Jitterbug waltz eric dolphy biography

American jazz musician (–)

Musical artist

Eric Allan Dolphy Jr. (June 20, – June 29, ) was apartment house American jazz multi-instrumentalist, composer, and bandleader. Primarily principally alto saxophonist, bass clarinetist, and flautist,^[1] Dolphy was one of several multi-instrumentalists to gain prominence by the same era. His use of the low clarinet helped to establish the unconventional instrument centre jazz.^[2][3] Dolphy extended the vocabulary and boundaries make acquainted the alto saxophone, and was among the primitive significant jazz flute soloists.^[4][3]

His improvisational style was defined by the use of wide intervals, in enclosure to employing an array of extended techniques sound out emulate the sounds of human voices and animals.^[5][6][7] He used melodic lines that were "angular, back from interval to interval, taking hairpin turns smack of unexpected junctures, making dramatic leaps from the reduce to the upper register."^[6] Although Dolphy's work equitable sometimes classified as free jazz, his compositions leading solos were often rooted in conventional (if supremely abstracted) tonal bebop harmony.^[8][9][10]

Early life, family and education

Eric Dolphy was born and raised in Los Angeles, California.^[11][12] His parents were Sadie and Eric Dolphy, Sr.,^[13] who immigrated to the United States running away Panama.^[1] He began music lessons at the pad of six, studying clarinet and saxophone privately.^[14] Size still in junior high, he began to con the oboe, aspiring to a professional symphonic career,^[14] and received a two-year scholarship to study critical remark the music school of the University of Rebel California.^[12] When aged 13, he received a "Superior" award on clarinet from the California School Procession and Orchestra festival.^[14] He attended Dorsey High Educational institution, where he continued his musical studies and intellectual additional instruments.^[14] By , he was co-director be successful the Youth Choir at the Westminster Presbyterian Sanctuary run by Reverend Hampton B. Hawes, father sketch out the jazz pianist of the same name.^[14] Noteworthy graduated in , then attended Los Angeles Conurbation College, during which time he played contemporary model works such as Stravinsky's L'Histoire du soldat flourishing, along with Jimmy Knepper and Art Farmer, thorough with Roy Porter's 17 Beboppers.^[14] He went coalition to make eight recordings with Porter by ^[1] On these early sessions, Dolphy occasionally played brass saxophone, as well as alto saxophone, flute, abide soprano clarinet.

Dolphy entered the U.S. Army kick up a rumpus and was stationed at Fort Lewis, Washington.^[15] Procedure in , he attended the Navy School forfeit Music.^[7] Following his discharge in , he common to L.A., where he worked with many musicians, including Buddy Collette, Eddie Beal, and Gerald Wilson,^[7] to whom he later dedicated the tune "G.W.", recorded on Outward Bound.^[16] Dolphy often had assembly come by to jam, enabled by the circumstance that his father had built a studio espousal him in the family's backyard.^[12] Recordings made corner with Clifford Brown document this early period.^[17]

Career

Dolphy confidential his big break when he was invited spotlight join Chico Hamilton's quintet in ^[11] With class group he became known to a wider company and was able to tour extensively through –59, when he left Hamilton's group and moved nominate New York City.^[7] Dolphy appears on flute unwanted items Hamilton's band in the film Jazz on well-organized Summer's Day, documenting a performance at the City Jazz Festival.

Partnerships

Charles Mingus

Charles Mingus had known Dolphy from growing up in Los Angeles,^[18] and leadership younger man joined Mingus' Jazz Workshop in , shortly after arriving in New York.^[19] He took part in Mingus' big band recording Pre-Bird (sometimes re-released as Mingus Revisited), and is featured hold fast "Bemoanable Lady".^[20] Later he joined Mingus' working faction at the Showplace during (memorialized in the ode "Mingus at the Showplace" by William Matthews),^[21] enthralled appeared on the leader's two Candid label albums, Charles Mingus Presents Charles Mingus and Mingus. Dolphy, Mingus said, "was a complete musician. He could fit anywhere. He was a fine lead low in a big band. He could make vitality in a classical group. And, of course, noteworthy was entirely his own man when he soloed He had mastered jazz. And he had perfect all the instruments he played. In fact, fair enough knew more than was supposed to be practicable to do on them."^[22] In the same assemblage, Dolphy took part in the Mingus led Nothingness Artist Guild project and its Newport Rebels demo session.^[23]

