Leonard Geoffrey Feather (13 September 1914 – 22 September 1994) was a British-born
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 m ...
pianist, composer, and producer, who was best known for his music journalism and other writing.
Biography
Feather was born in
London
London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...
, England, into an upper middle-class Jewish family. He learned to play the piano and clarinet without formal training and started writing about jazz and film by his late teens. At the age of twenty-one, Feather made his first visit to the United States, and after working in the UK and the US as a record producer finally settled in New York City in 1939, where he lived until moving to Los Angeles in 1960. Feather was co-editor of ''
Metronome
A metronome, from ancient Greek μέτρον (''métron'', "measure") and νομός (nomós, "custom", "melody") is a device that produces an audible click or other sound at a regular interval that can be set by the user, typically in beats pe ...
'' magazine and served as chief
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 m ...
critic for the ''
Los Angeles Times
The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the U ...
'' until his death.
Feather made a significant contribution to the development of jazz broadcasting in Britain, first devising three ''Evergreens of Jazz'' programmes broadcast in August and September 1936, using
George Scott-Wood and His Six Swingers. Leonard Feather's ''Swing Time'', which was first broadcast National Service in January 1937, probably derived its programme title from the
1936 American RKO musical film, songs from which were featured in BBC gramophone recitals several times in December 1936. Initially trailed in the ''
Radio Times'' as a programme of "Gramophone Records of Dance Music (Swing Time)". He also wrote the regular 'Tempo di Jazz' column in the ''Radio Times'' in the mid-1930s.
Feather's compositions have been widely recorded, including "Evil Gal Blues" and "Blowtop Blues" by
Dinah Washington
Dinah Washington (born Ruth Lee Jones; August 29, 1924 – December 14, 1963) was an American singer and pianist, who has been cited as "the most popular black female recording artist of the 1950s songs". Primarily a jazz vocalist, she performe ...
, and what is possibly his biggest hit, "
How Blue Can You Get
"How Blue Can You Get" (alternatively "Downhearted") is a blues song first recorded by Johnny Moore's Three Blazers in 1949. It is a slow 12-bar blues that jazz critic Leonard Feather and his wife, Jane Feather, are credited with writing. The so ...
?" by blues artists
Louis Jordan and
B.B. King
Riley B. King (September 16, 1925 – May 14, 2015), known professionally as B.B. King, was an American blues singer-songwriter, guitarist, and record producer. He introduced a sophisticated style of soloing based on fluid string bending, shi ...
.
But it was as a writer on jazz (as a journalist, critic, historian, and campaigner) that he made his biggest mark: "Feather was for a long time the most widely read and most influential writer on jazz." Even jazz enthusiasts who did not read his books and articles would have known him from the liner notes that he wrote for hundreds of jazz albums. He was not always a neutral commentator on the jazz scene: "Feather's skill at writing glowing advance press pieces about artists he was to record, including his own compositions on the session, and then reviewing his own productions as if he were an impartial critic, was almost an art form in itself." He also hosted radio shows including ''Jazz Club'' in the early 1950s and ''Platterbrains'' that aired from 1953 to 1958. Feather organized the first
Carnegie Hall jazz concerts, the only two jazz concerts at the original
Metropolitan Opera House.
He wrote the lyrics to the jazz song "
Whisper Not", which was recorded by
Ella Fitzgerald
Ella Jane Fitzgerald (April 25, 1917June 15, 1996) was an American jazz singer, sometimes referred to as the "First Lady of Song", "Queen of Jazz", and "Lady Ella". She was noted for her purity of tone, impeccable diction, phrasing, timing, in ...
on her 1966
Verve
Verve may refer to:
Music
* The Verve, an English rock band
* ''The Verve E.P.'', a 1992 EP by The Verve
* ''Verve'' (R. Stevie Moore album)
* Verve Records, an American jazz record label
Businesses
* Verve Coffee Roasters, an American coffee ho ...
release of the same name.
In 1984, Feather was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Music from
Berklee College of Music. Feather's archives are part of the International Jazz Collections at the
University of Idaho
The University of Idaho (U of I, or UIdaho) is a public land-grant research university in Moscow, Idaho. It is the state's land-grant and primary research university,, and the lead university in the Idaho Space Grant Consortium. The Universit ...
