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The Cab Calloway Orchestra
The Cab Calloway Orchestra, based at the exclusive Cotton Club in Harlem, was, for more than a decade, one of the most important jazz bands in America. Different lineups featured the best available established musicians. In 1930, Cab Calloway was hired to replace Duke Ellington at the Cotton Club, and recorded for Brunswick and the ARC dime store labels (Banner, Cameo, Conqueror, Perfect, Melotone, Banner, Oriole, etc.) from 1930 to 1932. In 1932, he signed with Victor for a year, but he was back on Brunswick in late 1934 through 1936, when he signed with manager Irving Mills's short-lived Variety in 1937, and stayed with Mills when the label collapsed and the sessions were continued on Vocalion through 1939, and then OKeh Records through 1942. When the Cotton Club closed in 1940, Calloway and his band went on a tour of the United States. In 1941 Calloway fired Dizzy Gillespie from his orchestra after an onstage fracas. Calloway wrongly accused Gillespie of throwing a spitb ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cotton Club
The Cotton Club was a New York City nightclub from 1923 to 1940. It was located on 142nd Street and Lenox Avenue (1923–1936), then briefly in the midtown Theater District (1936–1940).Elizabeth Winter"Cotton Club of Harlem (1923- )" Black Past (retrieved September 9, 2014). The club operated during the United States' era of Prohibition and Jim Crow era racial segregation. Black people initially could not patronize the Cotton Club, but the venue featured many of the most popular black entertainers of the era, including musicians Fletcher Henderson, Duke Ellington, Jimmie Lunceford, Chick Webb, Louis Armstrong, Count Basie, Fats Waller, Willie Bryant; vocalists Adelaide Hall,Iain Cameron Williams, Chapter 15, ''Underneath A Harlem Moon: The Harlem to Paris Years of Adelaide Hall'', Continuum, 2002. Ethel Waters, Cab Calloway, Bessie Smith, Aida Ward, Avon Long, the Dandridge Sisters, the Will Vodery Choir, The Mills Brothers, Nina Mae McKinney, Billie Holiday, Lena Horne, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Keg Johnson
Frederic Homer Johnson (November 19, 1908 – November 8, 1967), known professionally as Keg Johnson, was an American jazz trombonist. Early life He was born in Dallas, Texas. His father was a choir director there and also worked at a local Studebaker plant where Keg also worked for a while. He and his younger brother, Budd Johnson, began their musical careers singing and playing first with their father and later with Portia Pittman, daughter of Booker T. Washington. Keg played various instruments but is most noted for the trombone. The two brothers played in Dallas-area bands as the Blue Moon Chasers and later in Ben Smith's Music Makers. Eventually they performed with an Amarillo group led by Gene Coy called The Happy Black Aces. Career In the late 1920s, the Johnson brothers played in several bands in Dallas, including Terence Holder’s Dark Clouds of Joy. In 1929 they were playing with Jesse Stone, with whom they travelled to Kansas City and joined George E. Lee ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ike Quebec
Ike Abrams Quebec (August 17, 1918 – January 16, 1963) was an American jazz tenor saxophonist. He began his career in the big band era of the 1940s, then fell from prominence for a time until launching a comeback in the years before his death. Critic Alex Henderson wrote, "Though he was never an innovator, Quebec had a big, breathy sound that was distinctive and easily recognizable, and he was quite consistent when it came to down-home blues, sexy ballads, and up-tempo aggression." Biography Quebec was born in Newark, New Jersey, United States. An accomplished dancer and pianist, he switched to tenor sax as his primary instrument in his early twenties, and quickly earned a reputation as a promising player. His recording career started in 1940, with the Barons of Rhythm. Later on, he recorded or performed with Frankie Newton, Hot Lips Page, Roy Eldridge, Trummy Young, Ella Fitzgerald, Benny Carter and Coleman Hawkins. Between 1944 and 1951, he worked intermittently with Ca ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Andrew Brown (musician)