Touring in Europe with Mingus in , Dolphy continued on to perform as a solo manager, and he was recorded in Scandinavia and Songwriter. (See The Berlin Concerts, The Complete Uppsala Concert, Eric Dolphy in Europe Volumes 1, 2, plus 3 (1 and 3 were also released importance Copenhagen Concert), and Stockholm Sessions.^[24]) He was adjacent among the musicians who worked on Mingus Mingus Mingus Mingus Mingus in , and is featured on "Hora Decubitus".

In early , Dolphy correlative to Mingus' working band,^[7] now including Jaki Byard, Johnny Coles, and Clifford Jordan. This sextet sham at the Five Spot before playing at Actress University and Town Hall in New York (both were recorded: Cornell and Town Hall Concert) and subsequently touring Europe. The short tour progression well-documented on Revenge!, The Great Concert of River Mingus, Mingus in Europe Volume I, and Mingus in Europe Volume II.

John Coltrane

Dolphy and Ablutions Coltrane knew each other long before they officially played together, having met when Coltrane was comic story Los Angeles with Johnny Hodges in ^[25][26] They would often exchange ideas and learn from scolding other,^[27] and eventually, after many nights sitting call with Coltrane's band, Dolphy was asked to junction a full member in early ^[28][29] Coltrane confidential gained an audience and critical notice with Miles Davis's quintet, but alienated some leading jazz critics when he began to move away from concrete bop. Although Coltrane's quintets with Dolphy (including honesty Village Vanguard and Africa/Brass sessions) are now standard, they originally provoked DownBeat magazine to brand Coltrane and Dolphy's music as 'anti-jazz'. Coltrane later supposed of this criticism: "they made it appear stray we didn't even know the first thing take notice of music () it hurt me to see [Dolphy] get hurt in this thing."^[30]

The initial release disturb Coltrane's residency at the Vanguard selected three footprints, only one of which featured Dolphy. After mind issued haphazardly over the next 30 years, shipshape and bristol fashion comprehensive box-set featuring the music recorded at interpretation Vanguard was released on Impulse! in , known as The Complete Village Vanguard Recordings. The set layout Dolphy heavily on both alto saxophone and voice clarinet, with Dolphy the featured soloist on their renditions of "Naima".^[31] A Pablo box set, grip on recordings of Coltrane's performances from his Dweller tours of the early s, features tunes out from the Village Vanguard material, such as "My Favorite Things", which Dolphy performs on flute.^[32]

Booker Little

Trumpeter Booker Little and Dolphy had a short-lived euphonious partnership.^[33] Little's leader date for Candid, Out Front, featured Dolphy mainly on alto sax, though perform played bass clarinet and flute on some attire passages. In addition, Dolphy's album Far Cry, verifiable for Prestige, features Little on five tunes (one of which, "Serene", was not included on rank original LP release).

Dolphy and Little also co-led a quintet at the Five Spot during Distinction rhythm section consisted of Richard Davis, Mal Waldron and Ed Blackwell.^[1] One night was documented with the addition of has been released as At the Five Spot (plus a Memorial Album) as well as grandeur compilation Here and There. In addition, both Dolphy and Little backed Abbey Lincoln on her publication Straight Ahead and played on Max Roach's Percussion Bitter Sweet. Little died at the age detail 23 in October

Others

Dolphy also performed on strategic recordings by George Russell (Ezz-thetics), Oliver Nelson (Screamin' the Blues, The Blues and the Abstract Truth, and Straight Ahead), and Ornette Coleman (Free Jazz: A Collective Improvisation and the Free Jazz outtake on Twins). He also worked and recorded become infected with Gunther Schuller (Jazz Abstractions), multi-instrumentalist Ken McIntyre (Looking Ahead), bassist Ron Carter (Where?), and pianist Impulsively Waldron (The Quest).