Library.
Feather died from complications of pneumonia in
Encino, Los Angeles
Encino ( Spanish for "oak") is a neighborhood in the San Fernando Valley region of Los Angeles, California.
History
In 1769, the Spanish Portolá expedition, first Europeans to see inland areas of California, traveled north through Sepulveda ...
, California, at the age of 80. He was the father of lyricist and songwriter
Lorraine Feather
Lorraine Feather (born Billie Jane Lee Lorraine Feather; September 10, 1948) is an American singer, lyricist, and songwriter.
Early life
A native of Manhattan, she was born to jazz writer Leonard Feather and his wife Jane, a former big band sin ...
.
Bibliography
*1955: ''The Encyclopedia of Jazz'', with foreword by
Duke Ellington (Horizon Press)
*1956: ''The Encyclopedia Yearbook of Jazz'' (Horizon)
**''1993 reprint'' (Da Capo)
*1963: ''Laughter from the Hip'' co-written with
Jack Tracy
Jack Tracy (July 27, 1926 in Minneapolis, Minnesota – December 21, 2010 in Nooksack, Washington) was an American jazz producer and journalist.
Early years
Tracy enlisted in the Navy in World War II and served as a medic treating and ca ...
(Da Capo)
*1966: ''The Encyclopedia of Jazz in the Sixties''
*1977: ''Inside Jazz'' (Da Capo)
*1977: ''Pleasures of Jazz'' (Delacorte)
*1987: ''From Satchmo to Miles'' (Da Capo)
*1987: ''Encyclopedic Yearbook of Jazz'' reprint (Da Capo)
*1987: ''The Jazz Years – Earwitness to an Era'' (Da Capo)
*1988: ''Book of Jazz'' (Horizon)
*1999: ''The Biographical Encyclopedia of Jazz'' co-written with
Ira Gitler
Ira Gitler (December 18, 1928 – February 23, 2019) was an American jazz historian and journalist. The co-author of ''The Biographical Encyclopedia of Jazz'' with Leonard Feather—the most recent edition appeared in 1999—he wrote hundreds of ...
, second (revised) edition (Oxford University Press)
*2000: ''Oxford
Dictionary of National Biography''
Discography
*1937–1945: ''Leonard Feather 1937–1945'' (Classics)
*1951: ''Leonard Feather's Swingin' Swedes'' (Prestige)
*1954: ''Dixieland vs. Birdland'' (MGM)
*1954: ''Cats Vs. Chicks'' (MGM)
*1954: ''
Winter Sequence'' (MGM)
*1956: ''West Coast vs. East Coast'' (MGM)
*1956: ''Swingin' on the Vibories'' (MGM)
*1957: ''Hi-Fi Suite'' (MGM)
*1957: ''52nd Street'' (VSOP)
*1958: ''Swingin' Seasons'' (MGM)
*1959: ''Jazz from Two Sides'' (Concept)
*1971: ''Night Blooming Jazzmen'' featuring
Kittie Doswell (Mainstream)
*1971: ''Freedom Jazz Dance'' (Mainstream)
*1971–1972: ''Night Blooming'' (Mainstream)
*1972: ''All-Stars'' (Mainstream)
*1997: ''Presents Bop'' (Tofrec)
With
Langston Hughes
*''
Weary Blues'' (MGM, 1959)
References
External links
*
Leonard Featherpianist and producer appearing on Donald H. Gabor's Continental 78 RPM Jazz Records
{{DEFAULTSORT:Feather, Leonard
1914 births
1994 deaths
20th-century classical musicians
20th-century English composers
20th-century British pianists
Alumni of University College London
Bebop pianists
British emigrants to the United States
Discographers
English blues musicians
English Jews
English jazz composers
English jazz pianists
English male composers
English music journalists
English record producers
Grammy Award winners
Jazz writers
Jewish jazz musicians
Jewish British musicians
Male jazz composers
Swing pianists
British male pianists
20th-century British male musicians
20th-century jazz composers