Jimmy Cleveland

All Music Guide:

One of the finest trombonists to emerge during the 1950s, Jimmy Cleveland has been overlooked since moving to Los Angeles in the late '60s. He started on trombone when he was 16, and his first important job was with Lionel Hampton (1950-1953). After Hampton's European tour of 1953, Cleveland became a busy freelance musician in New York, making many recording sessions (including with Dizzy Gillespie, Gil Evans, Oliver Nelson, Oscar Pettiford, Lucky Thompson, James Moody, and Gerry Mulligan). He toured Europe with Quincy Jones in 1959-1960, and played with Thelonious Monk's 1967 octet, but otherwise stayed in New York until going to the West Coast to play with The Merv Griffin Show's band and to continue recording for Quincy Jones. Jimmy Cleveland remains one of the most technically skilled of the bop-based trombonists, and still appears on an irregular basis in Los Angeles clubs.

Wikipedia:

Jimmy Cleveland (May 3, 1926 – August 23, 2008) was an American jazz trombonist born in Wartrace, Tennessee.

Cleveland worked with many well-known jazz musicians, including Lionel Hampton, Miles Davis, Sarah Vaughan, Antonio Carlos Jobim, Quincy Jones, Lucky Thompson, Gigi Gryce, Oscar Peterson, Oscar Pettiford and James Brown. He also recorded a sequence of albums for EmArcy/Mercury Records in the 1950s and 1960s. He continued to make records with Zion Records later in his career.

Cleveland died August 23, 2008 in Lynwood, California at age 82.