This is the archive for April 2012
From Wikipedia:
Percy Heath (April 30, 1923 – April 28, 2005) was an American jazz bassist, brother to tenor saxophonist Jimmy Heath and drummer Albert Heath, with whom he formed the Heath Brothers in 1975. Heath also worked with Miles Davis, Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, Wes Montgomery and Thelonious Monk.
Learn more about Percy Heath, free from allaboutjazz.com.
Celebrate Jazz Appreciation Month with The Courier.
Posted by courier at 05:45 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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From Wikipedia:
Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington (April 29, 1899 – May 24, 1974) was an American composer, pianist, and big-band leader. Ellington wrote over 1,000 compositions. In the opinion of Bob Blumenthal of
The Boston Globe "In the century since his birth, there has been no greater composer, American or otherwise, than Edward Kennedy Ellington." A major figure in the history of jazz, Ellington's music stretched into various other genres, including blues, gospel, film scores, popular, and classical. His career spanned more than 50 years and included leading his orchestra, composing an inexhaustible songbook, scoring for movies, composing stage musicals, and world tours. Several of his instrumental works were adapted into songs that became standards. Due to his inventive use of the orchestra, or big band, and thanks to his eloquence and extraordinary charisma, he is generally considered to have elevated the perception of jazz to an art form on a par with other traditional genres of music. His reputation increased after his death and the Pulitzer Prize Board bestowed on him a special posthumous honor in 1999.
Visit DukeEllington.com.
Posted by courier at 06:12 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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Margrete Blossom Dearie (April 28, 1924 – February 7, 2009) was an American jazz singer and pianist, often performing in the bebop genre and remembered for her girlish voice. One of the last supper club performers, she performed regular engagements in London and New York City over many years.
Dearie was born on April 28, 1924, in East Durham, New York to a father of Irish-Scottish descent and a mother of Scandinavian descent. As a child she studied classical piano but switched to jazz in her teens.
Learn more about Blossom Dearie, free from National Public Radio.
Celebrate Jazz Appreciation Month with The Courier.
Posted by courier at 06:57 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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From Wikipedia:
Earl Roderick Anthony (April 27, 1938 – August 14, 2001) was a left-handed American professional bowler who amassed records of 41 titles and six bowler of the year awards on the Professional Bowlers Association (PBA) Tour. His title count was amended to 43 in 2008, when the PBA chose to include ABC Masters titles earned by a PBA member as PBA Tour titles. He is widely credited (along with Dick Weber) for having increased bowling's popularity in the United States. He was the first bowler to earn over $100,000 in a season (1975) and $1,000,000 in lifetime earnings (1982). His ten professional major titles -- six PBA National Championships, two Firestone Tournament of Champions titles, and two American Bowling Congress (which became part of the United States Bowling Congress) Masters titles -- are the most by any bowler.
Learn more about Earl Anthony, free from Bowlersparadise.com.
Posted by courier at 07:55 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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Charles Francis Richter (April 26, 1900 - September 30, 1985), was an American seismologist and physicist. Richter is most famous as the creator of the Richter magnitude scale which, until the development of the moment magnitude scale in 1979, quantified the size of earthquakes. Inspired by Kiyoo Wadati's 1928 paper on shallow and deep earthquakes, Richter first used the scale in 1935 after developing it in collaboration with Beno Gutenberg; both worked at California Institute of Technology. The quote "logarithmic plots are a device of the devil" is attributed to Richter.
Read an interview with Charles Richter, free from the United States Geological Service.
Posted by courier at 08:07 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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Ella Fitzgerald photographed
by Carl Van Vechten in 1940.
Ella Jane Fitzgerald (April 25, 1917 – June 15, 1996), also known as "Lady Ella" and the "First Lady of Song", is considered one of the most influential jazz vocalists of the 20th Century.
With a vocal range spanning three octaves, she was noted for her purity of tone, phrasing and intonation, and a "horn-like" improvisational ability, particularly in her scat singing. She is widely considered to have been one of the supreme interpreters of the Great American Songbook.
Listen to Ella Fitzgerald perform "Sing Me a Swing Song," recorded in 1936, free from npr.org.
Celebrate Jazz Appreciation Month with The Courier.
