Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Ferdinand Povel was born on February 13, 1947 in Haarlem, Netherlands. Coming from an artistic family, his father was a cineaste (filmmaker) and his mother a pianist. At an early age, he developed a taste for jazz, when first introduced to as a gift on his twelfth birthday, he received a ticket to a late-night concert by the Duke Ellington Orchestra at the Amsterdam Concertgebouw.
In 1961 he began studying clarinet with Theo Loevendie and teaching himself saxophone because jazz was not yet taught formally in the Netherlands. Ferdinand learned by playing with experienced musicians, such as pianists Rob Madna and Frans Elsen, picking up knowledge of harmony and arrangement as a young member of the orchestras of Kurt Edelhagen and Peter Herbolzheimer, and of the Skymasters.
In 1964 at 17, Povel won the Loosdrecht Jazz Concours with the Martin Haak Quartet. This was the start of his career as a professional musician. 1966 saw him playing with The New Sound Incorporated, giving school concerts and radio and TV broadcasts for Tros and Avro broadcasting companies. He went on to be a finalist at the 1966 International Modern Jazz Festival in Vienna, Austria where the judges included Cannonball Adderley and Mel Lewis.
In the same year, the Netherlands Jazz Orchestra invited Povel to join them as a saxophonist and flutist. Three years later he was in Munich, Germany playing with trumpet player Dusko Goykovich in his Summit Quintet, starring drummer Philly Joe Jones and touring Europe several times.
Ferdinand would go on to play with the Kenny Clarke/Francy Boland Big Band, the Kurt Edelhagen Orchestra, tour the United States of America with the Maynard Ferguson Big Band, and the Peter Herbolzheimer’s Rhythm Combination and Brass from 1971 to 1985. He was a member of George Grunz’s band, Jiggs Whigham Sextet, and the bands of Rob Madna, Frans Elsen, and Cees Slinger. He has played in the front line with jazz icons such as Art Farmer, Bennie Bailey, Woody Shaw, and Jimmy Knepper.
Throughout his career he was never far from playing in various occasional orchestras for radio and television. As an educator he taught jazz improvisation at the Rotterdam Conservatory and at conservatoriums in Zwolle, Hilversum and The Hague. Since 1990 he has taught exclusively at the Hilversum Music Academy, now named the Conservatory of Amsterdam, as part of Amsterdam School of the Arts.
Saxophonist Ferdinand Povel has a discography that includes over one hundred record and CD albums to which he has contributed as a soloist. He has received several honors and continues to perform and educate.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Alphonso Johnson was born on February 2, 1951 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and started off as an upright bass player, but switched to the electric bass in his late teens. He began his career in the early 1970s, and showing innovation and fluidity on the electric bass he sessioned with a few jazz musicians before landing a job with Weather Report, taking over for co-founding member Miroslav Vitous.
His debut with Weather Report was on the album Mysterious Traveller, followed by two more albums in the Seventies: Tale Spinnin’ and Black Market before he left the band to work with drummer Billy Cobham. During 1976-77 Alphonso recorded three solo albums as a bandleader, for the Epic label, in a fusion-funk vein.
One of the first musicians to introduce the Chapman Stick to the public, in 1977, his knowledge of the instrument offered him a rehearsal with Genesis, who were looking for a replacement for guitarist Steve Hackett but being more of a bassist than a guitarist, Johnson instead recommended his friend ex-Sweetbottom guitarist and fellow session musician Daryl Stuermer. However, he was one of two bass players on Phil Collins’s first solo album, Face Value, in 1981.
He would work with Bob Weir on a couple of projects – Bobby & The Midnites and The Other Ones; reunite with Cobham in the band Jazz Is Dead, and Steve Hackett’s Genesis Revisited album as well as with Santana, Steve Kimock and Chet Baker. He toured Europe and Japan with saxophonist Wayne Shorter, pianist James Beard, drummer Rodney Holmes, and guitarist David Gilmore.
Earning a Bachelor of Arts in Music Education degree from California State University in 2014, as an undergrad he was a member of the CSUN Wind Ensemble. With extensive experience as a bass teacher he has conducted bass seminars and clinics in Germany, England, France, Scotland, Ireland, Japan, Switzerland, Australia, Brazil and Argentina.
Bassist Alphonso Johnson continues to perform while serving as an adjunct instructor at the University of Southern California and the California Institute of the Arts.
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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…
Chuck Flores was born Charles Walter Flores on January 5, 1935 in Orange, California, and grew up in Santa Ana, California. Best known for his work with saxophonist Bud Shank in the 1950s, he also had a two-year stint with Woody Herman from 1954 to 1955.
Throughout his career Chuck performed and recorded with, among others, Carmen McRae, Art Pepper, Maynard Ferguson, Al Cohn, and Shelly Manne. His drum teacher Manne and others considered him an underrated drummer.
In his later years, Flores became a highly sought after and renowned educator who was a longtime faculty member at Musicians Institute in Los Angeles, California.
A few of his students were Danny Seraphine, Chad Wackerman, John Wackerman, Brooks Wackerman, Ray Mehlbaum, Pete Parada, Jamie Wollam, Jose Ruiz and Zack Stewart.
Drummer Chuck Flores, who was one of the relatively small number of musicians associated with West Coast jazz who were actually from the West Coast, transitioned on November 24, 2016.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Henry “Boots” Mussulli was born in Milford, Massachusetts on November 18, 1915. His first instrument was clarinet, which he first played at age 12.
By the Forties he was playing with Mal Hallett in Massachusetts and joined Teddy Powell’s group in 1943-44. He played with Stan Kenton from 1944 to 1947, then returned to play with Kenton again on tour in 1952 and 1954.
He played with Vido Musso, Gene Krupa, Charlie Ventura, Serge Chaloff, Toshiko Akiyoshi and Herb Pomeroy.
In 1949, Boots opened a jazz club in his hometown, called The Crystal Room and from the mid-1950s, he concentrated more on music education, leading a local youth orchestra, the Milford Youth Band. They performed at the Newport Jazz Festival in 1967.
Saxophonist Boots Mussulli, based chiefly out of Boston, Massachusetts, passed away from cancer on September 23, 1967 in Norfolk, Massachusetts.
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