Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Donald Tyson Ewell was born in Baltimore, Maryland on November 14, 1916. He played with Bill Reinhardt’s Jazz, Ltd. band in Chicago, Illinois in 1947, 1948, and 1949. From 1956 to 1962, he was a member of the Jack Teagarden band and after Teagarden’s death, he went on tour in Europe.
Returning to New Orleans, Louisiana he performed in clubs and hotels. From 1976 to 1978 he performed in concert while battling alcoholism, he lived with his friend King Denton, the manager of a jazz club where Don was Artist in Residence.
He worked with Sidney Bechet, Kid Ory, George Lewis, George Brunis, Muggsy Spanier, and Bunk Johnson. He recorded twenty-one albums as a leader and seven as a sideman with Barbara Dane, Doc Evans, Bunk Johnson, Jack Teagarden. Moving back to Maryland. After his daughter’s death from cancer and after two strokes, stride pianist Don Ewell passed away on August 9, 1983.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Eddie Calhoun was born November 13, 1921 in Clarksdale, Mississippi and raised in Chicago, Illinois. During the late Forties, he worked with Dick Davis and Ahmad Jamal in the early 1950s. Through the decade he played with Horace Henderson, Johnny Griffin, Roy Eldridge, Billie Holiday, and Miles Davis. He joined Erroll Garner in 1955 and played with him through 1966, recording extensively and touring worldwide.
After his time with Garner, Calhoun settled again in Chicago, where he played with vocalist and pianist Norvel Reed from 1967 to 1968. For two years from 1972 to 1974, he ran a nightclub called Cal’s in Chicago and led a sextet at the Fantasy Club from 1975 to 1980.
1980 to 1986 saw him accompanying pianist Lennie Capp before joining the Chicago All-Stars alongside Erwin Helfer for a tour of Europe. Never recorded as a leader, he recorded ten albums as a sideman during his career. Double bassist Eddie Calhoun passed away on January 27, 1993 in Paradise Lake, Mississippi.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Charlie Mariano was born Carmine Ugo Mariano on November 12, 1923 in Boston, Massachusetts, the son of Italian immigrants. Growing up in the Hyde Park neighborhood of Boston, after high school, he enlisted in the Army Air Corps during World War II. After his discharge, he attended Schillinger House of Music, now Berklee College of Music. He was among the faculty at Berklee from 1965–1971.
Moving to Europe in 1971, he eventually settled in Köln, Germany, with his third wife, Dorothee Zippel. He played with one of the Stan Kenton big bands, Toshiko Akiyoshi, his second wife, Charles Mingus, Eberhard Weber, the United Jazz and Rock Ensemble, Embryo and numerous other notable bands and musicians.
He was known for his use of the nadaswaram, a classical wind instrument from Tamil Nadu. He recorded thirteen albums as a leader and another sixty records as a sideman, working with Shelly Manne, Eberhard Weber, Manny Albam, Max Bennett, Chet Baker, Philip Catherine, Serge Chaloff, Peggy Connelly, Herb Ellis, Maynard Ferguson, Michael Gibbs, John Graas, George Gruntz, Chico Hamilton, Bill Harris, Bill Holman, Jackie and Roy, Elvin Jones, Quincy Jones, Mel Lewis, Arif Mardin, Toshiko Mariano, Vince Mendoza, Modern Jazz Quartet, Mike Nock, Nat Pierce, Herb Pomeroy, Irene Reid, Johnny Richards, Jimmy Ricks, Shorty Rogers, Frank Rosolino, Sal Salvador, Fredy Studer, Harvie Swartz, McCoy Tyner, Sadao Watanabe, Stu Williamson.
Alto and soprano saxophonist Carmine Mariano passed away from cancer on June 16, 2009
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Sonny White was born Ellerton Oswald White on November 11, 1917 in Panama City, Panama. He took the nickname Sonny while a member of Jesse Stone’s band in the middle of the 1930s. Later in the decade, he played with Willie Bryant, Sidney Bechet, Frankie Newton, and Teddy Hill alongside Dizzy Gillespie and Kenny Clarke.
He recorded several sessions with Billie Holiday, with whom he had a yearlong affair in 1939, and their engagement was announced in Melody Maker that May. A member of different line-ups backing Holiday in New York between January 1939 and October 1940, Sonny performed on the classic recording of Strange Fruit.
The 1940s saw him spending time in the bands of Artie Shaw, Benny Carter, with whom he played before and after his World War II military service. He would play again with Carter, Dizzy Gillespie, Big Joe Turner, Lena Horne, Dexter Gordon from 1944 to 1946, and Hot Lips Page in 1947.
In the 1950s he played with Harvey Davis and then with Wilbur De Paris, remaining with the latter until 1964. In the 1960s he freelanced with Eddie Barefield, among others, and was working with Jonah Jones at the time of his death. Pianist Sonny White passed away on April 28, 1971 in New York City.
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Three Wishes
Cherokee Conyers answered Nica inquiry of what his three wishes would be by telling her:
- “Good health.”
- “A nice home.”
- “Happiness. No! I want happiness secondPut the “nice home” third.”
*Excerpt from Three Wishes: An Intimate Look at Jazz Greats ~ Compiled and Photographed by Pannonica de Koenigswarter
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