Johnny Dodds Music and Biography

Clarinettist Johnny Dodds was born in New Orleans, Louisiana, in 1892. Johnny Dodds was one of the greatest jazz clarinetists of the Twenties and he possessed a very soulful and emotional style of playing. Dodds and Louis Armstrong complimented each other perfectly when the two musicians worked together in King Oliver’s Creole Jazz Band and later in Armstrong’s Hot Five and Seven recording bands.

Dodds played in many of the leading jazz bands of the classic jazz era. Dodds played in Kid Ory’s band in New Orleans from 1912 to 1919, and like Armstrong, he played on riverboats with Fate Marable before moving to Chicago in 1921 to play with King Oliver’s Creole Jazz Band. Dodds also lent his fine clarinet chops to Jelly Roll Morton’s band, The Red Hot Peppers. Dodds appeared on most of Armstrong’s classic Hot Five recordings and recorded numerous excellent sides under his own during the Twenties.

The best of Dodds’ solo recordings include, “Clarinet Wobble,” “Wild Man Blues,” and “Piggly Wiggly.” Dodds continued to play and record in Chicago throughout the Thirties, and also ran a taxi cab company with his brother, drummer Baby Dodds, until his death in 1940.

 The 2009 compilation, “The Complete Johnny Dodds,” is the best collection of his works. Dodds is also included on “The Chronological Classics: Johnny Dodds” series from 1991/1992.



Johnny Doods (third from right) with the Fate Marable  Band

Charlie Parker Ornithology

Saxophonist Charlie Parker is considered by many to be the best musician in the history of jazz. He is one of the few jazz musicians who could rival the technical brilliance and originality of Louis Armstrong and Art Tatum. Parker’s drug-addicted life and early demise is jazz legend and a tragic example which would be repeated by several jazz musicians who followed him.

Parker was nicknamed “Yardbird” which was eventually shortened to simply, “Bird.” Many of his compositions, including “Yardbrid Suite” and “Ornithology” would be inspired by that nickname.

Charlie Parker was born in Kansas City, Missouri, in 1920. He began to play the saxophone at age 11, and had joined a musician’s union instead of attending high school. He practiced diligently in the late Thirties, and by 1938, he was good enough to join the band of pianist Jay McShann. While in his teens, Parker had become addicted to morphine after being administered the drug in hospital after a car accident. His morphine addiction would lead to a heroin addiction which would contribute to his early death at age 34.

Parker quit the McShann band in 1939, and headed to New York City to begin a solo career. In the early Forties, Parker was experimenting with soloing methods. His experimentation constituted some of the early developments of be-bop music, a subgenre of jazz with which he would forever be linked. He would soon be collaborating with Dizzy Gillespie, Max Roach, Bud Powell, and others. In summer 1945, Parker and his friends recorded “Ko-ko” and other sides at a session for the Savoy label. That session and its recordings would become a watershed moment for bebop music.

By this time, Charlie Parker’s heroin addiction was causing him to miss gigs, and he resorted to busking on New York City streets to support his addiction. Parker then moved to Los Angeles where heroin was difficult to find, and he began to drink heavily to compensate. He was often in bad shape at recording sessions and needed, at times, to be physically supported by others. Parker moved back to New York City where he died, in 1955.

The best original albums and collections of Charlie Parker’s music include, “Charlie Parker with Strings” (1950), “Charlie Parker with Strings Vol.2” (1950), “Charlie Parker” (1953), “Big Band” (1954), “Summit Meeting at Birdland” (1977), “At Storyville” (1985), “The Genius of Charlie Parker” (1954), “The Charlie Parker Story” (1956), “The Genius of Charlie Parker” (1957), “Anthology” (1974), “Charlie Parker on Dial” (1974), “Bird/The Savoy Recordings (Master Takes)” (1974), “The Very Best of Bird” (1977), “The Complete Studio Savoy Recordings” (1978), “Bird: The Complete Charlie Parker on Verve” (1988), “Bird: The Original Recordings of Charlie Parker” (1988), “Masterworks 1946-47” (1990),”Yardbird Suite: The Ultimate Collection” (1997), “The Complete Savoy and Dial Studio Recordings 1944-1948” (2000), “The Essential Charlie Parker” (2004).

