Count Basie

William James "Count" Basie (August 21, 1904 – April 26, 1984) was an American jazz pianist, organist, bandleader, and composer. His mother taught him to play the piano and he started performing in his teens. Dropping out of school, he learned to operate lights for vaudeville and to improvise accompaniment for silent films at a local movie theater in his home town of Red Bank, New Jersey. By 16 he increasingly played jazz piano at parties, resorts and other venues. In 1924 he went to Harlem, where his performing career expanded; he toured with groups to the major jazz cities of Chicago, St. Louis and Kansas City. In 1929 he joined Bennie Moten's band in Kansas City, and played with them until Moten's death in 1935.

That year Basie formed his own jazz orchestra, and in 1936 took them to Chicago for a long engagement and their first recording. He led the group for almost 50 years, creating innovations like the use of two "split" tenor saxophones, emphasizing the rhythm section, riffing with a big band, using arrangers to broaden their sound, and others. Many musicians came to prominence under his direction, including the tenor saxophonists Lester Young and Herschel Evans, the guitarist Freddie Green, trumpeters Buck Clayton and Harry "Sweets" Edison and singers Jimmy Rushing and Joe Williams. Basie's theme songs were "One O'Clock Jump", developed in 1935 in the early days of his band, and later "April in Paris".

Lester Young

Lester Willis Young (August 27, 1909 – March 15, 1959), nicknamed "Pres" or "Prez", was an American jazz tenor saxophonist and occasional clarinetist.

Coming to prominence while a member of Count Basie's orchestra, Young was one of the most influential players on his instrument. In contrast to many of his hard-driving peers, Young played with a relaxed, cool tone and used sophisticated harmonies, using "a free-floating style, wheeling and diving like a gull, banking with low, funky riffs that pleased dancers and listeners alike".

Known for his hip, introverted style, he invented or popularized much of the hipster jargon which came to be associated with the music.

Early life and career

Lester Young was born in Woodville, Mississippi, and grew up in a musical family. His father, Willis Handy Young, was a respected teacher, his brother Lee Young was a drummer, and several other relatives performed music professionally. His family moved to New Orleans, Louisiana, when Lester was an infant and later to Minneapolis, Minnesota. Although at a very young age Young did not initially know his father, he learned that his father was a musician. Later Willis taught his son to play the trumpet, violin, and drums in addition to the saxophone.

Harry Edison

Harry "Sweets" Edison (October 10, 1915 – July 27, 1999) was an American jazz trumpeter and member of the Count Basie Orchestra.

Biography

Born in Columbus, Ohio, Edison spent his early childhood in Louisville, Kentucky, where he was introduced to music by an uncle. After moving back to Columbus at the age of twelve, the young Edison began playing the trumpet with local bands.

In 1933, he became a member of the Jeter-Pillars Orchestra in Cleveland. Afterwards he played with the Mills Blue Rhythm Band and Lucky Millinder. In 1937 he moved to New York and joined the Count Basie Orchestra. His colleagues included Buck Clayton, Lester Young (who named him "Sweets"), Buddy Tate, Freddie Green, Jo Jones, and other original members of that famous band. In a 2003 interview for the National Museum of American History, drummer Elvin Jones explained the origin of Edison's nickname: "Sweets had so many lady friends, he was such a handsome man. He had all these girls all over him all the time, that's why they called him Sweets."

Buddy Tate

George Holmes "Buddy" Tate (February 22, 1913 – February 10, 2001) was a jazz saxophonist and clarinetist.

Biography

Tate was born in Sherman, Texas, and began performing on alto saxophone. As a teenager in 1925, he played with his brother and their band called McCloud's Night Owls."

Tate quickly switched to tenor saxophone making a name for himself in bands such as the one led by Andy Kirk. He joined Count Basie's band in 1939 and stayed with him until 1948. He had been selected by Basie after the sudden death of Herschel Evans, which Tate stated he had predicted in a dream.

After his period with Basie ended, he worked with several other bands before he found success on his own, starting in 1953 in Harlem. His group worked at the "Celebrity Club" from 1953 to 1974. In the late 1970s, he co-led a band with Paul Quinichette and worked with Benny Goodman.

In 1980, he received serious injuries from scalding water in a hotel shower, which kept him inactive for four months. He later suffered from a serious illness. The 1990s saw him slow down, but he remained active playing with Lionel Hampton among others.

Earle Warren

Earle Warren (July 1, 1914 – June 4, 1994) was an alto saxophonist and occasional singer with Count Basie.

He was born in Springfield, Ohio.

Warren played 1st (Lead) Alto Saxophone in the Basie orchestra throughout its formative years and its heyday, from 1937 to the end of the 1940s. After the break-up of Basie's 1940s band, in 1949, he worked with former Basie trumpeter, Buck Clayton.

Earle Warren also played some rock´n roll, working for Alan Freed in Alan Freed's Christmas Jubilee, December 1959, which was the very last big Alan Freed show before the payola scandal put an end to the legendary Freed's career. He also appeared in the 1970s jazz film of Count Basie and his band, Born to Swing.

In his later years, Warren performed often at the West End jazz club at 116th and Broadway in New York City, helming a band called The Countsmen, which also featured fellow former Basie-ite Dicky Wells on trombone and Peck Morrison on bass. He lived part of the time in Switzerland where he fathered a child with a younger woman.