Life and early career --------------- Béla Fleck is often considered the premier banjo player in the world. A New York City native, he picked up the banjo at age 15 after being awed by the bluegrass music of Flatt & Scruggs. While still in high school he began experimenting with playing bebop jazz on his banjo, mentored by fellow banjo renegade Tony Trischka. In 1980, he released his first solo album, Crossing the Tracks, with material that ranged from straight ahead bluegrass to Chick Corea’s “Spain.” In 1982, Fleck joined the progressive bluegrass band New Grass Revival, making a name for himself on countless solo and ensemble projects ever since as a virtuoso instrumentalist. In 1989 he formed the genre-busting Flecktones, with members equally talented and adventurous as himself. Source: http://www.belafleck.com/bio.html --------------- Fiddle Tunes For Banjo with Tony Trischka and Bill Keith (Rounder Records, 1981) Sam Bush – Late as Usual (Rounder Records, 1984)
Béla Fleck (born July 10, 1958 in New York City, New York) is an American banjo virtuoso. He is best known for his work with the band Béla Fleck and the Flecktones, with bassist Victor Wooten, saxophonist Jeff Coffin, and percussionist Future Man.
Béla Anton Leoš Fleck, who is named after famous Hungarian composer Béla Bartók, Austrian composer Anton Webern, and Czech composer Leoš Janáček, was drawn to the banjo when he first heard Earl Scruggs play the theme song for the television show Beverly Hillbillies. He received his first banjo at age fifteen from his grandfather (1973). He was a member of the class of 1970 at P.S. 75 (the Emily Dickinson School) in Manhattan. Later, Fleck enrolled in New York City's High School of Music and Art where he studied the French horn. He was a banjo student under Tony Trischka.
Almost immediately after high school, Fleck traveled to Boston to play with Jack Tottle, Pat Enright, and Mark Schatz in Tasty Licks. During this period, Fleck released his first solo album (1979): Crossing the Tracks and made his first foray into progressive bluegrass composition.
Fleck played on the streets of Boston with bassist Mark Schatz; and the two, along with guitarist/vocalist Glen Lawson and mandolin great Jimmy Gaudreau, formed Spectrum: the Band in 1981. Fleck toured with Spectrum during 1981. That same year, Sam Bush asked Fleck to join New Grass Revival. Fleck performed with New Grass Revival for nine years. During this time, Fleck recorded another solo album, Drive. It was nominated for a Grammy Award in the then first-time category of "Best Bluegrass Album" (1988).
Béla Fleck and the Flecktones
Béla Fleck and Victor Wooten formed Béla Fleck and the Flecktones in 1988, along with keyboardist and harmonica player Howard Levy and Wooten's percussionist brother Roy "Future Man" Wooten, who played synthesizer-based percussion. Levy left the group in 1992, making the band a trio until Saxophonist Jeff Coffin joined the group onstage part-time in 1997, eventually becoming a permanent member. His first studio recording with the band was their 1998 album Left of Cool. In 1996, he appeared on the tribute album to Hank Marvin, one of his influences, and The Shadows "Twang" playing a Shadows UK hit from the 1960s, "The Stranger".
With the Flecktones, Fleck has been nominated for and won several Grammy awards. (Cf. Grammy sections below.)
Other music and recordings
Fleck has shared Grammy wins with Asleep at the Wheel, Alison Brown, and Edgar Meyer. He has been nominated in more categories than any other musician, namely country, pop, jazz, bluegrass, classical, folk, spoken word, composition, and arranging.
In 2001, Fleck collaborated with long-time friend and playing-partner Edgar Meyer to record Perpetual Motion, an album of classical material played on the banjo along with an assortment of accompanists, including John Williams, Evelyn Glennie, Joshua Bell and Gary Hoffman. The album includes selections such as Chopin's Etude Op. 10 No. 4 in C# minor, Debussy's Doctor Gradus ad Parnassum, and Paganini's Moto Perpetuo (from which is derived the name), as well as more lyrical pieces such as the first movement of Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata, two of Chopin's mazurkas, and two Scarlatti keyboard sonatas. Perpetual Motion won two Grammys at the Grammy Awards of 2002 for Best Classical Crossover Album and Best Arrangement for Fleck and Meyer's arrangement of Doctor Gradus ad Parnassum. Fleck and Meyer have also composed a double concerto for banjo and bass, and performed its debut with the Nashville Symphony Orchestra.
Fleck names Chick Corea, Charlie Parker, and the aforementioned Earl Scruggs as influences. He regards Scruggs as "certainly the best" banjo player of the three-finger style.
Solo and with the Flecktones, Fleck has appeared at Telluride Bluegrass Festival, Merlefest, Montreal International Jazz Festival, Toronto Jazz Festival, Newport Folk Festival, Austin City Limits Music Festival, Bonnaroo, and Jazzfest, among others.
He has also appeared as a sideman with artists ranging from Tony Rice to Ginger Baker and Phish.
In 2005, while the Flecktones were on hiatus, Fleck undertook several new projects: recording with African traditional musicians; cowriting a documentary film called Bring it Home about the Flecktones' first year off in 17 years and their reunion after that time; coproducing Song of the Traveling Daughter, the debut album by Abigail Washburn (a young banjo player who mixes bluegrass and Chinese music); forming the acoustic fusion supergroup Trio! with fellows Jean-Luc Ponty and Stanley Clarke, and recording an album as a member of the Sparrow Quartet (along with Abigail Washburn, Ben Sollee, and Casey Driessen).
In late 2006, Fleck teamed up with Chick Corea to record an album, The Enchantment, released in May 2007. Fleck and Corea toured together throughout 2007.
In July 2007 at the Winnipeg Folk Festival, he appeared and jammed with Toumani Diabaté, a kora player from Mali. He is also scheduled to play the 2009 Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival with Toumani Diabaté.
In December 2007, he performed charity concerts in Germany to help promote AIDS awareness. His largest concert was held in Grosse Halle Bern on December 1, 2007.
On June 13, 2008, he performed as part of The Bluegrass Allstars, composed of bluegrass heavyweights Sam Bush, Luke Bulla, Edgar Meyer, Bryan Sutton, and Jerry Douglas at the Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival in Manchester, Tennessee.
The next day Fleck performed with Abigail Washburn and the Sparrow Quartet also at the Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival.
Throw Down Your Heart, the third volume in Béla’s renowned Tales From the Acoustic Planet series, is his most ambitious project to date. In on-location collaborations with musicians from Uganda, Tanzania, Senegal, Mali, South Africa and Madagascar, Béla Fleck explores the African origins of the banjo, the prototype of which was brought to American shores by African slaves. Throw Down Your Heart is a companion to the award-winning film of the same name, which Béla and director Sascha Paladino are currently premiering at festivals nationwide. Transcending barriers of language and culture, Fleck finds common ground with musicians ranging from local villagers to international superstars such as the Malian diva Oumou Sangare to create some of the most meaningful music of his career.
The music on the album is as adventurous and varied as anything we’ve come to expect from Béla, ranging from the tradition-based opening track, performed with a group of Kenyan women singers, to the exquisite title track, performed with the Haruna Samake Trio and Bassekou Kouate from Mali. Basseko, who comes from a long line of Griot musicians, is an incredible improvising player who plays the n’goni, the Malian banjo. The music he and Béla make together is gentle and melodic. Equally modern is his duet with South African guitarist Vusi Mahlasela, who is simply known as ‘the voice’ (and what an awesome and expressive voice he has). His music connects South Africa’s Apartheid-scarred past with its promise for a better future.
Nothing can quite prepare the listener for the sound of the giant marimba played by the Muwewesu Xylophone Group in Uganda. Says Béla, “The marimba is reassembled every day, and it seems to be played by a set group of men. Each one plays a certain musical part in the group. I think there are other people who know each of the parts in case someone is unable, or unavailable to play. Also there seemed to be kids who were being taught parts. But a spot in the primary team seemed to be a very coveted spot, and the men who played in this group were very serious and very good. The village did join in – in large numbers, singing and playing flutes and fiddles and percussion instruments. They also danced.” It’s a sound of pure joy.
Another highlight is “Djorolen,” a duet with singer Oumou Sangare, who delivers a vocal that expresses heartbreaking beauty and sadness. “As she points out in this song,” says Béla, “it is often the orphans, those who have lost their parents when they are young, who have the greatest problems in life.”
“D’Gary Jam” is a fascinating amalgam that exemplifies the spirit of the album. Béla explains, “This track started its life in Nashville. We had a great jam one day, which went for 22 minutes straight, the whole take was really cool. 
This was in July, about 7 months before we went to Africa. I decided to bring the track along, and add people to it as we went, and even after the trip, a kind of science project, if you will. After things got added, I took some liberties with people’s parts and did a little audio sculpting.” Along with the great acoustic guitarist D’Gary, the track features, among others, Oumou Sangare, the legendary kora player Toumani Diabate, and Bassekou Kouyate.
As to the origins of the banjo, Béla comments, “When I went to Africa I found instruments and players that gave me a better sense of where the thing started. In Gambia and Mali in particular, I found what I was looking for!” This is especially apparent on the traditional song medley “Ajula/Mbamba,” performed by Béla and The Jatta Family from the Gambia. “The akonting could very well be the original banjo. Everyone around Banjul certainly seems to think so! Huge numbers of slaves came west from this area. We were told that the musicians were allowed to play these instruments on the slave ships, and that many lives were saved due to it.”
