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Dizzy Doovay -2023
photo by Styrous®
Styrous® ~ Monday, June 19, 2023
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Showing posts with label Dizzy Gillespie. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Dizzy Gillespie. Show all posts
June 19, 2023
September 9, 2021
January 30, 2018
Roy Eldridge ~ "Little Jazz" & tritones
David Roy Eldridge was born on this day, January 30, in 1911. Commonly known as Roy Eldridge, and nicknamed "Little Jazz", he was an American jazz trumpet player. His sophisticated use of harmony, including the use of tritone substitutions (link below), his virtuoso solos exhibited a departure from the smooth and lyrical style of earlier jazz trumpet innovator Louis Armstrong, and his strong impact on Dizzy Gillespie mark him as one of the most influential musicians of the swing era and a precursor of bebop.
There is a video of a 1964 telecast of Eldridge performing with Ella Fitzgerald on YouTube (link below) in which he utilizes tritones & she sings the most amazing scat. What a fantastic paring!
(From left) Thelonious Monk, Howard McGhee,
New York, c. September 1947
Photograph by William P. Gottlieb
Eldridge
left home after being expelled (couldn't find out why) from high school
in ninth grade at the age of sixteen. He found work leading a small
band in the traveling "Rock Dinah" show where swing-era bandleader Count Basie saw him and Basie thought Eldridge "the greatest trumpet I'd ever heard in my life."
At
the age of 20, Eldridge led a band in Pittsburgh, billed as "Roy
Elliott and his Palais Royal Orchestra", the agent intentionally
changing Eldridge's name because "he thought it more classy."
He moved to New York in November 1930, playing in various bands in the early 1930s, including a number of Harlem dance bands with Cecil Scott, Elmer Snowden, Charlie Johnson, and Teddy Hill. It was during this time that Eldridge received his nickname, 'Little Jazz', from Ellington saxophonist Otto Hardwick, who was amused by the incongruity between Eldridge's raucous playing and his short stature.
Eldridge recorded a number of small group sides with singer Billie Holiday in July 1935, including What a Little Moonlight Can Do and Miss Brown to You, employing a Dixieland-influenced improvisation style.
In the fall of 1936, Eldridge moved to Chicago to form an octet with older brother Joe Eldridge playing saxophone and arranging. The ensemble boasted nightly broadcasts and made recordings that featured his extended solos, including After You've Gone and Wabash Stomp." Fed up with the racism he had encountered in the music industry, he quit playing in 1938 to study radio engineering. He returned to playing in 1939, when he formed a ten-piece band that gained a residency at the Arcadia Ballroom in New York.
Roy Eldridge Orchestra - January 1, 1939
In the fall of 1936, Eldridge moved to Chicago to form an octet with older brother Joe Eldridge playing saxophone and arranging. The ensemble boasted nightly broadcasts and made recordings that featured his extended solos, including After You've Gone and Wabash Stomp." Fed up with the racism he had encountered in the music industry, he quit playing in 1938 to study radio engineering. He returned to playing in 1939, when he formed a ten-piece band that gained a residency at the Arcadia Ballroom in New York.
photogrpaher unknown
When he wasn't onstage himself, one trumpeter remembered, Eldridge would
search out young trumpeters in other clubs, then "take out his horn at
the door....start on a high B-flat and just come walking in." ~ Jazz: A History of America's Music" by Geoffrey C Ward and Ken Burns.
His rhythmic power to swing a band was a dynamic trademark of the jazz of the time. It has been said that "from the mid-Thirties onwards, he had superseded Louis Armstrong as the exemplar of modern 'hot' trumpet playing".
His rhythmic power to swing a band was a dynamic trademark of the jazz of the time. It has been said that "from the mid-Thirties onwards, he had superseded Louis Armstrong as the exemplar of modern 'hot' trumpet playing".
In April 1941, after receiving many offers from white swing bands, Eldridge joined the Gene Krupa Orchestra, and was successfully featured with rookie singer Anita O'Day.
In accepting this position, Eldridge became one of the first black
musicians to become a permanent member of a white big band. Eldridge was
instrumental in changing the course of Krupa's big band from schmaltz to jazz. The group's cover of the Jimmy Dorsey song, Green Eyes,
previously an entirely orchestral work, was transformed into jazz via
Eldridge's playing; critic Dave Oliphant notes that Eldridge "lift[ed]"
the tune "to a higher level of intensity."
Eldridge and O'Day were featured in a number of recordings, including
the novelty hit Let Me Off Uptown and Knock Me a Kiss.
