A sonic exploration and tonal analysis of contemporary creative music in a myriad of improvisational/composed settings, textures, and expressions.
Welcome to Sound Projections
I'm your host Kofi Natambu. This online magazine features the very best in contemporary creative music in this creative timezone NOW (the one we're living in) as well as that of the historical past. The purpose is to openly explore, examine, investigate, reflect on, studiously critique, and take opulent pleasure in the sonic and aural dimensions of human experience known and identified to us as MUSIC. I'm also interested in critically examining the wide range of ideas and opinions that govern our commodified notions of the production, consumption, marketing, and commercial exchange of organized sound(s) which largely define and thereby (over)determine our present relationships to music in the general political economy and culture.
Thus this magazine will strive to critically question and go beyond the conventional imposed notions
and categories of what constitutes the generic and stylistic definitions of ‘Jazz’, ‘classical music’, ‘Blues.’
'Rhythm and Blues’, ‘Rock and Roll’, ‘Pop’, ‘Funk’, ‘Hip Hop’, etc. in order to search for what individual
artists and ensembles do cretively to challenge and transform our ingrained ideas and attitudes of what
music is and could be.
So please join me in this ongoing visceral, investigative, and cerebral quest to explore, enjoy, and pay
homage to the endlessly creative and uniquely magisterial dimensions of MUSIC in all of its guises and expressive identities.
Saturday, March 2, 2019
Earl Hines (1903-1983): Legendary, iconic, and innovative musician, composer, arranger, ensemble leader, producer, and teacher
Once called "the first modern jazz pianist," Earl Hines
differed from the stride pianists of the 1920s by breaking up the
stride rhythms with unusual accents from his left hand. While his right
hand often played octaves so as to ring clearly over ensembles, Hines
had the trickiest left hand in the business, often suspending time
recklessly but without ever losing the beat. One of the all-time great
pianists, Hines was a major influence on Teddy Wilson, Jess Stacy, Joe Sullivan, Nat King Cole, and even to an extent on Art Tatum.
He was also an underrated composer responsible for "Rosetta," "My
Monday Date," and "You Can Depend on Me," among others. Earl Hines
played trumpet briefly as a youth before switching to piano. His first
major job was accompanying vocalist Lois Deppe, and he made his first
recordings with Deppe and his orchestra in 1922. The following year, Hines moved to Chicago where he worked with Sammy Stewart and Erskine Tate's Vendome Theatre Orchestra. He started teaming up with Louis Armstrong in 1926, and the two masterful musicians consistently inspired each other. Hines worked briefly in Armstrong's big band (formerly headed by Carroll Dickerson), and they unsuccessfully tried to manage their own club. 1928 was one of Hines'
most significant years. He recorded his first ten piano solos,
including versions of "A Monday Date," "Blues in Thirds," and "57
Varieties." Hines worked much of the year with Jimmy Noone's Apex Club Orchestra, and their recordings are also considered classic. Hines
cut brilliant (and futuristic) sides with Louis Armstrong's Hot Five,
resulting in such timeless gems as "West End Blues," "Fireworks," "Basin
Street Blues," and their remarkable trumpet-piano duet "Weather Bird."