While many of these recordings were made in the field, in Uganda, Tanzania, The Gambia and Mali, the album is beautifully recorded. The lasting impression is that Béla Fleck has revealed many subtle facets of African music, from the fully modern to the deeply traditional. It is some of the most exciting and beautiful music he’s ever made. “[Fleck’s] reverence for his fellow players allows for the honey of the African sounds to seem that much sweeter. And the music, well…You’ll just have to hear it for yourself…” -Popmatters.com
“The banjo sheds its image as the quintessential American instrument to reveal a symbol of deep African heritage and the collective wail of the European slave trade (the film’s title derives from this heartbreaking historical chapter).” - Austin American Statesman
Banjos played
Nechville Meteor Electric Banjo made by Nechville Musical Products
Nechville Nextar Banjo made by Nechville Musical Products
Deering Crossfire Banjo made by the Deering Banjo Company
Deering Tenbrooks Saratoga Star made by the Deering Banjo Company
Deering John Hartford banjo made by Deering Banjo Company
Discography
Solo/with multiple other musicians
Crossing the Tracks (Rounder Records, 1979)
Natural Bridge (Rounder Records, 1982)
Double Time (Rounder Records, 1984)
Inroads (Rounder Records, 1986)
Daybreak (Rounder Records, 1987)
Drive (Rounder Records, 1988; SACD reissue: Mobile Fidelity, 2004)
Places (Rounder Records, 1988)
Tales From The Acoustic Planet (Warner Brothers, 1995)
The Bluegrass Sessions: Tales from the Acoustic Planet, Vol. 2 (Warner Brothers, 1999)
Perpetual Motion (Sony Classical, 2001)
Banjo and Harpsichord (Sony Classical, 2004)
As part of a musical group
Tasty Licks
Tasty Licks (Rounder Records, 1978)
Anchored to the Shore (Rounder Records, 1979)
Spectrum
Opening Roll (Rounder Records, 1981)
Too Hot For Words (Rounder Records, 1982)
Live in Japan (Rounder Records, 1983)
The New Grass Revival
On the Boulevard (Sugar Hill 1984)
New Grass Revival (EMI 1986)
Hold to a Dream (Capitol 1987)
Live, (Sugar Hill 1989)
Friday Night in America (Capitol 1989)
Anthology (Capitol 1989)
Deviation (Rounder Records, 1984) – billed as "Béla Fleck with the New Grass Revival", sometimes considered a solo album
Best of New Grass Revival (Liberty 1994)
Grass Roots: The Best of the New Grass Revival (Capitol 2005)
Béla Fleck and the Flecktones
Béla Fleck And The Flecktones (Warner Brothers, 1990)
Flight of the Cosmic Hippo (Warner Brothers, 1991)
UFO Tofu (Warner Brothers, 1992)
Three Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (Warner Brothers, 1993)
Live Art (Warner Brothers, 1996)
Left of Cool (Warner Brothers, 1998)
Greatest Hits of the 20th Century (Warner Brothers, 1999)
Outbound (Columbia Records, 2000)
Live at the Quick (Columbia Records, 2002)
Little Worlds (Columbia Records, 2003)
Ten From Little Worlds (Selections from Little Worlds, Columbia Records, 2003)
The Hidden Land (Columbia Records, 2006)
Jingle All the Way (Rounder Records, 2008)
The Sparrow Quartet with Abigail Washburn, Casey Driessen, and Ben Sollee
The Sparrow Quartet EP (Nettwerk Records, 2005)
Abigail Washburn & The Sparrow Quartet (Nettwerk Records, 2008)
One-off collaborations
Snakes Alive! as part of The Dreadful Snakes (Rounder Records, 1983)
Telluride Sessions as part of Strength in Numbers (MCA Nashville Records, 1989)
Solo Banjo Works with Tony Trischka (Rounder Records, 1992)
The Great Dobro Sessions (Sugar Hill Records, 1994)
Tabula Rasa with Jie-Bing Chen and Vishwa Mohan Bhatt (Water Lily Acoustics, 1996)
Uncommon Ritual with Mike Marshall and Edgar Meyer (Sony, 1997)
Music For Two with Edgar Meyer (Sony, 2004)
The Enchantment with Chick Corea (Concord Records, 2007)
As a guest musician
Øystein Sunde - Kjekt å Ha (Universal Music, 1989)
Nitty Gritty Dirt Band - Will the Circle Be Unbroken: Volume Two (MCA Records, 1989)
Shawn Colvin – Fat City (Sony Records, 1992)
Phish – Hoist (Elektra Records, 1994)
Bruce Hornsby – Hot House (RCA Records, 1995)
David Grier - Lone Soldier (Rounder Records, 1995)
Curandero – Aras (Silver Wave, 1996)
Dave Matthews Band – Before These Crowded Streets (RCA, 1998)
Eddie From Ohio – Looking Out the Fishbowl (Vriginia Soul Records, 1999)
Phish – Farmhouse (Elektra Records, 2000)
Jorma Kaukonen – Blue Country Heart (2002)
Rodney Crowell - Fate's Right Hand (2003)
Bernie Williams - The Journey Within (2003)
Gov't Mule - The Deepest End: Live in Concert - ATO Records (2003)
Jimmy Sturr & His Orchestra – Let's Polka 'Round (2003)
Dave Matthews Band – Live Trax Vol. 1: 12.8.98 Centrum Centre, Worcester, MA (2004)
Charlie Peacock – Full Circle (2004)
Jerry Douglas - The Best Kept Secret (Koch Records, 2005)
Dave Matthews Band – Live Trax Vol. 7: 12.31.96 Hamptom Coliseum, Hampton, VA (2006)
Keller Williams – Dream (2007)
Grammy awards
1995
Best Country Instrumental Performance, Hightower by Asleep at the Wheel with Béla Fleck and Johnny Gimble
1996
Best Pop Instrumental Performance, The Sinister Minister by Béla Fleck And The Flecktones (with Sam Bush & Paul McCandless)
1998
Best Instrumental Composition, Almost 12 by Béla Fleck And The Flecktones
2000
Best Contemporary Jazz Album, Outbound by Béla Fleck And The Flecktones
Best Country Instrumental Performance, Leaving Cottondale by Alison Brown and Béla Fleck
2001
Best Instrumental Arrangement, Doctor Gradus Ad Parnassum from Children's Corner Suite (Debussy) by Béla Fleck and Edgar Meyer
Best Classical Crossover Album, Perpetual Motion by Béla Fleck with Edgar Meyer, Joshua Bell, and others
2006
Best Contemporary Jazz Album, The Hidden Land by Béla Fleck And The Flecktones
2008
Best Pop Instrumental Album, Jingle All The Way by Béla Fleck And The Flecktones
Grammy nominations
Béla Fleck has been nominated in more categories than any other musician in Grammy history.
2008
Pop Instrumental Album Jingle All The Way
Country Instrumental Performance Sleigh Ride (from Jingle All The Way)
2006
Pop Instrumental Subterfuge (from The Hidden Land)
2005
Country Instrumental Who's Your Uncle (from Best Kept Secret by Jerry Douglas)
Contemporary Jazz Album Soulgrass by Bill Evans
2002
Country Instrumental Performance Bear Mountain Hop (from The Country Bears Soundtrack)
2000
Pop Instrumental Zona Mona (from Outbound)
1999
Bluegrass Bluegrass Sessions
1998
Pop Instrumental Big Country (from Left Of Cool)
Country Instrumental The Ride (from Restless On the Farm by Jerry Douglas)
1996
World Music Tabula Rasa
1995 
Country Instrumental Cheeseballs In Cowtown (from The Bluegrass Sessions: Tales from the Acoustic Planet, Vol. 2)
1994
Spoken Word For Children The Creation by Amy Grant
1992
Jazz Instrumental Magic Fingers (from UFO Tofu)
1991
Jazz Album Flight of the Cosmic Hippo
Jazz Instrumental Blu-Bop
1990
Jazz Album Bela Fleck & The Flecktones
Jazz Instrumental
1989
Country Instrumental Bigfoot (from Friday Night In America by New Grass Revival
1988
Bluegrass album Drive
1987
Country Instrumental Metric Lips (from Hold to a Dream by New Grass Revival)
1986
Country Instrumental Seven By Seven (from New Grass Revival by New Grass Revival)
Saturday, February 21, 2009
BELA FLECK
BILLY BAUER
--------------- Billy Bauer (1915 - 2005) was already an established professional guitarist in New York when players like Johnny Smith and Jimmy Raney arrived on the scene. He played with the Jerry Wald band before joining Woody Herman in 1944 as a member of the 1st Herd. And in 1946 he played with Benny Goodman and Jack Teagarden. Billy Bauer established and distinguished himself as a solid rhythm player with these bands but it was in the small groups that emerged from these bands, lead by Chubby Jackson, Bill Harris and Lennie Tristano, that Billy Bauer established himself as a significant soloist in the evolving bebop movement. Billy Bauer's solo work with these groups has been sited as some of the best examples of early bebop guitar. But, more significantly, his solo work has been sited as some of the most progressive playing for any era. His work with Lennie Tristano in the mid 1940's certainly represented some of the most progressive guitar playing up to that time. The trio and duet recordings Bauer made with Tristano around 1945 are especially interesting. Tristano and Bauer enjoyed a natural synergy in style and approach to their music. Tristano's intricate arrangements were a perfect match for Bauer's guitar. These examples demonstrated that Bauer was not just a good guitarist, but also an outstanding musician. His unison playing with Tristano was precise, and his accompaniment to Tristano's piano represented some of the best and earliest examples of great guitar comping. Billy Bauer continued his pioneering guitar work with Lee Konitz in the 1950's and 1960's. As with Lennie Tristano, Bauer found a kindred musical spirit in Konitz. Konitz's avant-garde saxophone work was a perfect match for Bauer's advanced guitar. On the recording Lee Konitz especially, the two musicians demonstrated a unique musical dialogue across a range of styles from bop and cool to the avant-garde. Duet For Saxophone and Guitar, was an unusual instrument paring, that really allowed Bauer’s great musicianship to be heard. Early in 1956, Billy Bauer made a recording under his own name. Plectrist put Bauer front and center throughout, playing great jazz guitar. In the history of jazz guitar there have been many examples of great musicians who are often overlooked for the enormous influence they had. Billy Bauer is one of these. Anyone interested in the early evolution of the guitar in bop and cool jazz should start with Bill Bauer. He led the way for guitarists like Jimmy Raney, and along with Lennie Tristano, brought the piano, guitar, bass trio to a whole new level. In the 1990's Billy Bauer appeared at the 1997 JVC Tributes for Barney Kessel and Tal Farlow. Just Jazz Guitar, February 1996 had a nice interview with Billy Bauer by Michael Katz. ©Copyright 2005 Classic Jazz Guitar --------------- Biography by Jason Ankeny --------------- About Billy Bauer Born: 11/14/1915, New York Only solo album Plectrist Source: http://www.billybauersmusic.com/about-billy-bauer.htm --------------- Jazz guitarist Billy Bauer dead at 89 MELVILLE, N.Y.- Billy Bauer, a jazz guitarist who worked with Lennie Tristano, Benny Goodman and Charlie Parker, has died in Melville. He was 89. Source: All About Jazz Publicity --------------- Billy Bauer: Plectrist Source: www.jazzwax.com/2008/ 06/billy-bauer-ple.html Remembering Billy Bauer by Stephen Fratallone/Jazz Connection Magazine As a member of Tristano's ensemble, Bauer was present when the group was one of five bands that helped open Birdland Jazz Club in mid-town Manhattan in December 1949. Also on the opening night's bill were groups led by alto saxophone genius Charlie Parker, who served as the inspiration for the famed jazz spot, tenor sax stylist Lester Young, pianist Art Tatum, and trumpeter Max Kaminsky's Dixieland unit.
Billy Bauer (November 14, 1915 – June 16, 2005) was an American cool jazz guitarist.
Life
Bauer was born in New York City. He played banjo as a child before switching to guitar. He played with the Jerry Wald band and recorded with Carl Hoff and His Orchestra in 1941 before joining Woody Herman in 1944 as a member of the First Herd and in 1946 he played with Benny Goodman and Jack Teagarden.
