Hep Records, jazz in depth from the 1930's to the present day.


ARTIST BIOGRAPHIES
Artie Shaw (Clarinet) ,1910-2004 Artie Shaw was born in New York City on May 23,1910 and he became one of the top bandleader/soloists of the swing era. In the early thirties he became one of the most sought after lead alto saxophone players in the New York area and prospered with the growth of radio and studio recordings. He perfected his craft with such dance bands as Irving Aaronson and Roger Wolfe Kahn, and began to concentrate on the clarinet.

During this time he committed himself to a rigorous course of self improvement in the humanities and became highly literate and extended his musicality to include the impressionism of Ravel and Debussy and modernism as expressed by Stravinsky and Prokofiev . By 1936 young America was celebrating the music of Benny Goodman,the Dorseys and the Casa Lomans. Shaw, although highly respected in the business was still unknown to the public. A New York promoter,Joe Helbock,was putting on a night of Swing Music at New York's Imperial Theatre and he invited Shaw to form a band for the event. Shaw now exclusively a clarinettist, formed an unusual jazz combo with a string quartet. It was the hit of the evening and he was prevailed upon to make it a permanent unit. This he did but it failed to ignite the public's imagination and he reorganised with a conventional swing band in early 1937. The following year after months of rehearsals and touring the band won an RCA Victor contract and recorded 'Begin The Beguine' which became a national best seller. Although a far cry from today's crazy media driven business Shaw was pitch forked into becoming a celebrity which he disliked .Amidst the hysteria of the times and the proliferation of puerile music Shaw built a repertoire based on classic American Show songs by such as Jerome Kern, Cole Porter or Rodgers and Hart . But the pressures mounted and he disbanded at the height of his fame in late1939. He reformed the following year and shot to fame again with another national best seller 'Frenesi' into which he had incorporated a string section .There were two distinct editions with Billy Butterfield and Jack Jenney,and then Hot Lips Page and Georgie Auld as main soloists. Although he was unable to seriously challenge the box office power of Glenn Miller,Tommy Dorsey and Harry James he continued to present thoughtful and innovative music until Pearl Harbour .Shaw enlisted in the Navy and eventually led an all star navy band in the PacificTheatre of Operations. He did this with distinction till it returned to the U.S. in late 1943. He subsequently received a medical discharge in February 1944. In Hollywood he formed another orchestra in October 1944 with a corps of forward looking arrangers such as Ray Conniff,George Siravo and Eddie Sauter, and with fiery trumpet soloist Roy Eldridge, set out to tour in post war America. But things had changed and the conditions no longer existed for supporting a top touring orchestra and he disbanded exactly a year later. This orchestra left a rich library of recordings including many Gershwin songs. For the next few years he busied himself with reading, writing,some studio recording but was effectively out of music. In 1949 he was again persuaded to form another big band with such modernists as Al Cohn, Herb Steward, Don Fagerquist, Dodo Marmarosa and arrangers Tadd Dameron, Johnny Mandel and Eddie Sauter. It was soon clear that no viable audience existed for such a band. So for the next few months he resorted to standard commercial arrangements and ironically business improved. Deeply discouraged he disbanded and with the exception of a 1953 Decca studio set never again fronted a big band as a soloist. He returned briefly to public playing in 1953-54 with a very cool quintet including Hank Jones, Joe Roland,Irv Kluger and a young Tal Farlow. Recordings of this group show how Shaw's musical thinking had evolved to embrace the new music in a way that his contemporaries Goodman and Herman had never done. He announced his retiral from music shortly after and has never again performed in public or even played the clarinet again. He gave his blessing in the 1980s to an "Artie Shaw Orchestra" led by Dick Johnson and on occasion conducted. He also conducted a programme of his music with Bob Wilber and an All Star British orchestra at the Royal Festival Hall, London in 1992. His highly individual tone and lyric approach to interpretation plus a superlative technique have marked him as one of the great jazz clarinet players of all time-possibly the greatest. He had written several well received books,and had recently completed what he regarded as his major written work when he died at his home in Southern California on 30 December 2004. Artie Shaw available now on Hep: CD 1024 1936 'In The Beginning' CD 1046 1936-37 'The Chant' CD 1048 1937 'Non Stop Flight' CD 1073 1941-42 'Evensong' CD 19 1940-41 'At the Hollywood Palladium' CD 55 1940-41 'In Hollywood' CD 70 (3) '1944-45' Top

Three labels covering jazz in depth from 1930 to the present.

Hep Jazz, P.O. Box 50, Pitlochry, UK. PH16 5YL