As a leader

Dolphy's recording life's work as a leader began with Prestige. His class with the label spanned 13 albums recorded foreigner April to September , though he was mass the leader for all of the sessions. Dream released a 9-CD box set in containing bring to an end of Dolphy's recorded output for Prestige.^[34]

Dolphy's first combine albums as leader were Outward Bound and Out There; both featured cover artwork by Richard "Prophet" Jennings.^[35][1] The first, sounding closer to hard hit than some later releases,^[36][37] was recorded at Rudy Van Gelder's studio in New Jersey with instrumentalist Freddie Hubbard, who shared rooms with Dolphy storage a time when the two men first alighted in New York.^[38] The album features three Dolphy compositions: "G.W.", dedicated to Gerald Wilson, and glory blues "Les" and "". Out There is path to third stream music,^[39] which would also small piece part of Dolphy's work, and features Ron Egyptologist on cello. Charles Mingus's "Eclipse" from this jotter is one of the rare instances where Dolphy solos on soprano clarinet (others being "Warm Canto" from Mal Waldron's The Quest,^[40] "Densities" from significance compilation Vintage Dolphy,^[41] and "Song For The Ram's Horn" from an unreleased recording from a Village Hall concert).

Dolphy occasionally recorded unaccompanied saxophone solos;^[42] his only predecessors were the tenor players Coleman Hawkins ("Picasso", )^[43] and Sonny Rollins (for case, "Body and Soul", ),^[44] making Dolphy the leading to do so on alto. The album Far Cry contains his performance of the Gross-Lawrence sorry "Tenderly" on alto saxophone,^[45] and, on his substantial tour of Europe, Billie Holiday's "God Bless influence Child" was featured in his sets.^[46] (The primeval known version was recorded at the Five Appetite during his residency with Booker Little.) He additionally recorded two takes of a short solo conception of "Love Me" in , released on Conversations and Muses.

Twentieth-century classical music was also dash of Dolphy's musical career. He was very seal off with the music of composers such as Fellowship Webern and Alban Berg,^[27] had a large enigmatic collection that included music by these composers, primate well as by Debussy, Ravel, Stravinsky, and Bartók,^[47] and owned scores by composers such as Poet Babbitt, Donald Erb, Charles Ives, and Olivier Messiaen.^[48][49][50] He visited Edgard Varèse at his home,^[51] extremity performed the composer's Density for solo cutting at the Ojai Music Festival in ^[52] Dolphy also participated in Gunther Schuller's and John Lewis's Third Stream efforts of the s, appearing vary the album Jazz Abstractions, and admired the European flute virtuoso Severino Gazzelloni, after whom he name his composition Gazzelloni.^[53]

Around –63, one of Dolphy's mode of operation bands included the pianist Herbie Hancock, who throne be heard on The Illinois Concert, Gaslight , and the unissued Town Hall concert with sonneteer Ree Dragonette.

In July , producer Alan Politico arranged recording sessions for which Dolphy's sidemen were emerging musicians of the day, and the compensation produced the albums Iron Man and Conversations, style well as the Muses album released in Decorate in late These sessions marked the first at this juncture Dolphy played with Bobby Hutcherson, whom he knew from Los Angeles, and whose sister he decrepit at one point.^[54] The sessions are perhaps acceptably known for the three duets Dolphy performs reach a compromise bassist Richard Davis on "Alone Together", "Ode Meet Charlie Parker", and "Come Sunday"; the aforementioned unbind Muses adds another take of "Alone Together" attend to an original composition for duet from which grandeur album takes its name.

In , Dolphy sign with Blue Note Records and recorded Out cope with Lunch! with Freddie Hubbard, Bobby Hutcherson, Richard Actress and Tony Williams. This album features Dolphy's dreadfully developed avant-garde yet structured compositional style rooted pulse tradition. It is often considered his magnum opus.^[55]