Bird

Benny Goodman: The Birth of Swing

Benny Goodman and long-time rival, Artie Shaw, are the two greatest and best-known white clarinetists in the history of jazz. Both men achieved huge commercial and critical success during their respective careers. It was Goodman, however, who would forever be identified with the title, “King of Swing,” for his role in the invention of the most popular jazz subgenre during the height of the music’s popularity.

Benny Goodman was born in Chicago, Illinois, in 1909. His parents were Jewish immigrants from the Russian Empire who struggled to provide for their large family. Despite the family’s relative poverty, David Goodman arranged for music lessons for three of his sons, including Benny, at a local Chicago synagogue. After a year’s training, Benny Goodman, aged eleven, joined a boys’ club band and received further musical training from the club’s director, and later from a classically-trained clarinetist. With this solid foundation, Goodman would launch a career that would span seven decades and would span musical genres from early classic jazz to classical music.

Goodman’s began his jazz career as a clarinetist in the Ben Pollack Orchestra at the age of sixteen. He would make his first recording with the Pollack Orchestra in 1926. He would continue performing and recording with the Pollack Orchestra and its various off-shoots until 1929. During this frenetic period, Goodman also recorded with nationally- known bands of Ben Selvin, Red Nichols, and Ted Lewis. He also recorded under his own name with trombonist Glenn Miller and others as “Benny Goodman’s Boys.”

In the early Thirties, John Hammond of Columbia records arranged for Goodman to record in the company of other stellar jazz musicians in a jazz “all star” band. Other members of the band included pianist Teddy Wilson and drummer Gene Kroupa, two musicians that would form the core of the rhythm section of Goodman’s later orchestra. In 1935, Goodman expressed interest in appearing on the nationwide radio dance music show, “Let’s Dance.” At the advice of John Hammond, Goodman secured “swinging” arrangements of songs from Fletcher Henderson, leader of one of New York’s best jazz orchestras. These arrangements helped make Goodman a hit with the West Coast audience that heard his performance.

On the strength of the Let’s Dance performance and the rave reviews of Goodman’s recordings of “King Porter Stop” and “Sometimes I’m Happy” with Fletcher Henderson arrangements, a large and enthusiastic crowd of young fans were waiting in Oakland, California when the band played a show there in August of 1935. When the Goodman band began to play, the crowd went wild. The same reaction greeted the band in Los Angeles during the debut of a three week engagement at the Palomar Ballroom in August, 1935. During the three-week engagement the “Jitterbug” dance was born, and along with it, the “Swing Era.”

In the wake of the tremendous success of the Goodman band in California, Fletcher Henderson disbanded his great orchestra and become Goodman’s full-time arranger. With the addition of Henderson and pianist Teddy Wilson, both African-Americans, Goodman’s band became the first racially-integrated jazz band in America. Goodman would later add another African-American, the great Charlie Christian, on guitar.

Goodman was coined, “The King of Swing” in 1937, and was secured as such when his orchestra became the first jazz band to play New York’s Carnegie Hall, in 1938. The concert, which included members of Count Basie’s and Duke Ellington’s orchestras, was a true test for jazz music as an art form. If the high-brow Carnegie Hall set could be moved by jazz, the music would earn a much needed stamp of approval from the music establishment. After an uninspired start, the Goodman Orchestra slowly built momentum and climaxed with an epic version of “Sing, Sing, Sing” featuring spectacular solos by Goodman and pianist, Jess Stacy.

In 1939, John Hammond introduced the electric guitarist, Charlie Christian, to Goodman as a prospective band member. Despite initial doubts, Goodman was greatly impressed with Christian’s playing and included him in the Benny Goodman Sextet for the next two years. The sextet recordings with Christian including “Rose Room,” “Breakfast Feud,” and “Grand Slam” are some of the finest recordings in jazz history.

