Leon Breeden
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Leon Breeden
Harold Leon Breeden (3 October 1921 – 11 August 2010) was a jazz educator and musician. Biography When he was three his parents moved to Wichita Falls, Texas, where he grew up and graduated from high school. He attended Texas Wesleyan College in Fort Worth on a scholarship and later transferred to Texas Christian University where he completed both his bachelor's and master's degrees. While doing graduate work at Columbia University in New York City, he studied clarinet with Reginald Kell who had immigrated to the U.S. in 1948. Benny Goodman began studies with Kell in 1949. Breeden used his given name "Harold" only while serving in the Army. During the early part of World War II, he served in the 69th Infantry Division band as music librarian and played in the band at Ft. Bliss. In 1944, after military duty, he became the Director of Bands at Texas Christian University and later served as Director of Bands at Grand Prairie High School from 1953 to 1959. In 1959, M.E. "Gene" Ha ...
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Guthrie, Oklahoma
Guthrie is a city and county seat in Logan County, Oklahoma, United States, and a part of the Oklahoma City Metroplex. The population was 10,191 at the 2010 census, a 2.7 percent increase from the figure of 9,925 in the 2000 census. First known as a railroad station stop, after the Land Run of 1889, Guthrie immediately gained 10,000 new residents, who began to develop the town. It was rapidly improved and was designated as the territorial capital, and in 1907 as the first state capital of Oklahoma. In 1910, state voters chose the larger Oklahoma City as the new capital in a special election. Guthrie is nationally significant for its collection of late 19th and early 20th century commercial architecture. The Guthrie Historic District includes more than 2,000 buildings and is designated as a National Historic Landmark. Historic tourism is important to the city, and its Victorian architecture provides a backdrop for Wild West and territorial-style entertainment, carriage tours, ...
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Ronald Reagan
Ronald Wilson Reagan ( ; February 6, 1911June 5, 2004) was an American politician, actor, and union leader who served as the 40th president of the United States from 1981 to 1989. He also served as the 33rd governor of California from 1967 to 1975, after having a career in entertainment. Reagan was born in Tampico, Illinois. He graduated from Eureka College in 1932 and began to work as a sports announcer in Iowa. In 1937, Reagan moved to California, where he found Ronald Reagan filmography, work as a film actor. From 1947 to 1952, Reagan served as the president of the Screen Actors Guild, working to Hollywood blacklist, root out alleged communist influence within it. In the 1950s, he moved to a career in television and became a spokesman for General Electric. From 1959 to 1960, he again served as the guild's president. In 1964, his speech "A Time for Choosing" earned him national attention as a new conservative figure. Building a network of supporters, Reagan was 1966 Califo ...
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Texas House Of Representatives
The Texas House of Representatives is the lower house of the bicameral Texas Legislature. It consists of 150 members who are elected from single-member districts for two-year terms. As of the 2010 United States census, each member represents about 167,637 people. There are no Term limits in the United States, term limits. The House meets at the Texas State Capitol, State Capitol in Austin, Texas, Austin. Leadership The Speaker of the Texas House of Representatives, Speaker of the House is the presiding officer and highest-ranking member of the House. The Speaker's duties include maintaining order within the House, recognizing members during debate, ruling on procedural matters, appointing members to the various #Committees, committees and sending bills for committee review. The Speaker pro tempore is primarily a ceremonial position, but does, by long-standing tradition, preside over the House during its consideration of local and consent bills. Unlike other State legislature ( ...
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'Fessor Graham Award
Floyd Freeman Graham (aka 'Fessor) (October 15, 1902 – August 18, 1974 in Denton, Texas) was a US collegiate bandleader and music educator who founded and directed the Aces of Collegeland in 1927, the university dance band, pit orchestra and stage band of the University of North Texas College of Music. He also was a violinist. The Aces of Collegeland was the forerunner to the One O'Clock Lab Band. Graham laid the groundwork at North Texas for what became the first college degree in jazz studies. Many of the Ace's band members and Saturday night participants became a "who's who" in the performing arts – as members of famous big bands, film, and singers. Notable Saturday Night Performers with the Aces * Ann Sheridan * Joan Blondell * Louise Tobin * Nancy Jane Gates * Linda Darnell * Pat Boone Notable "Aces" Alumni * Harry Babasin * Bob Dorough * Herb Ellis * Jimmy Giuffre * Charles W. LaRue * William F. Lee III * William Ennis Thomson * JB Floyd In 1971, the Un ...
