Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Anthony Kerr was born in Belfast, Northern Ireland on October 16, 1965. From 1981 till 1984 he received his education at the Belfast School of Music. Moving to New York City after graduating, he studied vibes and marimba with David Friedman and Kenny Werner. He won a scholarship to the New School of Jazz and Contemporary Music in 1987.
Returning to Ireland, Anthony went on to work as a percussionist with the RTE Symphony Orchestra. There was a period of time when he was employed with the UK’s National Theater.
Kerr later worked as a jazz musician with John Taylor, Louis Stewart, Peter King, Norma Winstone, Mike Westbrook, a bandleader he toured with around Europe. He worked with Charlie Watts and Georgie Fame, while simultaneously leading his own group and conducting jazz workshops in Belfast.
He toured with the Irish Youth Jazz Orchestra and worked with BBC Big Band and collaborated with Ian Shaw and a saxophonist Dale Barlow. He leads his own quartet and the Mallet Band with Justin Woodward, Stewe Brown and Geoff Gascoyne.
In 1994 Kerr was voted best instrumentalist at the British Jazz Awards and the following year received the Young Jazz Musician of the Year. He also won nominations in the Rising Star category in 1995, 1996 and 1998.
His first album “First Cry” was made in collaboration with singer / lyricist Jacqui Dankworth. His second album, “Now Hear This” which was recorded live at Ronnie Scott’s Club, was released in 1997.
Vibraphonist Anthony Kerr currently teaches vibraphone and jazz improvisation at the Royal College of Music in London, produces and records music from his home studio in Hertfordshire, England.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Michael Anthony Nock was born September 27, 1940 in Christchurch, New Zealand. He began studying piano at 11 and attended Nelson College for one term in 1955. By the age of 18, he was performing in Australia and in Sydney he played in The Three Out trio with Freddy Logan and Chris Karan. They toured England in 1961 before he left to attend Berklee College of Music.
Nock was a member of Yusef Lateef’s group from 1963 to 1965. Three years later he became involved with fusion, leading the Fourth Way band for two years. For a decade beginning in 1975 he was a studio musician in New York City, then returned to Australia.
His 1987 album Open Door with drummer Frank Gibson, Jr. was named that year’s Best Jazz Album in the New Zealand Music Awards. The 2003 New Year Honours saw Mike appointed an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit, for services to jazz.
Currently residing in New South Wales, pianist, composer and arranger Mike Nock, who taught at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music until 2018, continues to perform with his trio, big band, and various one-off ensembles.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Sir John Phillip William Dankworth was born on September 20, 1927 in Woodford, Essex, England. He grew up within a family of musicians and attended Selwyn Boys’ Junior School and later Sir George Monoux Grammar School. Prompted by hearing a Benny Goodman Quartet album at 16, before settling on the clarinet he took violin and piano lessons. Soon afterwards he was inspired by Charlie Parker and learned to play the alto saxophone.
Beginning his career on the British jazz scene after studying at London’s Royal Academy of Music and then national service in the Royal Air Force, during which he played alto sax and clarinet for RAF Music Services. By 1947 he was working on the Queen Mary in Bobby Kevin’s band, and in London with Les Ayling. Through the rest of the decade he performed with Tito Burns, with Charlie Parker at the Paris Jazz Festival, and a tour of Sweden with Sidney Bechet. In 1949, Johnny was voted Musician of the Year.
The Fifties saw him forming a small group, the Dankworth Seven, as a vehicle to showcase his writing as well as several young players, Jimmy Deuchar, Eddie Harvey, Don Rendell, Bill Le Sage, Eric Dawson, Tony Kinsey and Frank Holder. also sang and recorded with this ensemble. Forming his big band in ‘53 and Cleo Laine was now a regular voice on appearances and recordings.
The band came to the States and performed at Newport, Birdland had Louis Armstrong sit in for a set and shared several stages with the Duke Ellington Orchestra. In 1959, John became chair of the Stars Campaign for Inter-Racial Friendship, set up to combat the fascist White Defence League.
The following decades saw him working and recording with numerous American and British jazz musicians, began composing for film and television, and received commissions all while performing live and on the radio.
As an educator his enthusiasm for jazz education led him to run for many years the Allmusic summer schools at the Stables in Wavendon and from 1984 to ‘86 he was a professor of music at Gresham College in London, where he gave free public lectures.
