Newell "Spiegle" Willcox (May 2, 1903 in
Sherburne, New York
Sherburne is a town in Chenango County, New York, United States. The population was 4,048 at the 2010 census. The town contains two villages, Sherburne and Earlville. The town is at the northern border of Chenango County.
History
The area th ...
– August 25, 1999 in
Cortland, New York
Cortland is a city and the county seat of Cortland County, New York. Known as the Crown City, Cortland is in New York's Southern Tier region. As of the 2020 census it had a population of 17,556.
The city of Cortland, near the county's western ...
) was a
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 ...
trombonist
The trombone (german: Posaune, Italian, French: ''trombone'') is a musical instrument in the brass family. As with all brass instruments, sound is produced when the player's vibrating lips cause the air column inside the instrument to vibrate ...
. He was born Newell Lynn Willcox in upstate New York, and learned valve trombone as a youngster under the tuition of his father, Lynn Willcox, an amateur musician and bandleader. As a student of Manlius Military Academy, where he also played in the school brass band, he acquired the familiar nickname Spiegle, after one of the horses from the Academy's stables which, according to his fellow students, he apparently resembled!
He switched to the more familiar slide trombone in his late teens, and joined a group called The Big Four in nearby Syracuse, New York. The band came to the notice of an aspiring young bandleader named
Paul Whiteman
Paul Samuel Whiteman (March 28, 1890 – December 29, 1967) was an American bandleader, composer, orchestral director, and violinist.
As the leader of one of the most popular dance bands in the United States during the 1920s and early 1930s, ...
, who first joined the group, then took over its leadership as the Paul Whiteman Collegians, and brought them to the bigger stage of
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
itself in 1923.
Willcox made his first recordings with the Collegians, and remained with Whiteman for three years, building a reputation as a good reader with a full, richly burnished tone which sat well with the leader's preference for a sweet, sophisticated ensemble sound, rather than the more earthy approach of the hot bands. Willcox regarded himself as predominantly a melody player rather than an improvising
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 ...
soloist.
He returned to Cortland for a time after leaving the band in 1925, but was quickly in demand, and played briefly with the
California Ramblers
The California Ramblers were an American jazz group that recorded hundreds of songs for many different record labels throughout the 1920s. Four members of the band – Red Nichols, Jimmy Dorsey, Tommy Dorsey, and Adrian Rollini – went on ...
replacing Tommy Dorsey, the Charles Dieseroth Orchestra and the Henry Thies Orchestra (again replacing Tommy Dorsey) before joining the popular
Jean Goldkette
John Jean Goldkette (March 18, 1893 – March 24, 1962) was a jazz pianist and bandleader.
Life
Goldkette was reportedly born on March 18, 1893 in Valenciennes, France,Russel B. Nye (1976). Music in the Twenties: The Jean Goldkette Orchestra ...
Orchestra, where, yet again, he replaced
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 ...
. Shortly after, cornetist
Bix Beiderbecke
Leon Bismark "Bix" Beiderbecke (March 10, 1903 – August 6, 1931) was an American jazz cornetist, pianist and composer.
Beiderbecke was one of the most influential jazz soloists of the 1920s, a cornet player noted for an inventive lyrical app ...
and saxophonist
Frankie Trumbauer
Orie Frank Trumbauer (May 30, 1901 – June 11, 1956) was an American jazz saxophonist of the 1920s and 1930s. His main instrument was the C-melody saxophone, a now-uncommon instrument between an alto and tenor saxophone in size and pitch. He al ...
also joined the band, making it one of the stellar ensembles of the day.
In 1927, and with a family to raise, the trombonist opted for the greater certainties of joining his father's coal business rather than pursuing the life of a professional musician. He continued to lead an amateur group in local functions on weekends in the
Syracuse
Syracuse may refer to:
Places Italy
*Syracuse, Sicily, or spelled as ''Siracusa''
*Province of Syracuse
United States
*Syracuse, New York
**East Syracuse, New York
**North Syracuse, New York
*Syracuse, Indiana
* Syracuse, Kansas
*Syracuse, Miss ...
area, and did so for almost half a century.
In 1975, Willcox was invited to take part in a reunion concert for the Goldkette band at
Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall ( ) is a concert venue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City. It is at 881 Seventh Avenue (Manhattan), Seventh Avenue, occupying the east side of Seventh Avenue between West 56th Street (Manhattan), 56th and 57th Street (Manhatta ...
, where he renewed acquaintance with violinist
Joe Venuti
Giuseppe "Joe" Venuti (September 16, 1903 – August 14, 1978) was an American jazz musician and pioneer jazz violinist.
Considered the father of jazz violin, he pioneered the use of string instruments in jazz along with the guitarist Eddie La ...
. Venuti persuaded the trombonist, now retired from the coal business, to join him on a series of club engagements, and they worked together until the violinist's death in 1978, by which time Willcox had firmly re-established himself on the music scene.
He began to play regularly in America, including many appearances at the celebrated Sacramento Jazz Jubilee, and was a regular visitor to Europe. In addition, he made some appearances with
Vince Giordano
Vince Giordano (born March 11, 1952 in Brooklyn) is an American saxophonist and leader of the New York-based Nighthawks Orchestra. He specializes in jazz of the 1920s and 1930s and his primary instrument is the bass saxophone. Vince Giordano and ...
's
Nighthawks Orchestra
Nighthawks Orchestra is a New York-based musical group, led by music historian Vince Giordano, that concentrates on recreations of the hot jazz and dance music styles of the period between 1919 and the mid-1930s.
Recordings by the Nighthawks Or ...
. He also made a rare venture into the recording studio with a group of Dutch musicians in Amsterdam in 1994. The resulting disc was released under the appropriate title of Jazz Keeps You Young, even though at the age of 91 it probably made him the oldest trombonist ever to record.
At least until he died (and possibly after that, perhaps even still today) Spiegle Willcox held the world record for the longest recording career (76 years) of any musician that ever lived; his first records were made in 1923 while his last performance, with an Italian jazz band, was recorded and issued on CD in 1999.
In 1995, he won the
Benny Carter
Bennett Lester Carter (August 8, 1907 – July 12, 2003) was an American jazz saxophonist, clarinetist, trumpeter, composer, arranger, and bandleader. With Johnny Hodges, he was a pioneer on the alto saxophone. From the beginning of his career ...
Award of the
American Federation of Jazz Societies. The trombonist reminisced on his experiences with Beiderbecke for the documentary film Bix in 1981, and can be heard discussing his life and music in a major television documentary series on jazz produced by film-maker
Ken Burns
Kenneth Lauren Burns (born July 29, 1953) is an American filmmaker known for his documentary film, documentary films and television series, many of which chronicle United States, American History of the United States, history and Culture of the ...
. He is survived by two sons, Newell Jr. (†2017), Charles, daughter Cynthia, several grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
External links
Spiegle Willcox Biography
{{DEFAULTSORT:Willcox, Spiegle
1903 births
1999 deaths
American jazz trombonists
Male trombonists
People from Sherburne, New York
People from Cortland, New York
People from Cincinnatus, New York
20th-century American musicians
20th-century trombonists
Jazz musicians from New York (state)
20th-century American male musicians
American male jazz musicians
Statesmen of Jazz members