One of Eldridge's best known recorded solos is on a rendition of the Hoagy Carmichael tune, Rockin' Chair, arranged by Benny Carter as something like a concerto for Eldridge. Jazz historian Gunther Schuller referred to Eldridge's solo on Rockin' Chair as "a strong and at times tremendously moving performance", although he disapproved of the "opening and closing cadenzas, the latter unforgivably aping the corniest of operatic cadenza traditions." Critic and author Dave Oliphant describes Eldridge's unique tone on Rockin' Chair as "a raspy, buzzy tone, which enormously heightens his playing's intensity, emotionally and dynamically" and writes that it "was also meant to hurt a little, to be disturbing, to express unfathomable stress."
After leaving Krupa's band, Eldridge freelanced in New York during 1943 before joining the Artie Shaw band in 1944. In the postwar years, he became part of the group which toured under the Jazz at the Philharmonic, a series of jazz concerts, tours and recordings produced by Norman Granz.
Eldridge moved to Paris in 1950 while on tour with Benny Goodman, before returning to New York in 1951 to lead a band at the Birdland jazz club.
He additionally performed from 1952 until the early 1960s in small groups with Coleman Hawkins, Ella Fitzgerald and Earl Hines among others, and also began to record for Granz at this time. Eldridge also toured with Fitzgerald from late 1963 until March 1965 and with Count Basie from July until September 1966 before returning to freelance playing and touring at festivals.
In 1960, Eldridge participated, alongside Abbey Lincoln, Charles Mingus, Eric Dolphy, Kenny Dorham and others, in recordings by the Jazz Artist's Guild, a short-lived grouping formed by Mingus and Max Roach as a reaction to the perceived commercialism of the Newport Festival. These resulted in the Newport Jazz Rebels LP.
One of Eldridge's best known recorded solos is on a rendition of the Hoagy Carmichael tune, Rockin' Chair, arranged by Benny Carter as something like a concerto for Eldridge. Jazz historian Gunther Schuller referred to Eldridge's solo on Rockin' Chair as "a strong and at times tremendously moving performance", although he disapproved of the "opening and closing cadenzas, the latter unforgivably aping the corniest of operatic cadenza traditions." Critic and author Dave Oliphant describes Eldridge's unique tone on Rockin' Chair as "a raspy, buzzy tone, which enormously heightens his playing's intensity, emotionally and dynamically" and writes that it "was also meant to hurt a little, to be disturbing, to express unfathomable stress."
After leaving Krupa's band, Eldridge freelanced in New York during 1943 before joining the Artie Shaw band in 1944. In the postwar years, he became part of the group which toured under the Jazz at the Philharmonic, a series of jazz concerts, tours and recordings produced by Norman Granz.
Eldridge moved to Paris in 1950 while on tour with Benny Goodman, before returning to New York in 1951 to lead a band at the Birdland jazz club.
Chet Baker - 1960
Birdland, New York
photo by William Claxton
He additionally performed from 1952 until the early 1960s in small groups with Coleman Hawkins, Ella Fitzgerald and Earl Hines among others, and also began to record for Granz at this time. Eldridge also toured with Fitzgerald from late 1963 until March 1965 and with Count Basie from July until September 1966 before returning to freelance playing and touring at festivals.
In 1960, Eldridge participated, alongside Abbey Lincoln, Charles Mingus, Eric Dolphy, Kenny Dorham and others, in recordings by the Jazz Artist's Guild, a short-lived grouping formed by Mingus and Max Roach as a reaction to the perceived commercialism of the Newport Festival. These resulted in the Newport Jazz Rebels LP.
Eldridge became the leader of the house band at Jimmy Ryan's jazz club on West 54th Street in Manhattan for several years, beginning in 1969. Although Ryan's was primarily a Dixieland venue, Eldridge tried to combine the traditional Dixieland style with his own more brash and speedy playing.
Eldridge was incapacitated by a stroke in 1970, but continued to lead the group at Ryan's soon after and performing occasionally as a singer, drummer and pianist. Writer Michael Zirpolo, seeing Eldridge at Ryan's in the late 1970s, noted, "I was amazed that he still could pop out those piercing high notes, but he did, with frequency....I worried about his health, because the veins at his temples would bulge alarmingly." In 1971, Eldridge was inducted into the Down Beat Jazz Hall of Fame.
After suffering a heart attack in 1980, Eldridge gave up playing. He died on February 26, 1989, at the Franklin General Hospital in Valley Stream, New York, three weeks after the death of his wife, Viola. He was 78 years old.
