Michael "Dodo" Marmarosa (December 12, 1925 – September 17, 2002) was an American
jazz
Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a major ...
pianist, composer, and arranger.
Originating in
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, Allegheny County. It is the most populous city in both Allegheny County and Wester ...
, Marmarosa became a professional musician in his mid-teens, and toured with several major
big band
A big band or jazz orchestra is a type of musical ensemble of jazz music that usually consists of ten or more musicians with four sections: saxophones, trumpets, trombones, and a rhythm section. Big bands originated during the early 1910s an ...
s, including those led by
Tommy Dorsey
Thomas Francis Dorsey Jr. (November 19, 1905 – November 26, 1956) was an American jazz trombonist, composer, conductor and bandleader of the big band era. He was known as the "Sentimental Gentleman of Swing" because of his smooth-toned trombo ...
,
Gene Krupa
Eugene Bertram Krupa (January 15, 1909 – October 16, 1973), known as Gene Krupa, was an American jazz drummer, bandleader and composer who performed with energy and showmanship. His drum solo on Benny Goodman's 1937 recording of "Sing, Sing, S ...
, and
Artie Shaw
Artie Shaw (born Arthur Jacob Arshawsky; May 23, 1910 – December 30, 2004) was an American clarinetist, composer, bandleader, actor and author of both fiction and non-fiction.
Widely regarded as "one of jazz's finest clarinetists", Shaw led ...
into the mid-1940s. He moved to Los Angeles in 1945, where he became increasingly interested and involved in the emerging
bebop
Bebop or bop is a style of jazz developed in the early-to-mid-1940s in the United States. The style features compositions characterized by a fast tempo, complex chord progressions with rapid chord changes and numerous changes of key, instrumen ...
scene. During his time on the West Coast, he recorded in small groups with leading bebop and
swing musicians, including
Howard McGhee
Howard McGhee (March 6, 1918 – July 17, 1987) was one of the first American bebop jazz trumpeters, with Dizzy Gillespie, Fats Navarro and Idrees Sulieman. He was known for his fast fingering and high notes. He had an influence on younger beb ...
,
Charlie Parker
Charles Parker Jr. (August 29, 1920 – March 12, 1955), nicknamed "Bird" or "Yardbird", was an American jazz saxophonist, band leader and composer. Parker was a highly influential soloist and leading figure in the development of bebop, a form ...
, and
Lester Young
Lester Willis Young (August 27, 1909 – March 15, 1959), nicknamed "Pres" or "Prez", was an American jazz tenor saxophonist and occasional clarinetist.
Coming to prominence while a member of Count Basie's orchestra, Young was one of the most i ...
, as well as leading his own bands.
Marmarosa returned to Pittsburgh due to health reasons in 1948. He began performing much less frequently, and had a presence only locally for around a decade. Friends and fellow musicians had commented from an early stage that Marmarosa was an unusual character. His mental stability was probably affected by being beaten into a coma when in his teens, by a short-lived marriage followed by permanent separation from his children, and by a traumatic period in the army. He made comeback recordings in the early 1960s, but soon retreated to Pittsburgh, where he played occasionally into the early 1970s. From then until his death three decades later, he lived with family and in
veterans' hospitals.
Early life
Marmarosa was born in
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, Allegheny County. It is the most populous city in both Allegheny County and Wester ...
on December 12, 1925.
[Doerschuk, Robert L.; Kernfeld, Barr]
"Marmarosa, Dodo"
''The New Grove Dictionary of Jazz'' (2nd ed.). Grove Music Online. Oxford Music Online. Oxford University Press. Retrieved July 8, 2015. Subscription required. He had "Italian working-class parents" – Joseph
[Kohler, Roy (March 6, 1960) "Pittsburgh's Jazz Pianists". ''The Pittsburgh Press''. p. 8.] and Carmella.
[ ] He was the middle of three children, between sisters Audrey and Doris,
and grew up in the
East Liberty neighborhood of Pittsburgh. Marmarosa attended
Peabody High School.
