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John LaPorta
John Daniel LaPorta (April 13, 1920 – May 12, 2004) was a jazz clarinetist and composer. Early life and education A native of Philadelphia, LaPorta started playing clarinet at the age of nine and studied at the Mastbaum School in Philadelphia, where one of his classmates was Buddy DeFranco. As a teenager he played in Philadelphia bands with Charlie Ventura and Bill Harris. He studied classically with Joseph Gigliotti of the Philadelphia Orchestra and Leon Russianoff at the Manhattan School of Music. Career From 1942 to 1944, he was a member of the Bob Chester big band, then spent the next two years with the Woody Herman Orchestra. Beginning in 1947, he studied with Lennie Tristano. With Teo Macero and Charles Mingus he was a member of the Jazz Composers Workshop, trying to combine jazz with classical music. In the classical world, he worked with Boston Pops, Leonard Bernstein, Leopold Stokowski, and Igor Stravinsky. In jazz he worked with Kenny Clarke, Miles Davis, Dizzy G ...
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Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Philadelphia ( ), colloquially referred to as Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania, most populous city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the List of United States cities by population, sixth-most populous city in the United States, with a population of 1,603,797 in the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. The city is the urban core of the Philadelphia metropolitan area (sometimes called the Delaware Valley), the nation's Metropolitan statistical area, seventh-largest metropolitan area and ninth-largest combined statistical area with 6.245 million residents and 7.379 million residents, respectively. Philadelphia was founded in 1682 by William Penn, an English Americans, English Quakers, Quaker and advocate of Freedom of religion, religious freedom, and served as the capital of the Colonial history of the United States, colonial era Province of Pennsylvania. It then played a historic and vital role during the American Revolution and American Revolutionary ...
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Leopold Stokowski
Leopold Anthony Stokowski (18 April 1882 – 13 September 1977) was a British-born American conductor. One of the leading conductors of the early and mid-20th century, he is best known for his long association with the Philadelphia Orchestra. He was especially noted for his free-hand conducting style that spurned the traditional baton (conducting), baton and for obtaining a characteristically sumptuous sound from the orchestras he directed. Stokowski was music director of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, the Philadelphia Orchestra, the NBC Symphony Orchestra, New York Philharmonic Orchestra, the Houston Symphony Orchestra, the NBC Symphony Orchestra, Symphony of the Air and many others. He was also the founder of the All-American Youth Orchestra, the New York City Symphony, the Hollywood Bowl Symphony Orchestra and the American Symphony Orchestra. Stokowski conducted the music for and appeared in several Hollywood films, most notably Disney's ''Fantasia (1940 film), Fantasia' ...
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Debut Records
Debut Records was an American jazz record company and label founded in 1952 by bassist Charles Mingus, his wife Celia, and drummer Max Roach. This short-lived label was an attempt to avoid the compromises of working for major companies. Intended to showcase performances by new musicians, only about two dozen albums were issued before the company closed in 1957. Nonetheless, several prominent jazz musicians made their first recordings as leaders for Debut, including pianist Paul Bley, and trumpeters Kenny Dorham and Thad Jones. Saxophonist Hank Mobley made his recording debut on the label, as a sideman with Roach. Teo Macero, later a producer with Miles Davis, recorded his first album as a leader as a saxophonist for Debut, an album described by critic Dan MorgensternSee Morgenstern's notes for the 4-CD set ''The Debut Records Story'' as an oddball fusion of Lennie Tristano and Anton Webern. Debut was the label on which the '' Jazz at Massey Hall'' concert album was first issu ...
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Mode (music)
In music theory, the term mode or ''modus'' is used in a number of distinct senses, depending on context. Its most common use may be described as a type of musical scale coupled with a set of characteristic melodic and harmonic behaviors. It is applied to major and minor keys as well as the seven diatonic modes (including the former as Ionian and Aeolian) which are defined by their starting note or tonic. ( Olivier Messiaen's modes of limited transposition are strictly a scale type.) Related to the diatonic modes are the eight church modes or Gregorian modes, in which authentic and plagal forms of scales are distinguished by ambitus and tenor or reciting tone. Although both diatonic and Gregorian modes borrow terminology from ancient Greece, the Greek ''tonoi'' do not otherwise resemble their medieval/modern counterparts. Previously, in the Middle Ages the term modus was used to describe intervals, individual notes, and rhythms (see ). Modal rhythm was an essential ...
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Jack Petersen (guitarist)
Jack Leroy Petersen (born October 25, 1933) is an American jazz guitarist and educator. He was a pedagogical architect for jazz guitar and jazz improvisation at Berklee College of Music, University of North Texas College of Music, and University of North Florida. Biography His father, Harold Petersen, worked for Ling-Temco-Vought, LTV and his mother, Effie, worked at Russel-Newman Manufacturing Company. When Jack Petersen was five years old, his family moved to Denton, Texas. He began playing guitar when he was 16 under the influence of Western swing. He won a course in guitar from a radio contest. The teacher was Bob Hames, a former soldier who was attending University of North Texas. Hames introduced Petersen the music of Charlie Christian, Herb Ellis, Tal Farlow, Barry Galbraith, Barney Kessel, Carl Kress, Oscar Moore, Remo Palmieri, Chuck Wayne. While in high school he and his friend Dick Crockett listened to North Texas Lab Bands and the small groups that performed on campu ...
