Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Brian Smith was born on January 3, 1939 in Wellington, New Zealand and studied piano in his youth but was primarily an autodidact on reeds. He played locally in pop and jazz groups before moving to England in 1964, where he played with Alexis Korner’s Blues Incorporated.
Following this stint he played at Ronnie Scott’s Jazz Club from 1966 to ‘67 and in the big bands of Tubby Hayes and Maynard Ferguson from 1969 to 1974. Smith went on to work with the group Nucleus from 1969 to 1982. During the next two decades he also performed with Mike Westbrook, Neil Ardley, Mike Gibbs, the Spontaneous Music Ensemble, Keith Tippett, Pacific Eardrum and Paz.
1982 saw the return to New Zealand, where Brian began playing with his own quartet. His 1984 album Southern Excursions was named Australian Jazz Record of the Year. Based out of Auckland, working with Frank Gibson, Jr. later in the Eighties, his Moonlight Sax albums were chart successes in New Zealand. Saxophonist and flautist Brian Smith continues to perform and record.
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Three Wishes
Pannonica inquired of Leo Wright, if given three, what would he wish for and he answered her by saying:
- “I wish that people would be more individualistic.”
- “The problem in my profession, that the supply is greater than the demand… I wish that that wasn’t so.”
- “I wish the public in general would realize the importance of jazz.”
*Excerpt from Three Wishes: An Intimate Look at Jazz Greats ~ Compiled and Photographed by Pannonica de Koenigswarter
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Lenny Hambro was born on October 16, 1923 in the Bronx, New York, the younger of two children. As a teenager, his brother-in-law introduced the 15 year old to woodwinds, giving him a soprano saxophone and introductory music lessons and taking every music class in which he could enroll. While in high school he took private lessons from Bill Sheiner, one of the leading music teachers and session musicians in New York City. During his later high-school years, Hambro played alto sax, tenor sax, clarinet, and flute in an assortment of teen dance bands, including a summer in the Catskills.
During the Second World War, at just 18, Hambro auditioned and got the empty seat in Gene Krupa’s band in 1942. However, he left the band in December of that year for the Army, there joining Ivan Mogul, Shorty Rogers and approximately 40 other musicians from the Bronx who had agreed to man the 379th Army Service Forces Band in Newport News, Virginia, where he stayed for three years. Post war he worked and recorded with Billy Butterfield and Bobby Byrne, before rejoining Gene Krupa as lead alto sax and featured jazz soloist through 1950.
He would go on to play and /or record with the Latin jazz ensembles of Vincent Lopez, Pupi Campo, Machito and his Afro-Cuban Orchestra, Ray McKinley Band. the Chico O’Farrill Orchestra, tour with The Gene Krupa Orchestra, Charlie Ventura’s Orchestra and Joe Loco’s band. He did studio work, worked as a music copyist, and taught private lessons.
In 1954 he formed the Lenny Hambro Quintet, and in 1955 he again played in and managed the Ray McKinley Band, and toured the United States routinely during this period as well as England, Poland, Iron Curtain Europe, and North Africa in 1957 and 1958. He was a booking agent, opened up an advertising company, then returned to music. He recorded his final tracks at the Clinton Recording Studio at 653 10th Avenue in New York City in February, 1995 for Chico O’Farrill’s album, Pure Emotion for Milestone Records.
Lenny Hambro, who played alto, baritone and tenor saxophone, flute, and clarinet, passed away of a blood clot following open heart surgery on September 26, 1995, at Shore Memorial Hospital, Somers Point, New Jersey, a month shy of his 72nd birthday.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Gerhard Rochus “Gerd” Dudek was born September 28, 1938 in Wrocław, Poland. He studied clarinet privately and attended music school in the 1950s before joining a big band led by his brother Ossi until 1958.
During the early 1960s, Dudek played in the Berliner Jazz Quintet, in Karl Blume’s group and in Kurt Edelhagen’s orchestra until 1965. He then became interested in free music and joined Manfred Schoof’s quintet. He took part in the first sessions of The Globe Unity Orchestra in 1966, and played with them at various times into the 1980s.
He also worked with many other European free musicians and composers, including Alexander von Schlippenbach, Loek Dikker and The Waterland Ensemble And European Jazz Quintet.
He is best known for his work with Manfred Schoof, Wolfgang Dauner, Lala Kovacev, the Globe Unity Orchestra, Berlin Contemporary Jazz Orchestra, Albert Mangelsdorff, Don Cherry and George Russell. Tenor and soprano saxophonist, clarinetist and flautist Gerd Dudek continues to be involved in music.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
John Wallace Carter was born on September 24, 1929 in Fort Worth, Texas and attended I.M. Terrell High School, and played music with schoolmates Ornette Coleman and Charles Moffett in the 1940s. Earning a Bachelor of Arts from Lincoln University in Jefferson, Missouri in 1949 and a Master of Arts from the University of Colorado in 1956. He also studied at the North Texas State and University of California at Los Angeles, California.
From 1961, Carter was based mainly on the West Coast. There he met Bobby Bradford in 1965, with whom he subsequently worked on a number of projects, notably the New Jazz Art Ensemble. He also played with Hampton Hawes and Harold Land. In the 1970s Carter became well known on the basis of his solo concerts.
At the New Jazz Festival Moers in 1979, he and the German clarinet player Theo Jörgensmann performed for three days. Carter received complimentary reviews and wide recognition from around the world. He and Jörgensmann met again in 1984, and played the Berlin JazzFest, both as a soloist and in duo.
Between 1982 and 1990, John composed and recorded Roots and Folklore: Episodes in the Development of American Folk Music. It was a five album set that focused on African Americans and their history, and was acclaimed by jazz critics as containing some of the best releases of the 1980s.
He recorded seventeen albums as a leader and thirteen albums with Tim Berne, Clarinet Summit, Vinny Golia, Richard Grossman, John Lindberg, James Newton and Horace Tapscott. Carter planned a clarinet quartet with Perry Robinson, Jörgensmann and Eckard Koltermann was planned for 1991, but it never came to fruition.
Clarinetist, saxophonist, and flutist John Carter passed away from a non-malignant tumor on March 31, 1991. Later that year he was inducted into the Down Beat Jazz Hall of Fame.
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