The Original Salty Dogs Jazz Band is a traditional jazz ensemble founded in 1947 in West Lafayette, Indiana, and later based in Chicago, Illinois. The Salty Dogs play standards and original pieces influenced by the Dixieland artists of the 1910s and 1920s, as well as the 1940s and 1950s "revivalists" such as Lu Watters and Turk Murphy.
A group of Purdue University students created a club in 1947 to discuss, listen to, and (later) perform jazz music. This club became semi-official when the university created the Purdue Jazz Society. The Jazz Society's performance group called themselves "The Original Peerless Jazz Band" at school functions and "The Salty Dogs" at paid performances at local taverns. Some band members moved to Chicago after graduation and continued to perform as a band. By the late 1950s, there were two "Salty Dogs" jazz bands: the one in Chicago and the one on the Purdue campus which was still being replenished by newer students. This occasionally led to misunderstandings, including cases in which, after playing at a venue for a few weeks, the campus band would be fired and replaced by the Chicago band. The Chicago band soon adopted the name "The Original Salty Dogs" in order to minimize such misunderstandings. [1] [2]
During the late 1950s, the campus band made a few limited-edition recordings which sold quickly at bookstores and the student union. (Some of these recordings were re-released on compact disc in the 2000s.) Their first widely distributed album was released in 1963 on Audiophile Records. This group soon disbanded as college students began to favor rock music over jazz. [1] [2] [3]
Meanwhile, other Chicago-area musicians had joined the Purdue graduates and the Original Salty Dogs were regularly performing at The Red Arrow, The Hunt Club, The Sabre Room and other jazz clubs in city's southwest suburbs. [1] [4] They recorded their first commercial album in 1964 on Delmark Records. [2] The band released more albums on the Delmark, GHB, Jazz & Jazz (Australia) OKOM, Xylophonia and Stomp Off record labels and began to play at festivals throughout the United States. [3] [4] The Original Salty Dogs sometimes performed with The Kingston Trio, George Shearing, The Four Freshmen and other notable artists. [4] Several members moved away from the Chicago area in the early 1970s, making regular performances difficult. Nevertheless, the Original Salty Dogs continue to give occasional performances with many of the same musicians who had joined in the 1950s and 1960s. [1] [2]
Richard "Dick" Karner joined the band in 1953 and played on the Salty Dogs first commercially released recording, a 1954 EP, called The Salty Dog Express. For the next numerous years, he performed with the band on Purdue's campus and at Chicago nightclub venues such as The Blue Note, Hunt Club and the Sabre Room. He died on March 12, 2021.
Thelonious Sphere Monk was an American jazz pianist and composer. He had a unique improvisational style and made numerous contributions to the standard jazz repertoire, including "'Round Midnight", "Blue Monk", "Straight, No Chaser", "Ruby, My Dear", "In Walked Bud", and "Well, You Needn't". Monk is the second-most-recorded jazz composer after Duke Ellington.
Aaron Thibeaux "T-Bone" Walker was an American blues musician, composer, songwriter and bandleader, who was a pioneer and innovator of the jump blues, West Coast blues, and electric blues sounds. In 2018 Rolling Stone magazine ranked him number 67 on its list of "The 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time".
Roscoe Mitchell is an American composer, jazz instrumentalist, and educator, known for being "a technically superb – if idiosyncratic – saxophonist". The Penguin Guide to Jazz described him as "one of the key figures" in avant-garde jazz; All About Jazz stated in 2004 that he had been "at the forefront of modern music" for more than 35 years. Critic Jon Pareles in The New York Times has mentioned that Mitchell "qualifies as an iconoclast". In addition to his own work as a bandleader, Mitchell is known for cofounding the Art Ensemble of Chicago and the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM).
Luther Sylvester Allison was an American blues singer-songwriter and guitarist. He was born in Widener, Arkansas, although some accounts suggest his actual place of birth was Mayflower, Arkansas. Allison was interested in music as a child and during the late 1940s he toured in a family gospel group called The Southern Travellers. He moved with his family to Chicago in 1951 and attended Farragut High School where he was classmates with Muddy Waters' son. He taught himself guitar and began listening to blues extensively. Three years later he dropped out of school and began hanging around outside blues nightclubs with the hopes of being invited to perform. Allison played with the bands of Howlin' Wolf and Freddie King, taking over King's band when King toured nationally. He worked with Jimmy Dawkins, Magic Sam and Otis Rush, and also backed James Cotton. Chicago Reader has called him "the Jimi Hendrix of blues guitar".
Andrew Wegman Bird is an American indie rock multi-instrumentalist, singer, and songwriter. Since 1996, he has released 16 studio albums, as well as several live albums and EPs, spanning various genres including swing music, indie rock, and folk music. He is primarily known for his unique style of violin playing, accompanied by loop and effect pedals, whistling, and voice. In the 1990s, he sang and played violin in several jazz ensembles, including Squirrel Nut Zippers and Kevin O'Donnell's Quality Six. He went on to start his own swing ensemble, Andrew Bird's Bowl of Fire, which released three albums between 1998 and 2001. Weather Systems (2003) was his first solo album after Bowl of Fire disbandment, and it marked a departure from jazz music into indie music. Bird's 2019 album My Finest Work Yet was nominated for "Best Folk Album" at the 2020 Grammy Awards.