Posted by courier at 07:28 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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From Wikipedia:
David Harold Blackwell (April 24, 1919 – July 8, 2010) was Professor Emeritus of Statistics at the University of California, Berkeley, and is one of the eponyms of the Rao–Blackwell theorem. Born in Centralia, Illinois, he was the first African-American inducted into the National Academy of Sciences, and the first black tenured faculty member at UC Berkeley.
Blackwell entered the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign with the modest intent to teach elementary school mathematics. In 1938 he earned his bachelor's degree in mathematics, a master's degree in 1939, and was awarded a Ph.D. in mathematics in 1941 at the age of 22, all by the University of Illinois.
Learn more about David Blackwell, free from the Mathematical Association of America.
Posted by courier at 09:03 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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From Wikipedia:
Robert Marshall (Bobby) Rosengarden (April 23, 1924 – February 27, 2007, Sarasota, Florida) was a jazz drummer, percussionist and bandleader. A native of Elgin, Illinois, he was a solid and versatile contributor on countless recording sessions and playing in TV network orchestras and talk-show bands.
Rosengarden began playing drums when he was 12, and later studied at the University of Michigan. After playing drums in Army bands in World War II, he moved to New York City, working in several groups between 1945 and 1948 before becoming a busy studio musician. He played at NBC-TV (1949–1968) and ABC (1969–1974) on
The Steve Allen Show, The Ernie Kovacs Show, Sing Along With Mitch, Johnny Carson's Tonight Show Band, and led the band for
The Dick Cavett Show.
Learn more about Bobby Rosengarden, free from boston.com.
Celebrate Jazz Appreciation Month with The Courier.
Posted by courier at 08:47 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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Charles Mingus Jr. (April 22, 1922 – January 5, 1979) was an American jazz musician, composer, bandleader, and civil rights activist.
Mingus's compositions retained the hot and soulful feel of hard bop and drew heavily from black gospel music while sometimes drawing on elements of Third stream, free jazz, and classical music. Yet Mingus avoided categorization, forging his own brand of music that fused tradition with unique and unexplored realms of jazz.
Watch Charles Mingus perform "Sue's Changes," free from YouTube.
Celebrate Jazz Appreciation Month with The Courier
Posted by courier at 12:17 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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Edmund Gerald “Pat” Brown, Sr. (April 21, 1905 – February 16, 1996) was the 32nd governor of California from 1959 to 1967, and the father of current Governor of California Jerry Brown.
Brown was born in San Francisco, California, one of four children of Edmund and Ida Schuckman Brown. His father was an Irish Catholic, his mother a German Protestant. He acquired the nickname "Pat" during his school years; the nickname was a reference to his Patrick Henry-like oratory. When he was 12 and selling Liberty Bonds on street corners, he would end his spiel with, "Give me liberty, or give me death."
Learn more about Edmund G. "Pat" Brown.
Posted by courier at 07:18 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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From Wikipedia:
Lionel Leo Hampton (April 20, 1908 – August 31, 2002) was an American jazz vibraphonist, pianist, percussionist, bandleader and actor. Like Red Norvo, he was one of the first jazz vibraphone players. Hampton ranks among the great names in jazz history, having worked with a who's who of jazz musicians, from Benny Goodman and Buddy Rich to Charlie Parker and Quincy Jones. In 1992, he was inducted into the Alabama Jazz Hall of Fame.
Lionel Hampton was born in Louisville, Kentucky, in 1908, and was raised by his grandmother. Shortly after he was born, he and his mother moved to her hometown Birmingham, Alabama. He spent his early childhood in Kenosha, Wisconsin before he and his family moved to Chicago, Illinois in 1916. As a youth, Hampton was a member of the Bud Billiken Club, an alternative to the Boy Scouts of America, which was off limits because of racial segregation. During the 1920s—while still a teenager—Hampton took xylophone lessons from Jimmy Bertrand and started playing drums. Hampton was raised Roman Catholic, and started out playing fife and drum at the Holy Rosary Academy near Chicago.
Learn more about Lionel Hampton, free from the University of Idaho.
Posted by courier at 07:04 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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From Wikipedia:
Gene Leis (April 19, 1920 – March 15, 1993) was an American jazz guitarist, teacher, bandleader, composer, producer and entrepreneur. Known primarily for his influential publications and recorded guitar courses in the 1960s, Gene was also a popular performer and a mentor to a large number of musicians through his teaching studios in Manhattan Beach, California.
