BUCK HILL

Saxophonist and clarinetist Roger “Buck” Hill at age fifteen in the early 1940s was a regular performer on the legendary U Street corridor of jazz clubs and show rooms. After high school graduation and military service in the 173rd Army Ground Force Band, he returned to Washington, married, began a family, and took a job with the U.S. Postal Service. With the exception of the period of 1955–60, he remained with the Postal Service until his retirement in 1998. Mr. Hill came tobe known as “The Jazz Postman,” and was so memorialized in the famous William Claxton image of the same name. By the early 1950s he had established himself as the premier tenor saxophonist in the Baltimore-Washington region. In 1956 Mr. Hill was in residence at Washington’s Showboat Lounge as a member of guitarist Charlie Byrd’s group. His recordings with Byrd include Jazz at the Showboat, Vol. I (1958) read more...