Fred Anderson was an American jazz tenor saxophonist who was based in Chicago, Illinois. Anderson's playing was rooted in the swing music and hard bop idioms, but he also incorporated innovations from free jazz. Anderson was also noted for having mentored numerous young musicians. Critic Ben Ratliff called him "a father figure of experimental jazz in Chicago". Writer John Corbett referred to him as "scene caretaker, underground booster, indefatigable cultural worker, quiet force for good." In 2001, author John Litweiler called Anderson "the finest tenor saxophonist in free jazz/underground jazz/outside jazz today."
Ann Arbor Blues and Jazz Festival is a music festival in Ann Arbor, Michigan, that started in 1972 from the Ann Arbor Blues Festival, which itself began in 1969. Although the festival has had a tumultuous history and suspended operations in 2006, it was restarted in 2017.
Joseph Benjamin Hutto was an American blues musician. Influenced by Elmore James, Hutto became known for his slide guitar playing and declamatory style of singing. He was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame two years after his death.
Earle Lavon "Von" Freeman Sr. was an American hard bop jazz tenor saxophonist.
Chicago Underground is an avant-garde jazz ensemble formed in Chicago in 1997 based around the core duo of cornetist Rob Mazurek and drummer/percussionist Chad Taylor. They have recorded and performed as the Chicago Underground Duo, Trio, Quartet or Orchestra depending on how many additional musicians are included. The ensemble which has released numerous recordings on the Thrill Jockey and Delmark labels.
An organ trio is a form of jazz ensemble consisting of three musicians; a Hammond organ player, a drummer, and either a jazz guitarist or a saxophone player. In some cases the saxophonist will join a trio which consists of an organist, guitarist, and drummer, making it a quartet. Organ trios were a popular type of jazz ensemble for club and bar settings in the 1950s and 1960s, performing a blues-based style of jazz that incorporated elements of R&B. The organ trio format was characterized by long improvised solos and an exploration of different musical "moods".
John Henry Windhurst was an American jazz trumpet player, who played primarily in the swing, big-band, and dixieland styles. Windhurst was a self-taught musician and known for his solos; he considered Bix Beiderbecke, Bobby Hackett, Wild Bill Davison, and Bunny Berigan among his influences. His playing style was considered to be a mixture of the delicate playing style of Bobby Hackett with his own feathery vibrato and mobility. Ruby Braff has cited Windhurst as one of his biggest inspirations as a jazz artist.
Mississippi Heat is an American blues band based in Chicago, led by harmonica player Pierre Lacocque. Formed in 1991, the band has toured in the United States, Canada, and Europe, with occasional performances in South America and North Africa.
Lafayette Leake was an American blues and jazz pianist, organist, vocalist and composer who played for Chess Records as a session musician, and as a member of the Big Three Trio, during the formative years of Chicago blues. He played piano on many of Chuck Berry's recordings.
George Freeman is an American jazz guitarist and recording artist. He is known for his sophisticated technique, collaborations with high-profile performers, and notable presence in the jazz scene of Chicago, Illinois. He is the younger brother of tenor saxophonist Von Freeman and drummer Eldridge "Bruz" Freeman, and the uncle of tenor saxophonist and trumpeter Chico Freeman.
Dave Specter is an American Chicago blues and jazz guitarist.
Terry Waldo is an American pianist, composer, and historian of early jazz, blues, and stride music, and is best known for his contribution to ragtime and his role in reviving interest in this form, starting in the 1970s. Says Wynton Marsalis in his introduction to Waldo's book: "He teaches Ragtime, he talks about Ragtime, he plays it, he embodies it, he lives it, and he keeps Ragtime alive." The book, This is Ragtime, published in 1976, grew out of the series of the same title that Waldo produced for NPR in 1974. Waldo is also a theatrical music director, producer, vocalist, and teacher. He is noted for his wit and humor in performance, as "a monologist in the dry, Middle Western tradition." Eubie Blake describes his first impression of Waldo's performance thus: "I died laughing...that's one of the hardest things to do—make people laugh. Terry's ability to do this, combined with his musicianship, actually reminds me of Fats Waller."
Samuel Julian Lay was an American drummer and vocalist who performed from the late 1950s as a blues and R&B musician alongside Little Walter, Howlin' Wolf, Paul Butterfield, and many others. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2015.
The Metropolitan Jazz Octet (MJO) was a group created in the 1950s by Chicago saxophonist and arranger Tom Hilliard that was revived in 2014 under the direction of Hilliard's student Jim Gailloreto.
Eddy Ray Davis was an American musician and bandleader of trad jazz, who was internationally known mainly through the decades of collaboration with the clarinetist and filmmaker Woody Allen.