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Lanny Steele
Robert L. Steele ("Lanny") (December 30, 1933 – October 21, 1994) was an American jazz pianist, educator, composer, and jazz festival promoter. He founded the Texas Southern University Jazz Ensemble. Steele graduated from Lamar High School in Houston, Texas. He studied music at the University of North Texas College of Music, where he was a member of the One O'Clock Lab Band. He was a pianist for Arnett Cobb. He taught music at Texas Southern University Texas Southern University (Texas Southern or TSU) is a public historically black university in Houston, Texas. The university is one of the largest and most comprehensive historically black college or universities in the USA with nearly 10,000 ..., where he created the TSU Jazz Ensemble. He also founded the Juneteenth Blues Festival (Houston), a commemoration of the liberation of Texan African-Americans from slavery. He helped organize the Houston Jazz Festival and was a co-founder of SUMArts.Jim Sherman, "Goodbye to Lanny S ...
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Marvin Stamm
Marvin Louis Stamm (born May 23, 1939) is an American jazz trumpeter. Career Stamm was born in Memphis, Tennessee, United States. Stamm began on trumpet at age twelve. He attended North Texas State University, where he was a member of the One O'Clock Lab Band. He was a member of Stan Kenton's Mellophonium Orchestra from 1961 to 1963, then worked with Woody Herman from 1965 to 1966. Following this he was with The Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Orchestra from 1966 to 1972 and with Benny Goodman from 1974 to 1975. In the 1970s, he began a decades-long career as a prolific studio and session musician. In the studio he has recorded with Paul McCartney, Average White Band, Bill Evans, Quincy Jones, Donald Fagen, Oliver Nelson, Duke Pearson, Wes Montgomery, Freddie Hubbard, Stanley Turrentine, Grover Washington, Jr., Patrick Williams, Michel Legrand, Lena Horne, Frank Foster, Paul Desmond, Frankie Valli, Deodato, Les DeMerle, and George Benson. He played the flugelhorn solo on "Uncle Alber ...
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Jim Riggs
James Garland Riggs (born July 28, 1941) is an American saxophonist in classical and jazz idioms, big band director, collegiate music educator, and international music clinician. He is also a University of North Texas Regents Professor Emeritus . Career As performer As a University of North Texas student (1969–72) Riggs performed with the University of North Texas One O'Clock Lab Band. Riggs performed regularly with the Dallas Symphony Orchestra and the Ft. Worth Symphony Orchestra. Riggs also appeared as a jazz soloist with the United States Navy Commodores in Washington, D.C. Riggs is the leader and founder of The Official Texas Jazz Orchestra, a Dallas-based ensemble dedicated to performing state of the art large jazz ensemble music. Riggs has conducted All-State Jazz Bands in Michigan, Ohio, Oklahoma, Kentucky, Tennessee. Riggs has appeared as a featured performer and clinician at Jazz Festivals throughout the USA and Sweden. As a freelance artist he has performed wit ...
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Lyle Mays
Lyle David Mays (November 27, 1953 – February 10, 2020) was an American jazz pianist, composer, and member of the Pat Metheny Group. Metheny and Mays composed and arranged nearly all of the group's music, for which Mays won eleven Grammy Awards. Biography While growing up in rural Wisconsin, Mays had a lot of curiosity but had to learn many things all by himself due to a lack of available resources and information. He had four main interests: chess, mathematics, architecture, and music. His mother Doris played piano and organ, and his father Cecil, a truck driver, taught himself to play guitar by ear. His teacher allowed him to practice improvisation after the structured elements of the lesson were completed. At the age of nine, he played the organ at a family member's wedding, and fourteen he began to play in church. During his senior year of high school, at summer national stage band camp in Normal, Illinois, he was introduced to jazz pianist Marian McPartland. ''Bill Ev ...