Gene was born into a musical family in Sedgwick, Kansas, just outside Witchita. His parents had a family band and played at local dances, weddings and other events. At 9, Gene joined the family group on mandolin, an instrument whose neck was small enough for him to play comfortably. In his early teens he took up tenor guitar and began playing with other small groups. His father wanted him to play cello, and Gene negotiated a series of banjo lessons in exchange.
Visit GeneLeis.com.
Celebrate Jazz Appreciation Month with The Courier
Posted by courier at 11:18 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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From Wikipedia:
Donald Christopher 'Chris' Barber (born 17 April 1930, Welwyn Garden City, Hertfordshire, England) is best known as a jazz trombonist. As well as scoring a UK top twenty trad jazz hit he helped the careers of many musicians, notably the blues singer Ottilie Patterson, who was at one time his wife, and vocalist/banjoist Lonnie Donegan, whose appearances with Barber triggered the skiffle craze of the mid 1950s and who had his first transatlantic hit, "Rock Island Line", while with Chris Barber's band. His providing an audience for Donegan and, later, Alexis Korner makes Barber a significant figure in the British rhythm and blues and "Beat boom" of the 1960s.
The son of a statistician father and headmistress mother, Barber was educated at St Paul's School in London and the Guildhall School of Music.
Visit ChrisBarber.net
Celebrate Jazz Appreciation Month with The Courier
Posted by courier at 08:22 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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From Wikipedia:
Herbert Jay Solomon (April 16, 1930 – July 1, 2003), better known as Herbie Mann, was an American jazz flutist and important early practitioner of world music. Early in his career, he also played tenor saxophone and clarinets (including bass clarinet), but Mann was among the first jazz musicians to specialize on the flute and was perhaps jazz music's preeminent flutist during the 1960s. His most popular single was "Hijack," which was a Billboard number-one dance hit for three weeks in 1975.
Mann emphasized the groove approach in his music. Mann felt that from his repertoire, the "epitome of a groove record" was
Memphis Underground or
Push Push, because the "rhythm section locked all in one perception."
Learn more about Herbie Mann and his music, free from National Public Radio.
Posted by courier at 08:22 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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From Wikipedia:
eden ahbez (born
George Alexander Aberle; April 15, 1908 – March 4, 1995) was an American songwriter and recording artist of the 1940s-1960s, whose lifestyle in California was influential on the hippie movement. He was known to friends simply as ahbe.
Ahbez composed the song "Nature Boy," which became a #1 hit for eight weeks in 1948 for Nat "King" Cole and has since become a pop and jazz standard.
Living a bucolic life from at least the 1940s, he traveled in sandals and wore shoulder-length hair and beard, and white robes. He camped out below the first L in the Hollywood Sign above Los Angeles and studied Oriental mysticism. He slept outdoors with his family and ate vegetables, fruits, and nuts. He claimed to live on three dollars per week.
Listen to "Surf Rider" by eden ahbez, with pictures, free from YouTube.com.
Posted by courier at 08:14 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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From Wikipedia:
Milton “Shorty” Rogers (April 14, 1924 – November 7, 1994), born Milton Rajonsky in Great Barrington, Massachusetts, was one of the principal creators of West Coast jazz. He played both the trumpet and flugelhorn, and was in demand for his skills as an arranger. Rogers worked first as a professional musician with Will Bradley and Red Norvo. From 1947 to 1949, he worked extensively with Woody Herman and in 1950 and 1951 he played with Stan Kenton.
Rogers appeared on the 1954 Shelly Manne album
The Three and the Two along with Jimmy Giuffre. Much of the music he recorded with Giuffre showed his experimental side, resulting in an early form of avant-garde jazz. He also made notable recordings with Art Pepper and Andre Previn, among others.
Read an interview with Shorty Rogers, free from JazzProfessional.com.
Celebrate Jazz Appreciation Month with The Courier.
Posted by courier at 07:07 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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From wikipedia:
Nellallitea 'Nella' Larsen (born Nellie Walker (April 13, 1891 – March 30, 1964), was an American novelist of the Harlem Renaissance. First working as a nurse and a librarian, she published two novels and a few short stories. Though her literary output was scant, she earned recognition by her contemporaries. A revival of interest in her writing has occurred since the late twentieth century, when issues of racial and sexual identity and identification have been studied.
