Benny Goodman's Clarinet | Arts & Culture | Smithsonian Contact Privacy Policy Terms of Use Benny Goodman's Clarinet Late in his career, jazz musician Benny Goodman favored a Parisian “licorice stick” as his instrument of choice Goodman played the clarinet even "during the commercial breaks of the World Series," according to one of his daughters. (Bettmann / Corbis) Smithsonian Magazine | Subscribe April 2009 In the hierarchy of musical instruments, the clarinet tends to get short shrift—at least compared with the violin, cello or piano. But the inauguration of Barack Obama raised the instrument's profile when Anthony McGill, principal clarinetist of the Metropolitan Opera orchestra, performed with cellist Yo-Yo Ma, violinist Itzhak Perlman and pianist Gabriela Montero before a global television audience estimated at a billion viewers. (The fact that cold weather forced the musicians to finger-sync to their own recording hardly diminished the clarinet's star turn.) From This Story [×] CLOSE Benny Goodman's National Museum of American History clarinet was crafted in the workshops of the legendary Parisian woodwinds manufacturer Buffet Crampon in 1967.

(Hugh Talman / NMAH, SI) Goodman played the clarinet even "during the commercial breaks of the World Series," according to one of his daughters. (Bettmann / Corbis) Under the Radar with Unmanned Aerial Vehicles The clarinet's other notable high notes include 1771, when Mozart composed the first of his clarinet works, a divertimento, and 1920, when 11-year-old Beno Goodman first picked up the instrument in a Chicago tenement. Beno, the ninth of 12 children born to Russian-immigrant parents, would of course become Benny Goodman, and would perform some of the greatest music of the big-band or any other era. One of Goodman's clarinets now resides within the collections of the Smithsonian National Museum of American History (NMAH), where Jazz Appreciation Month is celebrated each April and where Goodman's centenary year—he was born May 30, 1909—will be enthusiastically observed next month. In the hands of a man who was equally at home in jazz and classical music, the clarinet was—to use its affectionate nickname—one sweet licorice stick.

"Benny Goodman was the most popular clarinetist in American history," says curator John Edward Hasse. "As a clarinetist and a band leader, he played a key role in moving jazz from the margins of American society to the mainstream. He led the most influential, for a time the most popular, and perhaps the most polished of the big bands of the swing era." Goodman's NMAH clarinet was crafted in the workshops of the legendary Parisian woodwinds manufacturer Buffet Crampon in 1967. The maestro used it during the latter part of a long career. "He was playing in smaller jazz groups by then," says Russ Connor, author of Benny Goodman: Listen to His Legacy. In the years after the big-band heyday, Connor adds, Goodman "had more time to play classical music.

He was very choosy about instruments and reeds; even though he'd played Selmer clarinets and advertised for them earlier in his career, he had a natural affinity for the Buffet." In 1990, four years after Goodman's death at age 76, his daughters Rachel Goodman Edelson and Benjie Alice Goodman Lasseau donated the instrument, along with a music stand and chair used by their father during practice sessions, to the Smithsonian. "He practiced all the time," recalls Lasseau, "and he always seemed to have a clarinet handy. He even practiced during the commercial breaks of the World Series." Goodman performed until the end of his life. "He died of a heart attack in his New York City apartment in June 1986 while rehearsing for a Mostly Mozart concert," says Susan Satz, business manager for the Goodman estate. Goodman's crossover genius—he brought classical training to jazz, even as he raised the stature of jazz and expanded its audience—was on brilliant display in the now-legendary Carnegie Hall concert of January 16, 1938.

On that memorable night, Goodman brought his big band, including such greats as drummer Gene Krupa, trumpeter Harry James and vibraphonist Lionel Hampton, to the great Manhattan bastion of the classics. When Goodman and crew lit up the hall with hot-jazz composer Louis Prima's number "Sing, Sing, Sing," people began dancing in the aisles, a first for the venerable symphony space. "I grew up listening to all of [Goodman's] recordings," McGill told me in a phone interview after the Obama inaugural. "His recordings of works by Aaron Copland, Morton Gould, Igor Stravinsky and others are still available, so he's still enormously influential. Goodman was such a superstar that you really have to listen." Owen Edwards is a freelance writer and author of the book Elegant Solutions. Single Page Previous Page 1 of 2 Next 1 2 Like this article? Benny Goodman - IMDb IMDb 17 January 2017 4:34 PM, UTC NEWS Soundtrack | Actor | Music Department The King of Swing!

Famed clarinetist, composer ("Stompin' at the Savoy") and conductor, educated at the Lewis Institute in Chicago and a student of Schillinger and Schoepp. He was a clarinetist with the orchestras of Bix Beiderbecke , Jules Herbuveaux, Arnold Johnson and Ben Pollack , and also played in Broadway theater orchestras. He began to lead ... See full bio » Born: a list of 93 people created 27 Dec 2014 a list of 33 people created 30 May 2015 a list of 100 people created 21 Sep 2015 a list of 2346 people created 02 Jan 2016 a list of 200 people created 8 months ago Do you have a demo reel? Add it to your IMDbPage How much of Benny Goodman's work have you seen? User Polls 2015 American Horror Story (TV Series) (performer - 3 episodes) - Mommy (2015) ...

(performer: "Body and Soul" - as Benny Goodman Trio, uncredited) - Chutes and Ladders (2015) ... (performer: "Body and Soul" - as Benny Goodman Trio, uncredited) - Checking In (2015) ... (performer: "Body and Soul" - as Benny Goodman Trio, uncredited) 2015/I The Intern (performer: "Ain't Misbehavin'") 2015 Little Boy (writer: "If Dreams Come True") 2014 The Marty Stuart Show (TV Series) (writer - 1 episode) - Jesse McReynolds (2014) ... (writer: "Air Mail Special" - uncredited) 2014 Cesar Chavez (performer: "Darktown Strutters Ball") 2013 Six by Sondheim (TV Movie documentary) (performer: "You Must Meet My Wife") 2013 Waterloo Road (TV Series) (performer - 1 episode) - Don't Mention the War (2013) ...

(performer: "Ev'rytime We Say Goodbye") 2013 Average Consumer (TV Series short) (performer - 1 episode) - "The Great Gatsby" Review (2013) ... (performer: "You're a Sweet Little Headache") 2012 Bill W. (Documentary) (performer: "I'm Like a Fish Out of Water", "Body & Soul") Banda sonora (TV Series) (writer - 1 episode, 2012) (performer - 1 episode, 2008) 2011 The Restorers {They Were All Volunteers} (Documentary) (writer: "Stompin' at the Savoy") Mildred Pierce (TV Mini-Series) (performer - 1 episode, 2011) (writer - 1 episode, 2011) - Part Four (2011) ...

(performer: "Stompin' At The Savoy") / (writer: "Stompin' At The Savoy") 2011 The Future (performer: "Where or When") - Best Band in the Land (2010) ... (performer: "Unidentified Tune" - uncredited) 2010 Mafia II (Video Game) (performer: "SING, SING, SING (WITH A SWING)") - Episode dated 1 May 2010 (2010) ... (performer: "Sing, Sing, Sing") 2010 The Pacific (TV Mini-Series) (performer - 1 episode) - Home (2010) ... (performer: "Somebody Else Is Taking My Place") 2005-2009 Cold Case (TV Series) (performer - 3 episodes) - WASP (2009) ... (performer: "Sing Sing Sing") - World's End (2007) ... (performer: "You Can't Put The Wool Over My Eyes") - Colors (2005) ...

