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Shorty Rogers
Milton "Shorty" Rogers (born Milton Rajonsky; April 14, 1924 – November 7, 1994) was an American jazz musician, one of the principal creators of West Coast jazz. He played trumpet and flugelhorn and was in demand for his skills as an arranger. Biography Rogers was born as Milton Rajonsky in Great Barrington, Massachusetts, United States. He 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. On June 7, 1953, Rogers and his orchestra, including Johnny "Guitar" Watson, performed for the famed ninth Cavalcade of Jazz concert at Wrigley Field in Los Angeles, produced by Leon Hefflin, Sr. Also featured that day were Roy Brown and his Orchestra, Don Tosti and His Mexican Jazzmen, Earl Bostic, Nat "King" Cole, and Louis Armstrong and his All Stars with Velma Middleton. From 1953 through 1962, Rogers recorded a series of albums for RCA Victo ...
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Great Barrington, Massachusetts
Great Barrington is a New England town, town in Berkshire County, Massachusetts, United States. It is part of the Pittsfield, Massachusetts, Metropolitan Statistical Area. The population was 7,172 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. Both a summer resort and home to Ski Butternut, a ski resort, Great Barrington includes the villages of Van Deusenville and Housatonic, Massachusetts, Housatonic. History 1676–1995 The Mahican Indigenous peoples of the Americas, Indians called the area ''Mahaiwe'', meaning "the place downstream". It lay on the New England Path, which connected Fort Orange (New Netherland), Fort Orange near Albany, New York, with Springfield, Massachusetts, Springfield and Massachusetts Bay. The first recorded account of Europeans in the area happened in August 1676, during King Philip's War. Major John Talcott and his troops chased a group of 200 Mahican Natives west from Westfield, eventually overtaking them at the Housatonic River in what is now Great ...
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Johnny "Guitar" Watson
John Watson Jr. (February 3, 1935 – May 17, 1996), often known professionally as Johnny "Guitar" Watson, was an American musician. A flamboyant showman and electric guitarist in the style of T-Bone Walker, his recording career spanned 40 years, and encompassed rhythm and blues, funk and soul music. Watson recorded throughout the 1950s and 1960s with some success. His 1954 instrumental single "Space Guitar" was the first of his recordings to showcase his electric guitar playing. His creative self-reinvention in the 1970s, with funk overtones, saw Watson have hits with "Ain't That a Bitch" and "Superman Lover". His highest charting single was 1977's "A Real Mother for Ya". Early life Watson was born in Houston, Texas. His father John Sr. was a pianist, and taught his son the instrument. But young Watson was immediately attracted to the sound of the guitar, in particular the electric guitar as played by T-Bone Walker and Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown. His grandfather, a preacher, ...
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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 their first recording. He led the group for almost 50 years, creating innovations like the use of two "split" tenor saxophones, emphasizing the rhythm section, riffing with a big band, using arrangers to broaden their sound, his minimalist piano style, and others. Many musicians came to prominence under his direction, including the tenor saxophonists Lester Young and Herschel Evans, the guitarist Freddie Green, trumpeters Buck Clayton and Harry "Sweets" Edison, plunger trombonist Al Grey, and singers Jimmy Rushing, Helen Humes, Dennis Rowland, Thelma Carpenter, and Joe Williams (jazz singer), Joe Williams. As a composer, Basie is known for writing such jazz standards as "Blue and Sentimental", "Jumpin' at the Woodside" and "One O'Clock Jump" ...
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Bluebird Records
Bluebird Records is an American record label best known for its low-cost releases, primarily of children's music, blues, jazz and swing in the 1930s and 1940s. Bluebird was founded in 1932 as a lower-priced subsidiary label of RCA Victor. Bluebird was noted for what came to be known as the "Bluebird sound", which influenced rhythm and blues and early rock and roll. It is currently owned by RCA Records parent company Sony Music Entertainment. History The label was founded in 1932 as a division of RCA Victor by Eli Oberstein, an executive at the company. Bluebird competed with other budget labels at the time. Records were made quickly and cheaply. The "Bluebird sound" came from the session musician, session band that was used on many recordings to cut costs. The band included musicians such as Big Bill Broonzy, Roosevelt Sykes, Washboard Sam, and Sonny Boy Williamson I, Sonny Boy Williamson. Many blues musicians were signed to RCA Victor and Bluebird by Lester Melrose, a Artists a ...