Working in small groups led by bassist Chubby Jackson and trombonist Bill Harris, Bauer established himself as a soloist in the bebop movement.
In 1946 he began working with Lennie Tristano. Tristano and Bauer enjoyed a natural synergy in their style and approach. Their development of "intuitive music" led to the 1949 session which included the free improvisations "Intuition" and "Digression".
Bauer continued his pioneering guitar work in a partnership with Lee Konitz, whose avant-garde saxophone work was a perfect match for Bauer's guitar. The two musicians' dialogue crossed styles from bop and cool to the avant-garde. Their recordings have been described as "some of the most beautiful duet recordings in jazz". "Duet For Saxophone and Guitar", was an unusual instrument pairing which has been described as redefining the role of jazz guitar.
Bauer made one album under his own name, "The Plectrist" in 1956. The CD reissue has been described as "demand(ing) the attention of anyone even remotely interested in jazz guitar".
Teaching
In later life Bauer taught at the New York Conservatory of Modern Music and his own Billy Bauer Guitar School in Roslyn Heights, New York. He also published instructional books on studying music and playing the guitar.
Near the end of his career, Bauer appeared at the 1997 JVC Tributes for Barney Kessel and Tal Farlow. Bauer led the way for guitarists like Jimmy Raney and student Joe Satriani.
In 1997 he published his autobiography "Sideman" (with Thea Luba ISBN 13 978-0965723701).
Guitarist Billy Bauer was a critical force behind jazz's evolution from swing to bebop, his precise, progressive fretwork foreshadowing the emergence of cool jazz and even the avant-garde. Born in New York City on November 14, 1915, Bauer played banjo as a child but moved to guitar in his late teens, first earning notice behind clarinetist Jerry Wald. In 1941 he made his first recordings with Carl Hoff & His Orchestra -- three years later, Bauer signed on with Woody Herman's First Herd, with whom he cut a series of sessions, followed by stints in support of Benny Goodman and Jack Teagarden. The small groups that emerged from these big bands would prove Bauer's most fertile creative environment, however.
After brief collaborations with Chubby Jackson and Bill Harris, he teamed in 1946 with pianist Lennie Tristano, a three-year partnership that yielded the most inspired and influential work of the guitarist's career. Across a series of duet and trio recordings, Tristano and Bauer proved uniquely complementary musicians, with Bauer's razor-honed guitar navigating Tristano's intricate arrangements with nimble ease. Together, both men were cited as leaders of the growing bop movement, and on recordings like "Intuition" and "Digression," they effectively created free jazz.
After ending his partnership with Tristano, Bauer found another kindred spirit in alto saxophonist Lee Konitz. Their collaboration reached its creative apex with the 1951 session Duet for Saxophone and Guitar, which expanded upon its unusual instrumental pairing to essentially redefine the role of jazz guitar. By now Bauer was regularly winning awards from the magazines Down Beat and Metronome, but he retained the humility and disdain of the limelight that would ultimately serve to marginalize his contributions to contemporary music -- only in 1956 did he cut Plectrist, the first and last studio recording released under his own name.
Bauer was instead happiest and most effective as a sideman, working with the likes of Milt Hinton and Pete Candoli. He also served with the NBC Staff Orchestra and taught at the New York Conservatory of Modern Music. During the last three decades of his life Bauer rarely recorded or performed live, instead channeling his energy into the Billy Bauer Guitar School, which he operated from a small office in Roslyn Heights, NY. In 1997 he published his autobiography, Sideman, and continued offering private lessons until just weeks prior to his death from pneumonia on June 17, 2005.
Died: 6/17/2005, Melville New York
Internationally respected Jazz Guitarist. Billy Bauer was a musician, father, husband, publisher and master instructor.
Billy evolved with the jazz movement of his time -- from swing to be-bop to cool to avante-garde to "free jazz" with outstanding musicianship. Pioneered in taking the guitar out of the purely rhythmic to an intricate chordal melodic styling. His large life was dedicated to his art form seeking creative, authentic music expression through his guitar.
Highlights of his musical life:
Professional banjo player broadcasting on the radio at age 14
Changed to guitar in early 30's
Early credits Jerry Wald, Woody Herman's First Herd, Benny Goodman and Jack Teagarden 1941-46
Player of Be-bop with cool school stylist Lennie Tristano, Lee Konitz and Warne Marsh
Historical "Free Jazz" explorations and soloist on Tristano's recordings Intuition and Digression 1949
Recipient of several Down Beat and Metronome Magazine Awards
Recorded with Metronome All-Stars 1947-1953
Founded William H. Bauer Publishing Co. 1951 - dedicated to the preservation of Jazz transcripts of Lennie Tristano, Lee Konitz, and Warne Marsh and guitar instructional texts.
Served as an ABC staff orchestra guitarist
Freelance recording with the greatest players of all time
Leader of no-sittin' in jam sessions 1961-63 at Sherwood Inn, New Hyde Park, Long Island, New York with the finest swing and bop players of the day
Master guitar instructor for over 35 years at Billy Bauer's Guitar School in Roslyn Heights, Long Island, New York developed THE GUITAR INSTRUCTOR SERIES available on this website
Known as one of the most progressive jazz players of his time or any era
Published autobiography Sideman in 1997 for future generations
Bauer, who lived in Albertson, N.Y., died Friday of complications from pneumonia, said his daughter, Pamela.
He developed much of his solo technique while playing with Tristano's group, which he joined in 1946. Before that, he had played mostly rhythm parts.
Bauer recorded both with the band and with individual members, such as saxophonists Lee Konitz and Warne Marsh. He founded a publishing company, William H. Bauer Inc., to publish compositions by himself, Tristano, Konitz and Marsh.
He went on to work with Goodman and Parker, and recorded one album as band leader: “Plectrist," from 1956.
As the jazz recording industry began to fade, Bauer switched to teaching, opening the Billy Bauer Guitar School in Roslyn Heights, N.Y., on Long Island, in 1970. He continued teaching lessons until shortly before his death.
Born in the Bronx, Bauer first played banjo and ukulele before changing to guitar in his teens.
He wrote an autobiography called “Sideman."
-- Associated Press
Guitarist Billy Bauer recorded only one album as a leader.The album was Plectrist, and it featured Andrew Ackers on piano, Milt Hinton on bass and Osie Johnson on drums. Bauer wasn't shy. The reason for the sole leadership date was Bauer's workload as a sideman. Throughout the 1940s and 1950s, Bauer recorded relentlessly in bands and groups, preferring to play a supporting role. Producer Norman Granz virtually had to beg Bauer to record Plectrist for his Norgran label, cutting off Bauer repeatedly each time Bauer tried to explain how busy he was and why he couldn't do it.
Bauer had a natural, swinging style that was essential for keeping 1940s big-band rhythm sections on track. A superb sight-reader, Bauer had great taste in chord structures and improvisational lines. What's more, he was confident and clear, which is why he was in such demand.
As the big bands gave way to smaller ensembles in the late 1940s and early1950s, guitarists increasingly were called upon to keep tempos and set moods. Like Mundell Lowe, Barney Kessel, Kenny Burrell, Johnny Smith, Dave Barbour, Chuck Wayne, Jimmy Raney and many other guitarists, Bauer was a journeyman, joining groups for brief periods and record dates before being yanked away by another leader or record producer, especially in the 10-inch LP era.
Between 1942 and 1946, Bauer played steadily with Woody Herman's band, known euphemistically as the First Herd. In the fall of 1946 Bauer joined pianist Lennie Tristano and bassist Clyde Lombardi to form the first Lennie Tristano Trio. Sessions followed with other artists, including small ensemble dates with bassist Chubby Jackson and trombonist Bill Harris, Bauer rejoined Tristano's trio in 1947, this time with John Levy on bass. In 1948, Bauer spent much of the year with Benny Goodman. By year's end, he was voted an All Star by Metronome magazine's readers.
As was customary, the magazine's poll winners were recorded. So in January 1949, the Metronome All-Stars made two sides, Overtime and Victory Ball. Today, the discs remain highly charged works that not only showcase the advancedforms of jazz emerging from bebop's wide shadow but also represent an historic convergence of talent. The other 1948 Metronome All-Stars were Dizzy Gillespie, Miles Davis, Fats Navarro on trumpets; Kai Winding and J.J. Johnson on trombones; Buddy DeFranco on clarinet; Charlie Parker on alto sax; Charlie Ventura on tenor sax; Ernie Caceres on baritone sax; Lennie Tristano on piano; Billy Bauer on guitar; Eddie Safranski on bass; and Shelly Manne on drums. Pete Rugolo was the arranger. Before you read any further, take another look at that trumpet section.
In March 1949, Bauer joined the groundbreaking Lennie Tristano Sextet, which included Tristano, Lee Konitz, Warne Marsh, Tristano, Arnold Fishkin and Denzil Best. The group experimented with impossibly difficult modal compositions such as Wow! and Cross-Current, radicalizing the cool jazz sound introduced a year earlier at the Royal Roost by the Miles Davis nonet. Aninteresting footnote: The Miles Davis nonet 78-rpm recordings (later packaged as the Birth of the Cool sessions) were made in January 1949, just three months before Tristano recorded his. An interesting footnote: They were recorded for the same label—and Lee Konitz played on both!
In March 1951, Bauer played on the modal Ezz-thetic sessionwith Miles Davis and Lee Konitz, which further advanced the Third Stream sound. In August, Bauer recorded on Chico O'Farrill Orchestra's Dance One session for Norman Granz's Clef label. A long string of recording dates followed for Bauer in 1952 and 1953.
In December 1954, Bauer's phone rang. It was Charlie Parker asking "B.B" if he was available to appear on a Clef session. It would turn out to be Parker's last studio recordings. The date was the second half of Granz's ill-conceived Cole Porter concept album that Parker never completed before his death in March 1955.
Right after the turn of the year in 1956, Bauer finally relented to Granz's nagging and agreed to record Plectrist. The word "plectrist" wasmade up by the session's producer and means one who skillfully uses a plectrum or a triangular plastic pic on the guitar's strings. The first four tracks of Plectrist were recorded on January 23, 1956, with another six captured on March 12.
Bauer's playing swings on the up-tempo tracks and features gorgeous chords on the ballads. Bauer is so good on the album that he sounds as if he's accompanying himself. What you notice throughout, in addition to Bauer's beautiful taste, is Osie Johnson's drums. Johnson appeared on dozens of recordings in the 1950s, but it's rare to hear his drumming style and technique so distinctly. On Plectrist, you can hear clearly just how gifted a beat-keeper he was and why he was a favorite of so many session leaders of the period.
Milt Hinton, of course, keeps rock solid time all the way through.Again, because this is a small group with guitar as the lead, you hear exactly why Hinton was so beloved by session and club artists.
