[Dixielandjazz] Marie Marcus RIP

[Harry Epp]

Hi All:
I just heard marie marcus passed away. She was a real player
Harry Eppp

October 19, 2003

Marie Marcus, 89, Jazz Pianist and Fats Waller Protégée, Dies

By DOUGLAS MARTIN

      arie Marcus, a jazz pianist who was a protégée of Fats Waller and
appeared on Manhattan's 52nd Street, the prewar
      epicenter of jazz, before becoming a summer fixture in nightclubs
on Cape Cod, died on Oct. 10 in Hyannis, Mass. She
was 89.

In a book about jazz personalities, "Barney, Bradley, and Max" (Oxford,
1989), the jazz critic Whitney Balliett suggested that
Mrs. Marcus's talent and experience elevated her into a higher league
than the normal run of resort acts. "At first, her style
seems a simple mélange of chunky chords and brief connective runs, but on
closer examination it is a repository of the jazz
piano playing of the thirties and forties," he wrote.

Marie Eleanor Doherty, an only child, was born in Roxbury, Mass., on May
25, 1914. Her father, a plumber, and her mother
were elegant ballroom dancers and had a player piano in the house with
rolls by the likes of Waller.

She started playing the piano at 4 and studied at the New England
Conservatory of Music while attending Roxbury Memorial
High. She started in children's radio shows and ended up in Manhattan
playing the piano on a national radio show for NBC as
well as in clubs, under the name Marie Doherty. 

When Waller persuaded her to play in an after-hours club in Harlem, he
pointed to his heart and said, "For a white girl, you
sure got it there."

She asked him whether he knew a good piano teacher. He answered, "How
about me?" and gave her lessons when he was in
town.

With the licks she absorbed from him, she made it to 52nd Street, the
epicenter of jazz, where she played at the Swing Club.

At the end of her New York years, she led a 12-piece band and, after
several musicians were drafted, a six-piece one. Her
agent sent her to the Coonamessett Club in Falmouth on Cape Cod, in part
to help her relax from the exhausting work. The
respite became a happy 40-year residency, and she became popular with
both locals and tourists. 

President Kennedy came to hear her and Alma Gates White play as the
"piano mamas" at the Panama Club in Hyannis.

For many years, she also spent winters performing in Miami Beach. In the
1950's, she appeared on television shows like Steve
Allen's "Tonight" show and the "Dave Garroway Show."

In 1937, she married Jack Brown, a singer. They later separated, and he
died. She later married Bill Marcus, a trumpet player
and later a lawyer. He died in 1965.

She is survived by her sons, Jack Brown, of Quincy, Mass., and William
Marcus, of Fort Lauderdale; her daughters, Mary
Liles and Barbara Marcus, both of St. Petersburg, Fla.; eight
grandchildren; and eight great-grandchildren.

________________________________________________________________
The best thing to hit the internet in years - Juno SpeedBand!
Surf the web up to FIVE TIMES FASTER!
Only $14.95/ month - visit www.juno.com to sign up today!