Benny Goodman

Benjamin David Goodman (May 30, 1909 / June 13, 1986) was an American jazz musician, clarinetist and bandleader, known as "King of Swing ^{Swing (genre)} ", "Patriarch of the Clarinet", "The Professor", and "Swing's Senior Statesman".

In the mid-1930s, Goodman led one of the most popular musical groups in America. His January 16, 1938 concert at Carnegie Hall in New York City is described by critic Bruce Eder as "the single most important jazz or popular music concert in history: jazz's 'coming out' party to the world of 'respectable' music."
Goodman's bands launched the careers of many major names in jazz, and during an era of segregation ^{racial segregation} , he also led one of the first racially-integrated musical groups. Goodman continued to perform to nearly the end of his life, including exploring his interest in classical music.

  Goodman was born in Chicago, Illinois, the ninth of twelve children of poor Jewish immigrants from the Russian Empire, who lived in the Maxwell Street neighborhood. His father was David Goodman, a tailor from Warsaw; his mother was Dora Rezinski (from Kaunas, Lithuania). His parents met in Baltimore, Maryland, and moved to Chicago before Benny was born.
His early influences were New Orleans jazz clarinetists working in Chicago, notably Johnny Dodds, Leon Roppolo, and Jimmy Noone.
"Benny described his father's death as 'the saddest thing that ever happened in our family.'"Goodman left for New York City and became a successful session musician during the late 1920s and early 1930s (mostly with Ben Pollack's band between 1926 and 1929). He played with the nationally known bands of Ben Selvin, Red Nichols, Isham Jones (although he is not on any of Jones's records), and Ted Lewis ^{Ted Lewis (musician)} . He recorded sides for Brunswick under the name Bennie Goodman's Boys, a band that featured Glenn Miller. In 1928, Benny Goodman and Glenn Miller wrote the instrumental "Room 1411", which was released as a Brunswick 78. He also recorded musical soundtracks for movie shorts; fans believe that Benny Goodman's clarinet can be heard on the soundtrack of One A. M., a Charlie Chaplin comedy re-released to theaters in 1934.

During this period as a successful session musician, John Hammond ^{John H. Hammond} arranged for a series of jazz sides recorded for and issued on Columbia ^{Columbia Records} starting in 1933 and continuing until his signing with Victor ^{Victor Records} in 1935, during his success on radio. There were also a number of commercial studio sides recorded for Melotone ^{Melotone Reoords} between late 1930 and mid-1931 under Goodman's name. The all-star Columbia sides featured Jack Teagarden, Joe Sullivan, Dick McDonough, Arthur Schutt, Gene Krupa, Teddy Wilson, Coleman Hawkins (for 1 session), and vocalists Jack Teagarden and Mildred Bailey, and the first two recorded vocals by a young Billie Holiday.

In 1934 Goodman auditioned for NBC's Let's Dance ^{Let's Dance (radio)} , a well-regarded three-hour weekly radio program that featured various styles of dance music. His familiar theme song by that title was based on Invitation to the Dance by Carl Maria von Weber. Since he needed new arrangements every week for the show, his agent, John Hammond ^{John H. Hammond} , suggested that he purchase "hot" (swing) arrangements from Fletcher Henderson, an African-American musician from Atlanta who had New York's most popular African-American band in the 1920s and early 1930s.

In late 1937, Goodman's publicist Wynn Nathanson attempted a publicity stunt by suggesting Goodman and his band should play Carnegie Hall in New York City. "Benny Goodman was initially hesitant about the concert, fearing for the worst; however, when his film Hollywood Hotel opened to rave reviews and giant lines, he threw himself into the work. He gave up several dates and insisted on holding rehearsals inside Carnegie Hall to familiarize the band with the lively acoustics."

Goodman took the newly discovered recording to his record company, Columbia, and a selection was issued on LP. These recordings have not been out of print since they were first issued. In early 1998, the aluminum masters were rediscovered and a new CD set of the concert was released based on these masters.