Andrew Ackers is the least-known player on the date. Ackers was a session pianist who worked steadily in the 1940s with bandleaders Jerry Wald and George Paxton, and with Carmen McRae in 1955. Bauer picks up the story about Ackers in the liner notes from the 2000 re-issue:
"I just grabbed a couple of guys I'd been working with. I had been on a lot of dates with Milt Hinton and Osie Johnson who did a lot of studio work in those days. I knew Andrew Ackers because I was working at NBC at the time, and Fran Warren, the singer, had a couple of little shows, and he was the conductor; every once in a while I was called to do a show with him.
We didn't get to play much on the shows, but weused to get together about an hour before a show and talk and play. Andy was a good accompanist; he backed me up very nicely, never got in my way. Some guys play well but they get in your way all of the time. Andy let me play.
So when I got the record date, I said, 'Well, I'll get Andy.' I could have gotten anybody—I probably could have gotten Lennie [Tristano] to do it—but I was with Andy a lot, and I like the way he accompanied me...
Norman wasn't in the studio when I made the album. It was just the musicians and an engineer. I'd say, 'Here we go!' and we'd play. I let everybody do what they wanted to do."
For an example of Bauer and Ackers playing in completeharmony, dig the Bauer original ballad Night Cruise. Or the uptempo Irving Berlin standard, Maybe I Love You Too Much. Ackers had great taste. It's a shame he didn't record more.
Plectrist is a snapshot of the level of taste and talent that existed in early 1956, especially among guys who went from studio to studio earning a living on record dates. It's a sleeper album that's a must-own for any collection.
---------------
Jazz Guitarist With Woody Herman, Lennie Tristano And Others Dies At 89
Jazz guitarist Billy Bauer, who was a member of Woody Herman's thundering First Herd of 1944-1946, and who later worked with Lennie Tristano, Benny Goodman and Charlie Parker, died on Friday, June 17, 2005, in Melville, NY. He was 89.
Bauer, who lived in Albertson, NY, died of complications from pneumonia, said his daughter, Pamela.
He developed much of his solo technique while playing with Tristano's group, which he joined in 1946. Before that, he had played mostly rhythm guitar.
Bauer recorded both with the band and with individual members, such as saxophonists Lee Konitz and Warne Marsh.
He founded a publishing company, William H. Bauer Inc., to publish compositions by himself, Tristano, Konitz and Marsh.
He was twice named Best Guitar by Metronome's Readers' Poll from 1948-49 and from1949-50. He went on to work with Goodman and Parker, and recorded one album as band leader: Plectrist, from 1956.
As the jazz recording industry began to fade, Bauer switched to teaching, opening the Billy Bauer Guitar School in Albertson, NY, on Long Island, in 1970. He continued teaching lessons until shortly before his death.
Born in the Bronx, Bauer first played banjo and ukulele before changing to guitar in his teens.
He wrote an autobiography called Sideman.
---------------
The following article on Billy Bauer was originally published in the September 2003 issue of Jazz Connection Magazine.
Guitarist Billy Bauer may have blended very well playing with many jazz musicians, but he was and continues to be a stand out plectrist in jazz music. Known best for his stints in Woody Herman's thundering First Herd and in pianist Lennie Tristano's alternative jazz ensembles, Bauer is one of the few jazz guitarists of his generation to avoid the influences of Charlie Christian and he is considered by many as a major living link in the evolution of the jazz guitar.
"One of the things I did was that I 'comped' with the ensembles and bands," said Bauer, 87, from his second-story guitar studio in Albertson, NY, on Long Island. "Not that what I did was ever done before. It was, but not to that extent. The basic thing is that I was so dumb that I would blend with whomever I played with. I played in Dixieland groups, swing groups, modern jazz groups, even Irish musical groups. I played with every kind of combination you can think of. Before he died, (trumpeter) Charlie Shavers told me he liked the way I backed him up. Even (drummer) Max Roach said the same thing. I blend well. I'm not trying to cut them."
By the end of the 1940s, Bauer was considered the best guitarist in jazz, winning the Metronome All-Stars Readers' Poll several times. His 1959 guitar solo on Greenway, remains a textbook example of his modern approach to harmony and composition that continues to inspire new generations of guitarists.
William H. "Billy" Bauer was born on Nov. 14, 1915, in Bronx, NY. His mother played organ in a church and his father, a German immigrant, was a vaudevillian song and dance man who performed under the name of Harry Nelson.
"My father's introduction was, 'Harry Nelson: He Says He Sings,'" Bauer said with a chuckle. "But he did get to be in a Broadway show called School Days."
Having an actor in the family was something that didn't sit well with the song and dance man's father who believed working hard at a craft was the only way to get ahead in their newly-adopted country.
"My grandfather didn't like my father to be an actor," Bauer said. "When my father went up to Ossining, NY, to open School Days, my grandfather told him don't ever come back home until you are ready to get a real job. Eventually, my father conceded. He came back and went to work in the print factory which my grandfather owned. He became a printer."
Bauer's grandparents also owned a board and livery stable where work horses and buggies were rented out. As a result, young Bauer and his numerous cousins got their first jobs working as stable boys, he said.
"Us kids had to do work," Bauer said. "We had to clean the stables and bring the horses food and water. My grandmother was married with six kids before she met my grandfather. After they were married, they had six more kids! I had a large collection of aunts and uncles."
As a family, the Bauer's always sang, especially during their weekly Sunday afternoon car rides to Almond, NY, 16 miles away, where the family congregated for coffee and doughnuts, Bauer said.
"We'd sing all the way up and all the way home," Bauer recalled. "We had an open-air Ford touring car, the ones that you had to crank up to get it started. We were one of four families on our block that owned an automobile."
At age 9, Bauer began his life in music via a broken leg.
"My mother got an old baby carriage and hired this 13-year-old girl to push me around all summer long," Bauer said. "A friend of mine gave me a pair of drum sticks and I started drumming on my plaster cast. My father came home one day with a ukulele and gave it to me to play. At that time, 'Ukulele Ike' was very popular on radio and records. By the end of that summer, I could play some tunes on the ukulele." ("Ukulele Ike," whose real name was Cliff Edwards, went on to greater fame in 1940 as the voice of the Walt Disney character, Jiminy Cricket.")
Shortly thereafter, Bauer's father presented his young son with a tenor banjo. The youngster took banjo lessons from a Mr. Beca, a street-wise man who owned the neighborhood candy store, Bauer said.
"Mr. Beca made me read music which gave me an advantage," Bauer said.
By age 12, Bauer became so proficient on the tenor banjo that his father got his young son jobs working in speakeasies, Bauer said.
"My father would see ads in the newspapers like 'Banjo Player Wanted For Saturdays,' or something like that, and he would take me to see the owners," Bauer recalled. "One of the owners, Johnny Lane, was skeptical about hiring me because of my age. My father said, "Why don't you try him? Let him play.' I played for him and he hired me. His wife had to bring me to the club when my father couldn't take me."
Although he entertained in speakeasies, Bauer seemed unafraid to play in an environment frequented by gangsters, he said.
"Nah, I was too dumb," he said. "I still am."
At 16, Bauer played his first out-of-town in residence job in Rockaway, NY, a place owned by noted gangster Waxy Gordon.
"We'd be sitting around for two days and all of a sudden people would come in and the boss would say, 'Get up there and start now,'" Bauer said. "We'd start playing and the whole place would get jammed."
During the summer after his junior year in high school, Bauer played in a band at various resorts in the Catskill Mountains. Upon his return to school on the first day after summer vacation, Bauer was boasting to friends, albeit in jest, about the many "adult" experiences of which he supposedly engaged. A teacher came along after overhearing the teen banjoist's comments and believing the comments to be inappropriate, whacked him over his hands with a yard stick. The incident led to Bauer dropping out of high school.
"I got up and said, 'That's it! I'm through!'" Bauer said. "I walked out and I never went back. My father never went to school either, so he didn't mind."
Bauer then began to hang out with bar room pianist Bob King, "who could play a million tunes," according to Bauer. The association helped the young plectrist to get his ear accustomed to playing just about any kind of song.
"I guess that's why I got work because I was schooled in just playing tunes," he said.
From there, Bauer played in a group at Broad Channel, NY, replacing a black band which never returned to perform at that venue. The group Bauer was in was hired to play for dancing and for musical back up for an all-black girl show.
"After a few nights at this gig, we knew why this black band never returned," Bauer said. "We started around 8:30 p.m. and the boss would put out bottles of gin, rye, and scotch on the bandstand. We couldn't leave the bandstand until everyone went home, and that could be 4 in the morning. Because of all the booze we drank, we had to go to the bathroom in shifts. If I had to go, the piano player and drummer would have to stay on stage and continue playing. If the piano player had to go, the drummer and I would stay, etc. It was like being held hostage."
In 1933, after Prohibition was repealed, Bauer made the switch to guitar as the usage of the stringed instrument was gaining popularity over the banjo in many bands. He continued playing banjo while in Leo Clinton's band, a seven-piece outfit from the Bronx. When Clinton suddenly quit, Bauer was made leader and the instrumental switch was made.
"I bought my first electric guitar when I became a leader, a Rickenbacker," Bauer said. "It was a plastic guitar that looked like a frying pan."
Also in Clinton's band at the time were drummer Russ Williams and a young enthusiastic piano player named Harry Raab, who emerged in 1944 as Harry "The Hipster" Gibson, combining song and jive. Gibson was best-known for tunes such as Who Put The Benzedrine In Mrs. Murphy's Ovaltine?, I Stay Brown All Year 'Roun', and Get Your Juices At The Deuces. Gibson died in May 1991 at age 75.
Bauer and Gibson worked together for one summer playing for a yacht club in New Jersey, according to Bauer.
"Harry wanted me to go and work with him in a group he called 'The Domino Boys: The White Boys With The Black Rhythm,'" Bauer said.
Bauer gigged with smaller groups around The Big Apple playing downstairs at one night spot while trumpeter Bobby Hackett was playing with his group upstairs at the same venue, Bauer said.
"That's where I met Bobby and I got to know him pretty well," Bauer said.
It was during this time that Bauer began listening with an attentive ear to the music of young guitar phenom Charlie Christian, who reached stardom with Benny Goodman's orchestra from 1939 to 1941. Christian died of tuberculosis in March 1942 at age 23.
"All the other guitarists went for Django Reinhardt, but he was a crazy player!" Bauer said.
Bauer then started getting jobs playing in larger bands such as those led by Henry Jerome, Carl Hoff, clarinetist Jerry Wald and Abe Lyman.
In 1943, Bauer joined Lyman, who led a solid and successful commercial outfit many years before the big band boom began. Prior to getting an invitation to join Lyman and his Californians, Bauer was working with a comedy show band at The Metropole, a famed nightclub in New York City.
