Candido Camero born 22 April 1921

Cándido Camero Guerra (22 April 1921 – 7 November 2020), known simply as Cándido, was a Cuban conga and bongo player. He is considered a pioneer of Afro-Cuban jazz and an innovator in conga drumming. He was responsible for the embracing of the tuneable conga drum, the first to play multiple congas developing the techniques that all players use today, as well as the combination of congas, bongos, and other instruments such as the foot-operated cowbell, an attached guiro, all played by just one person. Thus he is the creator of the multiple percussion set-up. 

Cándido Camero Guerra was born near Havana. His father worked in a bottle factory, and his mother worked at home. Encouraged by an uncle who taught him (at the age of four) to play “bongos” on two old cans of condensed milk, he quickly progressed to the bass, piano and tres, the latter the small Cuban guitar, but he never learned to read music. Listening on the radio to American jazz, he was impressed by drummers Kenny Clarke and Max Roach, but was mainly influenced by Spanish and Yoruba music. 

Early in his career, Camero played as conguero and bongosero for the Cuban radio stations Radio Progresso and Radio CMQ (for 6 years) and for the Tropicana Club (also for 6 years). As a tresero, he was also a member of Chano Pozo's Conjunto Azul, where he met Mongo Santamaría, who then played bongos. Encouraged by Dizzy Gillespie, he first visited the US on a tour in 1946, and appeared at a Broadway theatre in the musical revue Tidbits, performing with the Cuban dance team of Carmen and Rolando while he played (and introduced) the quinto, a drum with a higher pitch than the standard conga. In 1948, he made his first U.S. recording with Machito and His Afro-Cubans on the tune "El Rey del Mambo", but he did not become a member of the band, since they already had Carlos Vidal Bolado on congas. 

Candido, Dizzy Gillespie & Charlie Parker

When Chano Pozo was murdered in 1948 (he arrived in New York shortly after Cándido), Dizzy Gillespie contacted Camero and they began a fruitful collaboration that culminated in the 1954 recording of Afro. Camero was also a member of the Billy Taylor Trio, with whom he recorded in 1953–54. Taylor asserted “I’ve not heard anyone who even approaches the wonderful balance between jazz and Cuban elements that Cándido demonstrates.” Camero was the first to play multiple congas was quickly adapted by several of his fellow countryman like Carlos "Patato" Valdés and became the norm giving rise to the standard set of tuneable congas that are commonly used today. 

                                   

Also in 1954 he performed and recorded with Stan Kenton. As one of the best known congueros in the U.S., Camero performed on variety shows such as The Jackie Gleason Show and The Ed Sullivan Show. In 1957 Camero was also the first to champion the use of the fiberglass conga drum when he began playing publicly fiberglass drums made for him by New York City based Puerto Rican artisan and boat builder Frank Mesa. 

Over the years Cándido recorded with such luminaries as Al Cohn (Cándido Featuring Al Cohn, 1956), Art Blakey (Drum Suite, 1957), Ray Bryant (Ray Bryant Trio, 1956), Kenny Burrell (Introducing Kenny Burrell, 1956), Duke Ellington (A Drum Is A Woman, 1956), Erroll Garner (Mambo Moves Garner, 1954), Dizzy Gillespie (Gillespiana, 1960), Coleman Hawkins (The Hawk Talks, 1955), Stan Kenton (Kenton Showcase, 1954), and Wes Montgomery (Bumpin’, 1965). He also made regular TV appearances, on The Ed Sullivan Show and The Jackie Gleason Show. 

Camero recorded several albums as a leader for ABC-Paramount in the late 1950s and early 1960s. In the early 1970s, he recorded for the independent jazz label Blue Note Records, before joining the dance music record company Salsoul. With the latter, Camero recorded two albums which were relatively successful and remain in rotation by DJs in the U.S. In 1979, he released Jingo, a disco-oriented track, which was also released as a 12" single in June, 1981 in the UK, running for over 9 minutes, itreached #55 in the BBC Top 75 chart. 

In the 2000s, Camero was a member of the Conga Kings alongside Patato and Giovanni Hidalgo. They recorded two albums for Chesky. He recorded another album for Chesky in 2004, Inolvidable, with Graciela, the long-time lead singer for Machito. This album earned a Grammy Award nomination. He received a Latin Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2008. In 2014, Camero recorded his last album, The Master, also for Chesky. He continued to perform in jazz clubs in New York until the late 2010s. 