He received the uncomplimentary nickname "
Dodo
The dodo (''Raphus cucullatus'') is an extinct flightless bird that was endemic to the island of Mauritius, which is east of Madagascar in the Indian Ocean. The dodo's closest genetic relative was the also-extinct Rodrigues solitaire. The ...
" as a child because of his large head, short body, and bird-like nose.
Although he had stated an interest in playing the trumpet, Marmarosa's parents persuaded him to take up the piano, which he began at the age of 9.
[Hoefer, George (December 29, 1966) "The Recorded Flights of Dodo". ''Down Beat''. pp. 25–27, 30.] He received classical music lessons, but was influenced by the jazz playing of
Art Tatum
Arthur Tatum Jr. (, October 13, 1909 – November 5, 1956) was an American jazz pianist who is widely regarded as one of the greatest in his field. From early in his career, Tatum's technical ability was regarded by fellow musicians as extraord ...
,
Teddy Wilson
Theodore Shaw Wilson (November 24, 1912 – July 31, 1986) was an American jazz pianist. Described by critic Scott Yanow as "the definitive swing pianist", Wilson had a sophisticated, elegant style. His work was featured on the records of ma ...
, and others after fellow pianist
Erroll Garner
Erroll Louis Garner (June 15, 1921 – January 2, 1977) was an American jazz pianist and composer known for his swing playing and ballads. His instrumental ballad "Misty", his best-known composition, has become a jazz standard. It was first rec ...
, four years Marmarosa's elder, introduced him to their music.
Marmarosa practiced a lot, until his left and right hands were equally strong.
["Dodo Marmarosa"](_blank)
(September 24, 2002). ''The Daily Telegraph''.
Later life and career
1941–50
Marmarosa began his professional career around 1941, joining the Johnny "Scat" Davis orchestra at the age of 15 or 16.
[Guidry, Nate (September 20, 2002]
"Obituary: Michael "Dodo" Marmarosa / Legendary Jazz Pianist"
Post-Gazette. He was first mentioned in the national jazz press the following year, appearing in ''
Down Beat
' (styled in all caps) is an American music magazine devoted to "jazz, blues and beyond", the last word indicating its expansion beyond the jazz realm which it covered exclusively in previous years. The publication was established in 1934 in Chi ...
'' magazine for his playing at a
jam session
A jam session is a relatively informal musical event, process, or activity where musicians, typically instrumentalists, play improvised solos and vamp over tunes, drones, songs, and chord progressions. To "jam" is to improvise music without exte ...
.
After touring, the Davis orchestra disbanded, so Marmarosa and others then joined
Gene Krupa
Eugene Bertram Krupa (January 15, 1909 – October 16, 1973), known as Gene Krupa, was an American jazz drummer, bandleader and composer who performed with energy and showmanship. His drum solo on Benny Goodman's 1937 recording of "Sing, Sing, S ...
around the end of 1942.
After one 1943 Krupa performance in Philadelphia, Marmarosa was beaten into a coma by sailors who accused him of
draft dodging
Draft evasion is any successful attempt to elude a government-imposed obligation to serve in the military forces of one's nation. Sometimes draft evasion involves refusing to comply with the military draft laws of one's nation. Illegal draft ev ...
.
According to clarinetist
Buddy DeFranco
Boniface Ferdinand Leonard "Buddy" DeFranco (February 17, 1923 – December 24, 2014) was an Italian-American jazz clarinetist. In addition to his work as a bandleader, DeFranco led the Glenn Miller Orchestra for almost a decade in the 1960s and ...
, who was also attacked by the men, "Dodo was always a little off but he seemed different after that beating. The head injury didn't affect his playing, but I think it created psychological problems for him."
[Myers, Marc (July 8, 2009]
"Interview: Buddy De Franco, '43"
jazzwax.com
After Krupa's orchestra broke up in the middle of 1943, Marmarosa played in
Ted Fio Rito
Theodore Salvatore Fiorito (December 20, 1900 – July 22, 1971),DeLong, Thomas A. (1996). ''Radio Stars: An Illustrated Biographical Dictionary of 953 Performers, 1920 through 1960''. McFarland & Company, Inc. . P. 95. known professionally a ...