(performer: "Gotta Be This or That") 2008 August (performer: "After You've Gone") 2007 The Water Horse (performer: "It's Only a Paper Moon") 2007 Big Love (TV Series) (performer - 1 episode) - Kingdom Come (2007) ... (performer: "A String of Pearls" - uncredited) 2007 Melba Moore: Live in Concert (Video) (writer: "Air Mail Special") 2000-2007 The Sopranos (TV Series) (performer - 2 episodes) - Remember When (2007) ... (performer: "Sing, Sing, Sing (With a Swing)") - Do Not Resuscitate (2000) ...

(performer: "Goodnight, My Love" - uncredited) 2007 Music and Lyrics (performer: "Flying Home", "Rose Room", "It's Tight Like That") / (writer: "Flying Home") 2006 An American Girl on the Home Front (TV Movie) ("Sing Sing Sing (With a Swing)") 2006 Hollywoodland (writer: "Flying Home") - Top 10 Perform (2006) ... (performer: "Sing, Sing, Sing") - Top 10 (2005) ... (performer: "Sing, Sing, Sing") 2005 End of the Spear (performer: "Don't Be That Way") / (writer: "Don't Be That Way") 2005 Cinderella Man (writer: "Don't Be That Way" (1934)) 2005 Carnivàle (TV Series) (performer - 1 episode) - The Road to Damascus (2005) ...

(performer: "Sing, Sing, Sing (With a Swing)" - uncredited) 2004 Exorcist: The Beginning (performer: "We'll Meet Again") 2004 The Notebook (performer: "Always and Always", "One O'Clock Jump" - uncredited) 2004 Independent Lens (TV Series documentary) (writer - 1 episode) - Jimmy Scott: If You Only Knew (2004) ... (writer: "Airmail Special" - as Goodman) 2003 Crooked Lines (performer: "Sing, Sing, Sing (With a Swing)") 2003 Mona Lisa Smile (writer: "Flying Home") 2003 Miss Match (TV Series) (performer - 1 episode) - Pilot (2003) ...

(performer: "Sing Sing Sing") 2003 I Capture the Castle (writer: "Stompin' At The Savoy" - as Goodman) 2002 Below (performer: "Sing, Sing, Sing (With A Swing)") 2002 Hollywood Ending (performer: "Hooray for Hollywood" (1937)) 2002 Hart's War (performer: "Idaho") 2002 Livshunger (TV Series) (music - 1 episode) - Episode #1.6 (2002) ... (music: "IF DREAMS COME TRUE") - From Broadway: Fosse (2001) ...

("Sing, Sing, Sing") 2000 Pollock (performer: "Sing, Sing, Sing") 2000 Small Time Crooks (writer: "Stompin' at the Savoy") 2000 U-571 (performer: "Dein ist mein ganzes Herz") 1999 American Masters (TV Series documentary) (performer - 1 episode) 1999 The Girl on the Bridge (performer: "Sing, Sing, Sing", "Bugle Call Rag", "Goodbye") 1999 California's Gold (TV Series documentary) (writer - 1 episode) - Muscle Beach (1999) ... (writer: "Don't Be That Way" - uncredited) 1998 The X-Files (TV Series) (performer - 1 episode) - Triangle (1998) ...

(performer: "Sing, Sing, Sing" - uncredited) 1998 The Life and Times of Hank Greenberg (Documentary) (writer: "Air Mail Special") 1998 Reinvention (Documentary short) (performer: "Somebody Else is Taking My Place") 1997 The Myth of Fingerprints (writer: "Don't Be That Way") 1997 The Game (writer: "Life Goes To A Party") 1997 Deconstructing Harry (performer: "Sing Sing Sing (With a Swing)" (1936), "Christopher Columbus" (1936)) 1996 My Fellow Americans (writer: "Don't Be That Way") 1996 The English Patient (performer: "Wang Wang Blues" (1921), "One O'Clock Jump" (1933)) 1995 How to Make an American Quilt (performer: "Riffin' at the Ritz") 1995 The Grass Harp (performer: "STOMPIN' AT THE SAVOY", "CLOSE YOUR EYES", "YOU BROUGHT A

 NEW KIND OF LOVE TO ME", "DON'T BE THAT WAY", "SOMEBODY STOLE MY GAL") / (writer: "STOMPIN' AT THE SAVOY", "DON'T BE THAT WAY") 1994 Cari fottutissimi amici (performer: "SING SING SING") 1994 Baseball (TV Mini-Series documentary) (performer - 2 episodes) - The National Pastime (1994) ...

(performer: "Sing, Sing, Sing (With a Swing)") - Shadow Ball (1994) ... (performer: "King Porter Stomp") 1994 The Hudsucker Proxy ("Flying Home") 1993 Swing Kids (performer: "BUGLE CALL RAG", "SWINGTIME IN THE ROCKIES", "FLAT FOOT FLOOGEE", "GOODNIGHT, MY LOVE") / (writer: "LIFE GOES TO A PARTY", "SWINGTIME IN THE ROCKIES") 1992 Malcolm X (writer: "Flying Home") 1992 Mr. Saturday Night (performer: "After You've Gone", "Something New", "How High the Moon") 1992 A League of Their Own (writer: "Flying Home") 1992 Northern Exposure (TV Series) (performer - 1 episode) - Things Become Extinct (1992) ...

(performer: "Memories of You") 1991 Lucky Luke (writer: "Stompin' At The Savoy" - as Goodman) 1991 The Marrying Man (writer: "STOMPIN' AT THE SAVOY") 1991 American Experience (TV Series documentary) (performer - 1 episode) - Coney Island (1991) ... (performer: "Sing, Sing, Sing (With a Swing)") 1990 Memphis Belle (writer: "Flying Home") 1989 When Harry Met Sally...

(writer: "Stompin' At The Savoy", "Don't Be That Way") 1989 New York Stories (performer: "Sing, Sing, Sing") 1988 Crossing Delancey (performer: "IT HAD TO BE YOU") 1988 Big Business (performer: "Sing Sing Sing ") 1987 Laguna Heat (TV Movie) (performer: "You Go To My Head") 1987 Hope and Glory (performer: "Flat Foot Floogie") 1987 In the Mood (writer: "STOMPIN' AT THE SAVOY", "DON'T BE THAT WAY") 1987 Radio Days (performer: "Body and Soul" (1930), "Goodbye" (1934)) 1987 Screen Two (TV Series) (music - 1 episode) - Will You Love Me Tomorrow (1987) ...