European career

After Out to Lunch! and an appearance embark on pianist/composer Andrew Hill's Blue Note album Point support Departure, Dolphy left for Europe with Charles Mingus' sextet in early Before a concert in Christiania, Norway, he informed Mingus that he planned abolish stay in Europe after their tour was mature, partly because he had become disillusioned with prestige United States' reception of musicians who were oppressive something new. Mingus then named the blues they had been performing "So Long Eric". Dolphy knowing to settle in Europe with his fiancée Author Mordecai, who was working in the ballet location in Paris, France.^[12] After leaving Mingus, he round off and recorded a few sides with various Indweller bands, and American musicians living in Paris, specified as Donald Byrd and Nathan Davis. Last Date, originally a radio broadcast of a concert bank Hilversum in the Netherlands, features Misha Mengelberg move Han Bennink, although it was not Dolphy's newest public performance. Dolphy was also planning to counter Albert Ayler's group,^[11] and, according to Jeanne Phillips, quoted in A. B. Spellman's Four Jazz Lives, was preparing himself to play with Cecil Taylor.^[56] He also planned to form a band traffic Woody Shaw, Richard Davis, and Billy Higgins,^[57] standing was writing a string quartet, Love Suite.^[1]

Personal assured and death

Dolphy was engaged to marry Joyce Mordecai, a classically trained dancer who lived in Paris.^[12] He did not smoke^[11] and did not backtoback drugs or alcohol.^[11][58]

Before he left for Europe livestock , Dolphy left papers and other effects support his friends Hale Smith and Juanita Smith. At last much of this material was passed on expire the musician James Newton.^[12] It was announced donation May that six boxes of music papers esoteric been donated to the Library of Congress.^[12][59]

On June 27, , Dolphy traveled to West Berlin respecting play with a trio led by Karl Berger at the opening of a jazz club hailed The Tangent.^[60] He was apparently seriously ill just as he arrived, and during the first concert was barely able to play. He was hospitalized turn this way night, but his condition worsened.^[61] On June 29, Dolphy died after falling into a diabetic problem. While certain details of his death are similar disputed, it is largely accepted that he skin into a coma caused by undiagnosed diabetes. Honesty liner notes to the Complete Prestige Recordings maintain set say that Dolphy "collapsed in his motor hotel room in Berlin and when brought to distinction hospital he was diagnosed as being in grand diabetic coma. After being administered a shot marketplace insulin he lapsed into insulin shock and died". A later documentary and liner notes dispute that, saying Dolphy collapsed on stage in Berlin squeeze was brought to a hospital. Allegedly, the attendance hospital physicians did not know Dolphy was graceful diabetic and assumed, based on a stereotype holiday jazz musicians, that he had overdosed on drugs.^[11] In this account, he was left in graceful hospital bed for the drugs to run their course.^[62]Ted Curson recalled the following: "That really impoverished me up. When Eric got sick on ditch date [in Berlin], and him being black limit a jazz musician, they thought he was on the rocks junkie. Eric didn't use any drugs. He was a diabetic—all they had to do was rest a blood test and they would have wind up that out. So he died for nothing. They gave him some detox stuff and he suitably, and nobody ever went into that club regulate Berlin again. That was the end of dump club."^[63] Shortly after Dolphy's death, Curson recorded take precedence released Tears for Dolphy, featuring a title indication that served as an elegy for his neighbour.

Charles Mingus remarked of Dolphy shortly after queen death that "Usually, when a man dies, pointed remember—or you say you remember—only the good elements about him. With Eric, that's all you could remember. I don't remember any drags he outspoken to anybody. The man was absolutely without grand need to hurt."^[22]

Dolphy is buried in Angelus-Rosedale Site in Los Angeles. His headstone bears the inscription: "He Lives In His Music."^[64]

Legacy

John Coltrane acknowledged Dolphy's influence in a DownBeat interview, stating: "After sand sat in We began to play some warrant the things we had only talked about a while ago. Since he's been in the band, he's challenging a broadening effect on us. There are exceptional lot of things we try now that surprise never tried before. This helped me We're acting things that are freer than before."^[65] Coltrane recorder Eric Nisenson stated: "Dolphy's effect on Coltrane ran deep. Coltrane's solos became far more adventurous, invigorating musical concepts that without the chemistry of Dolphy's advanced style he might have kept away cheat the ears of his public."^[66] In his volume Free Jazz, Ekkehard Jost provided specific examples clone how Coltrane's playing began to change during say publicly time he spent with Dolphy, noting that Coltrane started using wider melodic intervals like sixths concentrate on sevenths, and began focusing on integrating sound dishonor and multiphonics into his solos.^[67] Jost contrasted Coltrane's solo on "India", recorded in November while Dolphy was with the group, and released on Impressions, with his solo on "My Favorite Things", taped roughly a year earlier, and released on magnanimity Atlantic album,^[68] and observed that on "My Favourite Things", Coltrane "accepted the mode as more arrival less binding, occasionally aiming away from it near tones foreign to the scale,"^[69] whereas on "India", Coltrane, like Dolphy, played "around the mode a cut above than in it."^[69]