Charlie Christian


Pianist/arranger Mary Lou Williams was a good friend of both Columbia records producer John Hammond and Benny Goodman. She first suggested to John Hammond that he see Charlie Christian.


Charlie Christian was playing at the Ritz in Oklahoma City where [...] John Hammond heard him in 1939. Hammond recommended him to Benny Goodman, but the band leader wasn't interested. The idea of an electrified guitar didn't appeal, and Goodman didn't care for Christian's flashy style of dressing. Reportedly, Hammond personally installed Christian onstage during a break in a Goodman concert in Beverly Hills. Irritated to see Christian among the band, Goodman struck up "Rose Room," not expecting the guitarist to know the tune. What followed amazed everyone who heard the 45-minute performance.



Charlie was a hit on the electric guitar and remained in the Benny Goodman ***tet for two years (1939–1941). He wrote many of the group's head arrangements (some of which Goodman took credit for) and was an inspiration to all. The ***tet made him famous and provided him with a steady income while Charlie worked on legitimizing, popularizing, revolutionizing, and standardizing the electric guitar as a jazz instrument.


Charlie Christian's recordings and rehearsal dubs made with Benny Goodman in the early forties are widely known and were released by Columbia.


Beyond swing

, in the film Stage Door Canteen (1943)
Goodman continued his meteoric rise throughout the late 1930s with his big band, his trio and quartet, and a ***tet. By the mid-1940s, however, big bands lost a lot of their popularity. In 1941, ASCAP had a licensing war with music publishers. In 1942 to 1944 and 1948, the musician's union went on strike against the major record labels in the United States, and singers took the spot in popularity that the big bands once enjoyed. During this strike, the United States War Department approached the union and requested the production of the V-Disc, a set of records containing new and fresh music for soldiers to listen to. Also, by the late 1940s, swing was no longer the dominant mode of jazz musicians.


Bebop, Cool Jazz

By the 1940s, jazz musicians were borrowing advanced ideas from classical music. The recordings Goodman made in bop style for Capitol Records were highly praised by jazz critics. When Goodman was starting a bebop band, he hired Buddy Greco, Zoot Sims, Wardell Gray and a few other modern players.



By 1953, Goodman completely changed his mind about bebop. "Maybe bop has done more to set music back for years than anything [...] Basically it's all wrong. It's not even knowing the scales. [...] Bop was mostly publicity and people figuring angles."


Forays into classical repertoire

Goodman's first classical recording dates from April 25, 1938 when he recorded Mozart ^{Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart} 's Clarinet Quintet in A major ^{Clarinet Quintet (Mozart)} , K. 581, with the Budapest Quartet. After his bop period, Goodman furthered his interest in classical music written for the clarinet, and frequently met with top classical clarinetists of the day.


In 1949, when he was 40, Goodman decided to study with Reginald Kell, one of the world's leading classical clarinetists. To do so, he had to change his entire technique: instead of holding the mouthpiece between his front teeth and lower lip, as he had done since he first took a clarinet in hand 30 years earlier, Goodman learned to adjust his embouchure to the use of both lips and even to use new fingering techniques. He had his old finger calluses removed and started to learn how to play his clarinet again—almost from scratch.

Goodman commissioned and premiered works by leading composers for clarinet and symphony orchestra that are now part of the standard repertoire, namely Contrasts ^{Contrasts (Bartók)} by Béla Bartók, Clarinet Concerto No. 2, Op. 115 by Malcolm Arnold, Derivations for Clarinet and Band by Morton Gould, and Aaron Copland's Clarinet Concerto ^{Clarinet Concerto (Copland)} . While Leonard Bernstein's Prelude, Fugue, and Riffs was commissioned for Woody Herman's big band, it was premiered by Goodman. Woody Herman was the dedicatee (1945) and first performer (1946) of Igor Stravinsky's Ebony Concerto, but many years later Stravinsky made another recording, this time with Benny Goodman as the soloist.