"Lyman's booker, Al Pollack, told me that Abe was looking for a guitar player and he invited me to come over to the Lincoln Hotel where the band was playing and to play a set," Bauer recalled. "I started The Metropole job at 9 p.m. and Lyman's band started at 7 p.m. So I went over the next night."
When Bauer got on the bandstand, he noticed there wasn't any music for the guitar, he said.
"The band started to play and Abe pointed to me saying, 'You take it,'" Bauer said. "He didn't even ask me if I knew the tune or not. I got through the set and Abe said to me, 'Hey, Kid, when are you going to take it out of the case?' I got up and walked right out of the place."
As Bauer was making his way out of the hotel, Pollack came running after him and asked where he was going.
"Did you hear the way he talked to me?" Bauer replied angrily.
"Are you kidding?" Pollack replied. "After you started playing, Abe waved to me to get you. Don't be an idiot. You'll make about $8,000 next year. Abe treats the guys very well. Plus, we do nightly broadcasts."
Pollack smoothed things over with Bauer and the booker told Lyman that the guitarist would take the job.
In Lyman's band at the time were such outstanding musicians as Sy Zentner and Ray Heath on trombones; Marty Gold on Violin; Wolffe Tannenbaum on tenor sax; Bill Clifton on piano; and Sid Weiss on bass.
It was his friendship with tenor saxophonist Flip Phillips that eventually led Bauer to join clarinetist/alto saxophonist Woody Herman's orchestra in the spring of 1944.
I first met Flip when he was playing clarinet in (trumpeter) Frankie Newton's band," Bauer said. "We formed a sextet and we'd play after hours. One night Abe came to hear us and he liked it and wanted to put us on the next show to broadcast. We played one of my tunes, Burma Bomber."
Shortly thereafter, Phillips got the nod to join Herman, who was revamping his aggregation from "The Band That Plays The Blues" into an explosive modern jazz unit. Herman's earlier band had a hit in 1939 with Woodchopper's Ball.
A few weeks later, Bauer received a call from Herman to join the band.
"Flip recommended me to Woody," Bauer said. "I joined the band a few days later in Detroit."
Herman's new band, which would later become known as "The First Herd (1944-1946)," reflected spirited, muscle-flexing exuberance in its music. The band during this period boasted new and exciting young talents in Sonny Berman, Pete Candoli and his younger brother, Conte, Carl "Bama" Warwick, Ray Wetzel and Shorty Rogers on trumpets; Bill Harris and Ralph Pfiffner on trombones; Sam Marowitz and John LaPorta on alto saxophones; Phillips, Pete Mondello and Mickey Folus, tenor saxophones; Skippy DeSair and Sam Rubinowitch, baritone saxophone; and an ironclad rhythm section of Chubby Jackson, bass; Ralph Burns, Tony Aless, and later, Jimmy Rowles, piano; Bauer, guitar; Dave Tough and later, Don Lamond, drums; and Margie Hyams and later, Red Norvo, vibraphone. Burns and trumpeter Neil Hefti contributed stunning arrangements, while the band's "girl" singer, Francis Wayne, shared the vocal duties with Herman.
"It was a swinging band, that's for sure," Bauer said. "It had fire. I guess the rhythm section had something to do with it, too. The tight rhythmic sound just came. It seemed natural. Everyone just played the way they played. That was the good part."
"They had all different types of jazz to open the club," Bauer recalled. "Ours was just a little different."
Bauer's success with Tristano was also recognized when he was named Best Guitarist in Metronome's Readers' Poll for 1948-1949 and for 1949-1950. He participated in both traditional Metronome All-Star recording sessions. The 1948-49 All-Stars included Charlie Parker, alto sax; Charlie Ventura, tenor sax; Ernie Caceres, baritone sax; Buddy DeFranco, clarinet; J. J. Johnson and Kai Winding, trombones; Dizzy Gillespie, Miles Davis and Fats Navarro, trumpets; Lennie Tristano, piano; Eddie Safransky, bass; Shelly Manne, drums; and composer/arranger Pete Rugolo, conductor. The All-Stars for this recording session waxed for RCA-Victor (20-3361) Victory Ball and Overtime, a Rugolo composition.
"I remember we went over the allotted studio time to do the recordings and we named one of the tunes Overtime," Bauer recalled. "We just did one or two takes on a tune and that was it. In situations like that you get maybe eight bars to solo and if the whole band doesn't play good, you don't play good, then forget about it."
The 1949-50 All-Stars included Stan Getz, tenor sax; Lee Konitz, alto sax; Serge Chaloff, baritone sax; Buddy DeFranco, clarinet; Kai Winding, trombone; Dizzy Gillespie, trumpet; Lennie Tristano, piano; Eddie Safranski, bass; Max Roach, drums; and composer/arranger Pete Rugolo, conductor. The All-Stars on this recording session waxed No Figs, a Tristano original based on the chord progression of Indiana, and Double Date (Jan. 10, 1950).
Bauer continued to work in jazz throughout the 1950s, recording with the J. J. Johnson-Kai Winding band (Jay And Kai on Savoy Jazz, 1954), and with Tristano, Konitz and others, but most of his time was spent in studio work.
Tristano died in 1978 at age 59.
"With Lennie Tristano I was going broke," Bauer said. "I had a wife and two kids to support. It was OK working with these guys but we'd work one week, then we'd be out of work for two weeks. Then we'd maybe work three weeks somewhere, then we'd be out of work for a week. It got so that I couldn't even buy a house. I tried to buy a house, but then the banks would ask me where I was working. I'd have to say, 'Well, next week I'll be working at this club, and the week after that over here.' The bottom line was the banks refused me."
Bauer then heard of an opening for a guitar player at NBC. He auditioned for the job and became a studio musician.
"(Guitarist) Johnny Smith was leaving the studios to go into jazz and I was leaving jazz to get into the studios," Bauer said. "Meredith Wilson was the musical director at NBC and he liked my playing. He told the execs that I was the best rhythm guitar player he had ever heard. That sowed up the job for me right there! The following day I went to the same bank that refused my home loan a week earlier. When I told them I was working for NBC, they then approved my loan!"
Bauer worked for NBC for eight years doing The Bob And Ray Show, The Big Show with Tallulah Bankhead, and The Toast Of The Town with Ed Sullivan, among others. He also was hired out by the studio to do commercial "jingles" and to do outside record dates, including some duet work with Lee Konitz from the alto saxophonist's New Sounds album on Prestige Records, he said.
"I got some recognition doing duet recordings with Lee," Bauer said. "Lee has made it big. He's still going! He's made more records than anybody I ever heard. Every time he plays, he gets recorded."
From 1950 to 1953, Bauer also taught at the New York Conservatory of Modern Music and toured with Benny Goodman in Europe in 1958. He's on Goodman's Live At The Brussels' World Fair album.
After his work at NBC ended, Bauer began receiving calls to play in the pit orchestra for Broadway shows, most notably, How Now, Dow Jones, he said.
"I didn't like playing for Broadway very much because you were playing the same thing over and over again," Bauer said. "I didn't know if they liked me either. (laughs) I stuck it out for about three years."
During this period, Bauer continued to do free lance work in New York.
"Then that started to go because the whole music business went downhill," he said.
So, in 1970, Bauer opened an instructional studio for guitar players in Albertson.
"I'm still going at it," Bauer said with a laugh.
And what Bauer emphasizes at his music studio are the fundamentals, he said.
"I go back to the ABC's of the guitar," he said. "My students need to know the scales in all twelve keys. If they don't want to do that, I tell them that they shouldn't be here."
Reading music is also a high instructional priority for Bauer's students, he said.
"For guitarist's, they're given a G7 chord and that's it. Put any notation on it and they're lost," Bauer said. "Through that I can get into theory as to why things are the way they are."
Although Bauer may run the guitar school, he doesn't take any credit as a teacher, he said.
"I tell my students from the beginning that I'm not a teacher," Bauer said. "I'm an instructor."
That's not too shabby for a guy who claims he doesn't know anything.
"My students are teaching me just as much as I teach them," Bauer said.
In addition to guitar instruction, Bauer is also a published author. In 1997, he published his autobiography, Sideman, recounting his life as a jazz musician with prolific insights about his passion for music. The book may be purchased on line through Amazon.com at www.amazon.com or from Bauer himself by sending a check for $19.95 plus $3.50 postage to: William H. Bauer, Inc., P.O. Box 270, Albertson, NY 11507-0270.
Bauer continues to perform publicly on occasion. In 1995, he performed for Flip Phillips' 80th birthday party in Florida. Phillips died two years ago at age 86.
More recently, Bauer was part of an all-star Woody Herman alumni band that performed last November in Los Angeles to honor the late bandleader with a statue erected to his memory. Herman died in 1987.
"I just do what I can when I can," Bauer said. "I'm on the way out, but I still have something to give. If I can impart to my students just a little as to what I know, then it's all for the best."
GEORGE BARNES
Download music!: George Barnes-Blue Lou; George Barnes-Lover Come Back To Me
George Barnes (July 17, 1921 – September 5, 1977) was a world-renowned swing jazz guitarist, who claimed he played the first electric guitar in 1931, preceding Charlie Christian by six years. George Barnes made the first recording of an electric guitar in 1938 in sessions with Big Bill Broonzy.
Biography
George Barnes was born in South Chicago Heights, Illinois. He started his career accompanying blues vocalists such as Big Bill Broonzy. In the mid-1930s, Barnes toured throughout the Midwest. By 1938, he was working as a musician on the staff of NBC studios. After a stint in the Army, Barnes recorded with his octet and worked as a studio musician for Decca.
In 1940, Barnes released his first recording under his own name on Okeh Records, "I'm Forever Blowing Bubbles" backed with "I Can't Believe That You're In Love With Me".
He did not receive national acclaim until he recorded an album called Two Guitars with Carl Kress. After the death of Kress, Barnes recorded several albums with Bucky Pizzarelli. Their partnership lasted through the early 1970s. He also worked as a session musician for The Jodimars in the late 1950s.[1] Before his death, Barnes also made well-received albums with Joe Venuti. He also contributed an album entitled Guitars a'plenty, under the name The George Barnes Guitar Choir, for Mercury Records in 1962. It was part of a series of recordings known as "Super Stereo Sound" as technical "state of the art" techniques.
First Recording of Electric Guitar
The first recording of an electric guitar was by jazz guitarist George Barnes who recorded two songs in Chicago on March 1st, 1938: "Sweetheart Land" and "It's a Low-Down Dirty Shame" with Big Bill Broonzy. Many historians incorrectly attribute the first recording to Eddie Durham, but his recording with the Kansas City Five was not until 15 days later. Durham introduced the instrument to Charlie Christian.