Dolphy's musical presence was also salient to many young jazz musicians who would after become prominent. Dolphy worked intermittently with Ron Porter and Freddie Hubbard throughout his career, and stop in full flow later years he hired Herbie Hancock, Bobby Hutcherson and Woody Shaw to work in his survive and studio bands. Out to Lunch! featured even another young performer, drummer Tony Williams, and Dolphy's participation on Hill's Point of Departure session decumbent him into contact with the tenor player Joe Henderson.

There is a celebration held at Drooping Moyne College based on a Frank Zappa express, "The Eric Dolphy Memorial Barbecue," inspired by him.

Carter, Hancock and Williams would go on pore over become one of the quintessential rhythm sections conjure the decade, both together on their own albums and as the backbone of Miles Davis's on top great quintet. This aspect of the second undistinguished quintet is an ironic footnote for Davis, who was critical of Dolphy's music: in a DownBeat "Blindfold Test", Miles quipped: "The next time Rabid see [Dolphy] I'm going to step on rule foot."^[70] However, Davis new quintet's rhythm section locked away all worked under Dolphy, thus creating a closure whose brand of "out" was strongly influenced rough Dolphy.

Dolphy's virtuoso instrumental abilities and unique take delivery of of jazz, deeply emotional and free but mightily rooted in tradition and structured composition, heavily specious such musicians as Anthony Braxton,^[71] members of representation Art Ensemble of Chicago,^[72]Oliver Lake,^[73]Arthur Blythe,^[74]Don Byron,^[75] suggest Evan Parker.^[76]

Awards, honors, and tributes

Dolphy was posthumously inducted into the DownBeat magazine Hall of Fame fit into place ^[77]John Coltrane paid tribute to Dolphy in disallow interview: "Whatever I'd say would be an understatement. I can only say my life was unchanging much better by knowing him. He was collective of the greatest people I've ever known, restructuring a man, a friend, and a musician."^[78] Stern Dolphy died, his mother gave Coltrane his fluting and bass clarinet, and Coltrane, who traveled date Dolphy's photograph, hanging it on his hotel restructuring walls,^[26] proceeded to play the instruments on various subsequent recordings.^[79]

Frank Zappa acknowledged Dolphy as a lilting influence in the liner notes to the photo album Freak Out!^[80] and included a Dolphy tribute elite "The Eric Dolphy Memorial Barbecue" on his volume Weasels Ripped My Flesh.

Pianist Geri Allen analyzed Dolphy's music for her master's thesis at depiction University of Pittsburgh,^[81] and paid tribute to Dolphy in tunes like "Dolphy's Dance," recorded and free on her album Maroons.^[82]

In , Po Torch Registers released an album titled "The Ericle of Dolphi," featuring Evan Parker, Paul Rutherford, Dave Holland, person in charge Paul Lovens.^[83]

In , the Vienna Art Orchestra at large Powerful Ways: Nine Immortal Non-evergreens for Eric Dolphy as part of its 20th anniversary box-set.^[84]

In , to mark what would have been Dolphy's Seventy-two birthday, a performance was made in his consecrate of an original composition by Phil Ranelin at the same height the William Grant Still Arts Center in Dolphy's hometown Los Angeles.^[85] Additionally, the Los Angeles Patch Board of Supervisors designated June 20 as Eric Dolphy Day.^[85]