(music: "Flying Home" - uncredited) 1986 Miss Mary (performer: "I Can't Give You Anything But Love, Baby", "It's Been So Long") 1986 Power (performer: "Sing, Sing, Sing") 1983 Star 80 (performer: "Sing Sing Sing") 1982 The Atomic Cafe (Documentary) (writer: "Flying Home") 1981 Zoot Suit (writer: "Two O'Clock Jump" - uncredited) 1981 True Confessions (performer: "Memories of You") 1981 Raggedy Man (performer: "The Lady's In Love With You") 1981 They All Laughed (performer: "SING, SING, SING") 1980 Raging Bull (performer: "Jersey Bounce" (1936)) 1980 Joe Albany...

a Jazz Life (Documentary) (music: "Stompin' at the Savoy") 1980 Stardust Memories (writer: "If Dreams Come True" (1936) - as B. Goodman) 1979 Saturday Night Live (TV Series) (writer - 1 episode) - Steve Martin/Blondie (1979) ... (writer: "Stompin' at the Savoy") 1978 The 32nd Annual Tony Awards (TV Special) (performer: "Sing, Sing, Sing (With a Swing)") 1978 F.I.S.T. (writer: "Stompin' at the Savoy" - uncredited) 1973 Slither ("Stompin' At The Savoy") 1973 Save the Tiger (writer: "Air Mail Special", "Stompin' At The Savoy") 1970 Happy Days (TV Series) (writer - 1 episode) - Episode #1.2 (1970) ...

(writer: "Don't Be That Way" - uncredited) 1969 Army of Shadows (writer: "Stompin' At The Savoy" - uncredited) 1967 Frank Sinatra: A Man and His Music + Ella + Jobim (TV Special) (music: "Stompin' at the Savoy" - uncredited) / (writer: "Don't Be That Way" - uncredited) The Danny Kaye Show (TV Series) (writer - 1 episode, 1966) (performer - 1 episode, 1965) - Episode #4.15 (1966) ... (writer: "Stompin' at the Savoy") - Episode #3.5 (1965) ... (performer: "Poor Butterfly", "The World Is Waiting for the Sunrise", "Hi Ya, Sophia") 1963 The Lively Ones (TV Series) (performer - 1 episode) - Episode #2.5 (1963) ...

(performer: "I've Found a New Baby") 1958 Jazz Party (TV Series) (writer - 3 episodes) - Episode #1.23 (1958) ... (writer: "Air Mail Special") - Episode #1.22 (1958) ... (writer: "Stompin' at the Savoy" - uncredited) - Episode #1.20 (1958) ... (writer: "Stompin' at the Savoy") 1957 Perry Como's Kraft Music Hall (TV Series) (performer - 1 episode) - Episode #10.6 (1957) ...

(performer: "Sing, Sing, Sing" - uncredited) 1956 The Benny Goodman Story ("Original Dixieland One Step") / (performer: "Goodbye") / (writer: "Don't Be That Way", "Stompin' At the Savoy") Omnibus (TV Series) (1 episode, 1955) (performer - 1 episode, 1953) 1952 The Paul Whiteman's Goodyear Revue (TV Series) (music - 1 episode) - Episode #3.25 (1952) ...

(music: "Stompin' at the Savoy") 1950 I'll Get By (music: "Stompin' at the Savoy") 1949 The Stratton Story (music: "Stompin' at the Savoy" - uncredited) 1948 A Song Is Born (performer: "Anitra's Boogie", "Stealin' Apples" (1936), "Flying Home" (1939) - uncredited) / (writer: "Flying Home" (1939) - uncredited) 1946 After You've Gone (Short) (performer: "After You've Gone") 1946 Melody Time (Short) (writer: "Don't Be That Way" - uncredited) 1946 Make Mine Music (performer: "After You've Gone" (1918) - as Goodman) 1944 Sweet and Low-Down (arranger: "Clarinet Quintet in A Major, K.581" (1789) - uncredited) / (music: "Rachel's Dream" (1939), "

Stompin' at the Savoy" (1934) - uncredited) / (performer: "I'm Making Believe" (1944), "Hey Bub!

Let's Have a Ball" (1944), "Rachel's Dream" (1939) (uncredited), "Clarinet Quintet in A Major, K.581" (1789) (uncredited)) 1944 The Shining Future (Short) (performer: "Sing, Sing. Sing" - uncredited) 1943 The Gang's All Here (performer: "Minnie's in the Money", " (I've Got a Gal in) Kalamazoo", "Paducah" - uncredited) / (writer: "Soft Winds" - uncredited) 1941 Hi Gang!

(performer: "Moonglow" - uncredited) 1939 Love on Tap (Short) (music: "Stompin' at the Savoy" (1934)) 1938 It's in the Stars (Short) (music: "Stompin' at the Savoy" - uncredited) 1938 Man-Proof (music: "Stompin' at the Savoy" (1935) - uncredited) 1937 Hollywood Hotel ("I've Got a Heartful of Music" (1937), uncredited) / (arranger: "Satan's Holiday" (1934) - uncredited) Benny Goodman by Ted Gottsegen Born into a large, poverty stricken family, Benny began playing the clarinet at an early age. He was associated with the Austin High School Gang , having gone to school with drummer Dave Tough. By the time he was twelve, Goodman appeared onstage imitating famous bandleader/clarinetist Ted Lewis . It was at this concert that Ben Pollack heard the young clarinetist and Benny was soon playing in Pollacks band.

Goodmans first recordings were made with the Pollack group in 1926, and give a strong example of Bennys influences at the time including Jimmie Noone , who was then with Doc Cook and His Dreamland Orchestra and Leon Roppolo of the New Orleans Rhythm Kings . During this period Goodman recorded his first sides as a leader with members of the Pollack band including one 1928 date which features the only known recording of Benny on alto and baritone saxophones. Following the musical migration out of Chicago and into New York, Goodman became a very successful and popular free-lancer, joining the likes of Tommy and Jimmy Dorsey in New York studios. In 1934 Benny put together his first big band, featuring Bunny Berigan on trumpet, Jess Stacey on piano and Gene Krupa on drums. With the addition of some excellent, sophisticated arrangements by Fletcher Henderson , the Swing Era was born. Goodman spent the next fifty years recording and touring with various groups big and small, including some very successful trips to Russia and the Far East. He also played many concerts on a classical format that received mixed reviews.

Known by musicians for his stand-offish and �cheap� nature, many sidemen had a love/hate relationship with Goodman. Many musicians claimed that Benny was dishonest when it came time to pay off the band and many more recalled the Goodman �ray�, the dirtiest of looks received when a mistake was made. That aside, its clear that without Goodman the �Swing Era� would have been nowhere near as strong when it came, if it came at all. After his death, the Yale University library received the bulk of Goodmans personal collection including many private never-before-heard recordings and rare unpublished photos. Thanks to Richard Unger for the recordings on this page. BENNY GOODMAN, KING OF SWING, IS DEAD BENNY GOODMAN, KING OF SWING, IS DEAD By JOHN S. WILSON Benny Goodman, the King of Swing whose clarinet led a generation of music fans into the Big Band era in the 1930's, died yesterday afternoon at his Manhattan apartment, apparently of a heart attack. He was 77 years old.

