[Dixielandjazz] Greenspan & Woody - Redux

[Fred Spencer]

You are correct in suggesting that the article may be inaccurate - it is in
one instance. Leonard Garment wrote in his autobiogaphy,"I went to law
school in 1946", so he wasn't there in 1944 when he was with the Jerome
band. Couldn't Greenspan have done what Garment did-"college by day, and
music by night"? I assume that his intelligence would have made him more
successful than his former bandmate.Cheers.
Fred
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Stephen Barbone" <barbonestreet at earthlink.net>
To: "Dixieland Jazz Mailing List" <dixielandjazz at ml.islandnet.com>
Sent: Thursday, December 04, 2003 12:16 PM
Subject: [Dixielandjazz] Greenspan & Woody - Redux


> Can anybody find anything in the many biographies of Alan Greenspan that
> he played with Woody Herman? I cannot, but that doesn't prove anything.
>
> As to whether Greenspan played with Herman in 1944 as others suggest,
> please note the following from a New Yorker profile of Alan Greenspan,
> by John Cassidy -- 4/24 and 5/1/2000: (which of course may be inaccurate
> also)
>
> "Music was another passion, which he inherited from his mother.  At
> family gatherings, Greenspan was a star attraction.  His uncles would
> give him a dime to sing the Depression song 'Brother, Can You Spare a
> Dime?'"
>
>  "When Greenspan finished high school, he applied to Juilliard and spent
> two years there, studying the saxophone and the clarinet.  In 1944, at
> the end of his sophomore year, he dropped out and decided to try to make
> some money by playing professionally.
>
> "It was the beginning of the bebop era. Jazz orchestras, featuring
> virtuosos like Dizzy Gillespie, were starting to emerge; and some of the
> old swing bands were forced to update themselves.  One such outfit was
> the Henry Jerome Band, which played regularly at the Childs restaurant
> in the Paramount Theatre building, in Times Square.  The band's manager,
> who also played in its horn section, was a young law student named
> Leonard Garment - the same Leonard Garment who went on to become
> President Nixon's counsel during Watergate."
>
> "Greenspan enjoyed the show-business life, but soon realized it wasn't a
> viable career.  'I was a pretty good amateur musician, but I was average
> as a professional'. During his time in the band, Greenspan had started
> reading books about business and finance and he found them fascinating.
> In 1945, he quit and started taking classes at New York University's
> business school."
>
> If the above is accurate. From 1942 to 1944 Greenspan was at Julliard.
> 1944 to 1945, he was playing with Henry Jerome's band. From 1945 to 1948
> he attended New York University majoring in Economics, graduating Summa
> Cum Laude. Based on the above, graduated from hight school on 1942. No
> mean feat for a man born in 1926, who would have been 16 in 1942, in
> case we are wondering why he wasn't drafted.
>
> Cheers,
> Steve Barbone
>
>
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