Tag Archives: Ralph Sharon

Tony Bennett With The Count Basie Orchestra: Strike Up The Band

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In May 1959, “Roulette” label released “Strike Up the Band”, album by Tony Bennett with the Count Basie Orchestra. It was recorded in January 1959, at “Capitol Studios” in New York, and was produced by Teddy Reig.

Personnel:

  • Tony Bennett – vocals
  • Ralph Sharon – piano, arrangements

The Count Basie Orchestra:

  • Count Basie – piano
  • Marshal Royal, Frank Wess – alto saxophone
  • Frank Foster, Billy Mitchell – tenor saxophone
  • Charlie Fowlkes – baritone saxophone
  • Thad Jones, Snooky Young, Wendell Culley, Joe Newman – trumpet
  • Benny Powell, Henry Coker, Al Grey – trombone
  • Freddie Green – guitar
  • Eddie Jones – bass
  • Sonny Payne – drums

Track listing:

  1. Strike Up the Band – George Gershwin, Ira Gershwin
  2. I Guess I’ll Have to Change My Plan – Howard Dietz, Arthur Schwartz
  3. Chicago – Fred Fisher
  4. With Plenty of Money and You – Al Dubin, Harry Warren
  5. Anything Goes – Cole Porter
  6. Life Is a Song – Fred E. Ahlert, Joe Young
  7. I’ve Grown Accustomed to Her Face – Alan Jay Lerner, Frederick Loewe
  8. Jeepers Creepers – Johnny Mercer, Harry Warren
  9. Growing Pains – Dorothy Fields, Arthur Schwartz
  10. Poor Little Rich Girl – Noël Coward
  11. Are You Havin’ Any Fun? – Sammy Fain, Jack Yellen

Charles Mingus

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On January 5, 1977, Charles Mingus Jr. Died aged 57. He was musician (bass), composer and bandleader, regarded as one of the most creative and influential Jazz artists of all times.

For his work and contribution to the modern music, Mingus has received many awards including:

  • “Guggenheim Fellowship” (1971).
  • Inducted in the “Down Beat Jazz Hall of Fame” (1971).
  • “National Endowment for the Arts” provided grants for a Mingus nonprofit called “Let My Children Hear Music” which cataloged all of Mingus’s works (1988)
  • “The Library of Congress” acquired Mingus’s collected papers in what they described as “the most important acquisition of a manuscript collection relating to jazz in the Library’s history.(1993)]
  • “The United States Postal Service” issued a stamp in his honor (1995).
  • Posthumously awarded the “Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award” (1997)
  • Album “Mingus Dynasty”(1959) inducted in the “Grammy Hall of Fame” (1999)
  • Inducted in the “Jazz at Lincoln Center”, Nesuhi Ertegun “Jazz Hall of Fame” (2005)

Mingus has recorded and performed with some of the most important musicians of the modern music, including: Illinois Jacquet, Dinah Washington, Wilbert Baranco, Ivie Anderson, Lionel Hampton, Red Norvo, Billy Taylor, Oscar Pettiford, Max Roach,  Bud Powell, Paul Bley, Teo Macero, Oscar Pettiford,  Ada Moore,  Charlie Parker, J.J. Johnson, Hazel Scott, John Mehegan,  Thad Jones, John Dennis, Ralph Sharon, Miles Davis, Teddy Charles, The Metronome All-Stars, Jimmy Knepper, Langston Hughes, Duke Ellington, Max Roach and Eric Dolphy.