The death of the man who brought jazz to Carnegie Hall and enthralled millions with renditions of ''Sweet Georgia Brown'' and ''Stompin' at the Savoy'' brought expressions of grief and loss from his colleagues. Lionel Hampton, the vibraphonist, recalled that Mr. Goodman was the first major music figure to put black and white musicians together on stage in the 1930's. ''The most important thing that Benny Goodman did,'' he said, ''was to put Teddy Wilson and me in the quartet. It was instant integration. Black people didn't mix with whites then. Benny introduced us as Mr. Lionel Hampton and Mr. Teddy Wilson. He opened the door for Jackie Robinson. He gave music character and style.'' Apple Cheeks and Horn-Rims The tall, apple-cheeked bandleader with the horn-rimmed glasses had had a pacemaker implanted in 1984, but he had been active and about town in recent months, and had appeared to be in good health yesterday morning, according to Lloyd Rauch, his personal assistant. Mr.

Goodman apparently died while taking a nap on a guest-room couch in his apartment at 200 East 66th Street. The body was found by a housekeeper, Anna Lekander, Mr. Rauch said. Mr. Goodman became the King of Swing the night of Aug. 21, 1935, at the Palomar Ballroom in Hollywood. In the following years, he drew throngs to nightclubs and theaters and introduced jazz to Carnegie Hall, toured the world as a representative of a distinctive American culture, was instrumental in breaking the barrier that had kept white and black musical groups separate and developed a band that was a training ground for many other band leaders, including Harry James, Gene Krupa, Lionel Hampton and Teddy Wilson. Last month, Mr. Goodman was awarded an honorary Doctor of Music degree at Columbia University's commencement ceremonies, the latest in a long list of honors that included lifetime achievement awards at the Grammy show in February and from the Kennedy Center in Washington in 1982. But when he arrived at the Palomar in the summer of 1935 with a 14-piece band that he had formed a year before, there was no aura of success around Mr.

Goodman. He was, in fact, so discouraged that he was prepared to give up his band and return to freelancing. His career as a band leader had been discouraging. His orchestra had been dismissed from the only two engagements it had had in New York and, after completing a 26-week contract on a network radio program, it had set out on a cross-country trek from New York to California. The reaction to Mr. Goodman's repertory of jazz-based arrangements ranged from bewilderment to antipathy. ''I thought we'd finish the engagement in California and take the train back to New York and that would be it,'' he recalled many years later. ''I'd just be a clarinetist again.'' He Might Fail, But on His Own Terms He had tried to adapt to what he had been told the audiences wanted - pop tunes and waltzes. But on this night at the Palomar, starting what he thought would be the band's last engagement, Mr. Goodman decided that if he were going to fail, he would fail on his own terms.

He brought out some of his favorite arrangements - by Fletcher Henderson of ''Sugar Foot Stomp,'' ''Blue Skies,'' ''Sometimes I'm Happy'' and ''King Porter Stomp'' - which had been his reason for recruiting a band that included such jazz specialists as the trumpeter Bunny Berrigan, the pianist Jess Stacy and the drummer Gene Krupa. As he beat out the tempo for ''Sugar Foot Stomp,'' the band dug into the Henderson arrangement. Then Mr. Berrigan rose up in the trumpet section, playing a crackling solo. As the sound of his horn exploded across the ballroom, a responsive roar went up from the listeners and they surged around the bandstand, cheering. Mr. Goodman looked around in amazement. He was stunned by the sudden change but, he said later, that roar ''was one of the sweetest sounds I ever heard in my life.'' This stunning reversal in audience acceptance in Hollywood has been attributed to two factors. Although the ''Let's Dance'' program was on the air for only three hours, the bands actually played for five hours because, in those pretape days, the program had to be played a second time for the West Coast.

By the time young listeners in California heard the Goodman band, it was warmed up and bringing out its best arrangements. Calfiornia was also developing a new type of radio entertainer, the disk jockey. The first celebrity disk jockey was Al Jarvis in Los Angeles, who had a program of recordings called ''The Make Believe Ballroom'' (a title later used in New York by Martin Block). Mr. Jarvis had been plugging the Goodman band's records and, when the band reached the Palomar, the audience, thanks to Mr. Jarvis, knew and was anxious to hear his choice Henderson arrangements. The crowd's roar would follow him for years at precedent-setting events not only during the swing era, which lasted into the mid-1940's, but also decades later when, in the 60's, he toured the Soviet Union with his band. He heard that same sound at the ''Paramount riot,'' in March 1937, when he played at the Paramount Theater in New York for the first time.

Teenagers, who had followed the band on radio and had bought its records but could not afford the prices of such places as the Manhattan Room of the Hotel Pennsylvania, where the band usually played, were lined up around the theater at 6 A.M. to get into the morning show for 35 cents. During that day, more than 21,000 people jammed into the theater to bounce deliriously in the seats or shag in the aisles and battle ushers as they made desperate lunges toward the stage. First Jazz Concert At Carnegie Hall Mr. Goodman heard it again in January 1938, when, looking stiff and uncomfortable in white tie and tails, he led his orchestra in the first jazz concert ever given in Carnegie Hall to an audience that showed its enthusiasm by beating out the band's rhythm with pounding feet that rocked the old hall's balconies. There had been big bands that played swinging dance music before Mr. Goodman organized his orchestra. Fletcher Henderson led a groundbreaking black jazz band in the mid-20's, and in his wake came Duke Ellington, Earl Hines and Jimmie Lunceford, all black.

There had also been big, jazz-oriented white bands - Jean Goldkette's Orchestra, the Casa Loma Orchestra and the band in which Mr. Goodman began playing when he was 16 years old, Ben Pollack's Orchestra. But Mr. Goodman's band arrived at a moment when the public's ear had been attuned by these earlier bands. Mr. Goodman provided a blend of jazz and contemporary popular music that filled this demand so successfully that, for a brief period, jazz and popular music were one and the same. His band also represented a blend of the freedom of jazz improvisation and the discipline that Mr. Goodman demanded from his musicians and, even more, from himself. He practiced his clarinet, his trumpeter Harry James once said, ''15 times more than the whole band combined.'' ''All the time I was with Goodman, he was never satisfied,'' Jess Stacy, the pianist, once said. ''With him, perfection was just around the corner. I figure Benny will die in bed with that damn clarinet.'' In rehearsal or performance, Mr.

Goodman's musicians dreaded ''the ray'' - a long, accusatory, poker-faced glare over the top of his glasses at anyone who had committed a false musical move. ''If you're interested in music,'' Mr. Goodman once said, ''you can't slop around. I expected things and they had to be done.'' This discipline and his feeling for tempo produced performances that audiences that had not been exposed to much jazz found more exciting than the looser, more deeply jazz-flavored playing of Mr. Henderson's band, in which many of Mr. Goodman's most popular arrangements originated. ''Benny was very conscious of tempos,'' Willard Alexander, a booking agent who was one of the band's earliest supporters, once said. ''His music had a kind of lilt, a feel. I remember one time we dropped into the Roosevelt Grill when Guy Lombardo was playing there. Benny said to me, 'You know, this Lombardo's got something.' I thought he was putting me on. But he wasn't. 'You know his secret,' Benny said. 'He never plays a song in the wrong tempo.' '' 'No Glamour, No Sex Appeal' ''Benny was a phenomenon,'' Mr.

