JazzSnap: Woody Herman ('48)

This photo of Woody Herman's band in the summer of 1948 (based on the light jackets) is another one from Betty's collection of snapshots and stills. It was sent to me by her friend Chris. Betty has donated all of her prints, including this one, to Rutgers University's Institute of Jazz Studies. But since she and Chris also are big JazzWax readers, they wanted you to see this one, too. [Click on photo to enlarge]

Here's the band personnel, courtesy of Ira Gitler:

From left, Harry Babasin (bass), Fred Otis (piano), a Mutual Network engineer or announcer, Mary Ann McCall (voc) and Don Lamond (drums). Trumpets, from left: Ernie Royal, Bernie Glow, Stan Fishelson, Shorty Rogers and Marky Markowitz. Trombones, from left: Earl Swope, Ollie Wilson and Bob Swift (likely hidden: Bill Harris). Saxes, from left: Stan Getz, Al Cohn, Sam Marowitz (likely, obscured), Zoot Sims (partly obscured) and Serge Chaloff.

Want more JazzSnaps? Go to the right-hand column of JazzWax and scroll down to "JazzSnaps" for links.

JazzWax clip: Here's Four Brothers, a Jimmy Giuffre song and arrangement that was in this band's book. The 78-rpm has a nice rich bottom sound...

Comments

[Bruce Armstrong]

Seeing that Columbia label on the 78 record brought back some of my earliest boyhood memories of watching my late father stack the 78s on the record player to listen to the “sounds.” He was a big Woody Herman fan and had all the “hits” like “Apple Honey,” “Northwest Passage,” “Early Autumn,” etc. I remember him playing Woody’s vocal on “I’ve Got The World On A String” and making sure I heard the great saxophone section writing (by Ralph Burns) . My dad had been a promising young tenor player in the New York City area right before WWII, but when the war came he became a Navy carrier pilot and his dream of playing professionally pretty much ended. Marc, thanks for the memories!

[allan n]

Don Lamond was a great swinging big band drummer.

[T.K. Tortch]

I'm guessing that clarinet and alto sitting a bit off to the left in front of the drummer are Herman's. I wasn't aware that he would double on sax in concert (or at all, really), but I don't know too much about Herman himself. Most of what I know is from being into Cohn, Sims and Chaloff (and I had forgotten that Shorty Rogers played for him).

[David]

Yeah, while Woody's greatest talent was talent management (especially challenging in those days), he would occasionally pick up the alto or soprano in addition to clarinet and vocals. All you blues guitar fans should check out Woody trading licks with Mike Bloomfield on "Hitch Hike on the Possum Trot Line" (on the "Brand New" album.)