Style and technique
Barnes formative guitar years preceded the be-bop era therefore his playing style was more swing. His lines were usually short, very melodic, bluesy and "inside" (e.g. diatonic) as compared to the chromaticism and long lines of be-bop era guitarists (such as Pat Martino). His improvisation employed "call and answer" extensively — e.g. playing a line in one octave (call) and repeating the exact or similar line in another octave (answer). His lines swung, were well articulated and often cleverly posed. Barnes' tone was brighter than most jazz guitarists (such as Joe Pass or Jim Hall) and reflected his "happy" approach.
Barnes died in Concord, California. Not long before his death he recorded two live albums at a San Francisco club. The albums are good examples of his swinging, happy and often mischievous technique. The albums also include his banter with the audience, introduction of tunes and his band, giving you a brief look into his sense of humor.
Compositions by George Barnes
George Barnes' compositions included "Kilroy is Here", "Starlight Interlude", "South Side Blues", "Suite for Octette", "Zebra's Derby", "Jumpin' Jack", "Sunday Drive", "Misty Morn", "Girl in a Picture Hat", "A Good Night for Murder", "Fast and Fancy", and "Sunny Day in May".
---------------
George Barnes (1921 - 1977) began his career in Chicago while still a teenager. In 1935 he was playing blues guitar backup for singers like Memphis Minnie and Blind John Davis before making his move to jazz. His first significant jazz recording was The George Barnes Sextet made for Keynote Records in 1946. His last two recordings were produced in 1977, by Concord Records, one just shortly before and one just after his death.
George Barnes was one of the most underrated of the jazz guitarists that came up during the 1930's, 1940's and 1950's. He was easily recognized for the duets he made with Carl Kress, but sometimes overlooked as one of the great jazz stylists and innovators.
Barnes was one of the very first guitarists to electrify his instrument and he was also one of the first to prove the guitar's abilities as a significant solo instrument. In fact, it is said that Barnes' ambition throughout his life was to make the guitar as important an instrument as the more commonly heard solo instruments. His 1946 interpretation of Lover Come Back To Me on Keystone, showed that already in 1946, Barnes had extended the guitar's role as a solo instrument. Unlike many of his early recordings where the solo spotlight was shared with other instruments, on this recording the guitar was the only solo instrument backed by bass, drums and rhythm guitar. This extraordinary recording preceded and pointed the way to the great guitar recordings by Johnny Smith, Tal Farlow and many others.
While he was extending the guitar's role as a solo instrument, Barnes also continued to promote the guitar as a rhythm instrument. He often switched between solo and rhythm when he played in a group setting and he usually included outstanding rhythm guitarists on his recordings. He made duet recordings with Carl Kress, Art Ryerson and Bucky Pizzarelli on which the rhythm guitar was featured as prominently as his solos. In fact, some of these duet recordings were more significant due to the amazing strength of the rhythm playing. Barnes’ emphasis on preserving the role of the rhythm guitar also contributed to the preservation of the guitar duet format. This tradition began with Eddie Lang and Lonnie Johnson, was continued by Lang with Carl Kress and then Kress with Dick McDonough, Kress with Tony Mottola and then Kress and Barnes on electric guitars. George Barnes and Kress took this form to a new level by performing as a duet in public performances in clubs and concert halls. Many of the guitar duet players who followed referenced Barnes and Kress as the outstanding model for this venue.
Like all the great jazz guitarists, George Barnes was first a dedicated musician who happened to also be an outstanding guitar player. And like the other great guitar players he was dedicated to his instrument. He developed a very distinctive style that made him unique and he invested his career in an effort to keep the great guitar traditions alive.
©Copyright 2005 Classic Jazz Guitar
---------------
The following is extracted from a letter written by George's wife, Evelyn, on his behalf a few months before George's untimely death in 1977:
"George has asked me to answer your letter since he is quite busy in his studio editing the tape of a recording he made in concert on April 17 for Concord Jazz (to be released in September).
Perhaps you don't know as much about George as the 'fashionable' players because he's been in the radio, television and recording studios most of his adult life. He joined the NBC staff at age 17 because the money was tremendous and the studios were clean and he could write and play what he wanted, as opposed to dirty creepy night clubs that only paid $35, and he had to contend with drunks etc.
He began recording (always on electric) when he was 17 years old. He will be 56 on July 17. His older brother made an amplifier for him when he started playing guitar at age 9 (piano at age 6).
Regarding George's Guild Guitar: It is a special instrument the George designed beginning with the slab of Norway Spruce. There are no 'f' holes and the pickups are suspended (floating) within the instrument on a piece of mahogony. There were a few others made, but were too expensive and therefore are not made anymore. For many years his strings were made by a man in Chicago who died in 1962 and the company no longer exists. He now uses whatever he finds suitable for his purpose. He uses a cross-vibrato that no other guitarist uses (at least to the extent that George does). He developed this from the very beginning of his playing. The amplifier George uses is a Sho-Bud, made in Nashville by a slide (steel) player - Buddy Emmons.
...he has a book in progress that will be published, perhaps this year, entitled (tentatively) 'Musicians Stories I Keep Telling'.
The George Barnes/Ruby Braff Quartet (now defunct) was in London at Ronnie Scott's Club - Feb./March 1975 for three weeks...
Best,
Evelyn Barnes."
George Barnes was born July 17, 1921 in a Chicago suburb. He came from a family of professional musicians and his father, who was a guitarist taught him to play at age 9. George's original chosen instrument was the piano which he began playing at age 6 but when the Barnes family lost their piano as well as their house in the depression all that was left was a Sears Roebuck Silvertone guitar with an action about an inch high. George worked hard at this instrument and by the age of 12 had joined the union. He had by this time heard the records of Bix Beiderbecke featuring Joe Venuti and knew that he wanted to be a jazz musician.
Although there were few guitarists around at that time who soloed George never wanted to play rhythm - he wanted to play melody. He had heard many of the records of Django Reinhardt but never related to him because Django sounded foreign to him. George was mostly influenced by the horn and reedmen who he played with whilst growing up in Chicago. The single greatest influence was Jimmy Noone, the Chicago clarinetist, with whom George was playing when he was 16. Other influences were Benny Goodman and Louis Armstrong. During this time George also hung around with Lonnie Johnson who taught him how to play the blues. He claimed to have been playing electric guitar from 1931 when his brother built a pickup and amplifier for him. It is not clear who the first electric guitar player was but George must, surely, have been among the first.
At 14 he fomed the George Barnes Quartet and two years later made his first records under his own name - "I'm Forever Blowing Bubbles" and "I Can't Believe That You're In Love With Me" for Okeh records. At 17 he joined the staff at NBC in Chicago and became the youngest conductor/arranger they ever had. Around this time he was recording with top black blues artists such as Big Bill Broonzy often being the only white player on the date. Hughes Panassié once refered to George as "the great Negro blues guitarist from Chicago". This was brought to an end in 1942, when George was drafted.
In 1951 George made the move to New York where he immediately got a contract at Decca to conduct, arrange, do backing vocals, his own albums and record dates (he said the only thing he didn't do was sweep floors!). His first gig in NY was playing opposite Tal Farlow at the Embers. George also met Carl Kress in 1951, the start of a friendship that was to result in the formation of the critically acclaimed George Barnes/Carl Kress Duo in later years. They toured the world together and made some of the finest guitar duo recordings ever. Around this time George had the Guild Guitar Company build a unique guitar to his specifications partly arising out of his dissatisfaction with the way electric guitars were prone to feedback. (See George's Guitars)
After Kress' death in 1965 George's next partner was to be Bucky Pizzarelli. Their 3 year partnership produced such fine albums as "Guitars Pure And Honest" before Bucky went on to form his own career. The next and probably the most famous of George's associations was with cornet player Ruby Braff. Together with rhythm guitarist Wayne Wright and bass player Michael Moore they formed the George Barnes/Ruby Braff Quartet which again toured the world and delighted audiences everywhere.
George had a unique technique in playing the guitar in that he held the pick between his thumb and middle finger, claiming that it gave him more control; played with mainly down strokes and when creating vibrato he did it across the fingerboard instead of in line with the fingerboard as most guitarists do. His sound was instantly recognisable and a joy to listen to.
Before his death in 1977 he recorded enough material for Concord records to issue two albums of material by his Quartet which included Duncan James on second guitar. They are "must have" material for any guitarist and a fitting tribute to one of the finest guitarists ever. (Concord Please Note: It's about time that "Blues Going Up" was made available on CD!)
----------------
George Barnes Interview - Guitar Player Magazine February 1975
by Bob Yelin
The words "jazz guitarist" describe George Barnes - but he is also much more. His fantastic versatility has enabled him to play almost any kind of music, and has led to recording dates with such greats as Dinah Washington, Lena Horne, Billy Eckstine, Johnny Mathis, Mel Torme, Ella Fitzgerald, and Frank Sinatra. During the Sixties, Barnes formed the first full-time jazz guitar duo, with Carl Kress, and Barnes' guitar came into its own as a solo instrument.
- Editor
When and where were you born?
I was born July 17, 1921 in a Chicago suburb. However, I was raised in Chicago. I come from a family of professional musicians. My father was a guitarist and taught me to play the guitar when I was 9.
Did your father's playing of the guitar make you want to take it up also?
No, not really. At age 6, I began to play the piano and I knew that was the instrument for me. But when the depression came, we lost our piano as well as our house. All that was left for me to play was a little Sears Roebuck Silvertone guitar with action about an inch high. I worked hard at it and when I was 12, I joined the union.
What kind of music were you playing then?
When I was 11, I heard some Bix Beiderbecke records featuring Joe Venuti. I knew then that I wanted to be a jazz musician.
Did any guitarist influence the way you played?
No, there were few guitarists then who soloed. I didn't want to play rhythm; I wanted to play melody. I heard many records by Django (Reinhardt), but I couldn't relate to his playing because he sounded foreign to me. The musicians who influenced my playing the most were the horn and reedmen I played with while I was growing up in Chicago. This was at the time that the Chicago sound in jazz was being formed and was strongly felt in the music world. I was very fortunate to be a part of it. My single greatest influence was a famous Chicago clarinetist, Jimmy Noone. He also greatly influenced Benny Goodman. I was playing with Jimmy Noone when I was 16. His playing gave me a strong direction. Another strong influence was Louis Armstrong.
Did anyone influence the way you played the blues?
When I was young, I hung around with Lonnie Johnson, and he taught me how to play the blues. He played the first 12-string guitar I ever heard. He used to tune it down a whole tone to make it easier to play. George Van Eps does the same thing with his 7-string guitar.
As a teenager, did you mainly sit in with groups or did you work gigs?
At 14, 1 formed my first quartet, the George Barnes Quartet. We did a lot of work. At 16, I made my first record under my group's own name. We recorded "I'm Forever Blowing Bubbles" and "I Can't Believe That You're in Love With Me," for Okeh records: Many guitar players who read Guitar Player magazine have written me that they have that record.
Didn't you start doing a lot of studio work after your first record?
