Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Fulton “Fidgy” McGrath was born in Superior, Wisconsin on December 6, 1907. He played with Red Nichols early in the 1930s, then joined the band of the Dorsey boys and worked on their studio recordings and radio broadcasts.. Additionally he worked extensively as a studio musician and in radio orchestras.
From 1935-37 McGrath played in Lennie Hayton’s radio ensemble, before playing later in the decade with Bunny Berigan, Joe Venuti, and Chauncey Morehouse. After spending time in an NBC orchestra, he moved to the West Coast around 1943, where he became a first-call studio musician who worked on film soundtracks in Hollywood.
His compositions include Shim Sham Shimmy and Mandy Is Two, the latter of which was recorded by Billie Holiday.
Pianist and songwriter Fidgy McGrath passed away at the age of 51 on January 1, 1958 in Los Angeles, California.
Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Duane Andrews was born November 30, 1972 in Carbonear, Newfoundland and Labrador and grew up exposed to the island’s mélange of cultural influences and his development as a guitarist reflects that. After graduating from the Jazz Studies program at St. Francis Xavier University with honours, he spent several years studying contemporary music composition at the Conservatoire International de Paris and at the Conservatoire National de Region in Marseille, France.
He combines traditional Newfoundland folk music with jazz similar to the way that guitarist Django Reinhardt infused jazz with Manouche influences. He is a composer for film and television, and has recorded thirteen albums as he continues to compose and explore music.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Dick Vance was born on November 28, 1915 in Mayfield, Kentucky, and raised in Cleveland, Ohio. He learned violin before concentrating on trumpet and by 1932 was playing with J. Frank Terry before joining Lil Armstrong’s band in 1934.
He moved to New York City and played with Willie Bryant, Kaiser Marshall, and Fletcher Henderson between 1936 to 1938. In Henderson’s band he was lead trumpeter and occasionally sang. By 1939 he joined Chick Webb’s orchestra, remaining in the group when Ella Fitzgerald took over leadership. His next move had him becoming the staff arranger for Glen Grey’s band and, in 1942, joined the Lucky Millinder Orchestra.
From 1944–45 he worked with Charlie Barnet, Don Redman, Eddie Heywood and Ben Webster. From 1944 to 1947 he studied at Juilliard, and moonlighted as a pit orchestra musician and an arranger for Harry James, Cab Calloway, Earl Hines and Duke Ellington. During this time Dick played on notable Broadway productions including Pal Joey, Beggar’s Holiday, and in the off-stage band for Streetcar Named Desire.
In 1950, Vance reunited with Fletcher Henderson, playing in his New York sextet. 1951 to 1952 saw him as a member of Duke Ellington’s trumpet section where he arranged most of the items for the album Ellington ‘55. In 1958 he co-composed Jazz Festival Suite with Ellington for performance at the Newport Jazz Festival. He led Sonny Stitt’s trumpet section on the 1962 album Sonny Stitt & The Top Brass. He toured abroad with his own band in 1969, which later appeared in the film L’aventure du jazz.
He toured with Redman in 1953 and was a regular at the Savoy Ballroom throughout the 1950s. He released two albums in the 1960s and toured with Eddie Barefield in 1969. He appears briefly in episode 9 of the music documentary series All You Need Is Love: The Story of Popular Music. In 1979, he composed for the documentary film No Maps On My Taps, starring Lionel Hampton and Howard Sims.
Trumpeter, vocalist, composer and arranger Dick Vance passed away on July 31, 1985 in New York City at the age of 69.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Steve Lane was born on November 7, 1921 in London, England where his father was a concertina player who recorded with the Rio Grande Tango Orchestra in the 1920s. Having heard his first jazz in the Rhythm Clubs of the late 1930s, his first choice of instrument was guitar, but, following wartime service, he switched to the cornet on which he soon developed a jazz style based on the hot trumpeters of the 1920s he so much admired, with particular emphasis on his role leading the collective ensemble.
A gifted composer of vocal and instrumental pieces, he deftly incorporated female vocalists as an integral part of the band, thus presenting a range of songs carefully chosen to showcase the singer, and the supporting musicians strictly trained in the art of accompaniment. A taskmaster offering little compensation and weekly rehearsals, his personnel changed often but allowed him the ability to discover young talent such as pianists Martin Litton and Bruce Boardman and trombonist Bob Hunt.
Steve led his own Southern Stompers jazz band in the early 1950, and also led and recorded with his Red Hot Peppers and the VJM Washboard Band for over 50 years. In 1952 he established the Ealing Jazz Club, and in the Sixties establishe the West End Jazz Club and was a founding partner of VJM Records.
Cornetist, guitarist, composer, arranger and bandleader Steve Lane, who was a traditional jazz player, passed awya on August 22, 2015 at age 93.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Jane Jarvis, née Louella Jane Nossette on October 31, 1915 in Vincennes, Indiana, to Charles and Luella Nossette. She was recognized as a piano prodigy at the age of five and she studied under a Vincennes University professor as a young girl.
A family move to Gary, Indiana in 1927 soon put her in place to be hired to play the piano at radio station WJKS in Gary. Orphaned at 13 when her parents perished in a train-auto wreck, she returned to Vincennes, graduating from high school in 1932. She continued her studies at the Chicago Conservatory of Music, the Bush Conservatory of Music, Loyola University Chicago and DePaul University.
By 1954, Jane was on television in Milwaukee, hosting a show called Jivin’ with Jarvis while serving as staff pianist and organist. At the time, the Milwaukee Braves had just relocated from Boston and sought her out to be the organist at Milwaukee County Stadium. Jarvis stayed with the Braves for eight seasons and then went to New York City, where she took a position with Muzak Corporation as a staff composer and arranger. She would rise to become a corporate vice-president and its director of recording and programming.
In 1964, she was hired by the New York Mets to play the organ at Shea Stadium, where she is remembered for playing their theme song, Meet The Mets, which debuted in the 1963 season before every home game, followed by the Jarvis composed Let’s Go Mets, as the team took the field.
Leaving Muzak in 1978, the next year she left the Mets to concentrate on her first musical love, jazz piano. She became a fixture at New York City nightclubs, frequently playing alongside bassist Milt Hinton. She became a founding member of the Statesmen of Jazz, a group of jazz musicians aged 65 and older sponsored by the American Federation of Jazz Societies, and was featured on their 1994 album. She performed with this group across the US as well as in Japan and elsewhere.
Jarvis released several albums of her jazz piano work, including Jane Jarvis Jams, and Atlantic/Pacific. In addition to Hinton, she often collaborated with trombonist Benny Powell and bassist Earl May. As a member of ASCAP, she also had over three hundred compositions to her credit.
Living in Cocoa Beach, Florida, where she was honored in 2003 by the Space Coast Jazz Society for her lifetime achievement. Back in New York City in 2008, she was displaced when a construction crane collapsed, damaging her building on East 50th Street. Pianist, composer, baseball stadium organist and music industry executive Jane Jarvis spent her final years of her life at the Lillian Booth Actors Home in Englewood, New Jersey until she passed away on January 25, 2010.
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