Goodman continued to have tremendous success as a big band leader until the mid-Forties when swing music began to lose steam. Goodman flirted with be-bop music and even formed a bebop band before finally denouncing the music. In 1949, at the age of 40, Goodman turned his back on jazz to devote himself to the study of classical music. Following a lengthy retirement from jazz, Goodman died of a heart attack in 1986.

A plethora of fine collections are available for Goodman’s recordings at various phases of his career including the fine four volume “Chronological Classics: Benny Goodman and His Orchestra” (1996) while “The Famous 1938 Carnegie Hall Jazz Concert Vol.1-2” (1950) is one of the finest live recordings of popular music ever made.



Benny Goodman (third from left) and his band















Frank Sinatra: In the Wee Small Hours

Prior to the meteoric rise of Elvis Presley and rock and roll, Frank Sinatra was the biggest male singing phenomenon that popular music had ever seen. Sinatra’s rise to prominence was accompanied by the same female hysteria that would be heard with the rise of Presley and The Beatles in later decades.

Sinatra was born in Hoboken, New Jersey in 1915. He got his start as a big band jazz vocalist with the Harry James Orchestra in 1939. His first recording with James was “From the Bottom of My Heart.” Sinatra would stay with James for about one year and record other sides such as “Here Comes the Night” and “My Buddy.” In 1940, Tommy Dorsey lured Sinatra away from James, and it was with Dorsey that Sinatra would find stardom. Sinatra’s first recording with Dorsey was, “The Sky Fell Down.” Sinatra would stay with Dorsey for five years and record dozens of hit singles including, “Stardust,” “It’s Always You,” “Blue Skies,” and “Embraceable You.”

By the time Sinatra left the Dorsey Orchestra, he was already a pop star and was ready to move on to recordings and performances with himself getting top billing. Sinatra continued to record scads of hit songs throughout the mid-late Forties and early Fifties and branch out as an entertainer by acting in movies. He eventually formed the infamous “rat pack” with show business cronies, Sammy Davis Jr. and Dean Martin.

By the mid-Fifties, when rock and roll was beginning to replace swing and vocal jazz as America’s new pop music, Sinatra openly railed against the new music for being primitive and crude causing Elvis Presley to publically express his dismay at the comments.

Sinatra would begin to record his own albums in 1945, with his first notable effort being “The Voice of Frank Sinatra” (1946) on Columbia Records with The Nelson Riddle Orchestra. Several albums would follow, and then in 1954, Sinatra would record his first

classic album, “Songs for Young Lovers” The following year Sinatra would record the album that is generally cited as his masterpiece, “In the Wee Small Hours” in which Sinatra delivers sixteen songs of heartbreak in inimitable style.

Numerous other essential albums would follow for the next twenty years with the best being, “Songs for Swingin’ Lovers!” (1956), “A Swingin’ Affair” (1957), “Frank Sinatra Sings for Only the Lonely” (1958), “September of My Years” (1965), and “Sinatra at the Sands” (1966).

Sinatra on the town

Ethel Waters: Sweet Man Blues

Ethel Waters was one of the most popular African-American singers and actresses of the Twenties. She was born in Chester, Pennsylvania, in 1896. Waters attained success of a level that saw her eventually become the highest-paid female entertainer of her day, an unheard of accomplishment for an African-American woman in the early years of the 20^th century.

Waters moved to New York in 1919, following several years of touring in vaudeville shows as a singer and a dancer. In 1921, she made her first recordings for Cardinal Records. Later, she switched to the African-American run Black Swan label, and recorded “Down Home Blues” which would be the first blues recording for the label. Waters recorded blues and vaudeville numbers for the label including “Oh Daddy,” “Royal Garden Blues,” “Jazzin’ Baby Blues,” “Sweet Man Blues,” and “Sugar.”

Waters appeared in a number of musical productions and films during the Twenties including, “Check and Double Check,” featuring Amos and Andy and Duke Ellington. By the end of the Thirties, she was a big star on Broadway.