Yes, at 17 I joined the NBC staff in Chicago. There, I became the youngest conductor and arranger they ever had. I stayed with them for nearly five years, until I got drafted in 1942.
Didn't you do a lot of recording dates in Chicago, besides radio work?
Good heavens, I did a ton of recording dates! In 1935, I started recording with the top black blues artists of that time. I made over one hundred blues records with fellows like Big Bill Broonzy, Blind John Davis, and a host of other bluesmen. I was the only white musician on these dates. Hughes Panassie, the French author of the jazz book, Le Jazz Hot, came out with a discography which included me as "the great Negro blues guitar player from Chicago." I did all kinds of recording dates. But I got even more involved with recordings when I moved to New York in 1951.
What made you leave Chicago?
I was working on the Dave Garroway show in Chicago, and he told me that television work was booming in New York and would pay better than the work I was doing. When I first arrived in New York, I immediately got a contract with Decca records. With them, I did just about everything: Conducting, arranging, vocal backgrounds, my own albums, and record dates. Probably the only thing I didn't do was sweep the floors!
Did you ever get a chance to leave the studios and play in jazz clubs?
The first gig I got when I arrived in New York was playing at the Embers opposite Tal Farlow, who I love dearly. Tal is my favorite guitarist to listen to. I used to call him the "Spider," because he has such long fingers. He amazes me when he solos in harmonics. I've always regretted his not staying active in clubs or on records.
Do you have any idea how many recording dates you have played on?
Between 1951 and now, I have recorded 23 albums under my own name. From 1953 to 1961, I recorded 61 albums with the Three Suns alone. From 1961 to the present, I have recorded with practically every bigname singing star from Frank Sinatra to Bing Crosby, Patti Page, and loads more. It would be very difficult to find a singing star I haven't recorded with. They tell me down at the union, that I have recorded more than any other person in their contract file. I don't know how many recording dates I've done, but one day I intend to add them up. I know the number is well into the thousands.
Why do you think there is such a great demand for your playing?
It is probably because I am totally involved with all aspects of music. Not only am I a guitarist, but an arranger, conductor, and recording engineer, with years of knowledge and experience behind me. I've also developed ways of accompanying artists that enhances and enriches their music. You have to know how a singer phrases so your accompaniment does not conflict. As an arranger, I have a whole different set of ears from someone who is just a guitarist. I have a better knowledge of what to play and what not to play.
You have been part of two wellknown guitar duos, one with Carl Kress and one with Bucky Pizzarelli. How did your first one, with Carl, come about?
Carl Kress and I met in 1951, on the Garry Moore show. I was seated in the audience and Carl was working the show. Garry introduced me to the audience and suggested that Carl and I play a duet. We got together, at a later time, and played on his show. But Carl and I had a hard time finding time to play because he was busy with CBS, and my time was locked into Decca. Finally, ten years later, in 1961, we decided to work together. We were the first guitar duo to play steadily. All the others, Carl Kress-Eddie Lang, Eddie Lang-Lonnie Johnson, and their work with Dick McDonough were only for record dates. Carl and I were together for five years, until his passing in 1966, right after we returned from a concert tour of Japan with Mitch Miller. We played concerts all over the world. Carl was my closest friend. We really loved each other. We hung out together all the time, whether it be playing chess, drinking, or going to hear other musicians. He was always a gentleman with a relaxed manner, and a lot of fun to be with. He was also a fantastic musician. His style of playing was totally unique. Playing rhythm was his forte. He used a special tuning to give his chords a full, rich sound. His 6th string was tuned to Bb the 5th to F, the 4th and 3rd had the regular tunings of D and G, the 2nd was tuned to A and the 1st to D. With this lower tuning, he could play more and fuller bass lines. However, this tuning was not very good for playing solo. He rarely soloed in single notes; instead, he soloed in chords. It was his unique tuning that brought about the development of the 7-string guitar. George Van Eps, who studied with Carl, was warned by his father not to study with him, because he used an unusual tuning. We made four albums together, one of which was a live recording we did at a town hall concert. I truly miss him.
How and when did you and Bucky [see GP, June '74] get together?
In 1969, Bucky came up to my studio to try out his new 7-string guitar. We did some experimental recordings with it and we knew, right away, that we had a good sound. He had a marvelous facility for playing that instrument. I think the credit should be given to him for the development of the accompanist style on the 7-string guitar. (Van Eps is the supreme master of solo style playing on the 7-string.) Bucky and I worked a heavy schedule together for three years. We made two albums. One, on the A&R label [Guitars Pure And Honest], was our own record, and we were part of a package of guitarists for a Town Hall concert on Columbia Records [The Guitar Album, KG 31045]. Bucky and I knew from the beginning that he wouldn't be satisfied to be my accompanist for the rest of his life. He is too good a musician for that. We split up when he went to do concerts in Europe with Benny Goodman. But we had a marvelous three years together.
You're currently co-leading the Ruby Braff-George Barnes Quartet. How did you and cornetist Ruby Braff get together?
George Wein, the promoter for the Newport Jazz Festival, hired both of us to play there as part of an all-star band. Both Ruby and I were disenchanted with that playing format. Each person in that kind of band just solos briefly. Each brief solo is followed by another brief solo. It's an atmosphere where both Ruby and I feel cramped. So we decided that we'd form our own group and play our own music. We called George Wein, before the festival, and told him that we wanted to work together. "Don't give us any more money," we told him. "We'll hire our own men and put our group together." We've now been together for over a year, have played the major jazz festivals all over the world, and we've made several albums.
How do you and Wayne Wright, the rhythm guitarist in your group, manage not to get in each other's way when Ruby is soloing?
We have no drummer, the fourth piece being bassist, Mike Moore, so Wayne plays strict time. When Ruby plays, I only play accenting lines or chords to his statements. Wayne's a former student of mine. He's had years of meat experience; he worked with Peggy Lee for seven years, and on numerous broadway shows.
You've been quite involved with the development of better sound and range for the electric guitar. When did you start to play electric guitar?
In 1931, my older brother, who is an electronic genius, built me a pickup and an amplifier before they were even out on the market. He did this for me, because he knew I wanted to play solo lines which could be heard in a band. The first electric guitar came out the following year. National Dobro made them and one of those was my first real electric guitar. Nobody knows who had the first electric guitar; maybe I did. I knew, the first time I played one, that that instrument was going to take me through my career for the rest of my life.
For years, you've been playing a Guild arch-top guitar with no f-holes. How did the development of that guitar come about?
I designed that guitar back in 1961. When I first saw it, it was a piece of wood from Norway. My guitar is made from the finest woods. The pickups are suspended and the sound comes out of the body from the cut-out area of the top around the pickups. The guitar's sound works much the same way as a round-hole's, except my sound comes out of two enlarged triangular holes around the pickups. I knew that if I had a live top with suspended pickups, I'd get a better sound. I realized a long time ago that f-holes cause feedback. Both George Van Eps and I discovered that about the same time. We did a concert together in Aspen, Colorado and we both started laughing when we saw each other's guitar. He had put foam rubber in his f-holes to cut out the feedback, and I had taped mine over.
With Guild, you also developed the George Barnes guitar in F. What was the reason for that?
I made an album called Guitars Galore and I wanted the guitars to play the role of a big band. However, the guitar doesn't have the range for that. So I used the 6-string bass guitar to cover the baritone range, the regular guitar to cover the tenor saxophone range and developed the guitar in F to play the alto saxophone range. The guitar was tuned so if you played a C chord in the first position, it came out as an F barre chord in the first (fifth!) position of a regular - guitar. The instrument was tuned in the following way: the 6th string was A, the 5th D, the 4th G, the 3rd C, the 2nd E and the 1 st A. Because of the high tuning, you had to use light gauge strings. The guitar had twenty frets but the scale was shorter than the standard guitar.
Is it true that you only down-pick your single-string playing?
You get a better sound from the guitar by using only down-strokes. Your leverage just isn't as good when you up-pick. Therefore, I use as many downstrokes as possible. I developed a technique of quick picking, using only down-strokes. But sometimes, for very rapid phrasing, I have to use alternating up and down-strokes. I also hold the pick in an unusual manner-with my thumb, index, and middle finger. By picking this way, all I do to change the dynamics and volume is tighten or loosen my grip on the pick. I don't have to pick harder and my wrist remains loose.
With your vast experience in music, is there something you'd like to do that you haven't done yet in the music world?
I've often said that there aren't enough lifetimes for me to do all the musical things I want to do. I recorded some classical tunes in the Sixties. I'd like to do more of that. But, right now, I'm happier, musically, than at any other time in my life.
Why is that?
I'm doing exactly what I want to do. I'm not doing any commercial music, with people telling me how to play. I'm playing the tunes I like, the way I want to play them, and I'm performing with guys I love to work with. We don't listen to or copy anyone's work. We are totally doing our own thing. Also, we play concerts, which give us more bread in one night's work than if we performed in a club for three weeks. It's also beautiful to play concerts because people are more attentive to our music than in a club.
Do you have any advice about how to achieve success in the guitar world?
The best advice I can give is to work hard. Never settle for anything less than excellence. A musician should never just play for money alone. There are more rewards to music than money. Also, keep your musical ideas fresh by looking at each performance as a new experience.
Source: http://www.gould68.freeserve.co.uk/barnesgeo3.html
---------------
George Barnes Guitars
In the early 1960's the Guild Guitar Company manufactured two models to George Barnes' specifications. The model most associated with George is the Guild George Barnes Acousti-Lectric. This full-bodied 17" wide and 3.125" deep instruments' most distinguishing feature was the lack of 'F' holes in it's carved top of Norwegian Spruce. The back and sides were of highly figured curly maple. A Choice of natural and sunburst finishes were available. Twin humbucking pickups were fitted to an internal bar running the length of the body and protruded through to oblong holes cut into the top. 
The Acousti-Lectric had a great deal of power and penetration and the design allowed for the strings to vibrate with no vibration of the pickups. On conventional full bodied jazz guitars the strings and the pickups are vibrating simoultaneously and possibly in different directions (one of Les Paul's concerns while working on his guitars). Apart from the pickup selector switch near the cutaway, there was nothing to hinder the full resonant quality of the top. The tone and volume controls were mounted on the pick-guard which was cut in the then familiar Artist Award 'stepped' design (a much more pleasing design than todays Artist Award pick-guard!). The neck was of three piece maple fitted with an bound ebony fingerboard with pearl block inlays. The high cost of producing the George Barnes Acousti-Lectric meant that relatively few were made but other users include Les Spann who is seen in a Guild advert sporting a sunburst model (the head of which looked more like the Artist Award model than Georges personal guitar).