Eldridge was incapacitated by a stroke in 1970, but continued to lead the group at Ryan's soon after and performing occasionally as a singer, drummer and pianist. Writer Michael Zirpolo, seeing Eldridge at Ryan's in the late 1970s, noted, "I was amazed that he still could pop out those piercing high notes, but he did, with frequency....I worried about his health, because the veins at his temples would bulge alarmingly." In 1971, Eldridge was inducted into the Down Beat Jazz Hall of Fame.
After suffering a heart attack in 1980, Eldridge gave up playing. He died on February 26, 1989, at the Franklin General Hospital in Valley Stream, New York, three weeks after the death of his wife, Viola. He was 78 years old.
Viewfinder links:
Louis Armstrong
Ella Fitzgerald
Benny Goodman
Norman Granz Dizzy Gillespie
William P. Gottlieb
Coleman Hawkins
Billie Holiday
Charles Mingus
Thelonious Monk
Anita O'Day
Max Roach
NPR ~ The 'Little Jazz' Centennial Jazz-Music-History ~ jazz history's link
The Telegraph ~ Roy Eldridge: passionate perfectionist
All About Jazz ~ Little Jazz Giant
NY Times obit
Jerry Jazz Musician ~ A Roy Eldridge story
YouTube links:
TriTone Substitutions explained
Ella Fitzgerald, Roy Eldridge ~ Perdido
Roy Eldridge & Mildred Bailey ~ I'm Nobody's Baby (1940)
Roy Eldridge ~
Hoppin' John (January 29, 1951)
They Raided The Joint (January 22, 1951)
Rockin' Chair
Styrous® ~ Tuesday, January 30, 2018
Max Roach
Net links:
NPR ~ The 'Little Jazz' Centennial Jazz-Music-History ~ jazz history's link
The Telegraph ~ Roy Eldridge: passionate perfectionist
All About Jazz ~ Little Jazz Giant
NY Times obit
Jerry Jazz Musician ~ A Roy Eldridge story
YouTube links:
TriTone Substitutions explained
Ella Fitzgerald, Roy Eldridge ~ Perdido
Roy Eldridge & Mildred Bailey ~ I'm Nobody's Baby (1940)
Roy Eldridge ~
Hoppin' John (January 29, 1951)
They Raided The Joint (January 22, 1951)
Rockin' Chair
"I resolved to play my trumpet like a sax."
~ Roy Eldridge
Styrous® ~ Tuesday, January 30, 2018
January 25, 2018
January 21, 2018
January 10, 2018
Max Roach ~ January 10, 1924 – August 16, 2007
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Today, January 10, is the birthday of Maxwell Lemuel Roach; aka Max Roach. He was an American jazz percussionist, drummer, composer and considered an important drummer in jazz history. He had an innovative way of playing drums. He used the full kit to create a palette of melody and harmony and, of course, rhythm. And that style helped propel jazz through its most important developments - from swing to bebop to the avant-garde.
Today, January 10, is the birthday of Maxwell Lemuel Roach; aka Max Roach. He was an American jazz percussionist, drummer, composer and considered an important drummer in jazz history. He had an innovative way of playing drums. He used the full kit to create a palette of melody and harmony and, of course, rhythm. And that style helped propel jazz through its most important developments - from swing to bebop to the avant-garde.
Max Roach - ca. October, 1947
Three Deuces, NYC
photo by William P. Gottlieb
Roach worked in many styles of music. He wrote music for theater, such as plays written by Sam Shepard, presented at La Mama E.T.C. in New York City. He performed a concerto with the Boston Symphony Orchestra. He wrote for and performed with the Walter White gospel choir and the John Motley Singers. He performed with dancers: the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, the Dianne McIntyre Dance Company and the Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company. He performed in a hip hop concert, featuring the artist-rapper Fab Five Freddy and the New York Break Dancers. He made numerous musical statements relating to the Civil Rights Movement.
His birth certificate lists his date of birth as January 10, 1924, but he has been quoted by Phil Schaap that his family believed he was born on January 8, 1925. He was born in the Township of Newland, Pasquotank County, North Carolina, which borders the southern edge of the Great Dismal Swamp. His family moved to the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York when he was 4 years old. His mother was a gospel singer. He started to play bugle in parade orchestras when he was young. At the age of 10, he was already playing drums in some gospel bands. In 1942, when he was 18 and fresh out of Boys High School, he was called to fill in for Sonny Greer with the Duke Ellington Orchestra when they were performing at the Paramount Theater. His first professional recording took place in December 1943, supporting Coleman Hawkins.