Camero died in his sleep on 7 November 2020, at his home in New York. He was 99. 

(Edited from Wikipedia & Jazz Journal) 

 

Issy Bonn born 21 April 1903

Issy Bonn (born Benjamin Levin; 21 April 1903 – 21 April 1977) was a British comedian, singer, actor, and theatrical agent. His signature song was "My Yiddishe Momme". 

Benjamin Levin was born into a Jewish family in Whitechapel, London, the son of a butcher. He spent part of the First World War working as a delivery boy. The job may not have paid well, but at least it brought some money into the home, thereby enabling him to devote his spare time to his real love- singing, but his family disapproved of his interest in the music hall and he was sent to Canada to live with relatives. When he returned, he joined an existing comedy and singing group, the Three Rascals, and used the stage name Benny Levine, which featured a rather bizarre mixture of ragtime music and vocal comedy in its act. 

He performed in theatres and cinemas on a semi-professional basis, creating a comic character named Finklefeffer who became involved in all manner of humorous situations. He went solo in the early 1920s. He took the stage name Issy Bonn at the suggestion of BBC Radio producer John Sharman, who produced a popular programme, John Sharman's Music Hall and made his first radio appearance on the show in 1935, billed as "The Hebrew Vocal Raconteur". He combined sentimental songs such as "My Yiddish Momme" and "Let Bygones Be Bygones", with Jewish humour and sketches, many featuring the fictitious Finkelfeffer family. 

                                    

Issy Bonn made over a thousand radio broadcasts on programmes such as Variety Bandbox, and reputedly had a repertoire of over 500 songs. He also regularly toured South Africa. He appeared in the films I Thank You in 1941, and Discoveries in 1939, where he played Mr. Schwitzer. He made his first recordings in 1942, for the Rex label, and later recorded for Decca and Columbia. He toured Europe with the Entertainments National Service Association (ENSA), entertaining the forces, broadcasting on the highly-popular Variety Bandbox programme and playing variety engagements at all the major theatres in Britain. 

After the war Issy continued to capitalize on his burgeoning fame with a new touring road shows including The Big Broadcasts and The Melody Lingers On, in which he appeared himself, as well as using to introduce many new, young artists who he discovered himself. This was typical of him. He was always interested in fostering previously unknown performers, encouraging, developing and helping them to make their way in the highly competitive world of show business. 

Much as he enjoyed performing, Issy Bonn was still very much a realist. He knew that, no matter how popular he was, any celebrity’s time at the very top of the tree was likely to be limited. With a view to having something to fall back on when his days on stage were finished, he formed his own management agency, which he ran in tandem with his continuing live work for many years. He continued to appear on radio, television, and in pantomimes, and toured, often with the popular trumpeter Eddie Calvert. 

In the event Issy’s career went on for a good deal longer than he might have anticipated. In fact he carried on performing until the Seventies, after which he became manager of a provincial theatre, thereby keeping his links with the profession he loved so much. His image appears on the cover of The Beatles album Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. 

He died in London on his 74th birthday on 21 April 1977. 

(Edited from Wikipedia & CD liner notes by Tony Watts)

 

Hylo Brown born 20 April 1922

Hylo Brown (April 20, 1922 – January 17, 2003) was an American singer, guitarist and bass player who played a significant role in the development of bluegrass and country music and was one of the first artists to appeal to both sets of fans. 

Frank "Hylo" Brown Jr. was born in River, Johnson County, Kentucky, United States. Trying to make his way as a musician and avoid factory work, Frank signed on at WCMI in Ashland, Kentucky in 1939 and began his career as a performer. Soon, he moved to WLOG in Logan, West Virginia and their "Saturday Jamboree". During the war he moved to Springfield, Ohio and worked in a defense plant. 

After the war, Brown worked in a factory and began composing songs and performing on local radio stations in Ohio. During an appearance at WPFB in Middletown, Ohio he received his nickname "Hylo" because Smoky Ward, who was on the show, could not remember his name and started calling him "Hi-Lo". That nickname was a humorous indication of Brown's presumed vocal range. 

In 1950, he recorded with Bradley Kincaid at WWSO studio in Springfield. Four years later, Brown wrote a song, "Lost To A Stranger", that was sent to Ken Nelson, the A & R man of Capitol Records. The song was meant to be recorded by Kitty Wells but instead, Nelson offered Brown a recording contract if he recorded it himself. On November 7, 1954, he cut his first recordings for Capitol Records. "Lost To A Stranger" became his first hit. In early 1955, he formed the Buckskin Boys performing on the WWVA Jamboree in Wheeling, West Virginia. 