He made a further recording of Mozart's Clarinet Quintet, in July 1956 with the Boston Symphony String Quartet ^{Boston Symphony Orchestra} , at the Berkshire Festival; on the same occasion he also recorded Mozart's Clarinet Concerto in A major ^{Clarinet Concerto (Mozart)} , K. 622, with the Boston Symphony Orchestra under Charles Munch. He also recorded the clarinet concertos of Weber ^{Carl Maria von Weber} and Carl Nielsen ^{Clarinet Concerto (Nielsen)} .
*Premiere Rhapsodie for Clarinet by Claude Debussy
*Sonata No. 2 in E flat by Johannes Brahms
*Rondo from Grand Duo Concertant in E flat by Weber, and
*An arrangement by Simeon Bellison of Beethoven ^{Ludwig van Beethoven} 's Variations on a theme from Mozart's "Don Giovanni".


Touring with Armstrong

After forays outside of swing, Goodman started a new band in 1953. According to Donald Clarke, this was not a happy time for Goodman.




Movies

Benny Goodman's band appeared as a specialty act in major musical features, including The Big Broadcast of 1937, Hollywood Hotel ^{Hollywood Hotel (film)} (1938), Syncopation (1942), The Powers Girl (1942), Stage Door Canteen (1943), The Gang's All Here ^{The Gang's All Here (1943 film)} (1943), Sweet and Lowdown (1944) and A Song Is Born (1948). Goodman's only starring feature was Sweet and Low Down (1944).

Goodman's success story was told in the 1955 motion picture The Benny Goodman Story with Steve Allen and Donna Reed. A Universal-International production, it was a follow up to 1954's successful The Glenn Miller Story. The screenplay was heavily fictionalized, but the music was the real draw. Many of Goodman's professional colleagues appear in the film, including Ben Pollack. Gene Krupa, Lionel Hampton. and Harry James.Goodman was regarded by some as a demanding taskmaster, by others an arrogant and eccentric martinet. Many musicians spoke of "The Ray", Goodman's trademark glare that he bestowed on a musician who failed to perform to his demanding standards. Guitarist Allan Reuss incurred the maestro's displeasure on one occasion, and Goodman relegated him to the rear of the bandstand, where his contribution would be totally drowned out by the other musicians. Vocalists Anita O'Day and Helen Forrest spoke bitterly of their experiences singing with Goodman.
"The twenty or so months I spent with Benny felt like twenty years," said Forrest. "When I look back, they seem like a life sentence." At the same time, there are reports that he privately funded several college educations and was sometimes very generous, though always secretly. When a friend once asked him why, he reportedly said, "Well, if they knew about it, everyone would come to me with their hand out." Some suggest that without Goodman there would not have been a "Swing Era". It is true that many of Goodman's arrangements had been played for years before by Fletcher Henderson's orchestra. While Goodman publicly acknowledged his debt to Henderson, many young white swing fans had never heard Henderson's band. While most consider Goodman a jazz innovator, others maintain his main strength was his perfectionism and drive. Goodman was a virtuoso clarinetist and amongst the most technically proficient jazz clarinetists of all time.

Goodman is also responsible for a significant step in racial integration in America. In the early 1930s, black and white jazz musicians could not play together in most clubs or concerts. In the Southern states, racial segregation was enforced by the Jim Crow laws. Benny Goodman broke with tradition by hiring Teddy Wilson to play with him and drummer Gene Krupa in the Benny Goodman Trio. In 1936, he added Lionel Hampton on vibes to form the Benny Goodman Quartet; in 1939 he added pioneering jazz guitarist Charlie Christian to his band and small ensembles, who played with him until his death from tuberculosis less than three years later. This integration in music happened ten years before Jackie Robinson became the first black American to enter Major League Baseball. "[Goodman's] popularity was such that he could remain financially viable without touring the South, where he would have been subject to arrest for violating Jim Crow laws." According to Jazz ^{Jazz (TV series)} by Ken Burns, when someone asked him why he "played with that nigger" (referring to Teddy Wilson), Goodman replied, "I'll knock you out if you use that word around me again".One of Benny Goodman's closest friends off and on, from the 1930s onward was celebrated Columbia records producer John H. Hammond.