's band for at least a month that summer.
He then moved to
Charlie Barnet
Charles Daly Barnet (October 26, 1913 – September 4, 1991) was an American jazz saxophonist, composer, and bandleader.
His major recordings were "Skyliner", "Cherokee", "The Wrong Idea", "Scotch and Soda", "In a Mizz", and "Southland Shuffle ...
's big band, where he stayed from October 1943 to March 1944.
Marmarosa's recording debut was with Barnet
in 1943; they recorded "The Moose", a track described by
Gunther Schuller
Gunther Alexander Schuller (November 22, 1925June 21, 2015) was an American composer, conductor, horn player, author, historian, educator, publisher, and jazz musician.
Biography and works
Early years
Schuller was born in Queens, New York City, ...
as "a veritable masterpiece" on which the 17-year-old pianist played an original blend of nascent
bebop
Bebop or bop is a style of jazz developed in the early-to-mid-1940s in the United States. The style features compositions characterized by a fast tempo, complex chord progressions with rapid chord changes and numerous changes of key, instrumen ...
and
Count Basie
William James "Count" Basie (; August 21, 1904 – April 26, 1984) was an American jazz pianist, organist, bandleader, and composer. In 1935, he formed the Count Basie Orchestra, and in 1936 took them to Chicago for a long engagement and the ...
-style minimalism. Marmarosa recorded some trio tracks with Krupa and DeFranco in 1944.
From April to October of that year he was with
Tommy Dorsey
Thomas Francis Dorsey Jr. (November 19, 1905 – November 26, 1956) was an American jazz trombonist, composer, conductor and bandleader of the big band era. He was known as the "Sentimental Gentleman of Swing" because of his smooth-toned trombo ...
, including for the orchestra's appearance in the
MGM
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc., also known as Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures and abbreviated as MGM, is an American film, television production, distribution and media company owned by Amazon through MGM Holdings, founded on April 17, 1924 a ...
film ''
Thrill of a Romance
''Thrill of a Romance'' (also known as ''Thrill of a New Romance'') is an American Technicolor romance film released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in 1945, starring Van Johnson, Esther Williams and Carleton G. Young, with musical performances by Tommy D ...
''.
A Dorsey biographer indicated that the pianist was dismissed because the bandleader did not care for the modernistic facets of his playing.
Marmarosa soon joined clarinetist
Artie Shaw
Artie Shaw (born Arthur Jacob Arshawsky; May 23, 1910 – December 30, 2004) was an American clarinetist, composer, bandleader, actor and author of both fiction and non-fiction.
Widely regarded as "one of jazz's finest clarinetists", Shaw led ...
, with whom he stayed until November 1945, as part of a big band and Shaw's small band, the Gramercy Five.
From the early 1940s Marmarosa had searched for and experimented with advanced progressive forms of jazz,
and had become increasingly attracted to bebop after meeting and jamming with the leaders of that new movement,
Dizzy Gillespie
John Birks "Dizzy" Gillespie (; October 21, 1917 – January 6, 1993) was an American jazz trumpeter, bandleader, composer, educator and singer. He was a trumpet virtuoso and improviser, building on the virtuosic style of Roy Eldridge but addi ...
and
Charlie Parker
Charles Parker Jr. (August 29, 1920 – March 12, 1955), nicknamed "Bird" or "Yardbird", was an American jazz saxophonist, band leader and composer. Parker was a highly influential soloist and leading figure in the development of bebop, a form ...
.
In 1945 Marmarosa moved to Los Angeles.
He was pianist in March of the following year for Parker's first recordings for
Dial Records. Two of the tracks recorded, "
Ornithology
Ornithology is a branch of zoology that concerns the "methodological study and consequent knowledge of birds with all that relates to them." Several aspects of ornithology differ from related disciplines, due partly to the high visibility and th ...
" and "
Yardbird Suite
"Yardbird Suite" is a bebop standard composed by jazz saxophonist Charlie Parker in 1946. The title combines Parker's nickname "Yardbird" (often shortened to "Bird") and a colloquial use of the classical music term "suite" (in a manner similar to ...
