[Dixielandjazz] Tommy Whittle RIP

[Marek Boym]

Strange that the late Tommy Whittle should be described as "modern."  I
consider it badmouthing!  I liked Whittle's playing.  I first heard him in
either 1976 or 1977 at the 100 Club, with Bud Freeman, and the two
complemented each other very well.  Sure, he was not as "hot" as Freeman,
but certainly not "cool" like Stan Getz (to whom he is campared in the
obit).  Probably more in the Lester Young school, swinging like hell!
Actually, he started the proceedings without Freeman, and wounded very
good.  Then Freeman came in and they played together.  To me sounding good
with Bud Freeman - my all-time favourite tenor saxophonist - is not a mean
complement.
Cheers



On 24 October 2013 05:20, ROBERT R. CALDER <serapion at btinternet.com> wrote:

> I remember him with the Big Band got together for Benny Carter
>
> at the Glasgow Jazz Festival where Benny suddenly started writing
>
> the Glasgow suite Ken Mathieson has been reviving
>
>
> Robert R. Calder
>
>
>
> AND HERE FROM THE DAILY TELEGRAPH
> Tommy Whittle
> Tommy Whittle was a saxophonist who abandoned dance bands and became one
> of  the best-known modern jazzmen in Britain
>
> 6:28PM BST 23 Oct 2013
> Tommy Whittle, who has died on his 87th birthday, was a saxophonist
> of  outstanding flair and technical command; a prominent member of the
> British  jazz generation that arose in the immediate post-war years, he
> combined a  high reputation as a soloist with a successful career as a
> bandleader and  studio musician.
> Thomas Whittle was born on October 13 1926 at Grangemouth, the second son
> of a  Firth of Forth river pilot. He began learning the clarinet aged 13
> and a  year later acquired a tenor saxophone from a neighbour, the
> future  celebrated painter Alan Davie. He played his first professional
> engagement,  in a dance band at Bo’ness Town Hall, when he was 15.
> Concerned that their son had achieved nothing at school and seemed to
> be  getting into louche company among dance hall musicians, his parents
> sent the  16-year-old Whittle south, to live with his maternal grandparents
> at Chatham  and seek a respectable job. Almost immediately he fell in with
> another  teenage musician, the drummer Ronnie Verrell, and soon the pair of
> them were  fully employed playing in the band at The Pavillion, Gillingham.
> Tommy Whittle at Ronnie Scott's in 2010 (DAVID SINCLAIR)
> Related Articles
>     * Cedar Walton 20 Aug 2013
>     * Marian McPartland 21 Aug 2013
>     * Jim Godbolt 25 Jan 2013
> In 1944 Whittle moved to London to join a band led by the Dutch
> trumpeter  Johnny Claes, from which he soon moved to the Lew Stone
> Orchestra, a touring  show-band which topped the bill in variety theatres.
> “My call-up papers  followed me around from town to town, and finally
> caught up with me at  Green’s Playhouse, Glasgow,” he recalled in an
> interview many years later.  Rejected for military service because of an
> old shoulder injury, he was told  he would probably be sent to work in
> munitions, but Stone arranged to have  him issued with an Ensa card and
> registered as a Forces’ entertainer.
> From Lew Stone, Whittle moved through a series of nightclub and
> dance-band  jobs until, in March 1947, he joined Ted Heath and his Music,
> Britain’s most  popular dance band (“although not many people danced to us;
> mostly they just  stood and listened”). With Heath, Whittle led a
> seven-piece jazz  “band-within-a-band”, which was featured in each set.
> Three Whittle  compositions, recorded by this group in 1951 for the
> Melodisc label, reveal  him as an assured soloist in the Stan Getz style
> and adept at scoring in the  close-voiced bebop manner.
> After five years, Whittle gave in his notice. “Ted just couldn’t
> understand  it. He thought I’d gone mad,” he recalled. But, as others were
> later to  discover, playing in the Heath band, with its rigid routines and
> lack of  opportunity for self-expression, could become unbearably tedious
> to a young  musician with a spark of creativity — money and prestige
> notwithstanding.
> He escaped to Studio 51, a basement in Great Newport Street, where he
> joined  the Tony Kinsey Trio for three sessions a week. As his jazz muscles
> loosened  up, he recalled, “I began to feel good about what I had done —
> that I had  made the right move.” And so it turned out.
> A few months later he joined the newly formed BBC Showband, led by
> Cyril  Stapleton, recruited specifically for his talents as a jazz soloist.
> The  Showband was permanently based in London and made three broadcasts a
> week,  leaving plenty of scope for freelance jazz activities. These
> included  forming his own quintet for jazz club appearances.
> As a featured soloist with the BBC Showband, Whittle became one of
> the  best-known modern jazz players in Britain. He was voted “Top Tenor
> Sax” in  both Melody Maker and New Musical Express readers’ polls in 1955
> and 1956.  Encouraged by this, he formed a 10-piece touring band, but soon
> discovered  that the growing British audience for modern jazz, while
> enthusiastic, was  too scattered to support the venture. It folded after
> little more than a  year.
> In 1958 Whittle took the job of musical director at the Dorchester Hotel,
> with  a brief to “modernise” its musical profile. This proved difficult
> with a  conservative clientele, and Whittle twice offered to resign; but
> his  misgivings were waved aside and he was assured that all was well. In
> the  event he remained in the post until 1961, when the ballroom closed
> for  rebuilding.
> He moved to Jack Parnell’s ATV orchestra, based at Borehamwood Studios,
> which  at that time was virtually the old Ted Heath band in exile. During
> Whittle’s  12 years in its ranks it accompanied every major star in popular
> music and  light entertainment. For several years during his tenure with
> ATV he also  ran a weekly jazz club at the Hopbine pub in Wembley, which
> unashamedly  declared itself as a showcase for British jazz. Simply to
> appear there came  to be regarded as a mark of distinction.
> Whittle’s later career included periods with the BBC Big Band, the
> posthumous  Ted Heath orchestra (directed by Don Lusher), the Pizza Express
> All-Stars,  and innumerable appearances as a guest jazz soloist, as far
> afield as  Australia. He also recorded a number of albums, notably Grace
> Notes  (Spotlite Records, 2004). At the same time he was much occupied as
> musical  director of two shows, The Ella Fitzgerald Songbook and Ladies Of
> Jazz,  devised by his second wife, the singer Barbara Jay.
> Tommy Whittle was twice married. His first wife predeceased him, and he
> is  survived by Barbara Jay and two sons of his first marriage.
> Tommy Whittle, born October 13 1926, died October 13 2013
>
>
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