In 1949, Waters received an Oscar nomination for best supporting actress for the film, “Pinky.” Waters died in 1977. A series of compilations called, “The Chronological Classics” are the best sources of her classic recordings.

Ethel Waters in 1940

Billie Holiday: Lady Day

Billie Holiday’s life is the stuff of jazz legend. She rose from poverty and abuse to become one of the biggest stars of jazz during the Thirties and Forties. Holiday was a great singer who did not possess a great voice. She employed her voice like a horn player would his horn, and had a reputation for taking mediocre songs and transforming them into greatness. Her singing style was influenced by Bessie Smith’s singing and Louis Armstrong’s trumpet playing. Fellow jazz musicians referred to her as simply, “Lady Day.”

Holiday was born in Baltimore, Maryland, in 1915. In 1933, she was discovered by the legendary John Hammond, talent scout extraordinaire. Hammond signed her to Columbia Records, and she recorded for some of the company’s subsidiary labels.

Despite being offered only mediocre material to record, she was supported by some of the finest musicians in jazz, including pianist Teddy Wilson and saxophonist, Lester Young, who would coin her “Lady Day” and become her closest friend and musical collaborator.

In 1937, Holiday toured with the Count Basie Orchestra and later joined Artie Shaw’s Orchestra. She stayed with Columbia Records until 1942, only leaving once for the Commodore label with which she recorded the classic and searing song about lynching, “Strange Fruit.” In 1942, she signed with Decca records and later ended up recording for Verve. One of her last sessions with Columbia produced the classic side, “God Bless the Child.”
In the late Forties, Holiday was convicted of heroin possession and spent several months in prison. Due to the conviction, she was unable to obtain a cabaret card, making it impossible for her to find work in New York City clubs. Suffering from both liver and heart disease, Billie Holiday died in a New York hospital, in 1959.

Holiday’s best recordings can be found on the following collections: “Lady Sings the Blues” (1956), “Songs for Distingue Lovers” (1958), “Lady in Satin” (1958), “The Billie Holiday Story” (1959), “The Golden Years” (1962), “Billie Holiday’s Greatest Hits” (1967), “Lady Day: The Complete Billie Holiday on Columbia (1933-1944)” (2001), “Lady Day: The Best of Billie Holiday” (2001), “The Ultimate Collection” (2005), and “Lady Day: The Master Takes and Singles” (2007).

Lady Day

Artie Shaw: Begin the Beguine

Artie Shaw was the greatest white clarinetist of jazz, save perhaps, Benny Goodman. Like Goodman, Shaw was a classically trained musician that excelled at playing other styles of music besides jazz. Shaw had his own orchestra which rivaled Benny Goodman’s orchestra in popularity during the Thirties. Shaw had a huge pop hit with the song, “Begin the Beguine” in 1939.

Shaw was born Arthur Jacob Arshawsky in New York City. He faced a great deal of anti-Semitic discrimination during his youth in New Haven, Connecticut, so anglicized his name as Shaw. During the Thirties and Forties, Shaw was the rival of fellow clarinetist and band leader, Benny Goodman.

Shaw’s best work was with the small band he assembled called, The Gramercy Five. The Gramercy Five recordings are considered by jazz critics to be among the best ever jazz recordings.

Essential recordings by Shaw include the following studio albums and collections: The Great Artie Shaw” (1959), “This is Artie Shaw” (1971), “The Complete Gramercy Five Recordings” (1989) and “The Chronological Classics: Artie Shaw and His Orchestra 1938” (1998), and “The Chronological Classics: Artie Shaw and His Orchestra 1939” (1999).

Young Artie

Dizzy Gillespie Albums and Classic Sides

The great jazz trumpeter, Dizzy Gillespie, was one of the musicians at the forefront of the development of be-bop music in the Fifties. He was born John Birkes Gillespie in Cheraw, South Carolina, in 1917. Gillespie earned the moniker, “Dizzy,” for his ebullient personality and antics while performing.