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Berklee College Of Music
Berklee College of Music () is a Private university, private music college in Boston, Boston, Massachusetts. It is the largest independent college of contemporary music in the world. Known for the study of jazz and modern Music of the United States, American music, it also offers college-level courses in a wide range of contemporary and historic styles, including rock music, rock, hip hop music, hip hop, reggae, salsa music, salsa, Heavy metal music, heavy metal and Bluegrass music, bluegrass. Since 2012, Berklee College of Music has also operated a campus in Valencia, Valencia, Spain. In December 2015, Berklee College of Music and the Boston Conservatory at Berklee, Boston Conservatory agreed to a merger. The combined institution is known as Berklee, with the conservatory becoming The Boston Conservatory at Berklee. Berklee alumni have won 310 Grammy Awards, more than any other college, and 108 Latin Grammy Awards. Other accolades for its alumni include 34 Emmy Awards, seven ...
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Long Island
Long Island is a densely populated continental island in southeastern New York (state), New York state, extending into the Atlantic Ocean. It constitutes a significant share of the New York metropolitan area in both population and land area. The island extends from New York Harbor eastward into the ocean with a maximum north–south width of . With a land area of , it is the List of islands of the United States by area, largest island in the contiguous United States. Long Island is divided among four List of counties in New York, counties, with Brooklyn, Kings (Brooklyn), Queens, and Nassau County, New York, Nassau counties occupying its western third and Suffolk County, New York, Suffolk County its eastern two-thirds. It is an ongoing topic of debate whether or not Brooklyn and Queens are considered part of Long Island. Geographically, both Kings and Queens county are located on the Island, but some argue they are culturally separate from Long Island. Long Island may ref ...
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Fantasy Records
Fantasy Records is an American independent record label company founded by brothers Max and Sol Stanley Weiss in 1949. The early years of the company were dedicated to issuing recordings by jazz pianist Dave Brubeck, who was also one of its investors, but in more recent years the label has been known for its recordings of comedian Lenny Bruce, jazz pianist Vince Guaraldi, the last recordings made on the Wurlitzer organ in the San Francisco Fox Theatre before the theatre was demolished, organist Korla Pandit, the 1960s rock band Creedence Clearwater Revival, bandleader Woody Herman, and disco and R&B singer Sylvester. Formation In 1949, Jack Sheedy, owner of a San Francisco-based record label called Coronet, was talked into making the first recording of an octet and a trio featuring Dave Brubeck (not to be confused with either the Australian Coronet Records or the New York City-based Coronet Records of the late 1950s). Sheedy's Coronet Records had recorded area Dixieland b ...
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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 influential players on his instrument. In contrast to many of his hard-driving peers, Young played with a relaxed, cool tone and used sophisticated harmonies, using what one critic called "a free-floating style, wheeling and diving like a gull, banking with low, funky riffs that pleased dancers and listeners alike". Known for his hip, introverted style, he invented or popularized much of the hipster jargon which came to be associated with the music. Early life and career Lester Young was born in Woodville, Mississippi, on August 27, 1909, to Lizetta Young (née Johnson), and Willis Handy Young, originally from Louisiana. Lester had two siblings – a brother, Leonidas Raymond, known as Lee Young, who became a drummer, and a sister, Irm ...
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Buddy Rich
Bernard "Buddy" Rich (September 30, 1917 – April 2, 1987) was an American jazz drummer, songwriter, conductor, and bandleader. He is considered one of the most influential drummers of all time. Rich was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York, United States. He discovered his affinity for jazz music at a young age and began drumming at the age of two. He began playing jazz in 1937, working with acts such as Bunny Berigan, Artie Shaw, Tommy Dorsey, Count Basie, and Harry James. From 1942 to 1944, Rich served in the U.S. Marines. From 1945 to 1948, he led the Buddy Rich Orchestra. In 1966, he recorded a big-band style arrangement of songs from ''West Side Story''. He found lasting success in 1966 with the formation of the Buddy Rich Big Band, also billed as the Buddy Rich Band and The Big Band Machine. Rich was known for his virtuoso technique, power, and speed. He was an advocate of the traditional grip, though he occasionally used matched grip when playing the toms. Despite ...
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Charlie Parker
Charles Parker Jr. (August 29, 1920 – March 12, 1955), nicknamed "Bird" or "Yardbird", was an American jazz Saxophone, saxophonist, bandleader, and composer. Parker was a highly influential soloist and leading figure in the development of bebop, a form of jazz characterized by fast tempos, Virtuoso, virtuosic technique, and advanced harmonies. He was a virtuoso and introduced revolutionary rhythmic and harmonic ideas into jazz, including rapid Passing chord, passing chords, new variants of Altered chord, altered chords, and Chord substitution, chord substitutions. Parker was primarily a player of the alto saxophone. Parker was an icon for the hipster (1940s subculture), hipster subculture and later the Beat Generation, personifying the jazz musician as an uncompromising artist and intellectual rather than just an entertainer. Early life Charles Parker Jr. was born in Kansas City, Kansas, to Charles Parker Sr. and Adelaide "Addie" Bailey, who was of mixed Choctaw and African-A ...
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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 improvisation, improviser, building on the virtuosic style of Roy Eldridge but adding layers of Harmony, harmonic and rhythmic complexity previously unheard in jazz. His combination of musicianship, showmanship, and wit made him a leading popularizer of the new music called bebop. His beret and horn-rimmed spectacles, scat singing, bent horn, pouched cheeks, and light-hearted personality have made him an enduring icon. In the 1940s, Gillespie, with Charlie Parker, became a major figure in the development of bebop and modern jazz. He taught and influenced many other musicians, including trumpeters Miles Davis, Jon Faddis, Fats Navarro, Clifford Brown, Arturo Sandoval, Lee Morgan, Chuck Mangione, and balladeer Johnny Hartman. He pioneered Afro-Cuban jazz and won several Grammy Awards. Scott Yanow wrote: "Di ...
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