Modesto Briseño (1938-1965) was one of jazz’s shooting stars that blazed briefly in the 1950s and 1960s.
Continue ReadingBenny Carter
ZARDI’S – 1955
Zardi’s 1955 Sam Donato and Ben Arkin had been tinkering with the décor of Zardi’s ever since they acquired the club in 1953. The woven raffia ceiling that was framed in bamboo remained but the backdrop below the ceiling behind the musician bandstand changed several times. The strip below the bamboo termination of ceiling […]
Continue ReadingZARDI’S – 1951/1952
Zardi’s – 1951/1952 Ray Hewitt’s “The Spotlighter” column in the January 4th edition of the Daily News highlighted the vibrant entertainment scene kicking off 1951 in Los Angeles. The list of artists ran the gamut from top name jazz vocalists like Billie Holiday, Sarah Vaughan, and Ella Fitzgerald to society orchestras like Phil Spitalny […]
Continue ReadingVIVIEN GARRY ON RECORD
Vivien Garry The initial musical career of Vivien Garry was intertwined with the emerging guitar career of Arv Garrison. They met in Monroe, Michigan at The Silver Moon, a nightclub where Garrison was performing with a Toledo band led by Bud Ziegler. Monroe was a lakeside town located twenty miles north of Toledo. Vivien […]
Continue ReadingTiffany Club – 1951/1952
Chuck Landis featured Sharkey Bonano, Nat “King” Cole, Helen Humes, Benny Carter, the Billy Williams Quartette, Jay Johnson,and Dorothy Doengan at his Tiffany Club in the latter half of 1951.
Continue ReadingA JAZZ MASQUERADE SURPRISE
This research was originally published in Names & Numbers, No. 51, October 2009, in slightly different form. I began research and writing on Crown CLP-5009, Jazz Masquerade, in the spring of 2008 after an inquiry from a list member on a jazz discussion group who wondered if anyone had managed to make a complete identification of […]
Continue Reading“JAZZ MASQUERADE” UNMASKED
This research was originally published in the Dutch discography journal, Names & Numbers, No. 48, January 2009, in slightly different form. The Bihari brothers established their record empire beginning in late 1944 with the Modern Music label. Jules Bihari had a keen ear for talent and the rooster of artists recording for Modern soon numbered […]
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