And on his birthday on December 28, Hines debuted with his big band at Chicago's Grand Terrace. A brilliant ensemble player as well as soloist, Earl Hines would lead big bands for the next 20 years. Among the key players in his band through the 1930s would be trumpeter/vocalist Walter Fuller, Ray Nance on trumpet and violin (prior to joining Duke Ellington), trombonist Trummy Young, tenor saxophonist Budd Johnson, Omer Simeon and Darnell Howard on reeds, and arranger Jimmy Mundy. In 1940, Billy Eckstine became the band's popular singer, and in 1943 (unfortunately during the musicians' recording strike), Hines welcomed such modernists as Charlie Parker (on tenor), trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie, and singer Sarah Vaughan in what was the first bebop orchestra. By the time the strike ended, Eckstine, Parker, Gillespie, and Vaughan were gone, but tenor Wardell Gray was still around to star with the group during 1945-1946. In 1948, the economic situation forced Hines to break up his orchestra. He joined the Louis Armstrong All-Stars, but three years of playing second fiddle to his old friend were difficult to take. After leaving Armstrong in 1951, Hines moved to Los Angeles and later San Francisco, heading a Dixieland band. Although his style was much more modern, Hines kept the group working throughout the 1950s, at times featuring Muggsy Spanier, Jimmy Archey, and Darnell Howard. Hines did record on a few occasions, but was largely forgotten in the jazz world by the early '60s. Then, in 1964, jazz writer Stanley Dance arranged for him to play three concerts at New York's Little Theater, both solo and in a quartet with Budd Johnson. The New York critics were amazed by Hines' continuing creativity and vitality, and he had a major comeback that lasted through the rest of his career. Hines
traveled the world with his quartet, recorded dozens of albums, and
remained famous and renowned up until his death at the age of 79. Most
of the many recordings from his career are currently available on CD.
A brilliant keyboard virtuoso, Earl “Fatha” Hines was one of the
first great piano soloists in jazz, and one of the very few musicians
who could hold his own with Louis Armstrong. His so-called 'trumpet'
style used doubled octaves in the right hand to produce a clear melodic
line that stood out over the sound of a whole band, but he also had a
magnificent technical command of the entire range of the keyboard. Earl
Kenneth Hines was born into a musical family in Duquesne, Pennsylvania,
on December 28, 1905. His father worked as a foreman at the local coal
docks and played cornet with the Eureka Brass Band, a group that
performed at picnics and dances. His mother, played organ and gave him
his first piano lessons. Hines's sister, Nancy, also played organ, and
his brother, Boots, played piano; his aunt sang light opera and his
uncle played a variety of brass instruments. At age nine Hines started
taking piano lessons, but he soon outgrew his teacher. He then studied
classical technique under Von Holz, a teacher who introduced him to
exercise books, and began to dream of becoming a concert pianist. In
his teens Hines moved to Pittsburgh, where he attended Schenley High
School and continued to study music. His musical direction changed
abruptly when family members took Hines to the Liederhouse, a club
featuring jazz, and he fell in love with the rhythm-filled music. After
discovering the burgeoning jazz scene, he abandoned his plans to play
classical music and immersed himself in jazz. At age 15 he formed a
group with a violinist and drummer, and soon the trio was performing at
high school functions, nightclubs, and church socials. Because Hines
worked many late-night engagements, he decided to leave school when he
was 16. In 1922 Hines went to work with singer/band leader Lois B.
Deppe at the Liederhouse, where he earned $15 a week. The band made
forays into West Virginia, Ohio, and New York City, and in 1923 the
young pianist traveled to Richmond, Indiana, where he attended his first
recording session. In 1924 Hines led his own band for a short time and
then, following the advice of pianist Eubie Blake, he moved to Chicago.
In Chicago he met a cadre of first-class musicians, including Louis
Armstrong, Jelly Roll Morton, and Benny Goodman, who were beginning to
re-write the rules of jazz. In 1927 he joined with Armstrong and Zutty
Singleton, and the trio performed a regular gig at the Café Sunset, an
establishment that catered to gangsters and other high-dollar rollers.