He was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Music from Berklee College of Music, was made a Knight Bachelor in the 2006 New Year’s Honours List, and was made a Commander of the British Empire (CBE). In 2009 he fell ill and while he had to cancel several concerts he made one last appearance in December.
Saxophonist, clarinetist, composer, educator John Dankworth, who along with his wife Dame Cleo were one of a few couples to hold British titles, transitioned on February 6, 2010 at the age of 82, on the afternoon before a show celebrating the 40th anniversary of the foundation of The Stables.
Confer a dose of a Woodford saxophonist to those seeking a greater insight about the musicians around the world who are members of the pantheon of jazz…
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Jiggs Whigham was born Oliver Haydn Whigham III on August 20, 1943 in Cleveland, Ohio and began his professional career at the age of 17, joining the Glenn Miller/Ray McKinley orchestra in 1961. He left that band for Stan Kenton, where he played in the touring mellophonium band in 1963 before settling in New York City to play commercially.
Finding commercial playing frustrating, Whigham migrated to Germany where he still lives. He played for many years in the big band of Kurt Edelhagen, was a featured soloist in the Bert Kaempfert orchestra, and was also a member of the Peter Herbolzheimer band.
He has produced an extensive discography as a leader, including work with Bill Holman, Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen, Carl Fontana, and many others.
Recent years have seen Jiggs as musical director of the RIAS Big Band in Berlin, Germany. He is formerly conductor of the BBC Big Band in Great Britain and currently co-director of the Berlin Jazz Orchestra with singer Marc Secara.
As an educator he has taught at the Hochschule für Musik in Berlin, been a visiting tutor and artist at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London, England and the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester and KUG in Graz, Austria
He is featured on the Berlin Jazz Orchestra albums Update, You’re Everything, Songs of Berlin and music DVD Strangers In Night – The Music Of Bert Kaempfert. He is artist-in-residence for the Conn-Selmer company, maker of the King Jiggs Whigham model trombone.
Trombonist Jiggs Whigham is the musical director for the Bundesjazzorchester working with the top student jazz musicians in Germany. He continues to tour worldwide as soloist, conductor, and educator.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Nat Towles was born August 10, 1905 in New Orleans, Louisiana, the son of string bassist Phil “Charlie” Towles. He started his musical career as a guitarist and violinist at the age of eleven but switched to the bass at 13. Performing in his hometown through his teenage years with Gus Metcalf’s Melody Jazz Band, he eventually played with a number of bands, including Buddie Petit, Henry “Red” Allen, Jack Carey, and the Original Tuxedo Jazz Orchestra.
In 1923 he formed The Nat Towles’ Creole Harmony Kings. This jazz band became one of the prominent territory bands in Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, and Nebraska. By 1925 he was playing bass for Fate Marable, and reformed his own band the next year. 1934 saw Towles organizing a band of young musicians studying music at Wiley College in Austin, Texas. He also worked the club circuit in Dallas, Texas during this period, when T-Bone Walker and Buddy Tate worked for him.
In the 1930s he transformed his band into The Nat Towles Dance Orchestra, signed with the National Orchestra Service, and focused on swing music through the 1930s and 1940s. In 1934 Towles took up residence in North Omaha, Nebraska, where his band was stationed for the next 25 years. With this outfit Towles dueled with Lloyd Hunter for dominance over the much-contested Near North Side in North Omaha, where he was held over at the Dreamland Ballroom for several weeks. In 1936 and 1937 Towles’ band held residence at Omaha’s Krug Park.
Over the course of his career Billy Mitchell, Buster Cooper, Red Holloway, Buster Bennett, Preston Love, Paul Quinichette, Neal Hefti, Jimmy Heath, Duke Groner, Buddy McLewis and Oliver Nelson were members of his band at one time or another. He continued leading bands throughout the 1950s until retiring to California in 1959 where he opened a bar.
Never finding true national recognition and fearing the limelight would then steal away his best players, there are very few recordings of Nat Towles’ Band. Bassist, big band leader and educator Nat Towles, whose band is considered one of the greatest territory bands of all time by musicians who played in it and by others who heard it, transitioned in Berkeley, California of a heart attack in January 1963.
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