George also endorsed a smaller, sister model which was known as the "George Barnes Guitar in F". Constructed in the same freely vibrating top design the Guitar in F was 13.5" wide and 2.875" deep. Having the same electrics as the Acousti-Lectric this smaller instrument had a spruce top and mahogany back and sides. The mahogany neck was fitted with a 22.75" scale pearl inlaid rosewood fingerboard. George used a number of these instruments on the two albums which he made for the Mercury label - "Guitars Galore" and "Guitar Galaxies" - where they played the same role as the alto sax would in a sax section. Open tuning was the same as a conventional guitar at the fifth fret.
---------------
George Barnes Discography
Big Bill Broonzy
Acc. by Bill Owsley (ts); BJ Davis (p); George Barnes (el/g). 1/3/38
Curtis Jones
Acc. by Bill Owsley (ts); BJ Davis (p); George Barnes (el/g). 1/3/38
Washboard Sam
Acc. by Big Bill (g); George Barnes (el/g); Black Bob (b). 14/3/38
Jazz Gillum
Acc. by Big Bill (g); George Barnes (el/g); Black Bob (b)
+ Washboard Sam (wb). 14/3/38
Louis Powell
Acc. by Richard M Jones (p); George Barnes (el/g). 23/3/38
Blind John Davis (p/vcl)
Acc. by George Barnes (el/g). 7/4/38
Merline Johnson
Acc. by Blind John Davis (p); George Barnes (el/g). 7/4/38
Big Bill Broonzy
Acc. by Bill Owsley (cl/ts); Joshua Altheimer (p);
George Barnes (el/g). 5/5/38
Hattie Bolten
Acc. by Blind John Davis (p); George Barnes (el/g). 19/5/38
Blind John Davis (vcl/p)
Acc. by George Barnes (el/g). 19/5/38
Merline Johnson (vcl)
Acc. by Punch Miller (tp); Bill Owsley (ts); Blind John Davis (p);
George Barnes (el/g). 7/7/38
Merline Johnson (vcl)
Acc. by Punch Miller (tp); Bill Owsley (ts); Blind John Davis (p);
George Barnes (el/g). 7/7/38
Merline Johnson (vcl)
Acc. by Blind John Davis (p); George Barnes (el/g). 7/7/38
"Be There At Five"
George Barnes (g); Andy Ackers (p); Phil Kraus (vib); Jack Lesberg (b); Jimmy Crawford (d).
George Barnes
George Barnes (g); Duney Warren (ts); Bill Huntington (g); Ernie Newton (b). Feb.1940
"George Barnes And His Octet"
George Barnes (g) and various woodwinds. 1946.
George Barnes Octet
Personnel as above?
Soundies SCD 4122
"Vignettes - The George Barnes Sextet"
George Barnes (g); Earl Backus (g); Boyd Rowlands (ts); Frank Rullo (v); Mike Rubin (b); Dick Baldridge (d). 1946.
George Barnes
George Barnes (g); Boyd Rolando (ts); Frank Rullo (vib); Earl Backus (g); Mike Rubin (b); Dick Baldridge (d). Sept 1946
IRVING ASHBY
--------------- Irving Ashby (1920 – 1987) began playing the guitar at age nine. As a teenager he played with local bands in and around Somerville, Massachusetts. In 1940 he joined Lionel Hampton’s band and he continued playing with Hampton for two years until 1942. In 1947 Ashby joined Nat King Cole’s Trio replacing Oscar Moore. From the 1950’s on Ashby worked in and around Los Angeles as a freelance musician. He joined Oscar Peterson’s group in 1952 and he was a prominent member of Norman Granz’s Jazz At the Philharmonic at that time. He was also a studio player at MGM and 20th Century Fox and he led his own Sextet and recorded with the Sextet at United Artists. Ashby settled permanently in Perris, California where he was active as a teacher both privately and at the University of California at Riverside and local high schools. He published a guitar instruction book entitled Guitar. The list of prominent jazz players that Irving Ashby worked with is a long one. Starting with Hampton and Cole he went on to play with Erroll Garner, Count Basie, Phil Moore, Nellie Lutcher, Lester Young Charles Mingus, Illinois Jacquet and many more. As a member of Arv Garrison’s Guitar Quintet, that included Garrison, Kessel, Sargent and Rizzi, he appeared on Earle Spencer’s “Five Guitars In Flight”. He also shared the guitar chair with Howard Roberts on Dick Marks’ Marks Makes Broadway and he played on Mundell Lowe’s California Guitar. Irving Ashby was in demand primarily for his solid rhythm playing, but he was also a very adept soloist. ©Copyright 2005 Classic Jazz Guitar --------------- Irving Ashby Source: http://www.rockabilly.nl/references/messages/irving_ashby.htm --------------- One of the grand old men of jazz guitar, Ashby played in some groups that leaped over the pop music fence, but eventually saw his distinctive style overwhelmed by newer, fancier pickers. There was Django Reinhardt, whose speed and facility literally scared Ashby to death the first time he heard the French gypsy guitarist on the radio, followed by a wave of smarty-pants jazz guitarists such as Barney Kessel, who wound up gnabbing Ashby's seat in the famed Oscar Peterson trio. Most jazz listeners have enjoyed Ashby's work on early recordings by the Nat King Cole Trio, in which he played from 1947 through 1951, replacing Oscar Moore. It was in this context that he first came to prominence on the jazz scene, and it is often this collaboration that catches the ear of new listeners. The blues revivalist Taj Mahal, for example, will drop Ashby's name when listing important early infuences, sticking out among usual blues guitar suspects such as Blind Lemon Jefferson and Robert Johnson. "Everybody else I heard was playing real tight chords when I started hearing guitar in the '40's," Mahal said in an interview. "The first person I really loved was Irving Ashby, who played with Nat King Cole. That guy was incredible. He had a certain sound." Although it is the guitarist, and not the guitar, that makes the sound, part of the Ashby tone certainly came from his unique guitar, a Stromberg created by the brilliant luthier Elmer Stromberg. This was Ashby's guitar of choice in his days with the Lionel Hampton's band, even before he began performing with the Cole group. In the latter combo he was particularly known for playing an over-sized guitar known as "the Yellow Cloud", and it was perhaps this axe that Ashby was paying tribute to in the 50's when a combo under his own name recorded the expansive single entitled "Big Guitar". Legends abound concerning the Ashby guitars, including the one in which Wes Montgomery borrowed one for an early Los Angeles recording session. While Ashby's rhythm guitar playing was almost completely overlooked in the context of Lionel Hampton's music, best described as all hell breaking loose with a swing beat, the Cole group was the perfect format for both his rhythm and soloing style, as well a group in which the leader's mesmerizing effect on an audience could hardly have hampered the sidemen's ability to communite. After leaving Cole, Ashby concentrated on the west coast, teaming up in the early '50s with Oscar Peterson's trio. This Canadian performer was at this point getting huge attention in tours organized by promoter Norman Granz. While Peterson was certainly influenced by Cole, a much greater influence was Art Tatum, and the type of byzantine harmonic invention fostered 
Irving Ashby (born 29 December 1920; died 22 April 1987) was an American jazz guitarist. After playing rhythm guitar in Lionel Hampton's orchestra, he played in the Nat King Cole Trio from 1947 to 1951. He then briefly replaced Charlie Wilson, a drummer, in the Oscar Peterson Trio, producing a lineup (piano, guitar, bass) similar to the Cole Trio's; the substitution of a guitarist for a drummer continued until 1958. After leaving the Peterson Trio, Ashby concentrated on recording session work.
Born Irving C. Ashby, 29 December 1920, Somerville, Massachusetts
Died 22 April 1987, Perris, California
During the rock & roll era, Irving Ashby was a prolific session guitarist in and around Los Angeles, where he worked as a freelance musician. But like so many session players on R&R records, he was basically a jazzman, who had to adapt to the Big Beat in order to pay the bills. Irving Ashby was in demand primarily for his solid rhythm playing, but he was also a very adept soloist.
Ashby began playing guitar at age nine. As a teenager he played with local bands in around his hometown Somerville. In 1940 he joined Lionel Hampton's band and continued playing with Hampton for two years. Ashby is the guitarist on Hampton's influential "Flying Home" (1942), which is usually credited to sax man Illinois Jacquet. In 1947 he joined Nat 'King' Cole's Trio, replacing Oscar Moore, and recorded prolifically with the Trio until he settled permanently in Perris, California, in 1951. He joined Oscar Peterson's trio in 1952 and was a prominent member of Norman Granz's Jazz at the Philharmonic at that time. He also led his own sextet, with which he recorded for the United Artists label, and was active as a teacher, publishing a guitar instruction book in the process.
In the mid and late 50's Ashby was more often found in the recording studios, both as a guitarist and an upright bass player. For Imperial Records he played on many instrumental recordings, first with the Ernie Freeman Combo (biggest hit: "Raunchy"), later with drummer Sandy Nelson. Ashby also recorded instrumentals under his own name, including a fine version of "Big Guitar". His 1957-58 recordings for Imperial, usually with Plas Johnson on sax, still await reissue (as do his earlier R&B recordings on Enterprise with Bumps Myers). Some of the many (non-jazz) artists Ashby has backed: Joe Turner, Larry Williams, Sheb Wooley, LaVern Baker, B.B. King, Pat Boone, Jody Reynolds, Chan Romero, Amos Milburn, Perez Prado, Louis Jordan, Meade Lux Lewis, Marvin and Johnny, Helen Humes. By the 60's Ashby was also working outside the music field, but continued playing from time to time, sometimes brought back into the limelight by various guitarists whom he had strongly influenced, such as Howard Roberts.
by Tatum and continued by Peterson and others was hardly the Ashby forte. He was replaced by Kessel, then Herb Ellis. In the mid and late 50's Ashby was more often found in the recording studios, playing with artists such as crooner Pat Boone and surf music maestro Sandy Nelson. By the 60's Ashby was also working outside the music field, but continued playing from time to time, sometimes brought back into the limelight by various guitarists whom he had strongly influenced, such as Howard Roberts. As far as jazz was concerned, he was strictly a mainstream swing man, forever in awe of one of his early bandleaders, Lester Young. "I worship Lester Young" the guitarist was once quoted as saying, and when the interviewer responded that "Worship is a pretty strong word," Ashby said "If there was a stronger word, I would use it." As for Ashby ventures into more modern jazz, they barely exist, unless lending the guitar to Montgomery counts. The Ashby presence in the discography of modern jazz giant Charles Mingus is even a mistake, based on the mistaken assumption that a guitarist credited as Ashby De La Zooch on a tune of the same name was the famous Nat King Cole sideman. As it turns out, the name comes from a second World War English song about a seaside resort named "Ashby De La Zooch", and the recording isn't even by Mingus. It is one of several early pieces in Mingus discographies, another of which is "Love On A Greyhound Bus", that are only there because they happen to have master numbers that come directly in the same sequence as legitimate Mingus recordings.
Source: Eugene Chadbourne All Music Group
Posts