                                   

In 1957, Brown joined Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs, becoming a featured vocalist with the duo's Foggy Mountain Boys. The group's increasing popularity prompted Flatt and Scruggs to form a second Foggy Mountain band, called the Timberliners, with Brown as the unit's frontman; the Timberliners were fleshed out by mandolin player Red Rector, fiddler Clarence "Tater" Tate, Jim Smoak on the banjo, and bassist Joe Phillips. 

At their inception, the Timberliners performed on a circuit of television stations in Tennessee and Mississippi, later swapping schedules with Flatt & Scruggs in order to appear on West Virginia airwaves as well. In 1958, the group released Hylo Brown and the Timberliners, an LP that remains a traditional bluegrass classic. However, the advent of syndication and videotape allowed the original Flatt & Scruggs band to appear on any number of TV stations, effectively ending the Timberliners' career soon after, although Brown soldiered on for a time with a group including Norman Blake on Dobro and Billy Edwards on banjo. After the Timberliners' demise, Brown rejoined Flatt & Scruggs as a featured singer. Brown was inducted into the Opry in 1959. 

After his Capitol contract had expired, Brown signed with Starday Records in 1961, and cut a handful of solo albums including Bluegrass Balladeer, 1962's Bluegrass Goes to College, and in 1963 Hylo Brown Meets the Lonesome Pine Fiddlers. Although Brown's stature was slowly diminishing, he continued recording extensively for the smaller bluegrass-oriented Rural Rhythm label, turning out six albums over the next five years of roughly twenty songs each, some of which were atypically short. He seldom carried a full band in that era, and used local bands for backup. Roy Ross and his Blue Ridge Mountain Boys from Pike County, Ohio was one of them. 

By the 1970s, Hylo usually worked primarily in clubs and played a few bluegrass festivals. He also experienced some voice problems, finding it more difficult to sing in natural highs although he could still do his trademark falsetto on "The Prisoner's Song." Singing in low keys became increasingly common and had lesser appeal for a bluegrass audience that was his natural fan base. He did some later recording for labels like Jessup and Attieram, but they failed to revive his career and suffering a stroke in 1990 sidelined him further, resulting in Brown's eventual retirement in 1991 when he moved to Mechanicsburg, Ohio. 

Few interviewers called, and those that did found an often disillusioned man who'd given his life to keeping bluegrass alive, only to see his contribution ignored. He died from cancer in Mercy Medical Center on January 17, 2003. He is interred in Rose Hill Burial Park, Springfield, Clark County, Ohio.  Hylo Brown has received several honors posthumously: In 2003, just weeks after his death, he was inducted into the Society for the Preservation of Bluegrass Music of America's Preservation Hall of Greats. In 2009, he received the Distinguished Achievement Award from the International Bluegrass Music Association. 

(Edited from Wikipedia, AllMusic, Hillbilly Music.com, Bear Family notes & Country Music Highway)

 

Bee Houston born 19 April 1938

Bee Houston (19 April 1938 – 19 March 1991) was an exciting performer whose style blended elements of Texas shuffle blues and Southern gospel-tinged soul. 

Born Edward Wilson Houston in San Antonio, Texas, Bee lived a long time in the shadow of his taller and handsome twin brother Bo (Wilson Edward Houston). Bee played bugle and Bo the drums in their School’s drum and bugle corps. Later Bee bought a guitar and for a time his other brother “Honey” (Wilson Vincent Houston) played drums and Bee and Bo did an act where Bee played the treble strings and Bo the bass strings of the guitar. 

                                   

Bee, like all good blues artists, developed a unique style even to the point where he kept some strings slightly bent, even when tuning! His earthly voice made a fine complement to his strong guitar work and his Texas roots were noticeably evident. Music became Bee’s life and soon his group were the back-up band for “name” artists like Brook Benton, Little Willie John, Junior Parker, and Bobby Bland, when these singers were booked by Henderson Glass to tour the Southwest in the late 50’s and 60’s.

After a two-year army stint, bee and his wife decided to try their luck on the West Coast. He toured and recorded frequently with Big Mama Thornton in the '60s and became known as her guitarist during the waning years of her career. He also accompanied several visiting blues players during West Coast visits including the Simms Twins, Mc Kinley Mitchell and Little Johnny Taylor. Houston recorded for Arhoolie in the '60s and '70s, and also made several festival appearances and club dates. Bee Toured again with Junior Parker but preferred to stay in Los Angeles close to his family and continued to play the local R&B circuit until he died there on 19 March 1991 a month before his 53^rd birthday. 