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RCA Victor
RCA Records is an American record label owned by Sony Music Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony Group Corporation. It is one of Sony Music's four flagship labels, alongside Columbia Records (its former longtime rival), Arista Records and Epic Records. The label has released multiple genres of music, including pop, classical, rock, hip hop, afrobeat, electronic, R&B, blues, jazz, and country. The label's name is derived from the initials of its now defunct parent company, the Radio Corporation of America (RCA). After the RCA Corporation was purchased by General Electric in 1986, RCA Records was fully acquired by Bertelsmann in 1987, making it a part of Bertelsmann Music Group (BMG); following the merger of BMG and Sony in 2004, RCA Records became a label of Sony BMG Music Entertainment. In 2008, after the dissolution of Sony/BMG and the restructuring of Sony Music, RCA Records became fully owned by Sony. RCA Records is the corporate successor of the Victor Talking Machine ...
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Los Angeles Sentinel
The ''Los Angeles Sentinel'' is a weekly African-American owned newspaper published in Los Angeles, California. The paper boasted of reaching 125,000 readers , making it one of the oldest, largest and most influential African-American newspapers in the Western United States. The ''Sentinel'' was also noted for their coverage of the changing African-American daily life experience in the post-1992 Los Angeles Riots era. The ''Sentinel'' was founded in 1933 by Leon H. Washington Jr. for Black readers. Since that time, the newspaper has been considered a staple of Black life in Los Angeles. The paper mainly focuses on and thus enjoys most of its circulation in the predominantly African-American neighborhoods of South Los Angeles, Inglewood and Compton. The office is on Crenshaw Boulevard with commercial corridor in the Hyde Park neighborhood which is known as "the heart of African American commerce in Los Angeles". On March 17, 2004, the ''Sentinel'' was purchased and came un ...
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Velma Middleton
Velma Middleton (September 1, 1917 – February 10, 1961) was an American jazz vocalist and entertainer who sang with Louis Armstrong's big bands and small groups from 1942 until her death. Biography Middleton was born in Holdenville, Oklahoma, and moved with her parents to St. Louis, Missouri. She started her career as a chorus girl and dancer and throughout her career performed acrobatic splits on stage. After working as a solo performer, and singing with Connie McLean and his Rhythm Orchestra on a tour of South America, she joined Armstrong's big band in 1942, and appeared with him in soundies.Yanow, ScottBiography of Velma Middleton, ''AllMusic.com'' Retrieved 15 November 2016 When Armstrong's orchestra disbanded in 1947, Middleton joined his All-Stars, a smaller group. She was often used for comic relief, such as for duets with Armstrong on "That's My Desire" and "Baby, It's Cold Outside", and she did occasional features. She also recorded eight tracks as a solo singer ...
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Louis Armstrong
Louis Daniel Armstrong (August 4, 1901 – July 6, 1971), nicknamed "Satchmo", "Satch", and "Pops", was an American trumpeter and vocalist. He was among the most influential figures in jazz. His career spanned five decades and several eras in the history of jazz. Armstrong received numerous accolades including the Grammy Award for Best Male Pop Vocal Performance, Grammy Award for Best Male Vocal Performance for ''Hello, Dolly! (song), Hello, Dolly!'' in 1965, as well as a posthumous win for the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1972. His influence crossed musical genres, with inductions into the DownBeat, ''DownBeat'' Jazz Hall of Fame, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and the National Rhythm & Blues Hall of Fame, among others. Armstrong was born and raised in New Orleans. Coming to prominence in the 1920s as an inventive trumpet and cornet player, he was a foundational influence in jazz, shifting the focus of the music from collective improvisation to solo performance. ...