", have been included in the
Grammy Hall of Fame
The Grammy Hall of Fame is a hall of fame to honor musical recordings of lasting qualitative or historical significance. Inductees are selected annually by a special member committee of eminent and knowledgeable professionals from all branches of ...
.
Marmarosa recorded extensively as a sideman in the period 1945–47, in both bebop and
swing contexts.
Leaders of these sessions included
Wardell Gray
Wardell Gray (February 13, 1921 – May 25, 1955) was an American jazz tenor saxophonist who straddled the swing and bebop periods.
Biography
Early years
Gray was born in Oklahoma City, the youngest of four children. He spent his early chil ...
,
Lionel Hampton
Lionel Leo Hampton (April 20, 1908 – August 31, 2002) was an American jazz vibraphonist, pianist, percussionist, and bandleader. Hampton worked with jazz musicians from Teddy Wilson, Benny Goodman, and Buddy Rich, to Charlie Parker, Charles M ...
,
Mel Tormé
Melvin Howard Tormé (September 13, 1925 – June 5, 1999), nicknamed "The Velvet Fog", was an American musician, singer, composer, arranger, drummer, actor, and author. He composed the music for "The Christmas Song" ("Chestnuts Roasting on an Op ...
,
Willie Smith,
Lester Young
Lester Willis Young (August 27, 1909 – March 15, 1959), nicknamed "Pres" or "Prez", was an American jazz tenor saxophonist and occasional clarinetist.
Coming to prominence while a member of Count Basie's orchestra, Young was one of the most i ...
, and, with Marmarosa as house pianist for
Atomic Records
Atomic Records was an independent record label based in Hollywood, California, which was founded in 1945 by trombonist Lyle Griffin. Among the notable recording artists on Atomic were Slim Gaillard, Barney Kessel and Griffin himself. In 1947, Grif ...
,
Slim Gaillard and
Barney Kessel
Barney Kessel (October 17, 1923 – May 6, 2004) was an American jazz guitarist born in Muskogee, Oklahoma. Known in particular for his knowledge of chords and inversions and chord-based melodies, he was a member of many prominent jazz groups a ...
.
With a few exceptions, however, Marmarosa only rarely played in public with the leaders whose studio recordings he appeared on during his time on the West Coast.
Between the frequent recording sessions, he played "in big bands (especially
Boyd Raeburn
Boyd Albert Raeburn (October 27, 1913 – August 2, 1966) was an American jazz bandleader and bass saxophonist.
Career
He was born in Faith, South Dakota, United States. Raeburn attended the University of Chicago, where he led a campus band. H ...
and
Tommy Pederson
Pullman Gerald "Tommy" Pederson (August 15, 1920 – January 16, 1998) was an American trombonist and composer known for his work in jazz, big band, and classical genres.
Career
Pederson performed and recorded with big bands and artists that ...
), at jazz concerts, as a soloist in nightclubs
..or jamming after hours."
Raeburn's orchestra was a progressive group that used "modern arrangements seeking to bridge the gap between bop and advanced European music".
Marmarosa made his first recordings as leader in 1946, with trio tracks that included
Ray Brown on bass and Jackie Mills on drums, and in a quartet with saxophonist
Lucky Thompson
Eli "Lucky" Thompson (June 16, 1924 – July 30, 2005) was an American jazz tenor and soprano saxophonist whose playing combined elements of swing music, swing and bebop. Although John Coltrane usually receives the most credit for bringing th ...
added.
He also recorded his only vocal track, "I've Got News for You", in the same year.
In 1947 Marmarosa led a trio session for Dial with Harry Babasin on cello and Jackie Mills on drums; these were the first
pizzicato
Pizzicato (, ; translated as "pinched", and sometimes roughly as "plucked") is a playing technique that involves plucking the strings of a string instrument. The exact technique varies somewhat depending on the type of instrument :
* On bowed ...
jazz cello recordings. In the same year, he featured in some of
Gene Norman
GNP Crescendo Record Co. is an independent record label founded in 1954 by Gene Norman ''(né'' Eugene Abraham Nabatoff; 1922–2015). It started as a producer of jazz, then expanded into many other genres, including comedy, rock, and ''Star Trek' ...
