eMusic

Start Your Trial

Eddie Lang

Rate it!

Avg: 5.0 (4 ratings)

  • Born: Oct. 25, 1902 in Philadelphia, PA
  • Died:Mar. 26, 1933
  • Years Active: 1920s, 1930s

Biography

The first jazz guitar virtuoso, Eddie Lang was everywhere in the late '20s; all of his fellow musicians knew that he was the best. A boyhood friend of Joe Venuti, Lang took violin lessons for 11 years but switched to guitar before he turned professional. In 1924 he debuted with the Mound City Blue Blowers and was soon in great demand for recording dates, both in the jazz world and in commercial settings. His sophisticated chord patterns made him a superior accompanist who uplifted everyone else's music and Lang was also a fine single-note soloist. He often teamed up with violinist Venuti (including some classic duets) and played with Red Nichols's Five Pennies, Frankie Trumbauer and Bix Beiderbecke (most memorably on "Singing the Blues"), the orchestras of Roger Wolfe Kahn, Jean Goldkette and Paul Whiteman (appearing on one short number with Venuti in Whiteman's 1930 film The King of Jazz) and anyone else who could hire him. A measure of Lang's versatility and talents is that he mostly played the chordal parts on a series of duets with Lonnie Johnson (during which he used the pseudonym Blind Willie Dunn) yet on his two duets with Carl Kress (whose chord voicings were an advancement on Lang's), he played the single-note leads. Eddie Lang, who led some dates of his own during 1927-29, worked regularly with Bing Crosby during the early '30s in addition to recording many sessions with Venuti. Tragically his premature death was caused by a botched operation on a tonsillectomy.
— Scott Yanow , All Music Guide

Explore music recommended by Eddie Lang fans

“ The indie iTunes — Hardcore music fans are migrating to eMusic, the iTunes Music Store's cheaper, cooler cousin.”


Rolling Stone
Start Your Trial

© 1998-2009 eMusic.com Inc. eMusic and the eMusic logo are either registered trademarks or trademarks in the USA or other countries. All rights reserved.

All Music Guide © 1992 - 2009 All Media Guide, LLC
Portions of content provided by All Music Guide, a trademark of All Media Guide, LLC

Facebook®, YouTube, Flickr™ and Wikipedia® are registered trademarks of their respective owners, Facebook Inc., Google, Inc., Yahoo! Inc. and Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. Neither Facebook Inc., Google, Inc., Yahoo! Inc. nor Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. are partners or sponsors of eMusic. eMusic uses the Facebook, Flickr, YouTube and Wikipedia API but is not endorsed or certified by Facebook, Flickr, YouTube and Wikipedia. eMusic does not pre-screen, monitor, endorse nor assume any liability for websites, contents, products, services or claims made by Facebook, YouTube, Flickr™ and Wikipedia®.

Legal or copyright question regarding Facebook, YouTube, Flickr or Wikipedia content on eMusic? Please email us.