Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Joe Kennedy, Jr. on November 17, 1923 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and was introduced to the violin by his grandfather. During his induction in the Army he performed with the Camp Lee Symphony Orchestra in Petersburg, Virginia. Returning home he cut his jazz teeth as a member of the Four Strings along with Ahmad Jamal, with Mary Lou Williams supervising their debut recording session.
Kennedy would go on to study and earn degrees at Carnegie Mellon, Virginia State College, Duquesne University. As an educator with the Richmond Public Schools he was the Instrumental Music Supervisor, Supervisor of Music and Supervisor of Secondary Arts and Humanities, Director of Jazz Studies at Virginia Tech and Virginia Commonwealth University developing “An Introduction to African American Music” at the latter.
Joe would be one of the first Blacks to become the Resident Violinist with the Richmond Symphony from 1963 – 1981, traveled abroad with the Benny Carter All-Stars and performed at numerous concerts and festivals throughout the United States, and Europe.
Kennedy performed and recorded several albums as a leader as well as with pianist Ahmad Jamal. He performed with Benny Carter, Toots Thielemans, Billy Taylor and the Modern Jazz Quartet among others. Violinist, composer, arranger and educator Joe Kennedy, Jr., recipient of the 2001 Legacy Award, passed away on April 17, 2004.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Jean-Luc Ponty was born September 29, 1942 in Avranches, France to parents who taught and played violin, piano and clarinet. At sixteen, he was admitted to the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique de Paris, graduating two years later with the institution’s highest award, Premier Prix. He was immediately hired by one of the major symphony orchestras, Concerts Lamoureux, where he played for three years.
While still a member of the orchestra in Paris, Ponty picked up a side gig playing clarinet for a college jazz band that regularly performed at local parties. This life-changing jumping-off point sparked an interest in the jazz sounds of Miles Davis and John Coltrane, compelling him to take up the tenor saxophone. After a night in a local club with his violin it only took four years to be widely accepted as the leading figure in jazz fiddle.
Adopting the electric violin was at first proved to be a handicap as few at the time viewed the instrument as having no legitimate place in the modern jazz vocabulary. With a powerful sound that eschewed vibrato, Jean-Luc distinguished himself with be-bop era phrasings and a punchy style, that by 1964, at age 22, he released his debut solo album for Philips, Jazz Long Playing. He would go on to record with violin greats like Stephane Grappelli and Stuff Smith, perform at Monterey in 1967 with John Lewis, snag a recording contract and work with Gerald Wilson Big Band, the George Duke Trio and Niels-Henning Orsted Pederson.
In 1969, Frank Zappa composed the music for Jean-Luc’s solo album King Kong; in 1972 Elton John collaborated with Ponty on Honky Chateau, and within a year emigrated to America, making his home in Los Angeles, California. He worked with John McLaughlin Mahavishnu Orchestra, and in 1975 signed with Atlantic Records. For the next decade, Jean-Luc toured the world repeatedly and recorded 12 consecutive albums which all reached the top 5 on the Billboard Jazz charts.
Over the course of his prolific career, violinist Jena-Luc Ponty has performed with the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble, Radio City Orchestra, with symphonies around the world, Al Di Meola, Stanley Clarke, a host of American and African musicians, collaborated with his pianist daughter Clara on several project, joined the 4th incarnation of Return To Forever in 2011 and continues perform, tour and record, adding to his more than four dozen album catalogue.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Billy Bang was born on William Vincent Walker on September 20, 1947 in Mobile, Alabama and while he was still an infant his family moved to the Bronx in New York City. As a child he attended a special school for musicians in Harlem and being small in physical size was assigned a violin instead his first choices, the saxophone or drums. It was around this time that he acquired the nickname of “Billy Bang”, derived from a popular cartoon character.
Billy studied the violin until he earned a hardship scholarship to a private high school in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, at which point he abandoned the instrument due to a lack of a music program. He had difficulty adjusting to school life, encountering racism and developing confusion about his identity, and his later onset of schizophrenia.
Bang left the school after two years, attended a school in the Bronx, dropped out when he was drafted, at 18 joined the Army and arrived in Vietnam in time for the Tet Offensive. Returning from the war he became politically active, fell in with an underground group of revolutionaries, purchased weapons and impulsively bought another violin from the same pawnshop.
In 1977, Bang co-founded the String Trio of New York with guitarist James Emery and bassist John Lindberg, exploring his experience in Vietnam in two albums: Vietnam: The Aftermath and Vietnam: Reflections.
Free jazz composer and violinist Billy Bang passed away on April 11, 2011 from complications due to lung cancer. He is survived by a legacy of some three-dozen albums.
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