Daily Dose Of Jazz…
James Reese Europe was born on February 22, 1881 in Mobile, Alabama and in 1891 his family moved to Washington, D.C. In 1904 he moved to New York City and six years later he organized the Clef Club, a society for Black Americans in the music industry. In 1912, the club, with its 125 members who played in various configurations, made history when they became the first band to play a proto-jazza concert at Carnegie Hall for the benefit of the Colored Music Settlement School.
The importance of this historic concert is that it took place 12 years before the Paul Whiteman and George Gershwin concert at Aeolian Hall, and 26 years before Benny Goodman’s famed concert at Carnegie. The Clef Club’s performances played music written solely by Black composers, including Harry T. Burleigh and Samuel Coleridge-Taylor.
In 1913 and 1914 Jim made a series of phonograph records for the Victor Talking Machine Company. These recordings are some of the best examples of the pre-jazz hot ragtime style of the U.S. Northeast of the 1910s, predating and protecting the idea that the Original Dixieland Jass Band recorded the first jazz pieces in 1917 for Victor.
Europe was known for his outspoken personality and unwillingness to bend to musical conventions, particularly in his insistence on playing his own style of music. During World War I, Europe obtained a commission in the New York Army National Guard, where he fought as a lieutenant with the 369th Infantry Regiment otherwise known as the “Harlem Hellfighters” when it was assigned to the French Army. He went on to direct the regimental band to great acclaim. They made their first recordings in France for the Pathé Brothers.
Returning home in 1919 he made more records for Pathé with Noble Sissle and continued to lead his band. During a talk backstage with two of his drummers, Steve and Herbert Wright about their stage behavior, Herbert got agitated and stabbed Europe in the neck with a pen knife. The show went on, Jim went to the hospital but doctors were unable to stem the flow of blood.
Arranger, composer and bandleader Jim Europe, who also played piano and violin, and was the leading ragtime and early jazz figure on the Negro music scene of New York City in the 1910s, transitioned on May 9, 1919.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Louis “Kid Shots” Madison was born on February 19, 1899 in New Orleans, Louisiana. He studied cornet under David Jones, Louis Dumaine, and Joe Howard.
In 1915, he becames the drummer in the Colored Waif’s Home band with Louis Armstrong. By 1923, he was playing second cornet with the Tuxedo Brass Band. During the 1930s, he played with the WPA Brass Band and in the Forties he performed as a member of the New Orleans Eureka Brass Band.
In January 1948, cornetist Kid Shots Madison suffered from a stroke and transitioned eight months later in September in his hometown.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Zilner Trenton Randolph was born in Dermott, Arkansas on January 28, 1899 and matriculated at Biddle University, the Kreuger Conservatory, and the Wisconsin Conservatory of Music.
Randolph played in St. Louis, Missouri in the early 1920s, then in Bernie Young’s band in Milwaukee, Wisconsin from 1927 to 1930. A move to Chicago, Illinois in 1931 and was a trumpeter and arranger with Louis Armstrong until 1932 and again in 1933 and 1935.
He played trumpet on a number of Armstrong’s recordings and composed the tune Old Man Mose. In 1934 he played with Carroll Dickerson and Dave Peyton, and led his own Chicago band later in the decade. He arranged for bandleaders Earl Hines, Woody Herman, Fletcher Henderson, and Duke Ellington, and led a quartet in the 1940s.
From the 1940s Zilner devoted himself mainly to teaching, but recorded as a pianist in 1951. Trumpeter, arranger, composer and music educator Zilner Randolph, whose children Hattie and Lucious were part of Sun Ra’s band in the Fifties, transitioned on February 2, 1994.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Alvin “Abe” Aaron was born on January 27, 1910 in Toronto, Canada on January 27, 1910. His father, a bandleader with a theater band in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, had him playing reeds in the band for more than ten years. Early in the 1940s he left this group to play alto saxophone in the big band of Jack Teagarden, with which he recorded in 1942.
Moving to Hollywood, California in 1943, Abe played with Horace Heidt on radio. From 1945 to 1947 he played with Skinnay Ennis, then returned to work under Heidt through 1949. Through the 1950s he played in Les Brown’s Band of Renown, touring Europe and East Asia. He recorded often as a member of Brown’s band for Coral and Capitol record companies. In the band, he played clarinet and alto saxophone in the early 1950s, then switched to tenor and baritone. He also recorded on bass clarinet with Billy Usselton.
Clarinetist and saxophonist Abe Aaron transitioned on January 31, 1970.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Albert “Abbie” Brunies was born on January 19, 1900 in New Orleans, Louisiana into a famous musical family, which counted among its members George Brunies and Merritt Brunies.
He was the leader of the Halfway House Orchestra from 1919 to about 1927, playing at the Halfway House Club in New Orleans. This ensemble recorded for Okeh Records in 1925. Among the musicians who played in this group were New Orleans Rhythm Kings members Charlie Cordella, Mickey Marcour, Leon Rappolo, Sidney Arodin, Bill Eastwood, Joe Loyacano and Leo Adde.
He played in New Orleans into the mid-1940s, after which time he moved to Biloxi, Mississippi. There he played with Merritt in the Brunie Brothers Dixieland Jazz Band. Unfortunately, this ensemble recorded sparsely. Cornetist Abbie Brunies transitioned on October 2, 1978.
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