's Just Jazz concerts,
and was given ''
Esquire
Esquire (, ; abbreviated Esq.) is usually a courtesy title.
In the United Kingdom, ''esquire'' historically was a title of respect accorded to men of higher social rank, particularly members of the landed gentry above the rank of gentlema ...
'' magazine's New Star (piano) award.
According to Mills, his housemate in 1946–47, "Dodo was the most dedicated of players. He practiced an incredible amount of hours, often all day long. He wouldn't stop to eat. He would eat at the piano with one hand and keep playing with the other. He had no other interests that I was aware of. He could play forever." At this time, Marmarosa did not drink or take hard drugs, but his behavior was often eccentric. Mills reported that "Dodo was just a big kid
..He never really grew up because he never allowed anything but the piano to be important to him. The piano was his life. He heard things in his head that he wasn't able to play and it frustrated him. Once, he got mad at the old upright piano we had and chopped it up with an axe."
In the spring of 1948 Marmarosa returned to Pittsburgh because of illness.
He toured again with "Scat" Davis (April – July 1949)
and Shaw (September – November 1949).
He left Shaw's band for the final time during one concert after they had twice played Shaw's hit, "
Frenesí
"Frenesí" is a musical piece originally composed by Alberto Domínguez Borrás for the marimba, and adapted as a jazz standard by Leonard Whitcup and others.
Background
The word ''frenesí'' is Spanish for "frenzy".
Artie Shaw recording
A ...
", Marmarosa had threatened to leave if Shaw called for it again, and the leader had done so after the audience requested a third playing. Shaw reported that Marmarosa "was gentle and fragile,
..andnever learned to deal with the world of a musician."
The pianist returned to Pittsburgh in 1950, signed "a term contract" with
Savoy Records
Savoy Records is an American record company and label established by Herman Lubinsky in 1942 in Newark, New Jersey. Savoy specialized in jazz, rhythm and blues, and gospel music.
In September 2017, Savoy was acquired by Concord Bicycle Music.
...
, and recorded four trio sides for them in July, but the quality did not match his earlier playing.
1951–59
For around a decade, Marmarosa was much less active as a musician.
Shaw and DeFranco raised the idea of psychiatric treatment, but the former was rebuffed by Marmarosa himself, and the latter by the pianist's parents: "They were not reconciled to his needing professional help. They were from the old school, they saw it as a stigma. I got into a big argument about it with his father. He really blew up."
In 1952, two years after marrying, Marmarosa moved with his wife and their two daughters to California.
The marriage was short lived, and he again returned to his parents' home in Pittsburgh in the fall of that year.
His ex-wife remarried and asked him to allow her to change the children's names in exchange for not having to pay her any more money; following the advice of his parents, he signed the documents. A friend of his later stated that never seeing his children again "was the great blight of his life. It tore him apart". Another friend commented more generally that, "After the marriage broke up, he seemed to lose the spark, the drive he once had".
A tour of a few months in
Charlie Spivak
Charlie Spivak (February 17, 1907 – March 1, 1982) was an American trumpeter and bandleader, best known for his big band in the 1940s.
Early life
The details of Spivak's birth are unclear. Some sources place it in Ukraine in 1907, and that h ...
's band in 1953 preceded Marmarosa being drafted into the army the following year.
This exacerbated his problems: several months in a
Veteran Administration hospital preceded his discharge, at which point he was in a poor psychological condition.
Back in Pittsburgh, where he played locally from March 1956,
Marmarosa continued to be erratic, sometimes disappearing for weeks at a time, and giving his money away: "It was like he was on the road to self-destruction", commented trumpeter Danny Conn. Amateur recordings from the pianist's concerts in Pittsburgh in 1958 were released four decades later by
Uptown Records
Uptown Records is an American record label, based in New York City, founded in 1986 by onetime rapper Andre Harrell. From the late 1980s into the early 1990s, it was a leader in R&B and hip hop. During the 1990s, aided by its A&R worker Sean ...