Alexander went on. ''He was not really the biggest band of the swing era. Glenn Miller was. But Benny was the biggest new thing in this type of presentation. He was even different physically, contrary to what everybody expected in a band leader. No glamour. No sex appeal. But a well-grounded musician. Once he hit, in came the others in the same pattern. Tommy Dorsey, Glenn Miller. Like Goodman, they were not the typical Hollywood glamour boys. They wore glasses. They had musical experience. They were not young or green. And they had a lot of background.'' Mr. Goodman's background went back to Chicago, where he was born on May 30, 1909, the eighth of 12 children in the family of an immigrant tailor who rarely earned more than $20 a week. He was 10 when he got a clarinet on loan from a local synagogue that also provided music lessons. His brother, Harry, the biggest of the Goodman boys, was given a tuba. Freddy, the next largest, received a trumpet.

In later years, Benny Goodman wondered what kind of career he might have had ''if I had been 20 pounds heavier and two inches taller.'' When he was 12, the youth won $5 at a Chicago theater doing an imitation of Ted Lewis, and by the time he was 14 he was making $48 a week playing four nights in the neighborhood band. He also played in the band at Hull House, the celebrated Chicago settlement house, and studied for two years with Franz Shoepp, a clarinetist in the Chicago Symphony, a strict disciplinarian who, Mr. Goodman said, ''did more for me musically than anyone I ever knew.'' Still wearing short pants, he became part of a clique of teenage jazz musicians that included the cornetist Jimmy McPartland, the saxophonist Bud Freedman and the drummer Dave Tough, who were fascinated by the jazz sounds that flowed through Chicago in the 20's. He absorbed in his own playing the beautiful tone and sparkling flow of Jimmie Noone, the clarinetist.

'Kid in Short Pants' Is Summoned Leon Rappolo, clarinetist in the New Orleans Rhythm Kings, who leaned so far back in his chair when he played that he seemed to be lying down, influenced both Mr. Goodman's style and his posture. When Ben Pollack, the drummer in the Rhythm Kings, formed a band in California, he sent back to Chicago for ''the kid in the short pants, the kid who played lying down, like Rappolo.'' Mr. Goodman was 16 when he joined the Pollack band in Venice, Calif., in 1926. He remained in the band for four years, when Glenn Miller, Jack Teagarden, Bud Freeman, Jimmy McPartland and Mr. Goodman's brother, Harry, were in the band. For the last two years, the Pollack band was based in New York, playing at the Little Club and at the Park Central Hotel (now the Omni-Park Hotel) and doubling in the pit of a musical, ''Hello, Daddy.'' In the fall of 1929, after some disagreements with Mr. Pollack, Mr.

Goodman left the band and began to freelance on radio and records, making as much as $350 to $400 a week in the early days of the Depression. In 1933, he met a young jazz fan and jazz activist, John Hammond, whose enthusiasm, insight and energy were to have a profound effect on the careers of Mr. Goodman, Billie Holiday, Count Basie and Charlie Christian, the short-lived, precedent-setting electric guitarist who played in Mr. Goodman's band for two years before his death in 1941. Mr. Hammond, who had a commission to make some jazz records for release in England, asked Mr. Goodman to lead a band for this purpose. Mr. Goodman chose some of his freelance friends, a group that Mr. Hammond augmented by borrowing Gene Krupa and Jack Teagarden from Mal Hallett's orchestra in Boston. These records, released as by ''Benny Goodman and His Orchestra,'' planted a seed that took root in 1934, when, with his freelance income reduced to $40 a week, Mr. Goodman heard that Billy Rose was auditioning bands for a new club called the Music Hall.

With the help of Mr. Hammond, he started putting a band together. ''There were practically no hot bands using white musicians at the time,'' Mr. Goodman later recalled, ''and there was a lot of talent around town, both in jobs and laying off, that hadn't gotten the breaks.'' A Tight Group, Every Man a Soloist His concept was a jazz band made up of young musicians who read well and played in tune, a group with a tight, small-band quality in which every man could be a soloist. The band he and Mr. Hammond assembled included Claude Thornhill, the pianist, who soon returned to studio work, and three musicians who remained with Mr. Goodman through the band's early days of glory - Red Ballard, trombonist: Arthur Rollini (brother of Adrian), saxophonist, and Hymie Schertzer. Mr. Schertzer's alto saxophone later gave the Goodman saxophone section its sheen, but he was hired because Mr. Goodman had heard he would need a violin in his band to accompany the shows at the Music Hall and Mr. Schertzer could play violin as well as saxophone. Ironically, Mr.

Goodman's band was not able to play the routine accompanying music for the Music Hall's vaudeville acts - tumblers, a fire eater, a dog act - to Billy Rose's satisfaction. They were on the verge of being released when a compromise was reached - a second band would play for the shows and Mr. Goodman's band would play for dancing. Three months later, when the Music Hall's management changed, the band was let go. But before that happened, the band auditioned for a prospective three-hour weekly radio program to be divided between Latin music, ''sweet'' music and ''hot'' music. Xavier Cugat had already been signed as the Latin band. Murray Kellner (as Kel Murray) led the ''sweet'' band. The sponsor, the National Biscuit Company, lined up several ''hot'' bands and had some of its employes vote on them. Benny Goodman won by one vote. During the 26 weeks that Mr. Goodman played on this ''Let's Dance'' program, he had a budget with which to buy eight arrangements a week at $37.50 each.

Edgar Sampson's $37.50 arrangement of ''Stompin' at the Savoy,'' played on the first ''Let's Dance'' broadcast, became one of Mr. Goodman's classics. Another arranger, Gordon Jenkins, wrote ''Goodbye,'' which became Mr. Goodman's closing theme. He also got his opening signature, ''Let's Dance,'' from the show - a ''hot'' arrangement of Carl Maria Von Weber's ''Invitation to the Dance'' written by George Bassman, who also provided a Latin version for Mr. Cugat and a ''sweet'' version for Mr. Kellner. Paying $37.50 For 'Killer-Dillers' But the most important collection of arrangements that Mr. Goodman got for his $37.50 came from Fletcher Henderson who, in 1934, had given up the big band he had led for 11 years. Some of these arrangements had originally been played by the Henderson band. ''King Porter Stomp'' and ''Big John Special'' were the first two, providing Mr. Goodman with the basis for the library of what became known as ''killer-dillers.'' But, at Mr.

Goodman's urging, Mr. Henderson also wrote arrangements of popular songs that established the melodic and swinging style of the Goodman band. ''Fletcher's ideas were far ahead of anybody else's at the time,'' Mr. Goodman said. ''Without Fletcher, I probably would have had a pretty good band, but it would have been something quite different from what it eventually turned out to be.'' Mr. Henderson's insistently swinging scores typify the Goodman band's style. George Simon, in his book ''The Big Bands,'' described them as ''simple, swinging arrangements in which complete sections played with the feeling of a single jazz soloist.'' ''In addition,'' Mr. Simon wrote, ''Henderson would set off one section against another, rolling saxes vs. crisp brass, an approach quite different from the less rhythmic, more lethargic-sounding ensembles of most dance bands.'' After the ''Let's Dance'' program went off the air, Mr. Goodman's band was, inexplicably, booked into the Roosevelt Grill as a summer replacement for Guy Lombardo's ''Sweetest Music This Side of Heaven.'' Mr.