When the club temporarily closed in 1927, the band broke up and Hines
joined clarinetist Jimmy Noone's band at the Apex Club. Armstrong,
however, would soon call again, and together the old friends would make
jazz history. In 1928 Hines rejoined Louis Armstrong on the Hot
Five and Hot Seven recording sessions, playing on the classic “West End
Blues”, “Fireworks”, “Basin Street Blues” and composing “ A Monday
Date”, the young pianist was transformed from a local talent with
potential into a jazz innovator to be emulated. Hines played with
drummer Singleton, banjoist Mancy Cara, trombonist Fred Robinson, and
clarinetist Jimmy Strong, and the group broke new ground, opening up a
range of new musical possibilities for jazz players. Hines, was
Armstrong's match, and the two traded solos and ideas, taking one
another to new heights. No one had ever played the piano like that. He
fashioned complex, irregular single- note patterns in the right hand,
octave chords with brief tremolos that suggested a vibrato, stark single
notes, and big flatted chords. The same year, Hines recorded as a
soloist. He went into the studio in and recorded his first ten piano
solos including versions of “A Monday Date,” “Blues in Third”, and “57
Varieties”. On December 28, 1928, Hines's birthday, he began
leading his own big band at the Grand Terrace Ballroom, a luxurious
Chicago nightspot partly owned by Al Capone. “The Grand Terrace was the
Cotton Club of Chicago,” Hines said, “and we were a show band as much as
a dance band and a jazz band.” Hines and his orchestra worked seven
days a week, performing three shows a night on weekdays and four shows
on Saturdays. A national broadcast popularized the band outside Chicago,
and the group spent two to three months of each year touring. The band
also became one of the first African-American groups to travel widely in
the South during the 1930s. Hines earned his nickname during this
period. After he had given a radio announcer a “fatherly” lecture about
his immoderate drinking, the announcer began introducing the pianist as
“Father” Hines. The Grand Terrace band recorded frequently, and
throughout the 1930s scored a number of hits, including “G.T. Stomp,”
“Harlem Laments,” and “You Can Depend on Me.” Hines remained at the
Grand Terrace for 11 years and then, believing he was underpaid, left
with his band in 1940. Hines held his band together for the next
eight years, and they continued to perform such popular hits as “Jelly
Jelly,” “Boogie-Woogie on the St. Louis Blues,” and “Stormy Monday
Blues.”. Billy Eckstine became the band's popular singer and in 1943
both Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker were added. In 1946 Hines
suffered an injury in an automobile accident that caused him to curtail
his touring; by 1948, due to a decline in the popularity of big bands,
he broke up the 24-member group. Later in 1948 Hines reverted to sideman
status and rejoined his old friend Armstrong. Louis Armstrong's All
Stars toured Europe in 1948-49, and attended the 1948 jazz festival at
Nice, France. In 1951 Hines left Armstrong to work in a number of
smaller settings. In September of 1955, Hines settled into a
regular job at the Hangover Club in San Francisco, one of the last
bastions for more traditional forms of jazz. Although he toured
annually, traveling to Canada, England, and the European continent, the
Hangover Club was his mainstay during the late 1950s and early 1960s. In
1963 Hines opened his own club in Oakland, but the venture was
short-lived. In 1964 he abandoned his low profile by playing a
successful series of dates at the Little Theatre in New York, and the
pianist was once more in great demand. In 1966 Hines joined the State
Department's jazz combo and traveled to Russia as a goodwill ambassador.
During the 1970s he continued to tour the United States and the world
with his quartet, and recorded prolifically during this period, turning
out classics like “Tour De Force” and “Quintessential Continued” with
natural ease. Although Hines disliked his nickname, critics have
pointed out that it is an appropriate one: he is indeed the father of
modern jazz piano. Before him, most jazz pianists were either blues
performers, or stride pianists, Hines filled the space between these
approaches with an almost hornlike style. Today jazz aficionados accept
the piano as a mainstay of jazz, thanks to Hines's seminal work with
Armstrong and his work as a soloist in 1928. Unlike some early jazz
performers, he continued to embrace new music over his 50-year career,
and his personal style continued to grow in complexity. Even at the late
stage of his career, Hines constantly took chances and came up with
surprising and consistently fresh ideas. Despite heart problems and
arthritis, Hines performed until a week before his death in Oakland,
California, on April 22, 1983 Aptly referred to as “the first
modern jazz pianist,” Earl Hines differed from the stride pianists of
the 1920s by breaking up the stride rhythms with unusual accents from
his left hand. While his right hand often played octaves so as to ring
clearly over ensembles, Hines had the trickiest left hand in the
business, often suspending time recklessly but without ever losing the
beat. Earl “Fatha” Hines left a discography of well over one
hundred albums alone, not counting the early sides, and hundreds of
sessions as accompanist and sideman. Source: James Nadal
Earl “Fatha” Hines, often called 'the father of modern jazz piano,'
recalls his innovative years with Louis Armstrong with Siegfried H. Mohr
in an interview first published in Le Jazz Hot magazine in Paris in the 70s. Mr. Mohr is an expert in historical piano styles.
