|
| Bucky Pizzarelli
Born in Paterson, New Jersey, John Paul "Bucky" Pizzarelli was twenty-seven years old when Django passed away, having just settled into a twelve year run as a staff musician at NBC, before moving on to a similar gig at ABC. During this time he worked with The Three Sounds and toured with Benny Goodman, then in the 1970s began a fruitful collaboration with the great guitarist George Barnes (whose own electric guitar work pre-dates Christian's). While Bucky would have come of age in the bebop era, his heart was clearly drawn to the great American songbook and various incarnations of swing and pre-swing jazz, evidenced by his collaborations with the likes of Bud Freeman and Stephane Grappelli [Grappelli's being Django long-time collaborator], or his celebration of Bix Beiderbecke's music.
Johhny Frigo
Born in 1916, a young Johnny Frigo started on violin, switching over to tuba in junior high school, which led him logically enough to the bass violin-and it was as bassist that he began his professional career with the likes of Jimmy Dorsey, going on to collaborate with pianist Lou Carter and guitarist Herb Ellis in the trio Soft Winds (where he and Ellis crafted one of the truly great jazz standards, "Detour Ahead"). Thereafter, for decades bassist Frigo was a fixture on the Chicago music scene. It wasn't until the late 1980s that he reacquainted himself with the violin as a performance instrument, most notably on old friend Herb Ellis's 1991 Justice release, Roll Call, and subsequently on two Chesky recordings, Live From Studio A (with drummer Butch Miles, guitarists Bucky and John Pizzarelli, bassists Ron Carter and Michael Moore), and his own critically acclaimed Debut Of A Legend (again with bassist Moore and drummer Bill Goodwin).
Michael Moore
A veteran of Woody Herman's '60s big band, Michael Moore divided his time in the '70s between the likes of George Barnes, Marian McPartland, Ruby Braff and Benny Goodman on one hand, Jim Hall, Freddie Hubbard, Chet Baker, Lee Konitz and Gene Bertoncini on the other (his work with the latter extending well into the '90s on a number of recordings for OmniSound, Stash and Chiaroscuro).
Howard Alden
Since arriving in New York from California back in the early '80s, Howard Alden has performed and recorded with a who's who of major stylists such as Ruby Braff, Benny Carter, Mel Tormé, Bobby Short, Susannah McCorkle, Kenny Davern and Flip Phillips. And while Alden has proved an eloquent interpreter of modernists with as bold a harmonic scope as Bill Evans and Thelonious Monk, he brought a compelling authenticity to the Djangoish solos of Sean Penn's character in the soundtrack to Woody Allen's '30s period piece Sweet And Lowdown, and a series of recordings he did for Concord with his idol, seven-string innovator George Van Eps, are among the most timeless, persuasive examples of the swing aesthetic.
|
 |
|