Andrew Brown (February 2, 1900 - August 1960) was an American jazz reedist. He played clarinet, bass saxophone, alto saxophone, and tenor saxophone, and is best known for his longtime association with Cab Calloway. Early in the 1920s Brown worked in the bands of P.B. Langford and Wilson Robinson. He was a member of the house band at Harlem's Cotton Club starting in 1925. This group eventually came to be known as the under bandleader Andrew Preer; by the end of the 1920s, Cab Calloway had taken leadership of it."Andrew Brown". '' The New Grove Dictionary of Jazz''. 2nd edition, ed. Barry Kernfeld. Brown played in Calloway's band until 1945, including on many recording sessions and a tour of Europe in 1934.Eugene ChadbourneAndrew Brownat Allmusic AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rudy Powell
Rudy Powell (later Musheed Karweem) (October 28, 1907 – October 30, 1976) was an American jazz reed player. Born in New York City, United States, Powell learned piano and violin while young and then clarinet and saxophone. In the late 1920s, he played with June Clark, Gene Rodgers's Revellers, and Cliff Jackson's Krazy Kats (1928–1930). He never recorded as a leader, but worked extensively as a sideman throughout his career. Among his credits are (in roughly chronological order) Elmer Snowden, Dave Nelson, Sam Wooding, Kaiser Marshall, Rex Stewart (1933), Fats Waller (1935–37), Edgar Hayes, Claude Hopkins (1938–39, 1944), Teddy Wilson, Andy Kirk (1940–41), Fletcher Henderson (1941–42), Eddie South, Don Redman (1943), Chris Columbus, Cab Calloway (1945–48), Lucky Millinder (1949–51), Jimmy Rushing, Buddy Tate, Benton Heath (1953–61), Ray Charles (1961–62), Buddy Johnson, Duke Ellington, and Saints & Sinners (1965–69). He continued playing intermittently in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Chu Berry
Leon Brown "Chu" Berry (September 13, 1908 – October 30, 1941) was an American jazz tenor saxophone, tenor saxophonist during the 1930s. According to music critic Gary Giddins, musicians called him "Chu" either because he chewed on the mouthpiece of his saxophone or because he had a Fu Manchu mustache. Career Berry was born in Wheeling, West Virginia, Wheeling, West Virginia. He graduated from Lincoln High School, in Wheeling, then attended West Virginia State University, West Virginia State College for three years. His sister Ann played piano. Berry became interested in music at an early age, playing alto saxophone, at first with local bands. He was inspired to take up the tenor saxophone after hearing Coleman Hawkins on tour. Most of Berry's career was spent with swing jazz, swing bands: Sammy Stewart, 1929–1930, with whom he switched to tenor sax, Benny Carter, 1932–1933, Teddy Hill, 1933–1935, Fletcher Henderson, 1935–1937, Cab Calloway, his best-known affiliati ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ben Webster
Benjamin Francis Webster (March 27, 1909 – September 20, 1973) was an American jazz tenor saxophonist. Career Early life and career A native of Kansas City, Missouri, he studied violin, learned how to play blues on the piano from Pete Johnson, and received saxophone lessons from Budd Johnson. He played with Lester Young in the Young Family Band. He recorded with Blanche Calloway and became a member of the Bennie Moten Orchestra with Count Basie, Hot Lips Page, and Walter Page. For the rest of the 1930s, he played in bands led by Willie Bryant, Benny Carter, Cab Calloway, Fletcher Henderson, Andy Kirk (musician), Andy Kirk, and Teddy Wilson. With Ellington Webster was a soloist with the Duke Ellington Orchestra from 1940, appearing on "Cotton Tail". He considered Johnny Hodges, an alto saxophonist in the Ellington orchestra, a major influence on his playing. Gunther Schuller wrote in 1989 that Hodges influence pushed him away from his original inspiration, Coleman ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hilton Jefferson
Hilton Jefferson (July 30, 1903 – November 14, 1968) was an American jazz alto saxophonist born in Danbury, Connecticut, United States, perhaps best known for leading the saxophone section from 1940–1949 in the Cab Calloway band. Jefferson is said to have been "a soft, delicate saxophone player, with an exquisite sensibility." In 1929, Jefferson began his professional career with Claude Hopkins, and throughout the 1930s was busy working for the big bands of Chick Webb, Fletcher Henderson and McKinney's Cotton Pickers. From 1952–1953, Jefferson performed with Duke Ellington, but ultimately became a bank guard to support himself with a steady income. In the 1950s, he continued to perform, especially with Rex Stewart and some former members of Fletcher Henderson's Orchestra. Discography With Dizzy Gillespie * ''Afro'' (Norgran, 1954) * ''Dizzy and Strings'' (Norgran, 1954) * ''Jazz Recital'' (Norgran, 1955) * ''The Big Band Sound of Dizzy Gillespie'' (Verve, 1973) With Re ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jonah Jones