He studied classical percussion at the Manhattan School of Music from 1950 to 1953 and earned a Bachelor of Music degree (the School awarded him an Honorary Doctorate in 1990).
In 1952, Roach co-founded Debut Records with bassist Charles Mingus. This label released a record of a May 15, 1953 concert, billed as 'the greatest concert ever', which came to be known as Jazz at Massey Hall, featuring Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Bud Powell, Mingus and Roach. Also released on this label was the groundbreaking bass-and-drum free improvisation, Percussion Discussion.
In 1954, Roach and trumpeter Clifford Brown formed a quintet that featured tenor saxophonist Harold Land, pianist Richie Powell (brother of Bud Powell), and bassist George Morrow. Land left the following year and Sonny Rollins replaced him. The group was a prime example of the hard bop style also played by Art Blakey and Horace Silver. Brown and Powell were killed in a car accident on the Pennsylvania Turnpike in June 1956. The first album Roach recorded after their deaths was Max Roach + 4. After Brown and Powell's deaths, Roach continued leading a similarly configured group, with Kenny Dorham on trumpet, Booker Little on trumpet, George Coleman on tenor and pianist Ray Bryant.
Roach was a pioneer of bebop; he expanded the standard form of hard-bop using 3/4 waltz rhythms (YouTube link below) and modality with his 1957 album, Jazz in 3/4 time. During this period, Roach recorded a series of other albums for the EmArcy label featuring Stanley and Tommy Turrentine.
In 1955, he was the drummer for vocalist Dinah Washington at several live appearances and recordings, appearing at the Newport Jazz Festival with her in 1958 which was filmed and the 1954 live studio audience recording of Dinah Jams, considered to be one of the best vocal jazz albums of its genre.
On August 16, 1992, he performed in the Newport Jazz Festival (Newport, Rhode Island) which was recorded and a hell of a lot of fun to watch (YouTube link below).
In 1994, Roach appeared on the Rush drummer Neil Peart album, Burning For Buddy performing The Drum Also Waltzes, Part 1 and 2 on Volume 1 of the Volume 2 series during the 1994 All-Star recording sessions.
He also worked with Miles Davis, Thelonious Monk, Billy Eckstine, Stan Getz, Eric Dolphy, Booker Little, and saxophonist, Robert Stewart. He led his own groups, notably a pioneering quintet co-led with trumpeter Clifford Brown and the percussion ensemble M'Boom.
Roach was inducted into the Down Beat Hall of Fame in 1980 and the Modern Drummer Hall of Fame in 1992.
Max Roach died on August 16, 2007, in Manhattan. He was 83 years old. Over 1,900 people attended his funeral at Riverside Church in Manhattan, New York City, on August 24, 2007.
Viewfinder link:
Max Roach articles/mentions
Horace Silver
Net links:
Discography
Modern Drummer interview ~ Back On The Bandstand
Democracy Now obit ~ Thousands Pay Tribute
NPR Obit
YouTube links:
Max Roach drum solos ~
The Third Eye
Mr. Hi-Hat (1994)
The Drum also Waltzes (Lugano, Italy - 1994)
Drums Unlimited (full album 41 im, 29 sec.)
Newport Jazz Festival 8/16/92 (51 min, 29 sec.)
Discography
Modern Drummer interview ~ Back On The Bandstand
Democracy Now obit ~ Thousands Pay Tribute
NPR Obit
YouTube links:
Max Roach drum solos ~
The Third Eye
Mr. Hi-Hat (1994)
The Drum also Waltzes (Lugano, Italy - 1994)
Drums Unlimited (full album 41 im, 29 sec.)
Newport Jazz Festival 8/16/92 (51 min, 29 sec.)
“Music is an abstraction.”
