mick laBriola

Bulee “Slim” Gaillard (January 9, 1911 – February 26, 1991), also known as McVouty, was an American jazz singer and songwriter who played piano, guitar, vibraphone, and tenor saxophone.

Gaillard was noted for his comedic vocalese singing and word play in his own constructed language called “Vout-o-Reenee”, for which he wrote a dictionary. In addition to English, he spoke five languages (Spanish, German, Greek, Arabic, and Armenian) with varying degrees of fluency.^[2]: 676

He rose to prominence in the late 1930s with hits such as “Flat Foot Floogie (with a Floy Floy)” and “Cement Mixer (Put-Ti-Put-Ti)” after forming Slim and Slam with Leroy Eliot “Slam” Stewart. During World War II, Gaillard served as a bomber pilot in the Pacific. In 1944, he resumed his music career and performed with such notable jazz musicians as Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, and Dodo Marmarosa.

In the 1960s and 1970s, he acted in films—sometimes as himself—and also appeared in bit parts in television series such as Roots: The Next Generations.

In the 1980s, Gaillard resumed touring the circuit of European jazz festivals. He followed Dizzy Gillespie’s advice to move to Europe and, in 1983, settled in London, where he died of cancer on February 26, 1991, after a long career in music, film and television, spanning nearly six decades.

Xavier Cugat (Catalan: [ʃəβiˈe kuˈɣat]; 1 January 1900 – 27 October 1990) was a Spanish musician and bandleader who spent his formative years in Havana, Cuba. A trained violinist and arranger, he was a leading figure in the spread of Latin music. In New York City, he was the leader of the resident orchestra at the Waldorf–Astoria before and after World War II. He was also a cartoonist and a restaurateur. The personal papers of Xavier Cugat are preserved in the Biblioteca de Catalunya.

James Robert Haslip (born December 31, 1951) is an American bass guitarist who was a founding member of the jazz fusion group the Yellowjackets, which he left in 2012. He was also an early user of the five-string electric bass. Born in the Bronx to Puerto Rican immigrants, Spanish was Haslip’s first language and he learned to speak English in kindergarten. His father, James Joseph (Jaime) Haslip (1915–1999) served in the United States Customs Service, beginning as a Merchant Marine until moving to patrolman and eventually deputy commissioner, marrying Jimmy’s mother Virginia (Viera) Haslip (1912–2009) in 1937.

Jonah Jones (born Robert Elliott Jones; December 31, 1909 – April 30, 2000) was a jazz trumpeter who created concise versions of jazz and swing and jazz standards that appealed to a mass audience. In the jazz community, he is known for his work with Stuff Smith. He was sometimes referred to as “King Louis II”, a reference to Louis Armstrong. Jones started playing alto saxophone at the age of 12 in the Booker T. Washington Community Center band in Louisville, Kentucky, before quickly transitioning to trumpet, where he excelled.

Jones was born in Louisville, Kentucky, United States. An early music instructor stuttered when stating Jones’ surname, and so Jones became known as ‘Jonah’. He began his career playing on a river boatnamed Island Queen, which traveled between Kentucky and Ohio. He began in the 1920s playing on Mississippi riverboats and then, in 1928, he joined with Horace Henderson.

John Kirby (December 31, 1908 – June 14, 1952), was an American jazz double-bassist and bandleader. In addition to sideman work (prominently with Benny Goodman), Kirby is remembered for leading a successful chamber jazz sextet in the late 1930s and early 1940s, which scored several hit songs including “Loch Lomond” and the debut recording of “Undecided“, a jazz standard. He is perhaps the first musician in the chamber jazz genre. Earlier in his career he also played trombone and tuba. Kirby was born John Kirk in Winchester, Virginia, United States, on 31 December 1908. His mother, Dolly Kirk (died October 1925) gave him up for adoption in 1908 and he was raised by Reverend Washington Johnson and his wife, Nancy, at 442 North Kent Street in Winchester. (Kirby is listed as a household member in the 1920 United States Federal Census, but not in the 1910 census.)

John Cowan Hartford (December 30, 1937 – June 4, 2001) was an American folk, country, and bluegrass composer and musician known for his mastery of the fiddle and banjo, as well as for his witty lyrics, unique vocal style, and extensive knowledge of Mississippi River lore. His most successful song is “Gentle on My Mind“, which won three Grammy Awards and was listed in “BMI’s Top 100 Songs of the Century”. Hartford performed with a variety of ensembles throughout his career, and is perhaps best known for his solo performances where he would interchange the guitar, banjo, and fiddle from song to song. He also invented his own shuffle tap dance move, and clogged on an amplified piece of plywood while he played and sang.

Harford (he changed his name to Hartford later in life at the behest of Chet Atkins) was born on December 30, 1937, in New York City to parents Carl and Mary Harford. He spent his childhood in St. Louis, Missouri, where he was exposed to the influence that shaped much of his career and music: the Mississippi River. From the time he got his first job on the river, at age 16, Hartford was on, around, or singing about the river.

Ellas Otha Bates (December 30, 1928 – June 2, 2008), known professionally as Bo Diddley, was an American guitarist and singer who played a key role in the transition from the blues to rock and roll. He influenced many artists, including Buddy Holly, Elvis Presley, the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, the Animals, George Thorogood, Syd Barrett, and the Clash.

His use of African rhythms and a signature beat, a simple five-accent hambone rhythm, is a cornerstone of hip hop, rock, and pop music. In recognition of his achievements, he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1987, the Blues Hall of Fame in 2003, and the Rhythm and Blues Music Hall of Famein 2017. He received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Rhythm and Blues Foundation and the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. Diddley is also recognized for his technical innovations, including his use of tremolo and reverb effects to enhance the sound of his distinctive rectangular-shaped guitars. Bo Diddley was born in McComb, Mississippi, as Ellas Otha Bates (also stated as Otha Ellas Bates or Elias Otha Bates).

Stanley William Tracey CBE (30 December 1926 – 6 December 2013) was a British jazz pianist and composer, whose most important influences were Duke Ellington and Thelonious Monk. Tracey’s best known recording is the 1965 album Jazz Suite Inspired by Dylan Thomas’s “Under Milk Wood”, which is based on the BBC radio drama Under Milk Wood, by Dylan Thomas.

The Second World War meant that Tracey had a disrupted formal education, and he became a professional musician at the age of sixteen as a member of an ENSA touring group playing the accordion, his first instrument. He joined Ralph Reader’s Gang Shows at the age of nineteen, while in the RAF and formed a brief acquaintance with the comedian Tony Hancock. Later, in the early 1950s, he worked in groups on the transatlantic liners Queen Mary and Caronia and toured the UK in 1951 with Cab Calloway. By the mid-1950s, he had also taken up the vibraphone, but later ceased playing it. At this time he worked widely with leading British modernists, including drummer Tony Crombie, clarinettist Vic Ash, the saxophonist-arranger Kenny Graham and trumpeter Dizzy Reece.