.
1960–2002
Marmarosa departed for California by car in 1960, but problems with the vehicle halted him in Chicago. Promoter Joe Segal organized an
Argo Records
Argo Records was a record label in Chicago that was established in 1955 as a division of Chess Records.
Originally the label was called Marterry, but bandleader Ralph Marterie objected, and within a couple of months the imprint was renamed Arg ...
session for him there, but Marmarosa departed suddenly and the recording was delayed until the following year. The resultant trio music from two days in May was released as ''
Dodo's Back!'' in 1962.
Leonard Feather
Leonard Geoffrey Feather (13 September 1914 – 22 September 1994) was a British-born jazz pianist, composer, and producer, who was best known for his music journalism and other writing.
Biography
Feather was born in London, England, into an u ...
described it as "required listening for anyone with a serious interest in the history of modern jazz piano", but it failed to gain Marmarosa more than a brief resurgence of interest.
He made his final studio recordings in 1962. One album from these, ''
Jug & Dodo'', contained trio and quartet tracks, with saxophonist
Gene Ammons
Eugene "Jug" Ammons (April 14, 1925 – August 6, 1974), also known as "The Boss", was an American jazz tenor saxophonist. The son of boogie-woogie pianist Albert Ammons, Gene Ammons is remembered for his accessible music, steeped in soul and ...
; it was released on
Prestige Records
Prestige Records is a jazz record company and label founded in 1949 by Bob Weinstock in New York City which issued recordings in the mainstream, bop, and cool jazz idioms. The company recorded hundreds of albums by many of the leading jazz music ...
more than a decade later. The other, in a quartet with trumpeter
Bill Hardman
William Franklin Hardman Jr. (April 6, 1933 – December 6, 1990) was an American jazz trumpeter and flugelhornist who chiefly played hard bop. He was married to Roseline and they had a daughter Nadege.
Career
Hardman was born and grew ...
, was released in 1988. Segal commented that Marmarosa "didn't talk much, was very mild-mannered. He just drank an awful lot, shot and a beer all day long. It would've put nine out of ten people under the table, but he was still walking around." The pianist shuttled between Chicago and Pittsburgh for a time, then settled again in the latter.
Marmarosa continued to perform in Pittsburgh, albeit irregularly.
Around 1963, DeFranco dropped by; he recalled that the pianist "would play brilliantly for half a tune, then just stop and walk away. He didn't even know who I was". Marmarosa's last performance in public has been dated variously as occurring in 1968
[Feather, Leonard; Gitler, Ira (2007) ''The Biographical Encyclopedia of Jazz''. Oxford University Press. .] or the early-to-mid 1970s.
[Salemann, Dieter; Grob, Fabian (2009) ''Flights of the Vout Bug: A Guide to the Recorded Music of Michael "Dodo" Marmarosa''. BearManor Media. .] Diabetes contributed to his permanent retirement.
"Even the resurgence of interest in bebop in the 1970s and 80s did not bring him back to national attention", reported ''
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
''.
For the rest of his life, Marmarosa alternated between living with his sister Doris' family and in a veterans' hospital, both in the Pittsburgh area.
Some of his friends blamed Marmarosa's family for keeping him in their home because of shame about his mental problems, and suggested that the family blamed musicians and music for his instability. Marmarosa himself did not explain his withdrawal from performing.
Irritated by telephone calls from a fan seeking an interview in 1992, Marmarosa passed on the news that he had died; this led to premature obituaries being published in two British newspapers. He sometimes played piano in the family's basement or for other residents at the hospital.
His mother died in 1995, after his father.
Marmarosa died of a heart attack on September 17, 2002, in a veterans' hospital in Pittsburgh.
[Keepnews, Peter (September 27, 2002]
"Dodo Marmarosa, 76, an Early Bebop Pianist, Is Dead"
''The New York Times''. He was survived by his two sisters.
