Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Paul Quinichette was born on May 17, 1916 in Denver, Colorado. Known as the Vice President or Vice Prez for his emulation of the breathy style of Lester Young a.k.a. Prez, but Quinichette was also capable of a gruffer style of playing.
The young Paul started playing the saxophone and clarinet, first on alto and then switching to tenor as R&B work started rolling in. Gaining experience playing with Nat Towles, Lloyd Sherock and Ernie Fields he became a feature in Jay Mcshann’s band from 42-46. He followed with stints on the west coast with Johnny Otis, and in New York with Louis Jordan, Lucky Millinder, Red Allen and Hot Lips Page.
Quinichette’s big break came when Basie hired him to play solos like Lester Young. His success with Basie garnered him an Emarcy record contract, the release of several albums and a modicum of fame. Over the course of his career Quinichette worked with Benny Goodman, recorded with Lester Young, John Coltrane, Billie Holiday, Sammy Price and Buddy Tate but mainly led his own group sessions.
In the late 50s he left music to become an electrical engineer only to return briefly in the Seventies. Poor health forced retirement for tenor saxophonist Paul Quinichette who passed away on May 25, 1983 in New York City.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Sidney Bechet was born on May 14, 1897 in New Orleans, Louisiana to a wealthy Creole family. At age six he picked up his brother’s clarinet, learned to play by on his own, eventually playing at a family birthday party exhibited his new talent. Later he would study with renowned Creole clarinetists Lorenzo Tio, Big Eye Louis Nelson and George Baquet. He would be found improvising jazz in many New Orleans ensembles led by John Robichaux, Bunk Johnson and King Oliver.
By the time he was 17 Bechet was touring as far north as Chicago and two years later landed in New York playing with Marion Cook’s Syncopated Orchestra. This led him to Europe and the Royal Philharmonic Hall where he attracted attention with his playing. It was in London that Sidney found the straight soprano and quickly developed a style different from his warm clarinet.
Sidney became one of the first important soloists in jazz, eclipsing Louis Armstrong into the studio by several months, and was possibly the first notable jazz saxophonist. His forceful delivery and well-constructed improvisations characterized his distinctive and wide vibrato playing although his lively and unpredictable temperament did not gain him wide acclaim until well into the late forties.
Returning to New York in 1922 he began recording songs like “Wild Cat Blues” and “Kansas City Man’s Blues” with sessions led by pianist and songwriter Clarence Williams. Over the next three decades Bechet continued to record and tour although his success was intermittent. He relocated to France in 1950, got married and shortly before his death dictated his poetic autobiography “Treat It Gentle”. Sidney Bechet, clarinetist, saxophonist and composer died in Garches, France of lung cancer on May 14, 1959, his 62nd birthday.
Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Teddy Edwards was born Theodore Marcus Edwards in Jackson, Mississippi on April 26, 1924. Learning to play at a very early age he began on alto, then clarinet, finally settling on the tenor. His first professional gig was with the Royal Mississippians prior to his uncle sending for him in Detroit where he lived for a short time. Although presented with the chance for greater opportunities family illness took him back to Jackson.
Venturing to Louisiana he met Ernie Fields who persuaded him to join his band and touring through Tampa, Washington, DC thwarted his dream of New York and Edwards ended up in Los Angeles, which would become his permanent residence in 1945. It was during this period in his career when he started playing with Howard McGhee’s band that Teddy switched to the tenor saxophone.
Teddy played with such notables as Charlie Parker, Roy Milton, Wynonie Harris, Vince Guaraldi, Joe Castro, Ernie Andrews among others and recording “The Duel” with Dexter Gordon in 1947 set Edwards up as a dueling legend. As a leader, throughout the 50s and 60s he worked with Max Roach, Clifford Brown, Benny Carter, Benny Goodman, Milt Jackson Sarah Vaughan, Tom Waits and Jimmy Smith, recording on Onyx, Pacific Jazz, Contemporary, Prestige and other labels, writing his best known composition Sunset Eyes.
Teddy Edwards, who became one of the most influential tenor saxophonists passed away on April 20, 2003. His sound exemplified an affinity for the blues and tone-quality that accompanies within a fluent post-bop vocabulary.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
John Arnold Griffin III was born on April 24, 1928 in Chicago, Illinois. Nicknamed the “Little Giant”, he studied music at DuSable High School starting out on clarinet, taking up the oboe and finally the alto saxophone. At fifteen he was playing with T-Bone Walker and three days after graduation joined Lionel Hampton who encouraged the young man to take up the tenor, appearing on a Hamp recording in 1945 at age 17.
In the mid-forties Johnny formed a sextet with Joe Morris and George Freeman, played on R&B records for Atlantic Records and played baritone with Arnett Cobb’s R&B band. After a two-year stint in the Army he returned to Chicago and began establishing his reputation, subsequently signing with Blue Note. By 1957 he gained membership into Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers, then replaced Coltrane in Monk’s Five Spot Quartet, and recorded Thelonious In Action and Misterioso.
On his first leader outing in 1956 with Blue Note that brought him critical acclaim, Griffin led Wynton Kelly, Curly Russell and Max Roach on “Introducing Johnny Griffin”. This was immediately followed the next year with “A Blowing Session” featuring Coltrane and Hank Mobley. He went on to play with Monk, Blakey and with Clark Terry. During this period he became known as the fastest tenor in the west for the ease with which he could execute fast note runs with excellent intonation.
In 1960 he teamed up with Eddie “Lockjaw” Davis establishing a quintet and recorded several albums over the next two years, then moved to France in ’63 and recorded with Wes Montgomery and Dizzy Gillespie, Nat Adderley, and joined the Kenny Clarke-Francy Boland Big Band and by 1978 he moved to the Netherlands. He became the first choice sax player for touring musicians to the continent. In the seventies he and Davis recorded again, he played with Toots Thielemans, Nat Adderley, Grady Tate, Stan Getz, Art Farmer, Slide Hampton, Gerry Mulligan and arranger Quincy Jones among a host of others.
On July 25, 2008, Johnny Griffin passed away of a heart attack at the age of 80 in Mauprévoir, France, his home for the last 24 years of his life.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Leo Parker was born on April 18, 1925 in Washington, DC. He studied alto saxophone in high school and by 1944 had recorded with Coleman Hawkins. Switching to baritone the same year, he joined Billy Eckstine’s bebop band for the next two years.
In 1945 he became a member of the “Unholy Four” of saxophonists joining Dexter Gordon, Sonny Stitt, Gene Ammons. Possessed of a big, beefy sound tone and a fluent technique that spoke to R & B and advanced harmonies of bebop, Leo played with Dizzy Gillespie, Illinois Jacquet, Fats Navarro, J.J. Johnson, Teddy Edwards, Wardell Gray and Sir Charles Thompson, the later which he had a hit with “Mad Lad”.
During the ‘50s Leo experienced problems with drug abuse that interfered with his recording obligations. Although he made two comebacks recordings for Blue Note in 1961, the following year Leo Parker died of a heart attack at age 36 in New York City on February 11, 1962.
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