Jonah Jones (born Robert Elliott Jones; December 31, 1909 – April 29, 2000) was a jazz trumpeter who created concise versions of jazz and swing and jazz standards that appealed to a mass audience. In the jazz community, he is known for his work with Stuff Smith. He was sometimes referred to as "King Louis II", a reference to Louis Armstrong. Jones started playing alto saxophone at the age of 12 in the Booker T. Washington Community Center band in Louisville, Kentucky, before quickly transitioning to trumpet, where he excelled. Career Jones was born in Louisville, Kentucky, United States. An early music instructor stuttered when stating Jones' surname, and so Jones became known as 'Jonah'. He began his career playing on a river boat named ''Island Queen'', which traveled between Kentucky and Ohio. He began in the 1920s playing on Mississippi riverboats and then, in 1928, he joined with Horace Henderson. Later he worked with Jimmie Lunceford and had an early collaboration with ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Shad Collins
Lester Rallingston "Shad" Collins (June 27, 1910 – June 6, 1978) was an American jazz trumpet player, composer and arranger, who played in several leading bands between the 1930s and 1950s, including those led by Chick Webb, Benny Carter, Count Basie, Lester Young, Cab Calloway and Sam "The Man" Taylor. Life and career Born in Elizabeth, New Jersey, United States, the son of a clergyman, he acquired the nickname of "Shad" in his teens, and by the late 1920s had joined Charlie Dixon's band. He also performed with pianist Eddie White, before joining Chick Webb's band in 1931. In the mid-1930s he played in Teddy Hill's band, with whom he toured in Britain and Europe, before joining the Count Basie Orchestra. Biography by Eugene Chadbourne |
Reuben Reeves
Reuben "River" Reeves (October 25, 1905 in Evansville, Indiana – September 1975 in New York City) was an American jazz trumpeter and bandleader. Reeves started out playing locally in the Midwest; he moved to New York City in 1924 and then to Chicago in 1925. In 1926 he joined Erskine Tate's orchestra, then played with Fess Williams and Dave Peyton (1928–1930). While in Chicago, he took lessons from a German trumpet player, Albert Cook, who played in the Chicago Symphony. While playing at the Regal Theater in 1929, Peyton featured Reeves, his hot trumpet player, on a night where Louis Armstrong, who had a gig across the street at the Savoy, performed as a guest. The "vicious" gesture from Peyton in an attempt to intimidate Armstrong did not work as the audience begged Armstrong to play five encores. He signed to Vocalion and recorded as a bandleader with his groups the Tributaries and the River Boys; among his sidemen were his brother, trombonist Gerald Reeves, and clarinetist ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Doc Cheatham
Adolphus Anthony Cheatham, better known as Doc Cheatham (June 13, 1905 – June 2, 1997), was an American jazz trumpeter, singer, and bandleader. He is also the Grandfather of musician Theo Croker. Early life Doc Cheatham was born in Nashville, Tennessee, United States, of African, Cherokee and Choctaw heritage. He noted there was no jazz music there in his youth; like many in the United States he was introduced to the style by early recordings and touring groups at the end of the 1910s. He abandoned his family's plans for him to be a pharmacist (although retaining the medically inspired nickname "Doc") to play music, initially playing soprano and tenor saxophone in addition to trumpet, in Nashville's African American Vaudeville theater. Cheatham later toured in band accompanying blues singers on the Theater Owners Booking Association circuit. His early jazz influences included Henry Busse and Johnny Dunn, but when he moved to Chicago in 1924, he heard King Oliver. Oliver's p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