Hammond and Goodman were so close that Hammond influenced Goodman's move from RCA records to the newly created Columbia records in 1939.After winning numerous polls over the years as best jazz clarinetist, Goodman was inducted into the Down Beat Jazz Hall of Fame ^{Down Beat} in 1957.

Goodman continued to play on records and in small groups. One exception to this pattern was a collaboration with George Benson in the 1970s. The two met when they taped a PBS salute to John Hammond ^{John H. Hammond} and re-created some of the famous Goodman-Charlie Christian duets. Benny Goodman's musical papers were donated to Yale University after his death.(This discography combines LP and CD reissues of Goodman recordings under the dates of the original 78 rpm recordings through about 1950)

* A Jazz Holiday (1928, Decca)
* Benny Goodman and the Giants of Swing (1929, Prestige)
* BG and Big Tea in NYC (1929, GRP)
* Swinging '34 Vols. 1 & 2 (1934, Melodean)
* Sing, Sing, Sing (1935, Bluebird)
* The Birth of Swing (1935, Bluebird)
* Original Benny Goodman Trio and Quartet Sessions, Vol. 1: After You've Gone (1935, Bluebird)
* Stomping at the Savoy (1935, Bluebird)
* Air Play (1936, Doctor Jazz)
* Roll 'Em, Vol. 1 (1937, Columbia)
* Roll 'Em, Vol. 2 (1937, CBS)
* From Spirituals to Swing (1938, Vanguard)
* Carnegie Hall Concert Vols. 1, 2, & 3 (Live) (1938, Columbia)
* Mozart Clarinet Quintet (with Budapest String Quartet) (1938, Victor)
* Ciribiribin (Live) (1939, Giants of Jazz)
* Swingin' Down the Lane (Live) (1939, Giants of Jazz)
* Featuring Charlie Christian (1939, Columbia)
* Eddie Sauter Arrangements (1940, Columbia)
* Swing Into Spring (1941, Columbia)
* Undercurrent Blues (1947, Blue Note)
* Swedish Pastry (1948, Dragon)
* The Famous 1938 Carnegie Hall Jazz Concert (1950, Columbia)
* ***tet (1950, Columbia)
* BG in Hi-fi (1954, Capitol)
* The Benny Goodman Story Volume 1 (1955?, Decca)
* The Benny Goodman Story Volume 1 (1955?, Decca)
* Mozart Clarinet concerto (with Boston symphomy) (1956)
* The Great Benny Goodman (1956, Columbia)
* Peggy Lee Sings with Benny Goodman (1957, Harmony)
* Benny in Brussels Vols. 1 & 2 (1958, Columbia)
* In Stockholm 1959 (1959, Phontastic)
* The Benny Goodman Treasure Chest (1959, MGM)
* (1959, Cunningham & Walsh, Inc.)
* Swing With Benny Goodman And His Orchestra (1960s?, Columbia/Harmony)
* Benny Goodman in Moscow (1962, RCA Victor)
* Benny Goodman And His Orchestra (1977)
* Benny Goodman Live at Carnegie Hall; 40th Anniversary Concert (1978)
* The King Swings Star Line
* Pure Gold (1992)
* 1935–1938 (1998)
* Portrait of Benny Goodman (Portrait Series) (1998)
* Carnegie Hall Jazz Concert '38 (1998)
* Bill Dodge All-star Recording (1999)
* 1941–1955 His Orchestra and His (1999)
* Live at Carnegie Hall (1999)
* Carnegie Hall: The Complete Concert (2006) Remastered again