Playing style and influence
Pianist
Dick Katz
Richard Aaron Katz (March 13, 1924 – November 10, 2009) was an American jazz pianist, arranger and record producer. He freelanced throughout much of his career, and worked in a number of ensembles. He co-founded Milestone Records in 1966 with O ...
wrote that, "In the opinion of many, Dodo Marmarosa was the most gifted of all the pianists who figured in the bebop saga. Blessed with a beautiful legato touch and a fluid technique, he developed an original style, which
..blended perfectly with the bop idiom, as well as with earlier styles. He combined advanced chordal and scalar elements with graceful rhythmic phrasing."
In some of his 1944 playing, Marmarosa was progressively bebop-directed, employing melodies derived from the harmony and varying the rhythmic positioning of accents; soon after, he added more space to his playing, using shorter sequences of notes than typical in bebop.
Jazz critic
Marc Myers, in comparing Marmarosa with other pianists of the early bebop period, observed that he was less aggressive than
Bud Powell
Earl Rudolph "Bud" Powell (September 27, 1924 – July 31, 1966) was an American jazz pianist and composer. Along with Charlie Parker, Thelonious Monk, Kenny Clarke and Dizzy Gillespie, Powell was a leading figure in the development of modern ...
, and more expressive and complex than
Al Haig
Alan Warren Haig (July 19, 1922 – November 16, 1982) was an American jazz pianist, best known as one of the pioneers of bebop.
Biography
Haig was born in Newark, New Jersey and raised in nearby Nutley. In 1940, he majored in piano at Obe ...
, and that he "had a punctuating, full-keyboard approach, developing ideas in the middle and widening out to express them."
Critic and musician
Brian Priestley
Brian Priestley (born 10 July 1940)Many sources list Priestley's year of birth as 1946, but this is inaccurate. See Priestley's entry in ''The Rough Guide to Jazz'' anon his revised Charlie Parker study. is an English jazz writer, pianist and a ...
wrote that "What was so distinctive about Dodo's work was partly his harmonic sense and knowledge of the additional notes
..in bebop.Many pianists were trying to find ways to voice these satisfactorily in full chording, but none did so as pleasingly or as fluently as Marmarosa. Partly it was also the way he alternated between employing his hands together and in opposition to each other, and allied to this was his unusual time feeling."
By the time of his 1960s recordings, Marmarosa had a more relaxed playing style. Biographers commented that "his even, classically derived articulation had given way to a more rhythmically pronounced, jazz-oriented playing, and, above all, his musical personality seemed still more determined and coherent."
Pianist
Cecil Taylor
Cecil Percival Taylor (March 25, 1929April 5, 2018) was an American pianist and poet.
Taylor was classically trained and was one of the pioneers of free jazz. His music is characterized by an energetic, physical approach, resulting in complex ...
commented in 1961 that "The first modern pianist who made any impression on me was Dodo Marmarosa, with Charlie Barnet." Marmarosa also encouraged DeFranco to take up bebop.
Discography
Compilations of previously released material, and recordings from or for radio broadcasts, are not listed.
Albums as leader/co-leader
Albums as sideman
Singles as leader/co-leader
Singles as sideman
Tracks recorded but not released as singles are not listed.
Main sources:
[Hulme, George (2008) ''Mel Tormé: A Chronicle of His Recordings, Books and Films''. McFarland. pp. 19, 21–22. .]
Filmography
*''
Thrill of a Romance
''Thrill of a Romance'' (also known as ''Thrill of a New Romance'') is an American Technicolor romance film released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in 1945, starring Van Johnson, Esther Williams and Carleton G. Young, with musical performances by Tommy D ...
'' (made 1944; released 1945)
References
Bibliography
*
Further reading
*
Réda, Jacques (1985) "Un oiseau rare: Dodo Marmarosa". In Réda, Jacques (ed.) ''Jouer le jeu (L'improviste, II)''. pp. 103–134. (In French)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Marmarosa, Dodo
1925 births
2002 deaths
American jazz pianists
American male jazz musicians
American male pianists
American people of Italian descent
Bebop pianists
Jazz musicians from Pennsylvania
Musicians from Pittsburgh
20th-century American pianists
20th-century American male musicians
Argo Records artists
Savoy Records artists
Uptown Records (jazz) artists