 After hearing the great Roy Eldridge on the radio as a child, Gillespie decide then and there that he, too, wanted to be a jazz trumpeter. Gillespie got his start in New York City, in 1935, playing in the bands of Teddy Hill and Edgar Hayes. It was with the Teddy Hill Orchestra that Gillespie would make his first recording, “King Porter Stomp.” Gillespie stayed with Hill for one year and then freelanced with several bands for a while before finally winding up in Cab Callaway’s Orchestra in 1939. Calloway would fire Gillespie three years later following an altercation between the two men.

In 1943, Gillespie would join Earl Hines band which featured Charlie Parker and was beginning to create a new music which would become bebop. From there, it was on to the Billie Ekstine band, which also featured Parker. He would later leave the Ekstine band because he wanted to play in a smaller ensemble.

In the mid-Forties, Gillespie, Parker and other jazz musicians such as Max Roach, Bud Powell, Thelonious Monk, and Kenny Clark would meet at clubs such as Minton’s Playhouse and Monroe’s Uptown to jam and experiment. It was at these jams that bebop was born.

Gillespie would become a member of the “Quintet,” the legendary be-bop supergroup formed in Toronto in 1953, with Parker, Powell, Charles Mingus and Max Roach. Following his one-show tenure with the Quintet, Gillespie would form his own Dizzy Gillespie Orchestra.

Among the best of the classic sides that Gillespie recorded in the Forties and Fifties are: “A Night in Tunisia,” “Salt Peanuts,” “Hot House,” “Manteca,” “Perdido,” and “Night and Day.”

Gillespie’s best albums begin with the Quintet. His “Salt Peanuts” from the album “Live at Massey Hall” is perhaps the best moment of many brilliant moments on that live recording of the Quintet’s only show. Other fine Gillespie albums include, “Dizzy In Paris” (1953), “For Musicians Only” (1958), ”Gillespiana” (1960), “Groovin’ High” (1953).

After Gillespie had had his fill of bebop, he became interested in Afro-Cuban music. Gillespie died in 1993.



Fats Waller: Handful of Keys

Jazz singer/songwriter/pianist Thomas “Fats” Waller was born in New York City, in 1904. While he is not a household name to the extent of fellow jazz legends, Armstrong, Ellington, Basie, and Goodman, Fats Waller was no less important or influential. In the opinion of his fellow musicians, especially Louis Armstrong, he was a giant among giants.

As a youth in New York City, Waller sought out the Harlem stride piano legend, James P. Johnson, and became the great pianist’s understudy. Soon thereafter, Waller was one of the best stride pianists in the city. The stride style is sort of the jazz version of boogie-woogie, and as such, it is quite palatable to the ears of rock music fans. Waller would eventually become one of the very best pianists that jazz ever produced. Only the likes of Art Tatum, Earl Hines, Teddy Wilson and Oscar Peterson could match his virtuosity.

In addition to being one of the finest musicians in early jazz, Waller was one of the best and most prolific songwriters in jazz, penning the standards, “Honeysuckle Rose” and “Ain't Misbehavin.” Many of Waller’s compositions are humorous, and display his penchant for writing clever lyrics laden with double-meanings.

Waller’s first recording was made as early as 1922, with the sides, “Muscle Shoals Blues” and “Birmingham Blues” recorded for the General Phonograph Company. After a few more recording sessions in 1923, Waller’s recording career would begin in earnest in 1927 with a solid string of classic sides that would continue until his death in 1943.

Waller’s first big hit, “Ain’t Misbehavin,’” appeared in 1929, and was followed by scads of others including, “African Ripples,” “Honeysuckle Rose,” “Viper’s Drag,” “I’m Gonna Sit Right Down and Write Myself a Letter,” It’s a Sin to Tell a Lie,” “S’Posin’,” “You’re Feets Too Big,” “All That Meat and No Potatoes,” “The Joint is Jumpin’,” and “A Good Man’s Hard to Find.”

These recordings and more can be found on several excellent compilations of Waller’s music such as the multi-volume “The Complete Fats Waller,” “The Very Best of Fats Waller” (2000), and “The Centennial Collection” (2004).