She was born Nellie Walker in Chicago, Illinois, on April 13, 1891, the daughter of Marie Hanson, a Danish immigrant, and Peter Walker, a West Indian man of predominantly African descent from Saint Croix, who soon disappeared from her life. Her mother was a domestic worker.
Learn more about Nella Larsen, free from the College of Staten Island Library.
Posted by courier at 12:06 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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From Wikipedia:
Johnny Dodds (April 12, 1892 – August 8, 1940)[1] was an American New Orleans based jazz clarinetist and alto saxophonist, best known for his recordings under his own name and with bands such as those of Joe "King" Oliver, Jelly Roll Morton, Lovie Austin and Louis Armstrong. Dodds (pronounced "dots") was also the older brother of drummer Warren "Baby" Dodds. The pair worked together in the New Orleans Bootblacks in 1926.
Born in Waveland, Mississippi, United States, he moved to New Orleans in his youth, and studied clarinet with Lorenzo Tio. He played with the bands of Frankie Duson, Kid Ory, and Joe "King" Oliver. Dodds went to Chicago and played with Oliver's Creole Jazz Band, with which he first recorded in 1923.
Learn more about Johnny Dodds.
Celebrate Jazz Appreciation Month with The Courier
Posted by courier at 08:23 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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From Wikipedia:
Dominic James "Nick" LaRocca (April 11, 1889 – February 22, 1961), was an early jazz cornetist and trumpeter and the leader of the Original Dixieland Jass Band. He is the composer of one of the most recorded jazz classics of all-time, "Tiger Rag". He was part of what is generally regarded as the first recorded jazz band, a band which recorded and released the first jazz recording, "Livery Stable Blues" in 1917.
Nick LaRocca was born in New Orleans, Louisiana, the son of poor Sicilian immigrants. His father was Girolamo LaRocca of Salaparuta, Sicily and his mother was Vita De Nina of Poggioreale, Sicily. Young Nick was attracted to the music of the brass bands in New Orleans and covertly taught himself to play cornet against the wishes of his father who hoped his son would go into a more prestigious profession. LaRocca at first worked as an electrician, playing music on the side.
Read "The Nick LaRocca Story," free from ODJP.com.
Celebrate Jazz Appreciation Month with The Courier
Posted by courier at 07:49 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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From Wikipedia:
Dolores Clara Fernandez Huerta (born April 10, 1930) is a noted American labor leader and civil rights activist who, along with César Chávez, co-founded the National Farmworkers Association, which later became the United Farm Workers (UFW). Huerta has received numerous awards for her community service and advocacy for workers', immigrants', and womens' rights, including the Eugene V. Debs Foundation Outstanding American Award and the United States Presidential Eleanor Roosevelt Award for Human Rights. As a role model to many in the Latin community, Huerta is the subject of many corridos (ballads) and murals.
Visit the Dolores Huerta Foundation website.
Posted by courier at 08:03 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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From wikipedia:
Joseph "Sharkey" Bonano (he sometimes billed himself as
Sharkey Banana or
Sharkey Bananas) (April 9, 1904 – March 27, 1972) was a jazz trumpeter, band leader, and vocalist.
Sharkey was known for playing searing hot and technically virtuoso trumpet with a beautiful tone. His great musical abilities were sometimes overlooked in part because of his love of being an entertainer; he would often sing silly lyrics in a high raspy voice and break into dance routines on stage.
Learn more about Sharkey Bonano.
Posted by courier at 07:41 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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From wikipedia:
Dionisio "Dennis" Chavez (April 8, 1888 – November 18, 1962) was a Democratic politician from the U.S. State of New Mexico who served in the United States House of Representatives, and in the United States Senate from 1935 to 1962.
Chavez was born in Los Chaves, Valencia County, New Mexico. His parents, David and Paz Chavez, were members of families that had lived in Los Chaves for generations. In 1895, David Chavez moved his family to the Barelas section of Albuquerque where Dennis attended school until financial hardships necessitated that he work. His first job was delivering groceries at the Highland Grocery store. Later on, he studied engineering and surveying at night, and worked as an engineer for the City of Albuquerque for several years.