Goodman's musicians had scarcely let out their first ''hot'' blast on opening night at the Roosevelt when they were given their two weeks' notice. The trail of discouragement continued as the band headed west toward California and the sudden turnaround at the Palomar Ballroom. First Billing As a 'Swing' Band So, instead of taking the train back to New York, Mr. Goodman stayed at the Palomar for two months. Then the band went to Chicago, where, booked into the Joseph Urban Room of the Congress Hotel, it stayed for six months. In Chicago it was billed for the first time as a ''swing'' band, with the word in quotes - ''as if,'' Mr. Goodman remarked, ''it was something in a foreign language.'' The word had been used for years by musicians - Duke Ellington wrote ''It Don't Mean a Thing if It Ain't Got That Swing'' in 1932. But the general public seized on ''swing'' as a trendy catchword. However, references to Mr. Goodman as ''the King of Swing'' made him nervous.

''I didn't know how long it was going to last,'' he explained, ''and I didn't want to be tied down to something people might say was old-fashioned just because they tired of the name in a year or so.'' But swing fever was on the rise, and in December 1935, some of Mr. Goodman's fans organized what may have been the first jazz concert. It was advertised as a ''Tea Dance'' and it was held in the Joseph Urban Room. But it was a sit-down-and-listen affair and a few people who instinctively tried to dance were booed off the floor. The response was so enthusiastic that another concert was organized for Easter Sunday in 1936. This time Mr. Goodman flew Teddy Wilson, the pianist, out to Chicago from New York. Less than a year before, Mr. Goodman had jammed with Mr. Wilson at the home of Mildred Bailey, the singer, accompanied on drums by Miss Bailey's cousin, Carl Bellinger. This led to some recordings by a trio made up of Mr. Goodman, Mr. Wilson and Gene Krupa, the Goodman band's drummer, made just before Mr.

Goodman's fateful trip to the West Coast. This Chicago concert was the first time the trio performed in public. The performance was so successful that Mr. Goodman decided to keep Mr. Wilson and the trio as a regular part of his troupe. A Breakthrough In the Color Barrier This created a precedent, quickly copied by other swing bands, of having a small group within the big band. And by making Mr. Wilson, a black, a part of his entourage, Mr. Goodman broke through the color barrier that, until then, had kept white bands white and black bands black. A few months later, while the band was in Hollywood making its first movie, ''The Big Broadcast of 1937,'' Mr. Goodman heard Lionel Hampton leading a band at the Paradise Cafe and, after enjoying an after-hours jam session with him, persuaded Mr. Hampton to add his vibraphone to the trio, making it a quartet that was 50 percent black. For the next four years the Goodman band rode on the crest of the Swing Era popularity, despite a brief challenge from another clarinet-playing leader, Artie Shaw. The cheers and shouts of approval were seemingly endless.

In 1938, when the band's second film, ''Hollywood Hotel,'' opened in New York, The New York Times film critic, Frank Nugent, reported: ''You couldn't hear anything but the audience except when the picture worked its volume to a storm-warning level. It would have taken more than that, though, to override their howling when Mr. Goodman's clarinet came into camera range.'' Not long after appearing in the film, Mr. Goodman performed with other jazz musicians in the Broadway musical ''Swingin' the Dream,'' which opened in 1939. The eye of the Goodman whirwind was the Hotel Pennsylvania in New York, where the band spent several months each year. When Mr. Goodman's mother came to hear his band for the first time, she looked around in amazement. ''This is the way he makes a living?'' she asked. In the summer of 1940, despite a steady load of engagements, Mr. Goodman broke up his band to take three months off to undergo surgery for a painful case of sciatica.

When he reorganized his band in October of that year, the bulk of the arranging was taken over by Eddie Sauter, a trumpet player who had played and arranged for Red Norvo and who, in the 1950's, would be co-leader of an adventurous band with Bill Finegan. Mr. Finegan was making his reputation as an arranger with Glenn Miller at the very time that Mr. Sauter began arranging for the new Goodman band. The New Band Of the 1940's For this 1940's band, Mr. Goodman lured away Duke Ellington's trumpet star, Cootie Williams. He had a brilliant 18-year-old pianist, Mel Powell, and such veterans as Charlie Christian, Dave Tough, Billy Butterfield, Lou McGarity and Georgie Auld. In the opinion of many Goodman fanciers, this band of the early 40's, less publicized than his band of the 30's but with Mr. Sauter's provocative arrangements, was the finest of the Benny Goodman bands. It was during the 40's also that Mr. Goodman appeared in another Brodway musical, this time with a small group.

The show was ''Seven Lively Arts,'' which opened in December 1944. Mr. Goodman continued to lead a big band until 1950. After World War II, he tried, briefly, to adapt to the new jazz style - be-bop - but soon gave it up, to the relief of proponents of both be-bop and swing. Meanwhile, Mr. Goodman carried on a dalliance with classical music. In 1935 John Hammond, who, despite his devotion to jazz, expressed himself musically by playing viola in classical string quartets, enticed Mr. Goodman to join his quartet in playing the Mozart Clarinet Quintet. It was an intoxicating whiff for the clarinetist. He subsequently played, and recorded, with the Budapest Quartet, with Joseph Szigeti and with symphony orchestras. He commissioned works by Bela Bartok, Aaron Copland and Paul Hindemith.

During the 1940's, he studied with Reginald Kell, a renowned classical clarinetist, learning a new embouchure that required the use of a new set of facial muscles and a change in fingering for which he had his finger callouses surgically removed. Goodman Sidemen Played in Film In 1955, ''The Benny Goodman Story,'' a biographical film, was made in which Steve Allen played Mr. Goodman, and the producer assembled a band studded with former Goodman sidemen to play the sound track. Through the 50's, 60's and 70's, he formed small groups and big bands sporadically for concerts and tours, concentrating on the hits he had established in the Swing Era. Mr. Goodman took his music around the world, playing duets with the King of Thailand, a fellow clarinetist. At the 1958 World's Fair in Brussels, his band was regarded as one of the best American exhibits. He took a band to the Soviet Union in 1962 as part of a cultural exchange arrangement, producing a mixture of adulation and controversy, including an impromptu debate on jazz with Premier Nikita S.

Khrushchev. In 1941, Mr. Goodman married Alice Duckworth, the sister of his friend John Hammond. She died in 1979. Mr. Goodman is survived by two daughters, Rachel Edelson and Benjie Lasseau; four brothers, Harry, Freddy, Irving and Gene; two sisters, Ethel Goodman and Ida Winsberg, and three stepdaughters. The police said Mr. Goodman's body had been taken to the Metropolitan Funeral Home in Manhattan and was to be transferred to the Bouton & Reynolds Funeral Home in Stamford, Conn. Funeral arrangements were incomplete last night. Some Rememberances ''Working with Benny Goodman wasn't a job, it was an experience. Benny meant a whole lot to me, not only as a teacher but as a friend. I loved the man.'' - Frank Sinatra. ''You think of clarinet and Benny Goodman simultaneously. He had an innate dignity about him, coupled with his integrity in music. He was a step in the refinement of jazz. He upheld standards that were never less than the Carnegie Hall type of thing. He taught me the value of rehearsing and discipline, and that's a great value in any craft.'' - Peggy Lee.