Jazz singer/songwriter/pianist Thomas “Fats” Waller was born in New York City, in 1904. While he is not a household name to the extent of fellow jazz legends, Armstrong, Ellington, Basie, and Goodman, Fats Waller was no less important or influential. In the opinion of his fellow musicians, especially Louis Armstrong, he was a giant among giants.

As a youth in New York City, Waller sought out the Harlem stride piano legend, James P. Johnson, and became the great pianist’s understudy. Soon thereafter, Waller was one of the best stride pianists in the city. The stride style is sort of the jazz version of boogie-woogie, and as such, it is quite palatable to the ears of rock music fans. Waller would eventually become one of the very best pianists that jazz ever produced. Only the likes of Art Tatum, Earl Hines, Teddy Wilson and Oscar Peterson could match his virtuosity.

In addition to being one of the finest musicians in early jazz, Waller was one of the best and most prolific songwriters in jazz, penning the standards, “Honeysuckle Rose” and “Ain't Misbehavin.” Many of Waller’s compositions are humorous, and display his penchant for writing clever lyrics laden with double-meanings.

Waller’s first recording was made as early as 1922, with the sides, “Muscle Shoals Blues” and “Birmingham Blues” recorded for the General Phonograph Company. After a few more recording sessions in 1923, Waller’s recording career would begin in earnest in 1927 with a solid string of classic sides that would continue until his death in 1943.

Waller’s first big hit, “Ain’t Misbehavin,’” appeared in 1929, and was followed by scads of others including, “African Ripples,” “Honeysuckle Rose,” “Viper’s Drag,” “I’m Gonna Sit Right Down and Write Myself a Letter,” It’s a Sin to Tell a Lie,” “S’Posin’,” “You’re Feets Too Big,” “All That Meat and No Potatoes,” “The Joint is Jumpin’,” and “A Good Man’s Hard to Find.”

These recordings and more can be found on several excellent compilations of Waller’s music such as the multi-volume “The Complete Fats Waller,” “The Very Best of Fats Waller” (2000), and “The Centennial Collection” (2004).

Fletcher Henderson: Sugarfoot Stomp

Fletcher Henderson was a jazz pianist and bandleader born in Cuthbert, Georgia, in 1897. Henderson was the leader of one of the best African-American jazz bands of the Twenties.

Henderson was born to a middle-class family that valued education, and Henderson would go on to earn a degree in chemistry from Atlanta University. When he moved to New York in 1920, he was rejected by employers in the chemistry field due to his skin colour. He went to work for W.C. Handy’s music publishing company and then became a manager at the Black Swan recording label.

In 1922, Henderson led a band at a club which would become the legendary Roseland Ballroom. Henderson and his band, which would later become known as the Fletcher Henderson Orchestra, would stay on at the Roseland for ten years. Henderson’s Orchestra featured some of the best musicians in jazz and included at various times, Coleman Hawkins, Louis Armstrong, Joe Smith, and many other star soloists. With stellar members such as Hawkins and Armstrong, the Henderson Orchestra made some of the finest sides of jazz in the Twenties including, “Sugar Foot Stomp,” “Shanghai Shuffle,” “Jim Town Blues,” “Christopher Columbus,” “Stealin’ Apples,” “King Porter Stomp,” and “Stampede.”

The Fletcher Henderson Orchestra continued to tour and record until 1939 when Henderson joined the Benny Goodman Orchestra as the pianist and arranger. The hiring of Henderson by Goodman was a watershed moment in jazz, as it was the first time that a white band had hired a black musician as arranger. Henderson’s participation would help secure Goodman’s reputation as the “King of Swing,” a music which Henderson had pioneered with his work with his own orchestra years before.

Henderson died in 1952, following several years with heart problems. The classic sides of the Henderson Orchestra can be fairly easily found on several compilations of the band’s work, and on compilations of classic early jazz, including the series, “The Chronological Classics: Fletcher Henderson.” (1996).