Learn more about Dennis Chavez, free from the Library of Congress.
Posted by courier at 12:30 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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From wikipedia:
Ramón "Mongo" Santamaría Rodríguez (April 7, 1917 in Havana, Cuba – February 1, 2003 in Miami, Florida) was a rumba quinto master and an Afro-Cuban Latin jazz percussionist. He is most famous for being the composer of the jazz standard "Afro Blue," recorded by John Coltrane among others. In 1950 he moved to New York where he played with Perez Prado, Tito Puente, Cal Tjader, Fania All Stars, etc. He was an integral figure in the fusion of Afro-Cuban rhythms with R&B and soul, paving the way for the boogaloo era of the late 1960s. His 1963 hit rendition of Herbie Hancock's "Watermelon Man" was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1998.
Listen to Mongo Santamaria, free from Last.fm
Celebrate Jazz Appreciation Month with The Courier.
Posted by courier at 07:41 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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From wikipedia:
Gerald Joseph "Gerry" Mulligan (April 6, 1927 – January 20, 1996) was an American jazz saxophonist, clarinetist, composer and arranger. Though Mulligan is primarily known as one of the leading baritone saxophonists in jazz history – playing the instrument with a light and airy tone in the era of cool jazz – he was also a notable arranger, working with Claude Thornhill, Miles Davis, Stan Kenton, and others. Mulligan's pianoless quartet of the early 1950s with trumpeter Chet Baker is still regarded as one of the more important cool jazz groups. Mulligan was also a skilled pianist and played several other reed instruments. Mulligan reportedly had a relationship with actress Judy Holliday until she died in 1965, and with actress Sandy Dennis from 1965 until they broke up in 1976.
Visit GerryMulligan.com.
Celebrate Jazz Appreciation Month with The Courier
Posted by courier at 07:09 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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From wikipedia:
Lord Richard Buckley (
Richard Myrle Buckley; April 5, 1906 - November 12, 1960, New York City) was an American stage performer, recording artist, monologist, and hip poet/comic. Buckley's unique stage persona never found more than a cult audience during his life, but anticipated aspects of the Beat Generation sensibility, and influenced figures as various as Bob Dylan, Ken Kesey, George Harrison, Tom Waits and Dizzy Gillespie.
Born to English immigrants in Tuolumne, California, Buckley's earliest years are unclear, although he's referred to as an "ex-lumberjack". By the mid-1930s he was performing as emcee in Chicago at Leo Seltzer's dance marathons at the Chicago Coliseum, and worked his own club, Chez Buckley, on Western Avenue through the early 1940s. During World War II Buckley performed extensively for armed services on USO tours, where he formed a lasting friendship with Ed Sullivan.
Visit LordBuckley.com.
Posted by courier at 06:22 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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From wikipedia:
Emmett Williams (4 April 1925 – 14 February 2007) was an American poet and visual artist.
Williams was born in Greenville, South Carolina, and grew up in Virginia, and lived in Europe from 1949 to 1966. Williams studied poetry with John Crowe Ransom at Kenyon College, studied anthropology at the University of Paris, and worked as an assistant to the ethnologist Paul Radin in Switzerland.
Visit Emmett-Williams.com.
Posted by courier at 06:32 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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From wikipedia:
Herbert Eugene Caen (April 3, 1916 – February 1, 1997) was a Pulitzer Prize-winning San Francisco journalist whose daily column of local goings-on, social and political happenings, local anecdotes, and insider gossip -- often poking fun, but rarely if ever hostile or ill-willed -- appeared in the
San Francisco Chronicle for almost sixty years, except during a relatively short stint at the
San Francisco Examiner. His name was a household word throughout the San Francisco Bay Area for decades; his funeral was one of the best-attended in San Francisco history, and republications of his old columns remain a prominent
Chronicle feature many years after his death.
Read Herb Caen's columns, archived by SFgate.com.
Posted by courier at 12:16 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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Walter Percy Chrysler (April 2, 1875 – August 18, 1940) was an American machinist, railroad man, automotive industry executive, and founder of the Chrysler Corporation.
He was born in Wamego, Kansas and grew up in Ellis, Kansas.
Visit the Walter Chrysler Museum online at chryslerheritage.com.
Posted by courier at 07:01 AM. Filed under: In Quotes
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