~ Max Roach
Styrous® ~ Wednesday, January 10, 2018
December 26, 2017
Miles Davis articles/mentions
~ the "Forevers" Pt 3
the "Forevers" Pt 4
Miles Davis - June 12, 2012
USA "Forever"stamp
photo of Davis by David Gahr
Harry Belafonte ~ At the Greek
Betty Davis ~ They Say I'm Different
Dizzy Gillespie ~ trumpeter, bandleader, composer
William P. Gottlieb: Jazz photographer
Gil Mellé – The Andromeda Strain
Edith Piaf ~ the Little Sparrow
Leontyne Price ~ the ultimate Aida
Max Roach
Gunther Schuller & Third Stream jazz
November 15, 2017
scat singing on the Viewfinder
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Louis Armstrong ~ Trumpeter & scat singer extraordinaire
Ella Fitzgerald articles/mentions
Dizzy Gillespie ~ trumpeter, bandleader, composer & singer
The Guess Who ~ Live @ the Paramount
Iron Butterfly ~ Metamorphosis
Al Jarreau ~ Breakin' Away & scat
Some Like It Hot ~ Marilyn Monroe sings, "I Wanna Be Loved by You"
Louis Armstrong ~ Trumpeter & scat singer extraordinaire
Ella Fitzgerald articles/mentions
Dizzy Gillespie ~ trumpeter, bandleader, composer & singer
The Guess Who ~ Live @ the Paramount
Iron Butterfly ~ Metamorphosis
Al Jarreau ~ Breakin' Away & scat
Some Like It Hot ~ Marilyn Monroe sings, "I Wanna Be Loved by You"
October 21, 2017
Dizzy Gillespie ~ trumpeter, bandleader, composer, and singer
all photos from the Internet
Gillespie got his start on the "Golden Strip" in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in the 1930s. "The Strip" was Columbia Avenue, now Cecil B. Moore Avenue, between 12th and 19th streets. The stretch was home to independent businesses, but it was most notable for the dozen or so small clubs that dotted it.
Gillespie had his twisted trumpet; it was his trademark, and it happened by accident. Gillespie wrote in his autobiography, "To Be or Not to Bop," that backup dancers Stump n' Stumpy were "fooling around on the bandstand," when one of them pushed the other into his trumpet.
In the 1940s, Gillespie, with Charlie Parker, became a major figure in the development of bebop and modern jazz.
He taught and influenced many other musicians, including trumpeters Miles Davis, Jon Faddis, Fats Navarro, Clifford Brown, Arturo Sandoval, Lee Morgan, Chuck Mangione, balladeer Johnny Hartman, and one of Gillespie's final pupils before his death, Robert Stewart (saxophonist).
AllMusic's Scott Yanow
wrote: "Dizzy Gillespie's contributions to jazz were huge. One of the
greatest jazz trumpeters of all time, Gillespie was such a complex
player that his contemporaries ended up being similar to those of Miles Davis and Fats Navarro instead, and it was not until Jon Faddis's
emergence in the 1970s that Dizzy's style was successfully recreated
[....] Arguably Gillespie is remembered, by both critics and fans alike,
as one of the greatest jazz trumpeters of all time".
A longtime resident of Englewood, New Jersey, Gillespie died of pancreatic cancer on January 6, 1993, aged 75, and was buried in the Flushing Cemetery, Queens, New York City. Mike Longo delivered a eulogy at his funeral. He was also with Gillespie on the night he died, along with Jon Faddis.
There is a video he did with Louis Armstrong of Umbrella Man by James Cavanaugh, Larry Stock and Vincent Rose. It is fantastic! In it he and Armstrong demonstrate scat at its finest and Armstrong gives Gillespie a run for his money. It 's a bunch of fun to watch (link below)!
There are WAY too many songs, albums, etc. by Gillespie to mention, so, there is a link to various songs by him on YouTube below.
A longtime resident of Englewood, New Jersey, Gillespie died of pancreatic cancer on January 6, 1993, aged 75, and was buried in the Flushing Cemetery, Queens, New York City. Mike Longo delivered a eulogy at his funeral. He was also with Gillespie on the night he died, along with Jon Faddis.
There is a video he did with Louis Armstrong of Umbrella Man by James Cavanaugh, Larry Stock and Vincent Rose. It is fantastic! In it he and Armstrong demonstrate scat at its finest and Armstrong gives Gillespie a run for his money. It 's a bunch of fun to watch (link below)!
There are WAY too many songs, albums, etc. by Gillespie to mention, so, there is a link to various songs by him on YouTube below.
Viewfinder link:
Encyclopædia Britannica ~ Dizzy Gillespie bio
Smithsonian ~ Dizzy Gillespie and His Bent Trumpet
New York Times obit
NPR ~ Dizzy Gillespie On Piano Jazz
Time/Life ~
LIFE With Dizzy Gillespie: Rare and Classic Portraits of a Playful Genius
YouTube links:
Dizzy Gillespie links
Umbrella Man
"Men have died for this music.
You can’t get more serious than that."
~ Dizzy Gillespie
Styrous® ~ Saturday, October 21, 2017
August 12, 2017
Norman Granz articles/mentions
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