Note from the author: “This is my interview with Earl
Hines for the 70th anniversary special edition of “Jazz Hot” magazine
(Paris). I presented this to Louis Armstrong onstage at his 70th
birthday concert in Los Angeles, and then I had it published by “Coda”
(Canada) in English.” Mohr: Mr. Hines, I have been asked to interview you
about the era in the twenties when you played with Louis Armstrong and
then about the later years with the Louis Armstrong All Star Band. Hines Now, Armstrong and I have always been buddies
from the beginning, we went into the Sunset Cafe together with Carroll
Dickerson's Orchestra, see? This was right across 35th Street from the
Plantation Cafe where King Oliver was playing. With Darnell Howard on
clarinet and alto, Honoré Dutrey on trombone and Tubby Hall on drums
this band won quick recognition in Chicago. And then there's not too
much to say other than what we were doing in the Club just as any other
ordinary band. We went into the Sunset in the spring of 1926. Finally,
they let Carroll Dickerson go as a leader in 1927 and they gave Louis
the band and made me the director of the band. Then Louis and I ran
around together. We were inseparable you know, the whole time we were in
the Sunset. So, there's nothing much there's to be said about this time
with Louis other than we were just like two brothers. Mohr: Was it during this time that you started to
make the legendary recordings with Louis, thus creating a new milestone
in music because it was for the first time—it seems to me—that the
individual performer became very important? Hines Yes, Louis and I recorded in small-group
recording sessions, one of which was called Johnny Dodds' Black Bottom
Stompers for Vocalion in April, 1927, doing Wild Man Blues and
Melancholy. A little while later, still in ‘27, we recorded under the
name of Louis Armstrong and His Stompers. These were my first recordings
with Armstrong. Mohr: Concerning your then-famous 'trumpet piano
style' which was strongly featured in those Armstrong dates how did you
evolve that? Hines Well, you see, it so happens that a lot of
people don't tell the truth about it but coming from me, my father
played cornet and my mother played organ and I wanted to play cornet but
at that time they didn't have this system of non-pressure so I picked
the doggone thing up and blew it and it used to hurt me behind my ears;
so when I learned piano after I studied classics in piano and then
decided to go into the rhythm side of music I said, well, what I wanted
to do on trumpet the way I wanted to play 'cornet' at that time I just
played it on the piano, you see. Now, there were such guys as Joe Smith,
Gus Aikens—very good trumpet players at that time that I decided to
copy some of my style off of them. Now, anybody who ever heard of Joe
Smith—he had a very smooth style of playing and so did Gus Aiken. Joe
Smith was with the Fletcher Henderson Band and Gus Aiken was with the
Tennessee Ten Band. This is where I actually got my style and then with
what I played on the piano the things I learned I certainly got in there
in my style, you know. When I got to Chicago I was amazed to find a
trumpet player like Louis who was playing the things that I wanted to
play. You see, so we were actually playing the same things, the same
style, only he was playing on trumpet, I was playing on piano. So we
used to copy from each other—if he used to make a run I'd steal it and
say thank you and I'd make one and he'd steal it and say thank you and
those kind of things. That's how my trumpet style piano came. So many
people think that I've got it from Armstrong but l didn't! I was playing
this way before I met Louis because when I made the records with him I
was already playing like this. The way they hear me. So, many people
have misunderstood that, not that I feel envious toward Louis—I don't
mean it that way I just want to let people know that there are other
people that were involved in my getting that particular style: Joe Smith
and Gus Aiken—they played the way I'd have wanted to play trumpet and
it was similar to the things that Louis was playing—you see—but these
were unknowns. Mohr: The repertoire you played with Armstrong, was
that a mutual thing that was already established? Had you both played
the numbers before or did you work them out at the time you played