(Scant information edited from liner notes by Chris Strachwitz & AllMusic)

Little Brother Montgomery born 18 April 1906

Little Brother Montgomery (April 18, 1906* – September 6, 1985) was an American jazz, boogie-woogie and blues pianist and singer. Largely self-taught, Montgomery was an important blues pianist with an original style. He was also versatile, working in jazz bands, including larger ensembles that used written arrangements. He did not read music but learned band routines by ear. 

Eurreal Wilford "Little Brother" Montgomery was born in Kentwood, Louisiana, United States, a sawmill town near the Mississippi border, across Lake Pontchartrain from New Orleans, where he spent much of his childhood. Both his parents were of African-American and Creek Indian ancestry. As a child he looked like his father, Harper Montgomery, and was called Little Brother Harper. The name evolved into Little Brother Montgomery, and the nickname stuck. He started playing piano at the age of four, and by age 11 he left home for four years and played at barrelhouses in Louisiana. His main musical influence was Jelly Roll Morton, who used to visit the Montgomery household. 

Early in his career he performed at African-American lumber and turpentine camps in Louisiana, Arkansas, and Mississippi. He then played with the bands of Clarence Desdunes and Buddy Petit. He lived in Chicago from 1928 to 1931, regularly playing at rent parties and Chicago was where he made his first recordings in 1930 for Paramount. From 1931 through 1938, he led a jazz ensemble, the Southland Troubadours, in Jackson, Mississippi (also called the Collegiate Ramblers), that played in ballrooms throughout the South. They never recorded, but as a solo pianist or with only one accompanist, Montgomery cut twenty-two blues sides, all released on singles on the Bluebird label, in 1935-36, including the original versions of his standards “Shreveport Farewell” and “The First Time I Met the Blues.” 

                                   

Montgomery, hailed in Down Beat magazine in 1940 as “the greatest piano man that ever invaded Dixie,” spent time in Yazoo City, Hattiesburg, and Beaumont, Texas, before permanently settling in Chicago in 1942. His graceful New Orleans-style swing and uncommonly wide repertoire that encompassed blues, boogie-woogie, ragtime, popular songs, and jazz standards, made him a popular pianist in traditional jazz groups. In 1948 he played in Kid Ory’s Dixieland band at Carnegie Hall. He also accompanied classic blues singer Edith Wilson, but he appeared most often as a solo performer or leader of his own groups. 

Otis Rush benefited from his sensitive accompaniment on several of his 1957-1958 Cobra dates, while Buddy Guy recruited him for similar duties when he nailed Montgomery's "First Time I Met the Blues" in a supercharged revival for Chess in 1960. That same year, Montgomery cut a fine album for Bluesville with guitarist Lafayette "Thing" Thomas that remains one of his most satisfying sets. 

Montgomery toured Europe several times in the 1960s and recorded some of his albums there. He appeared at many blues and folk festivals during the following decade and was considered a living legend, a link to the early days of blues in New Orleans. Among his original compositions are "Shreveport Farewell", "Farrish Street Jive", and "Vicksburg Blues". His instrumental "Crescent City Blues" served as the basis for a song of the same name by Gordon Jenkins, which in turn was adapted by Johnny Cash as "Folsom Prison Blues." 

In 1968, Montgomery contributed to two albums by Spanky and Our Gang, Like to Get to Know You and Anything You Choose b/w Without Rhyme or Reason. His fame grew in the 1960s, and he continued to make many recordings, some of them on his own record label, FM Records, which he formed in 1969 (FM stood for Floberg Montgomery, Floberg being the maiden name of his wife). 

In 1975, Folkways issued an album of Monrtgomery’s “Church Songs”, which enhanced his reputation for turning his hand and voice to many styles. This brought his output of albums to over 30. He gave many interviews about his life in the Blues and his endless stream of stories made him a one-man-repository of Blues  history, as his remarkable memory gave us insights into the story of the Blues from it’s origins into the digital age. 

Montgomery died on September 6, 1985, in Champaign, Illinois, and was interred in the Oak Woods Cemetery. In 2013  he was posthumously inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame. 

