and Don Redman. On December 30, 1940 Otis enlisted in the 369th Coast Artillery of the New York Army National Guard. He was discharged on October 13, 1945.
Trumpeter Otis Johnson, who never returned to active performance after leaving the military, died on February 28, 1994.
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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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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Al Klink was born on December 28, 1915 in Danbury, Connecticut. He began his professional career playing with Glenn Miller from 1939 to 1942 as a featured soloist, along with Tex Beneke, on the most well-known version of In the Mood. When Miller started playing in the U.S. military, he took a chair in Benny Goodman and Tommy Dorsey orchestras. He appeared in the 1941 film Sun Valley Serenade and 1942’s Orchestra Wives.
From 1952 to 1953 he played with the Sauter-Finegan Orchestra. Two years later he recorded his only session as a bandleader, performing six songs for a Bob Alexander album that won a Grammy Award. In the late 1960s to early Seventies, he was a tenor saxophone doubler on the staff of NBC’s Tonight Show Band under Doc Severinsen, where he was an occasional featured soloist.
He recorded with Mundell Lowe, Gerry Mulligan, Judy Holliday, Nelson Riddle, Phil Silvers, Cootie Williams and Rex Stewart. After a hiatus from recording and performing, he returned in 1974 when he began playing with the World’s Greatest Jazz Band. During the 1970s, he played with Glenn Zottola and George Masso, and continued playing until the mid-1980s, when he retired to Florida.
Swing tenor saxophonist Al Klink, who recorded ten albums as a sideman between 1956 and 1961, transitioned on March 7, 1991 at the age of 75 in Bradenton, Florida.
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