Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Norman Simmons was born on October 6, 1929 in Chicago, Illinois. As a child he was captivated by the sounds of the big band era, in particular, Duke Ellington’s orchestra. He started teaching himself piano and by sixteen enrolled in the Chicago School of Music, completing in four years.
In 1949 Norman formed his own group and began recording in 1952. An accomplished composer his tune “Jan” was a hit for tenorist Paul Bascomb the following year. Keeping a steady gig at the noted Chicago jazz spot “The Beehive” gave him the opportunity to back touring musicians like Wardell Gray, Lester Young and Charlie Parker. But it was Ernestine Anderson who convinced him to move to New York City to continue working with her.
In New York Simmons performed with Johnny Griffin and played and wrote intricate arrangements for Eddie “Lockjaw” Davis. Upon the latter’s recommendation he teamed up with Carmen McRae for nine years before moving on with Betty Carter and Anita O’Day where he found greater improvisational freedom. Late in the 70’s decade he began his long collaboration with Joe Williams and would work with Helen Humes and Sarah Vaughan among others.
As an educator he has taught at Paterson State College since 1982, participated in the Jazzmobile program for over twenty years, and has fostered music in public schools. Pianist Norman Simmons’ arrangement of Ramsey Lewis’ 1966 hit of “Wade In The Water” became a large commercial success, he was a member of the Ellington Legacy Band beginning in 2002 and he currently continues to perform, compose and arrange.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Bill Dixon was born on October 5, 1925 in Nantucket, Massachusetts and his family later moved to Harlem, New York City when he was about 7. It wasn’t until some twenty years later that he became interested in music and trumpet began his five-year studies at the Hartnette Conservatory of Music in 1946. He studied painting at Boston University, the WPA Arts School and the Art Students League. During the early 1950s while employed at the United Nations, he founded the UN Jazz Society.
By the 1960’s Dixon established himself as a major force in the jazz avant-garde movement, organizing and producing the “October Revolution in Jazz”. This first free-jazz festival comprised four days of music and discussions at the Cellar Café in Manhattan with musicians such as Cecil Taylor and Sun Ra participating.
Bill would later found the Jazz Composers Guild, become a professor of music at Bennington College, establish their Black Music Division, and was one of four featured musicians in the Canadian documentary Imagine the Sound in 1981 with Cecil Taylor, Archie Shepp and Paul Bley.
Dixon recorded relatively little over the decade and a half beginning in the late Sixties but co-led a few sessions with Archie Shepp, appeared on Cecil Taylor’s “Conquistador!” and some solo trumpet recordings has emerged. His recording career as a leader and sideman would pick up in the 80s into the new millennium with his last album being issued posthumously in 2011. On June 16, 2010, Bill Dixon, who played trumpet, flugelhorn and piano died in his sleep at his home after suffering from an undisclosed illness.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Niels Lan Doky was born in Copenhagen, Denmark on October 3, 1963 and first learned to play guitar before switching to piano at age 11. At the age of 15, he began working with Thad Jones, Kenny Drew, Ernie Wilkins, Ed Thigpen and others living and playing around his hometown. Shortly after finishing high school in 1981, following the advice of Thad Jones, he moved to the U.S. and studied at Berklee College of Music in Boston before establishing himself in New York City’s jazz scene.
Bassist Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen helped Doky land his first recording contract with Storyville records in 1986 and toured and recorded with him across Europe and in the USA during the rest the decade and well into the 1990s. During that period Pederson became a mentor and played a crucial role in helping him find his own musical voice and develop his own personal style.
Over the course of his career pianist Niels Lan Doky has recorded thirty-three albums, played for Pope Paul II, received an award from Denmark’s royal family, was appointed Member of the Music Committee under the Danish Arts Council, and made his film directing debut with the acclaimed feature film “Between a Smile and a Tear”.
He has performed with Joe Henderson, Gary Peacock, Jack DeJohnette, Ray Brown, Randy and Michael Brecker, David Sanborn, Al Foster, Billy Hart, John Scofield, John Abercrombie, Bill Evans, Bob Berg, Tom Harrell, Ray Drummond, Al Jarreau, Charlie Haden, Gino Vannelli, in addition to leading groups under his own name currently today.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Nicholas Payton was born on September 26, 1973 in New Orleans, Louisiana, the son of bassist and sousaphonist Walter Payton. He took up the trumpet at age four and by nine was playing in the Young Tuxedo Brass Band. Upon leaving school, he enrolled first at the New Orleans Center for Creative Arts and then at the University of New Orleans under the tutelage of Ellis Marsalis.
Payton toured with Marcus Roberts and Elvin Jones in the early 90s, signed a recording contract with Verve Records, and released his first album, From This Moment in 1994. In 1996 he performed on the soundtrack of the movie Kansas City.
After seven albums on Verve, Nicholas signed with Warner Bros. and would perform and record with Wynton Marsalis, Dr. Michael White, Christian McBride, Joshua Redman, Roy Hargrove and Joe Henderson among others. He became a member of the Blue Note 7 in 2008, releasing an album in 2009 that produced a U.S. promotional tour.
Trumpeter Nicholas Payton also plays piano and is a prolific blogger and has written a notable blog titled “On the Difference Between Prejudice and Racism…” in which Payton theorizes that blacks cannot be racist because a prerequisite to racism is power.
He has recorded more than a dozen albums as a leader and sideman, received a Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Solo for his playing on the album Doc Cheatham & Nicholas Payton and continues to compose, record and perform.
Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Gene M. Roland was born September 15, 1921 in Dallas, Texas and learned to play several instruments, such as trumpet and piano. He received a degree in music from the University of North Texas College of Music, first hooked up with Kenton in 1944, playing fifth trumpet and contributing arrangements. He worked briefly with Lionel Hampton and Lucky Millinder, and then rejoined Kenton in 1945 as a trombonist and writer, arranging the hit “Tampico”.
In 1946 Roland played piano and wrote for a group that included Stan Getz, Zoot Sims, Jimmy Giuffre and Herbie Steward, and would lead Woody Herman’s Four Brothers Second Herd. By the late 40s, he played trombone with George Auld, trumpet with Count Basie, Charlie Barnet and Lucky Millinder, and contributed charts for the big bands of Claude Thornhill and Artie Shaw. He led a giant rehearsal band in 1950 that included Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker, wrote for Kenton in 1951, Dan Terry in 1954, and Woody Herman from 1956-58, for whom he contributed 65 arrangements.
Gene was a major force in Kenton’s mellophonium band of the early 1960s, not only writing for the ensemble, but also performing as one of the mellophoniums, occasionally doubling on soprano sax with the orchestra. He provided the robust vocal on “Hawaiian Teenage Girl”, and remained active as a writer in the 1960s and 70s, working with Copenhagen’s Radiohus Orchestra and playing trumpet, piano and tenor with his own groups.
Arranger, composer, vocalist and multi-instrumentalist Gene Roland, who was the only arranger to write for Kenton in all four decades of the band’s existence, passed away on August 11, 1982 in New York City.
