Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Coleman Randolph Hawkins was born on November 21, 1904 in St. Joseph, Missouri and named after his mother’s maiden name. He started out playing piano and cello prior to playing saxophone at age nine. By the time he turned 14, he was playing around eastern Kansas while attending Topeka High School and simultaneously studying harmony and composition for two years at Washburn College.
In 1921 Hawkins joined Mamie Smith’s Jazz Hounds, toured through 1923 and settled in New York City. Hawkins joined Fletcher Henderson’s Orchestra doubling on clarinet and bass saxophone and becoming a star soloist. He recorded with band mates Louis Armstrong and Henry “Red” Allen, a number of solo recordings with either piano or a pick-up band of Henderson musicians. In late 1934, he played with Jack Hylton’s band in London, toured Europe as a soloist until 1939 and worked with Django Reinhardt and Benny Carter in 1937 Paris.
Returning to the States he worked Kelly’s Stables, recorded two choruses of Body and Soul, his landmark recording of the Swing Era. Recorded as an afterthought at the session, it is notable in that Coleman ignores almost all of the melody, only the first four bars are stated in a recognizable fashion. In its exploration of harmonic structure it is considered by many to be the next evolutionary step in jazz recording from where Louis Armstrong’s “West End Blues” in 1928 left off.
Over the course of his long and prolific career Hawkins had an unsuccessful attempt at a big band, led a combo at Kelly’s Stables, played with Thelonious Monk, Oscar Pettiford, Miles Davis, Oscar Peterson, Herb Ellis, Ray Brown, Ben Webster, Max Roach, Howard McGhee, Sonny Rollins, John Coltrane, Roy Eldridge, J.J. Johnson, Fats Navarro and Duke Ellington among others, recorded a session with Dizzy Gillespie that is considered the first bebop recording and toured with Jazz at the Philharmonic. After 1948 Hawkins divided his time between New York and Europe, making numerous freelance recordings. In the 1960s, he appeared regularly at the Village Vanguard.
Tenor saxophonist Coleman Hawkins directly influenced many future bebop musicians such as Sonny Rollins and John Coltrane. In his later years he stopped recording, began drinking heavily and died of pneumonia on May 19, 1969 in New York.
Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Houston Person, born November 10, 1934, grew up in Florence, South Carolina, first playing the piano before switching to tenor sax. He studied at South Carolina State College, went on to join the Air Force, became a member of a service band stationed in West Germany and played with Don Ellis, Eddie Harris, Cedar Walton and Leo Wright.
After his discharge he continued his studies at Hartt College of Music in Hartford, Connecticut. He first became known for a series of albums for Prestige Records in the 1960s, met Etta Jones while both were with Johnny Hammond’s band and spent many years as her musical partner, recording, performing and touring, and for much of his career this association was what he was best known for. Contrary to popular belief, they were never married.
Houston has performed in the hard bop and swing genres but is best known for his soul-jazz work. He has recorded more than seventy-five albums as a leader for Prestige, Westbound, Mercury, Savoy, and Muse Records. He is currently in residence as a leader and record producer at HighNote and has recorded with Charles Brown, Bill Charlap, Charles Earland, Lena Horne, Etta Jones, Lou Rawls, Horace Silver, Dakota Staton, Billy Butler and Richard “Groove” Holmes among others.
He received the Eubie Blake Jazz Award in 1982 and was inducted into the South Carolina State College Hall of Fame in 1999. He continues to produce, record, perform and tour.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Russell Malone was born November 8, 1963 in Albany, Georgia. He began playing at the age of four with a toy guitar his mother had bought him, influenced by musicians such as B. B. King and The Dixie Hummingbirds. However, his most influential musical experience was seeing George Benson perform on television with Benny Goodman. He learned technique from listening to recordings of Benson, Wes Montgomery and Charlie Christian among others.
Malone played with jazz organist Jimmy Smith, followed by a residency with the Harry Connick Jr. Big Band and in 1995, Malone became part of the Diana Krall Trio, that had three albums nominated for a Grammy. Following his tenure with Krall, he went on to tour regularly leading his own quartet, has played with Dianne Reeves, Romero Lubambo, Ron Carter, Bobby Hutcherson, the late Mulgrew Miller, Dr. Lonnie Smith, Hank Jones, Benny Green, Bill Frisell and Sonny Rollins.
The essentially self-taught swing and bebop jazz guitarist has recorded several sessions for Columbia, Impulse, Venus, Verve and Telarc record labels and since 2004 has recorded on the MaxJazz label with his latest 2010 session being “Triple Play”. Russell Malone has amassed to date 18 albums in his catalogue and continues to perform, record and tour.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Jan Garber was born Jacob Charles Garber on November 5, 1894 in Indianapolis, Indiana. He had his own band by the time he was 21. He became known as “The Idol of the Airwaves” in his heyday of the 1920s and 1930s, playing jazz in the vein of contemporaries such as Paul Whiteman and Guy Lombardo.
It was during World War II that Garber began playing swing jazz with arranger Gray Rains and vocalist Liz Tilton. However, the recording restrictions in America during the war eventually made his ensemble unfeasible, and he returned to “sweet” music after the war, playing violin with the Philadelphia Symphony Orchestra.
Jan formed the Garber-Davis Orchestra with pianist Milton Davis from 1921–1924. After parting with Davis, he formed his own orchestra, playing both “sweet” and “hot” 1920s dance music. He was hit hard by the Great depression and in the thirties he refashioned his ensemble into a big band and recorded a string of successful records for Victor.
Violinist and bandleader Jan Garber continued to lead ensembles nearly up until the time of his death on October 5, 1977 in Shreveport, Louisiana.
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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.