(Edited from Wikipedia, All Music, Britannica, All About The Blues Music.com & Mississippi Blues Trail) (*birth year possibly a year or two later according to some documents) 

 

Marta Eggerth born 17 April 1912

Marta Eggerth (17 April 1912 – 26 December 2013) was a Hungarian actress and singer from "The Silver Age of Operetta”. 

Eggerth was born in Budapest, the daughter of Tilly (née Herzog) a dramatic coloratura soprano, and Paul Eggerth, a bank director. Eggerth began singing during her early childhood. Her mother dedicated herself to her daughter, who was called a "Wunderkind" at the age of 11 making her theatrical debut in the operetta Mannequins. It was during this time and the years that followed that Eggerth began singing the most demanding coloratura repertoire by composers including Rossini, Meyerbeer, Offenbach and Johann Strauss II. 

While still a teenager, Eggerth embarked on a tour of Denmark, Holland and Sweden before arriving in Vienna at the invitation of Emmerich Kálmán. Kálmán invited her to Vienna to understudy Adele Kern, the famous coloratura of the Vienna State Opera, in his operetta Das Veilchen vom Montmartre (The Violet of Montmartre). Eggerth eventually took over the title role to great critical acclaim after Kern suddenly became indisposed. Subsequently, Eggerth performed the role of Adele in Max Reinhardt's famous 1929 Hamburg production of Die Fledermaus at the age of 17. 

During the early 1930s, Eggerth was discovered by the film industry, and her career took off resulting in international fame. She made more than 40 films in five languages: Hungarian, English, German, French and Italian. It was on the set of the 1934 film Mein Herz ruft immer nach dir (My Heart is Calling You, music Robert Stolz) that she met and fell in love with the young Polish tenor, Jan Kiepura. They were married in 1936 and together became known as Europe's Liebespaar (Love Pair) causing a sensation wherever they appeared. 

                                   

While Kiepura toured the United States, Eggerth was signed by the Shubert Theatre on Broadway to appear in Richard Rodgers' musical Higher and Higher. She subsequently signed a contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in Hollywood and, during the early 1940s, made two movies with Judy Garland: For Me and My Gal in 1942 and Presenting Lily Mars in 1943. In Chicago, Eggerth and Kiepura performed together on the operatic stage in La bohème to rave reviews. 

They also starred together on Broadway at the Majestic Theater in a revised production of Lehár's The Merry Widow, with Robert Stolz conducting and choreography by George Balanchine. They would eventually perform The Merry Widow more than 2,000 times, in five languages throughout Europe and America. In 1945, they were back on Broadway together in the musical Polonaise. After World War II, they returned to France touring and making films, before bringing The Merry Widow to London's Palace Theatre in 1954. 

Throughout her career, Eggerth maintained active recital tours throughout Europe, Canada and the United States, combining her extensive repertoire of lieder, opera, film songs, and especially Viennese operetta. In London, Eggerth and Kiepura gave two sold-out concerts in one week at the Royal Albert Hall in 1956. The couple continued singing throughout the 1950s and 1960s with more productions of The Merry Widow in the United States, concerts and other productions in Europe. In 1965 they brought The Merry Widow back to Berlin for yet another successful run. 

Kiepura died in 1966. Eggerth stopped singing at this time for several years. Finally, persuaded by her mother, she decided to revive her career. In the 1970s she began to make regular television appearances, and to actively perform concerts in Europe. In 1982, she returned to the American stage to co-star in the Tom Jones/Harvey Schmidt musical Colette opposite Diana Rigg in Seattle and Denver, and later in Stephen Sondheim's Follies in Pittsburgh. 

In 1999, at the age of 87, she sang on the stage of the Vienna State Opera in a special televised matinée concert hosted by opera impresario and historian Marcel Prawy, to mark that opera house's first production of Lehár's The Merry Widow. She sang a medley from the operetta in four languages and received a spontaneous standing ovation. She repeated this medley in 2000, at a gala to mark the 200th anniversary of Vienna's Theater an der Wien. 

In 2001, Eggerth returned to London for "An Interview-in-Concert" at an absolutely sold-out Wigmore Hall. She continued to tour and give recitals up to her last performance at the age of 99 in 2011. Eggerth was awarded many major artistic decorations from Austria, Germany, Poland, and Italy in recognition of her accomplishments in operetta, theatre and film. Her final recognitions included the Knights Cross of the Order of the Merit of the Republic of Poland, Knights Cross of the Order of the Merit of the Republic of Hungary, her native land's highest honour, and the Erwin Piscator Life Achievement Award for her legendary achievements. 