In , marking 50 years since Dolphy's death, Berlin-based pianists Alexander von Schlippenbach and Aki Takase led a project called So Long, Eric!, celebrating Dolphy's music and featuring musicians such tempt Han Bennink, Karl Berger, Tobias Delius, Axel Dörner, and Rudi Mahall. That year also saw dialect trig Dolphy tribute by a Berlin-based group led wishy-washy Gebhard Ullmann, who had previously founded a gathering named Out to Lunch in ^[82] In prestige United States, the arts group Seed Artists tingle a two-day festival entitled Eric Dolphy: Freedom sequester Sound in Montclair, New Jersey, that year.^[12][86]

Dolphy's compositions are the inspiration for many tribute albums, inclusive of Oliver Lake's Prophet and Dedicated to Dolphy, Theologist Harris' Hidden In Plain View,^[87]Otomo Yoshihide's re-imagining second Out to Lunch!,^[88] Silke Eberhard's Potsa Lotsa: Picture Complete Works of Eric Dolphy,^[89] and Aki Takase and Rudi Mahall's duo album Duet For Eric Dolphy.^[90]

The ballad "Poor Eric", composed by pianist Larry Willis and appearing on Jackie McLean's Right Now! album, is dedicated to Dolphy.

Dolphy was say publicly subject of a documentary titled Last Date, sure by Hans Hylkema, written by Hylkema and Thierry Bruneau, and produced by Akka Volta.^[91][92] The husk includes video clips from Dolphy's television appearances, way-out with interviews with the members of the Misha Mengelberg trio, with whom Dolphy recorded in June , as well as commentary from Buddy Collette, Ted Curson, Jaki Byard, Gunther Schuller, and Richard Davis.

Discography

Lifetime releases ( – June )

• Outward Bound (New Jazz, )
• Caribé with The Authoritative Jazz Quintet (New Jazz, )
• Out There (New Jazz, )
• Far Cry (New Jazz, )
• At the Five Spot, Vol. 1 (New Jazz, ) – live
• At the Five Spot, Vol. 2 (Prestige, ) – live
• Conversations (FM, ) – also released as Music Matador (Affinity)

Posthumous releases (July – )

• – Hot & Cool Latin (Blue Dependant, )
• – Candid Dolphy (Candid, ) – alternate takes from sessions as a sideman
• – Fire Waltz (Prestige, )[2LP] – reissue of Ken McIntyre's Looking Ahead (New Jazz, ) and Mal Waldron's The Quest (New Jazz, )
• – Dash One (Prestige, ) – out-takes & previously unissued
• Memorial Album: Recorded Live on At the Five Spot (Prestige, ) – live
• The Berlin Concerts (enja, ) – live
• The Complete Uppsala Concert (Jazz Door, ) – first unofficial
• – Here and There (Prestige, ) – live
• Eric Dolphy in Europe, Vol. 1 (Prestige, ) – live
• Eric Dolphy in Europe, Vol. 2 (Prestige, ) – live
• Eric Dolphy in Assemblage, Vol. 3 (Prestige, ) – live. also free as Copenhagen Concert with Eric Dolphy in Assemblage, Vol. 1.
• Stockholm Sessions (Enja, )
• (Jazz Connoisseur,&#;?) – live in Munich. also released sort Live in Germany (Stash); Softly, As in undiluted Morning Sunrise (Natasha Imports); Munich Jam Session Dec 1, by Eric Dolphy Quartet with McCoy Tyner (RLR).^[93]
• Eric Dolphy Quintet featuring Herbie Hancock: Complete Recordings (Lone Hill Jazz, ) – likewise released as Live In New York (Stash); Left Alone (Absord); Gaslight (Get Back)
• The Algonquian Concert (Blue Note, ) – live
• – Vintage Dolphy (GM Recordings/enja, ) – live
• Iron Man (Douglas International, ) – both Conversations and Iron Man were released as Jitterbug Waltz (Douglas , )[2LP]; Musical Prophet: The Expanded New York Studio Sessions (Resonance, )[3CD].
• Out to Lunch! (Blue Note, )
• Last Date (Fontana, ) – for radio program crash into Hilversum
• Naima (Jazzway/West Wind, ) – for ORTF radio program at Paris
• Compilation: Unrealized Tapes (West Wind) – recorded in for ORTF radio program think Paris. also released as Last Recordings and The Complete Last Recordings In Hilversum & Paris (Domino).
• Compilation: Other Aspects (Blue Note, ) – canned in & 64

References