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Nat King Cole
Nathaniel Adams Coles (March 17, 1919 – February 15, 1965), known professionally as Nat King Cole, alternatively billed as Nat "King" Cole, was an American singer, jazz pianist, and actor. Cole's career as a jazz and Traditional pop, pop vocalist started in the late 1930s and spanned almost three decades where he found success and recorded over 100 songs that became hits on the pop charts. Cole started his career as a jazz pianist in the late 1930s, when he formed the King Cole Trio, which became the top-selling group (and the only black act) on Capitol Records in the 1940s. Cole's trio was the model for small jazz band, jazz ensembles that followed. Starting in 1950, he transitioned to become a solo singer billed as Nat King Cole. Despite achieving mainstream success, Cole faced intense racial discrimination during his career. While not a major vocal public figure in the civil rights movement, Cole was a member of his local NAACP branch and participated in the 1963 March ...
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Earl Bostic
Eugene Earl Bostic (April25, 1913October28, 1965) was an American alto saxophonist. Bostic's recording career was diverse, his musical output encompassing jazz, swing music, swing, jump blues and the post-war American rhythm and blues style, which he pioneered. He had a number of popular hits such as Flamingo (song), "Flamingo", "Harlem Nocturne", "Temptation (Nacio Herb Brown and Arthur Freed song), Temptation", "Sleep", "Special Delivery Stomp", and "Where or When", which all showed off his characteristic growl on the horn. He was a major influence on John Coltrane.Williams, T. (1985), "That's Earl Brother" Liner Notes 12"LP Spotlite SPJ152 Herts, UK. Career Bostic was born in 1913 in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Tulsa, Oklahoma. In his youth, he played the clarinet in school and saxophone with the local Boy Scouts of America, Boy Scouts troop. He turned professional at the age of 18 when he joined Terence Holder's "Twelve Clouds of Joy". Bostic made his first sound recording and reprodu ...
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Don Tosti
Don Tosti (given name: Edmundo Martínez Tostado) (March 27, 1923 – August 2, 2004) was an American musician and composer. Tosti forged a career spanning several decades and styles, from classical to jazz and rhythm and blues. He was best remembered for his Pachuco-style compositions like the hit "Pachuco Boogie". Recorded in 1948, it was the first million-selling Latin song. Career Tosti's career began in the Boyle Heights neighborhood of Los Angeles with other Mexican-American jazz musicians such as Ray Vasquez and Eddie Cano. Tosti and his Mexican Jazzmen performed for the famed ninth Cavalcade of Jazz concert held at Wrigley Field in Los Angeles which was produced by Leon Hefflin, Sr. on June 7, 1953. Also featured that day were Roy Brown and his Orchestra, Shorty Rogers, Earl Bostic, Nat "King" Cole, and Louis Armstrong and his All Stars with Velma Middleton. Personal life Tosti lived in the Deep Well neighborhood of Palm Springs, California, from 1973 until his ...
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Roy Brown (blues Musician)
Roy James Brown (September 10, 1920 or 1925May 25, 1981) was an American blues singer who had a significant influence on the early development of rock and roll and the direction of R&B. His original song and hit recording " Good Rockin' Tonight" has been covered by many artists including Wynonie Harris, Elvis Presley, Bruce Springsteen, Paul McCartney, Joe Ely, Ricky Nelson, Jerry Lee Lewis, Pat Boone, James Brown, the Doors, the Treniers, and the rock group Montrose. Brown was one of the first popular R&B singers to perform songs with a gospel-steeped delivery, which was then considered taboo by many churches. In addition, his melismatic, pleading vocal style influenced notable artists such as B.B. King, Bobby Bland, Elvis Presley, Jackie Wilson, James Brown and Little Richard. Early life and education Brown was born in Kinder, Louisiana. Some sources report his birth date as September 10, 1925, but the researchers Bob Eagle and Eric LeBlanc gave the date as September 10, 1 ...
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