''The world's greatest artist on the classical clarinet, and his orchestra was one of the best of all time.'' - Steve Allen. ''He proved that good music could reach the general public. He was the most popular figure in the history of jazz to reach a non-jazz public. He was the Beatles of his day. And he did it with pure, uncompromising music. He never compromised.'' - George Wein. Armstrong | Basie | Ellington | Fitzgerald | Goodman | Hawkins | Henderson | Holiday | Miller | Waller | Young LOUIS ARMSTRONG (1901-1971) Trumpeter and singer Louis Armstrong was the first jazz musician to combine musical brilliance with a cultivated public persona as entertainer (bandleader, film actor, comic). His virtuoisity as a soloist led to abandonment of the previous standard practice in jazz of concentrating on individual instruments' relation to the group as a whole, and to increased importance of solos. Armstrong established the rhythmic approach to improvisation which became known as "swinging," and which led to swing as a specific genre of jazz.

In the 1936 book Swing That Music, Armstrong discussed his personal experiences in jazz, as well as the evolution of jazz and the transition from jazz to swing. Top COUNT BASIE (1904-1984) Renowned pianist, composer, and big band leader William "Count" Basie studied piano as a child with his mother, and was later influenced by James P. Johnson and mentored by Fats Waller. A vaudeville accompanist, Basie settled in Kansas City in 1927 when he found himself there without enough money for fare back east. There, Basie played with the Bennie Moten band, and he became the band's leader upon Moten's death in 1935. The band included saxophonist Lester Young, trumpeter Buck Clayton, and trumpeter-composer Thad Jones. By 1936, Basie's band was playing regular gigs at the Reno Club, from which there were many late-night radio broadcasts, often reaching as far as Chicago. Jazz critic and producer John Hammond heard one of these broadcasts and travelled to Kansas City to write about the band for Down Beat and to arrange a contract with the MCA talent agency.

Count Basie's band's work at Decca (1937-1939) and at Columbia (1939-1946) constitute some of the best-loved swing ever recorded: "One O'Clock Jump," "Jumpin' at the Woodside," "Taxi War Dance," "Miss Thing," "Lester Leaps In," etc. The Count Basie band was known for playing with the tightness and versatility of a smaller group, and for experimenting with innovative new rhythms which would inspire the transition into bebop. Basie's orchestra disbanded in 1950. The subsequent band Basie formed in 1952 relied less heavily on the improvisational power of soloists, and more on the organizational power of arrangers. Top DUKE ELLINGTON (1899-1974) An influential pioneer of the big band form. Composer, bandleader, and pianist Ellington brought prestige to jazz and, particularly, swing. He has been referred to as America's greatest composer in any genre. His fifty years as orchestra leader left thousands of compositions, ranging in size and scope from standards to extended suites.

Ellington's study of classical piano began at age seven, and his middle-class parents encouraged him to pursue it as a career. A year after beginning to play professionally, at seventeen, however, Ellington turned away from the classical style. Having been captivated by ragtime as a teenager, Ellington began to play jazz exclusively. In the early 1930s, Ellington's exotic "jungle style" captivated white audiences at the New York Cotton Club. As his career progressed, Ellington turned more and more towards concert, rather than nightclub or dance-hall settings. His stylistic innovation of grouping instruments from different sections of the band broke from the swing standard of pitting one instrument against another, and resulted in rich, unique sounds. In the 1950s, the tecnological move to the LP, which allowed extended play of twenty-five to thirty minutes per side, released the restriction of time, and Ellington started writing extended pieces. Among these was the Such Sweet Thunder suite, inspired by Shakespearean themes. Ellington's songs "Mood Indigo," "Solitude," "In A Sentimental Mood," and "Don't Get Around Much Anymore" remain pop standards.

The fact that he also created film scores, operas, ballets, Broadway shows, church music, and symphony orchestras contributed to Ellington's own prestige, and to that of the jazz and swing genres as a whole. Top BENNY GOODMAN (1909-1986) Goodman's pioneering work as a clarinetist and orchestra leader earned him the title "King of Swing." He was crucial in inspiring the movement of jazz from the margins to the mainstream. To many, the popularity he achieved, particularly with white audiences following a famed performance at the Palomar Ballroom in Los Angeles on August 21, 1935, signified the official beginning of the "Swing Era." By 1937, Goodman's performances were complete with screaming fans and ecstatic, jitterbugging bobby-soxers rushing the stage. In 1935, Goodman helmed the first interracial popular jazz band: the Benny Goodman Trio, with drummer Gene Krupa and pianist Teddy Wilson. This was one of many small groups in which Goodman played, in addition to his big band. This small-group swing inspired a return to the traditional jazz heritage of smaller performance groups.

Goodman thus indirectly inspired the genesis of post-Swing modern jazz, a style he did not favor. As a clarinet soloist Goodman received praise for technical cleanliness. Notorious for perfectionism, he was purportedly a difficult boss as bandleader. The "King of Swing" was immortalized in the 1955 biopic The Benny Goodman Story. Top BILLIE HOLIDAY (1915-1959) Influenced by Bessie Smith and Louis Armstrong, Billie Holiday is considered one of jazz's greatest vocalists. Her improvisational genius left its mark on popular standards, and she introduced the memorable "Strange Fruit" and "God Bless the Child." Holiday's father was a guitar and banjo player in Fletcher Henderson's band, and she entered the world of professional music as a teenager, signing with Columbia Records in 1933. Holiday had received no formal musical training, but quickly proved she could hold her own with swing's best. Her first recordings were with the bands of Benny Goodman and Count Basie, and she toured with Count Basie and Artie Shaw in 1937 and 1938.

Earning the nickname "Lady Day," Holiday attained great popularity in the New York club scene during the 1940s. Her post-war Decca recordings, epitomized by the hit "Lover Man," were extremely successful. However, struggles with heroin addiction led to a certain unevenness in quality, particularly by the 1950s, when Holiday recorded with Verve Records. In 1959, Billie Holiday died of a kidney ailment. Top GLENN MILLER (1904-1944) An enormously popular trombonist, composer, arranger and bandleader, Miller's music has come to serve as a sort of shorthand for the perseverant American spirit in the years leading up to, and during, World War II. The Glenn Miller Band was known for its romantic ballads on one hand, and for jubilant, energetic hard swing on the other. After a brief period of study at the University of Colorado at Boulder, Miller joined the Ben Pollack orchestra in California in 1924. Following a decade of steady work, in 1937 the ambitious Miller formed the first of several bands which would mark his meteoric rise.

After the failure of this band, one formed a year later signed with Victor Records and recorded "Moonlight Serenade," which exhibited the characteristic strong clarinet of Miller's work. With success at Long Island dance hall Glen Island Casino, Miller's band rose in popularity throughout 1939, achieving a huge hit with "In the Mood" in 1940. Miller appeared in two of the most successful big-band centered Hollywood films: Sun Valley Serenade (1941) and Orchestra Wives (1942). In 1942, Miller gave up his position as leader of America's most popular swing band in order to serve the war effort. After a standard stint in the Army Air Force, Miller became leader of the band at the Technical Training Command at Yale University. In June 1944, this band was transferred to England, where it played dances, concerts, broadcasts, and recording sessions daily. Once France was liberated, the Air Force band was to transfer to Paris. The band arrived there for a Christmas broadcast, but Miller himself never made it, his small plane having been lost in the English Channel on December 15. Miller's posthumous popularity was enormous.