She taught at the Manhattan School of Music until her death following a brief illness on 26 December 2013 in Rye, New York. She was 101 years old. (Edited from Wikipedia) 

Bennie Green born 16 April 1923

Bennie Green (April 16, 1923 – March 23, 1977) was one of the most dexterous and velvet-toned modern American trombonists. 

Bennie Green was born in Chicago and his family was a musical one. With his brother Elbert who later played tenor saxophone with Roy Eldridge he attended the famous DuSable High School whose musical director was the celebrated Walter Dyett.  In these early formative years Bennie’s acknowledged influences were Trummy Young, Lawrence Brown, J.C.Higginbotham, Tommy Dorsey and Bobby Byrne. Much later of course J.J.Johnson was added to the mix. 

Thanks to a recommendation from Budd Johnson, Bennie joined Earl Hines’s band in the summer of 1942 just as James Petrillo’s AFM announced a strike preventing union members from recording for major labels. This was a great pity because that particular edition of the band boasted Dizzy Gillespie, Benny Harris, Charlie Parker, Shadow Wilson and Sarah Vaughan among its members. 

Green became very friendly with Dizzy Gillespie often visiting him at the trumpeter’s house where Dizzy would accompany him on the piano. These sessions were invaluable insights into the new harmonic and rhythmic discoveries and Bennie later described them as “Going to school”. Drafted into the military he was discharged in 1946 and later that year he recorded with Charlie Ventura for the first time on a big band date playing Neal Hefti and Stanley Baum arrangements. Green returned to Hines again until 1948 when he joined the legendary Gene Ammons who had just had a big hit with Red Top which was his wife Mildred’s nickname. 

In the summer of 1948 Charlie Ventura invited Bennie to join the new group he was forming to be called ‘Bop For The People’. With this high profile group making regular radio broadcasts and concert appearances Bennie’s reputation as a superior soloist was now established. Ventura’s group was breaking attendance records at the Royal Roost and was voted the No.1 bebop group by the readers of Down Beat and Metronome magazines. They ultimately recorded no less than 61 titles (some on obscure labels) and their brilliant but quite outrageous interpretation of I’m Forever Blowing Bubbles became something of a commercial success. The leader disbanded a few months after their famous Pasadena concert in May 1949. 

                                  

Later that year on the 24th. December Green was part of a ‘Stars Of Modern Jazz’ concert at Carnegie Hall compered by Symphony Sid with Sarah Vaughan and the Charlie Parker quintet as headliners. In 1950 he recorded four titles with Gene Ammons and a seven piece group featuring Sonny Stitt on baritone. In 1952 Bennie recorded four titles with strings demonstrating elements of Jack Teagarden especially in his immaculate control of the upper register on Embraceable You and Stardust. 

In 1953 he recorded an extrovert, foot-tapping date for Decca with Cecil Payne and Frank Wess where they pulled out all the stops on a simple but very effective Blow Your Horn. It has elements of rhythm and blues with one of his favourite call and response devices and became quite a juke-box hit. In 1955 he recorded ‘Bennie Green Blows His Horn’ with Charlie Rouse together with the redoubtable Cliff Smalls and Candido in the rhythm section. 

In 1959 the trombonist recorded ‘Bennie Green Swings The Blues’ with Jimmy ‘Night Train’ Forrest and Sonny Clark. As the title implies the repertoire mostly consists of jazz music’s most basic harmony but with such gifted performers there is no chance of monotony. It does include though one of Bennie’s favourite standards – Pennies From heaven – which had been his feature with Charlie Ventura back in the forties. He only made one further LP as a leader in 1961 because the sixties was a difficult decade especially for his generation of jazz musicians. Clubs like Birdland were closing and the emergence of the Beatles and Rolling Stones reflected a definite change in popular music taste. The revolutionary concepts of the jazz avant-garde movement didn’t help matters either. 

Bennie was always popular in his home-town of Chicago and he continued to lead small bands there throughout the sixties as well as travelling as a single, sitting-in with house rhythm sections. He settled in Las Vegas in the late '60s, working in hotel bands. He worked for a time with Duke Ellington’s orchestra in 1968, playing on his second sacred concert. Green was also featured on recordings made at the Newport in New York festival in the early '70s. He recorded as a leader for Jubilee, Prestige, Blue Note, Enrica, Time, and Vee Jay. 

After a long illness Bennie Green died of cancer on March 23rd. 1977, in San Diego.

(Edited mainly from Jazz profiles)