Daily Dose Of Jazz…
He was born William Correa on February 28, 1934 in East Harlem, New York City but to the jazz and Latin music worlds he was simply known as Willie Bobo, a moniker given him by Mary Lou Williams after they recorded in the early 50’s. Growing up in Spanish Harlem in New York City, he began playing bongos at age 14 and started performing a year later with Perez Prado. Over the next few years he studied with Mongo Santamaria while serving as his translator and at 19 joined Tito Puente for four years.
Willie became one of the great Latin percussionists of his time, a relentless swinger on the congas and timbales, a flamboyant showman onstage, and an engaging if modestly endowed singer. He also made serious inroads into the pop, R&B and straight jazz worlds, and he always said that his favorite song was Antonio Carlos Jobim’s “Dindi.”
He worked with Cal Tjader, Herbie Mann and Santamaria with whom he recorded the evergreen Latin standard “Afro-Blue” but it was in 1963 that he made his first recording as a leader with Clark Terry and Joe Farrell. He went on to record with Miles Davis, Cannonball Adderley, Herbie Hancock, Wes Montgomery, Chico Hamilton and Sonny Stitt. In 1969, he moved to Los Angeles where he led jazz and Latin jazz combos, appeared on Bill Cosby’s first comedy series in 1969.
He recorded on his own for Sussex, Blue Note, Verve and Columbia. One of his last appearances, only three months before his death, was at the 1983 Playboy Jazz Festival where he reunited with Santamaria for the first time in 15 years. Jazz percussionist and timbale master Willie Bobo, known for his Afro-Cuban and Latin jazz succumbed to cancer on September 15, 1983 at age 49.
More Posts: drums,percussion,timbales
Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Chano Pozo was born Luciano Pozo Gonales was born in Havana, Cuba on January 7, 1915 and Chano showed an early interest in drumming, gaining his musical background performing ably in Afro-Cuban religious ceremonies in which drumming was a key element.
Growing up in poverty in the foul and dangerous area of El Africa solar where even the police feared to tread, By 13 he was in reformatory learning to read and write, study auto repair and hone his already exceptional drumming skill. Upon his release and during a series of lackluster jobs he composed music. His reputation grew among the people each year for the compositions he wrote for carnival and he quickly became the most sought after rumbero in Cuba.
At the beginning of 1947 Pozo moved to New York City with the encouragement of Miguelito Valdes with who he recorded along with Arsenio Rodriguez, Carlos Vidal Bolado and Jose Mangual. By September he was a featured performer with Dizzy Gillespie’s Big Band at Carnegie Hall and subsequently on a European tour. Their most notable material was ‘Cubana Be, Cubana Bop, Tin Tin Deo and Manteca, the latter two co-written by Pozo.
A conguero, percussionist, singer, dancer and composer, Chano became one of the founding fathers of Latin jazz, which was essentially a blend of bebop and Cuban folk music. Chano Pozo, a hot-tempered Cuban, was killed in a Harlem bar, a little more than a month shy of his 34th birthday on December 2, 1948.
Chano Pozo: 1915-1948 / Drums, Percussion
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Don Elliott was born on October 21, 1926 in Somerville, New Jersey. He played mellophone in his high school band and played trumpet for an army band. After study at the University of Miami he added vibraphone to his arsenal of instruments. He recorded with Terry Gibbs and Buddy Rich before forming his own band.
From 1953 to 1960 he won the Down Beat readers poll several times for “miscellaneous instrument-mellophone.” Known as the “Human Instrument”, Elliott additionally performed jazz as a vocalist, trombonist, flugelhornist and percussionist. He pioneered the art of multi-track recording, composed over 5000 jingles with a countless number being prize-winning advertising jingles, prepared film scores, recorded over 60 albums and built a thriving production company.
Don scored several Broadway productions, such as The Beast In Me and A Thunder Carnival, the latter of which he performed with the Don Elliott Quartet, provided one of the voices for the novelty jazz duo the Nutty Squirrels, and lent his vocal talents to such motion picture soundtracks as The Getaway, $ (Dollars), The Hot Rock and The Happy Hooker.
His album Calypso Jazz is considered by some jazz enthusiasts to be one of the definitive calypso jazz albums. He worked with Paul Desmond, Bill Taylor, Billy Eckstine, Bill Evans, Urbie Green, Michel Legrand, George Shearing and Mundell Lowe among others over his career. Multi-instrumentalist, vocalist, publisher and producer Don Elliott, who was a longtime associate of Quincy Jones, passed away of cancer in Weston, Connecticut on July 5, 1984.
More Posts: flugelhorn,mellophone,percussion,trombone,trumpet,vibraphone,vocal