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The great veteran pianist Jay McShann (also known as Hootie) enjoyed a long career and it is unfair to primarily think of him as merely the leader of an orchestra that featured a young Charlie Parker. He was mostly self-taught as a pianist, worked with Don Byas as early as 1931 and played throughout the Midwest before settling in Kansas City in 1936. McShann formed his own sextet the following year and by 1939 had his own big band. In 1940 at a radio station in Wichita, KS, McShann and an octet out of his orchestra recorded eight songs that were not released commercially until the 1970s; those rank among the earliest of all Charlie Parker records (he is brilliant on "Honeysuckle Rose" and "Lady Be Good") and also feature the strong rhythm section team McShann had with bassist Gene Ramey and drummer Gus Johnson. The full orchestra recorded for Decca on two occasions during 1941-1942 but they were typecast as a blues band and did not get to record many of their more challenging charts (although very rare broadcasts have since surfaced and been released on CD by Vintage Jazz Classics). In addition to Bird (who had a few short solos), the main stars were trumpeter Bernard Anderson, the rhythm section, and singer Walter Brown. McShann and his band arrived in New York in February 1942 and made a strong impression, but World War II made it difficult for any new orchestras to catch on. There was a final session in December 1943 without Parker, but McShann was soon drafted and the band broke up. After being discharged later in 1944, McShann briefly re-formed his group but soon moved to Los Angeles, where he led combos for the next few years; his main attraction was the young singer Jimmy Witherspoon.
McShann was in obscurity for the next two decades, making few records and mostly playing in Kansas City. In 1969 he was rediscovered and McShann (who had first sung on records in 1966) was soon a popular pianist/vocalist. Sometimes featuring violinist Claude Williams, he toured constantly, recorded frequently, and appeared at many jazz festivals, being active into the mid-'90s. Jay McShann, who recorded through the years for Onyx (the 1940 radio transcriptions), Decca, Capitol, Aladdin, Mercury, Black Lion, EmArcy, Vee Jay, Black & Blue, Master Jazz, Sackville, Sonet, Storyville, Atlantic, Swingtime, and Music Masters among others, was a vital pianist and an effective blues vocalist who keept a classic style alive. A live album, Hootie Blues, recorded in 2001 in Toronto and released in 2006 by Stony Plain, showed that McShann could still bring it at the age of 85. He died at the age of 90 on December 7, 2006.
from Wikipedia:
Jay McShann (January 12, 1916 – December 7, 2006) was an American Grammy Award-nominated jump blues, mainstream jazz, and swing bandleader, pianist and singer.
During the 1940s, McShann was at the forefront of blues and hard bop jazz musicians mainly from Kansas City. He assembled his own big band, with musicians that included some of the most influential artists of their time, including Charlie Parker, Bernard Anderson, Ben Webster and Walter Brown. His kind of music became known as "the Kansas City sound"
McShann died on December 7, 2006, at St. Luke's Hospital in Kansas City. Jay McShann was survived by his companion of more than 30 years, Thelma Adams (known as Marianne McShann), and three daughters - Linda McShann Gerber, Jayne McShann Lewis, and Pam McShann.
Biography
Nicknamed "Hootie", McShann was born James Columbus McShann in Muskogee, Oklahoma. Musically, his education came from Earl Hines' late-night broadcasts from Chicago's Grand Terrace Cafe: "When 'Fatha' [Hines] went off the air, I went to bed". He began working as a professional musician in 1931, performing around Tulsa, Oklahoma and neighboring Arkansas.
Orchestra
He moved to Kansas City, Missouri in 1936, and set up his own big band, which featured variously Charlie Parker (1937–1942), Al Hibbler, Lawrence Anderson, Ben Webster, Paul Quinichette, Bernard Anderson, Gene Ramey, Jimmy Coe, Gus Johnson (1938–1943), Harold "Doc" West, Earl Coleman and Walter Brown, among others. His first recordings were all with Charlie Parker, the first as 'The Jay McShann Orchestra' on August 9, 1940.
Although they included both swing and blues numbers, the band played blues on most of its records; its most popular recording was "Confessin' the Blues." The group disbanded when McShann was drafted into the Army in 1944 and, the big band era being over, he was unable to successfully restart it when he got out.
Smaller groups
After World War II McShann began to lead small groups featuring blues shouter Jimmy Witherspoon. Witherspoon started recording with McShann in 1945, and fronting McShann's band, and had a hit in 1949 with "Ain't Nobody's Business." As well as writing much material, Witherspoon continued recording with McShann's band, which also featured Ben Webster, until 1951, whence McShann then played in obscurity until 1969.
McShann later became popular as a singer as well as a pianist, often performing with violinist Claude Williams. He continued recording and touring through the 1990s. Well into his 80s, McShann still performed occasionally, particularly in the Kansas City area and Toronto, Ontario where he made his last recording ['Hootie Blues'] in February 2001 after a recording career of 61 years.
Influence
On one of their earliest albums, Five by Five (a UK EP) and 12x5 (a US LP) (both 1964), The Rolling Stones recorded a cover of "Confessin' the Blues", a song McShann had co-written with Walter Brown in the 1940s.
Crime-fiction writer Elmore Leonard featured McShann as a character in his 2005 novel, The Hot Kid.