James Reese Europe and the Harlem Hellfighters 369th Infantry Regiment: ...

James Reese Europe: Harlem Hellfighter

James Reese Europe was one of the earliest figures of jazz music. He was a great bandleader and an inspiration to African-Americans in the early years of the last century. Europe was the leader of Europe’s Society Orchestra that first recorded in 1913. That orchestra ostensibly played ragtime music, the forerunner of jazz; however, Europe’s orchestra played a highly- improvised version of ragtime which could easily be classified as jazz. Europe took ragtime music and speeded it up considerably, making it a frenetic and highly infectious and danceable music.

Europe was the first African-American bandleader to ever make a commercial recording and in 1914, Europe and the Society Orchestra recorded Castle’s Lame Duck” and “Castle House Rag” for the Victor label.

During World War One, Europe was enlisted in the U.S, army as a lieutenant with the African-American 369^th Infantry Regiment that was dubbed the “Harlem Hellcats.” Europe also directed the regimental band and with them made recordings for the Pathe brothers while stationed in France. Europe and the band also performed concerts, making a hit of the number, “Memphis Blues.”

Shortly after returning to America at the conclusion of the war, Europe was stabbed in the neck with a pen by one of his drummers during the intermission of a concert in Boston. Europe succumbed to the wound, and became the first African-American citizen to be honoured with a public funeral in New York City.

Roy Eldridge: Trumpet Virtuoso

Most jazz critics consider Roy Eldridge as the successor of Louis Armstrong in the evolution of jazz trumpet players. Armstrong is almost universally considered as the greatest jazz trumpeter in history; however, Eldridge is viewed as the musician who took the hot New Orleans style of Armstrong and turned it into something new.

Eldridge was notable for his rough and speedy technique, particularly when playing high notes on the trumpet. A now almost forgotten trumpeter, Jabbo Smith, who rivaled the virtuosity of Armstrong in the late Twenties, was a huge influence on Eldridge, as was Armstrong.

In terms of jazz cornet/trumpet greatness, the progression is loosely as follows: Buddy Bolden-Freddie Keppard-King Oliver-Louis Armstrong-Roy Eldridge-Dizzy Gillespie-Miles Davis-Clifford Brown.

Eldridge was born to a musical family in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in 1911. As a child, Eldridge became a drummer in the band of his brother, Joe, before his brother convinced him to pick up the trumpet. By the age of 20, he had started his own band in Pittsburgh and then left that band to join the band of Horace Henderson, brother of the great New York bandleader, Fletcher Henderson. Shortly thereafter, in 1930, Eldridge moved to New York City.

In New York, Eldridge found work with a number of dance bands, and by 1935, while as a member of the Teddy Hill Orchestra, Eldridge made his first recordings. Eldridge would eventually land a gig with the Fletcher Henderson Orchestra from 1935-36, becoming Henderson’s star soloist by lending his hot solos to the Henderson classics, “Christopher Columbus” and “Blue Lou.”

Eldridge later moved on to work with white bands led by Gene Kroupa, and later, Artie Shaw. The presence of an African-American musician in a white band was a rarity in the segregated America of the Thirties. In the post-war era, Eldridge became one of the leading musicians that toured under the banner of “Jazz at the Philharmonic.” He also freelanced with the bands of Count Basie, Ella Fitzgerald and Benny Goodman.

Leon Redbone: On the Track

Leon Redbone is one of the most unique musical performers of the last 40 years. He is one of the few current performers of ragtime music, although he is generally classified as a folk/blues singer. Redbone was born in Cyprus in 1949 and appeared in the early Seventies as something of a musical curio of mysterious origin.

In 1975, Redbone recorded his debut album, the delightful and utterly original, “On the Track,” an album of cover songs that were in some cases, more than 50-years-old. The album is a collection of blues, jazz, and ragtime standards sung in Redbone’s signature deep nasal baritone. In 1977, the album, “Double Time,” appeared, featuring more blues and ragtime classics including Blind Blake’s “Diddy Wah Diddy.”