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Lou Marini
Louis William Marini Jr. (born May 13, 1945), known as "Blue Lou" Marini, is an American saxophonist, arranger, and composer. He is best known for his work in jazz, rock, blues, and soul music, as well as his association with The Blues Brothers. Early life Marini was born in Charleston, South Carolina. His parents were Italian immigrants from the region of Trentino. He graduated from Fairless High School in Navarre, Ohio. His father, Lou Marini Sr., was the high school's band director and wrote the school song. Fairless bestows the annual Lou Marini Award in honor of Marini Sr. who died in May 2008. Both Lou Marini Sr. and Lou Marini Jr. were inducted into the Fairless Alumni Association Hall of Honor in May 2010. In June 2010, Marini Jr. was named artistic director at the first Brianza Blues Festival, in Villa Reale (Monza, Italy). Marini attended North Texas State University College of Music (now known as the University of North Texas College of Music), where he played in ...
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Marc Johnson (musician)
Marc Alan Johnson (born October 21, 1953, in Omaha, Nebraska) is an American jazz bass player, composer and band leader. Johnson was born in Nebraska and grew up in Texas. He is married to the Brazilian jazz pianist and singer Eliane Elias. Career At the age of 19, Johnson was working professionally with the Fort Worth Symphony, and while at the University of North Texas, he played in the One O'Clock Lab Band and was also the principal bassist in the NTSU Symphony. In 1978, Johnson joined pianist Bill Evans in what would be Evans's last trio. Johnson toured and recorded with Evans until the death of the pianist in 1980. In 2007 he released the tribute album ''Something For You''—a tribute to Evans—together with his wife, pianist Eliane Elias. His credits since then include albums with Joe Lovano, Michael Brecker, Stan Getz, Bob Brookmeyer, Gary Burton, John Abercrombie (guitarist), John Abercrombie, Bill Frisell, Pat Metheny, Lyle Mays, Eliane Elias, Enrico Pieranunzi, ...
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Herb Ellis
Mitchell Herbert Ellis (August 4, 1921 – March 28, 2010), known professionally as Herb Ellis, was an American jazz guitarist. During the 1950s, he was in a trio with pianist Oscar Peterson. Biography Born in Farmersville, Texas, and raised in the suburbs of Dallas, Ellis first heard the electric guitar performed by George Barnes on a radio program. This experience is said to have inspired him to take up the guitar. He became proficient on the instrument by the time he entered North Texas State University. Ellis majored in music, but because they did not yet have a guitar program at that time, he studied the string bass. Unfortunately, due to lack of funds, his college days were short-lived. In 1941, Ellis dropped out of college and toured for six months with a band from the University of Kansas. In 1943, he joined Glen Gray and the Casa Loma Orchestra, and it was with Gray's band that he got his first recognition in the jazz magazines. After Gray's band, Ellis joined the ...
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Dee Barton
Dewells "Dee" Barton Jr. (September 18, 1937 — December 3, 2001) was an American jazz trombonist, big band drummer, and prolific composer for big band and motion pictures. He is best known for his association with the Stan Kenton Orchestra. Life Early years Dee Barton was born in Houston, Mississippi in 1937. The family moved to Starkville, Mississippi in 1941. His father became the band director at Starkville High School. "My dad brought home an old Mellophone, E flat mellophone and at the age of three I figured out the fingerings on it," said Barton. Barton later took up the trombone. He practiced in the school band room for 10 hours a day, and was able to help when his father was ill. Barton was able to take over his father's work and teach all of his classes for two years to keep the Starkville High School job running.Voce, Steve. The Independent. Dee Barton, obit. Saturday 22 December 2001 01:00Cuscuna, Michael. The Jazz Compositions of Dee Barton. CD Liner noters. ...
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