In 1953, a saccharine biopic The Glenn Miller Story, achieved great success. Miller's brand of swing remains a window, for many, onto a uniquely American spirit and exuberance during a particularly trying time. Some critics question the Glenn Miller Band's place in the jazz canon, arguing that its style is at times far removed from the jazz tradition. Nevertheless, the superbly complex structure of Miller's swing pop standards gains praise as uncommon for popular music. Top FATS WALLER (1904-1943) A brilliant stride pianist and composer ("Honeysuckle Rose," "Ain't Misbehavin'"), Julliard-trained Fats Waller attained significant commercial success. Many believe, however, that this popularity occurred at the expense of full artistic freedom. Waller cultivated a slapstick comic persona; his humorous vocals appealed to a mainstream audience which may not have been willing to recognize Waller's true artistic abilities. Although Waller's minister father had expected his son to devote his life to religion, Waller began work as an organist at age 15. He studied with James P. Johnson, who proved a great influence.

Soon after his first recordings in 1922, other jazz and blues artists took note of Waller's great composition skill and began recording versions of his songs. Waller's immense popularity led to touring success on the West Coast and in Europe during the 1930s. He also appeared in successful films, most notably 1943's Stormy Weather. The stress of legal battles over alimony contributed to Waller's abrupt death of pneumonia at age 38. Top LESTER YOUNG (1909-1959) A product of the Kansas City Jazz scene of the mid-1930s, Lester Young broke onto the national scene as a member of Count Basie's band. Earning the nickname "Pres" (or "Prez") after Billie Holiday called him the "president of tenor saxophonists," Young's unique improvisational style left its mark on swing and inspired such modern jazz musicians as Charlie Parker, Stan Getz, and John Coltrane. His style was characterized by a "swinging" lightness of texture, a relaxed divergence from many of the swing orchestrations of the 1930s.

Young's most influential work includes "Taxi War Dance," "D.B. Blues," and "Lester Leaps In." Our band leader The Stardust Memories Big Band (SMBB) The Stardust Memories Big Band is the culmination of a life-long dream for Craig. His earliest musical influences came from his father, who frequently played big band records. Even before Craig played an instrument, he imagined himself playing the solo saxophone and clarinet parts he heard on records by Benny Goodman, Artie Shaw, Glenn Miller, Tommy Dorsey, and many other Big Band greats. Craig graduated from the University of Miami, with a double major in Jazz Performance and Music Business, and is one of South Floridaï¿½s most in-demand woodwind performers and studio musicians. He performs with many touring Broadway shows which have included Wicked, Spamalot, Anything Goes, Billy Elliot, Chicago, Hairspray and many others, and with international celebrities including Johnny Mathis, Bernadette Peters, Frankie Valli, the Four Tops, and the Temptations.

Locally, he has performed with the Naples Philharmonic, the Southwest Florida Symphony, the Charlotte Symphony, the Naples Jazz Orchestra, in the pit at Sugden Theater for The Naples Players, and many others. Musically, Craig's first love is the sound of the big band, specifically the classics from The Golden Age of The Big Bands ('30s, '40s and '50s). It is our sincere desire that you enjoy listening to us recreate these classics as much as we love playing them! ï¿½ Stardust Memories Big Band 2014 - 2016 All rights reserved Website Design and Maintenance by DDS Web Design LLC. Benny Goodman, May 30, 1909 - June 13, 1986 - Swing Dance Club Swing Dance Club East Coast Swing Benny Goodman, May 30, 1909 - June 13, 1986 Born in Chicago, Illinois in the United States, into a large, impoverished family of immigrants. Goodman experienced hard times while growing up.

Encouraged by his father to learn a musical instrument, Goodman and two of his brothers took lessons; as the youngest and smallest he learned to play the clarinet. These early studies took place at the Kehelah Jacob Synagogue and later at Hull House, a settlement house founded by reformer Jane Addams. From the start, Goodman displayed an exceptional talent and he received personal tuition from James Sylvester and then the renowned classicist Franz Schoepp. Before he was in his teens, Goodman had begun performing in public and was soon playing in bands with such emerging jazz artists as Jimmy McPartland, Frank Teschemacher and Dave Tough. Goodman's precocious talent allowed him to become a member of the American Federation of Musicians at the age of 14 and that same year he played with Bix Beiderbecke.

By his mid-teens Goodman was already established as a leading musician, working on numerous engagements with many bands to the detriment of his formal education.Goodman was using arrangements by leading writers of the day such as Fletcher Henderson and Lyle "Spud" Murphy, and including in his band musicians such as Bunny Berigan, trombonists Red Ballard and Jack Lacey, saxophonists Toots Mondello and Hymie Schertzer, and in the rhythm section George Van Eps and Frank Froeba, who were quickly replaced by Allen Reuss and Jess Stacy. Goodman's brother, Harry, was on bass, and the drummer was Stan King, who was soon replaced by the more urgent and exciting Gene Krupa. The band's singer was Helen Ward, one of the most popular band singers of the day. When the Let's Dance show ended, Goodman took the band on a nation-wide tour. Prompted in part by producer John Hammond Jnr.

and also by his desire for the band to develop, Goodman made many changes to the personnel, something he would continue to do throughout his career as a big band leader, and by the time the tour reached Los Angeles, in August 1935, the band was in extremely good form. Despite the success of the radio show and the band's records, the tour had met with mixed fortunes and some outright failures. However, business picked up on the west coast and on 21 August 1935 the band played a dance at the Palomar Ballroom in Los Angeles. They created a sensation and the massive success that night at the Palomar is generally credited as the time and place where the show business phenomenon which became known as the "swing era" was born. After an extended engagement at the Palomar the band headed back east, stopping over in Chicago for another extended run, this time at the Joseph Urban Room at the Congress Hotel. Earlier, Goodman had made some trio recordings using Krupa and pianist Teddy Wilson. The records sold well and he was encouraged by Helen Oakley, later Helen Oakley Dance, to feature Wilson in the trio at the hotel.

Goodman eventually was persuaded that featuring a racially mixed group in this manner was not a recipe for disaster and when the occasion passed unremarked, except for musical plaudits, he soon afterwards employed Wilson as a regular member of the featured trio. In 1936 he added Lionel Hampton to form the Benny Goodman Quartet and while this was not the first integrated group in jazz it was by far the one with the highest profile. Goodman's big band continued to attract huge and enthusiastic audiences. In the band now were leading swing era players such as Harry James, Ziggy Elman , Chris Griffin , Vernon Brown, Babe Russin and Arthur Rollini. Goodman had an especially successful date at the Paramount Theatre in New York, beginning on 3 March 1937, and his records continued to sell very well. Picture from

Question: Band leader Benny Goodman also played which instrument?
Answer: Clarinet