together? Hines Well, you see, they were nothing but standard
tunes with the exception of his originals and we used to do the "head
arrangements" at that time and by being advanced on your own instruments
all you had to do is tell a guy "you play this" and "you play this" and
so forth and first thing you know we had an arrangement. But these are
all standard things that we were playing, just everybody played their
own style. And that's what that was as far as Louis is concerned. Louis
and I, we just enjoyed each other's work. Louis was a happy-go-lucky
fellow at that time and so was I and we ran around together. I couldn't
start to tell you the things we did together. And even today, he called
me when I was in New Orleans and I talked almost a half hour on the
phone. We're the best of pals. But the styles we had—it just so happened
that I was playing the things similar to the things he was playing—not
the same things but similar to it. But the idea was, it was "trumpet
style" - in other words, I used octaves to be heard—I used octaves like
this and played it like a trumpet would play it rather than a whole lot
of fingering like a lot of other guys were doing years ago. They were
playing the ragtime stuff, I wasn't doing that. I was playing the
fingering but didn't do it when I was in the band because I called
myself another instrument similar to what they had—in other words I used
to team up with the other instruments with my right hand, see? So
that's the reason why they call it that. Mohr: And this, conversely, must have bad a strong influence on Louis' playing also. Hines Well, you'd have to get that from Armstrong.
I'd like for Louis Armstrong to elaborate on that himself, because I
can't speak for Louis. Mohr: Were there any idols that you might have had
on your instrument at that time or were you breaking away from the
tradition of piano playing up until that time? Hines Well, you see, I actually didn't have any
idols because in studying classical piano, as I said before, I happened
to be taken to a couple of night clubs in Pittsburgh by my relatives,
cousins, during the time when I majored in music in school and it was
there that I heard an unusual guy named Toodle-oo—that's what they
called him—and this rhythm was being played in this night club. Well,
after all, the best danceable, best likeable music I found during those
days was in night life. Because most people who were in the Theaters
were playing what they called Theater Music but the night clubs were
playing the kind of music that lasted because it had the blues effect,
it had the thing the people were looking for that went to night clubs.
People that were out late at night and wanted someplace to go and had
someplace to tap their foot and listen to something or some of them
beautiful ballads during those days. This is where I got the idea. Now I
didn't hear anybody. Fats Waller, I didn't hear him until I got to
Chicago; I heard James P. (Johnson) in Pittsburgh; Luckey Roberts and
Eubie Blake actually were the first two guys that I heard that actually
didn't play ragtime—they played it, but then they concentrated on ballad
style, because Luckey Roberts wrote music and so did Eubie Blake. So
naturally they had a different style themselves—although they could play
the ragtime—but they were more commercial because they were ragging
these things now, there was no style to be gained from them. Actually, I
came to this style all by myself. Now, when I came in contact with Fats
Waller later in the 20s, why, he was playing the style that I had in
mind and his was similar to what I was doing. The reason why the
youngsters grabbed my style was because of the trumpet style. Fats
wasn't playing trumpet style. He was playing some beautiful chords and
beautiful things, but everybody was using my style so-to-speak because
there were so many big bands cropping up and that was the only way to be
heard because we didn't have amplification like we have now. So we had
to use those octaves to cut through the band. This is why most of those
guys got my style because I had that night-club feeling, I had that beat
that they use in the night club with my trumpet style and I played
dances by myself a lot of times, without rhythm section and I still do
it. I still can play that way. It was a danceable thing, it wasn't
ragtime and the people would dance and were having a ball and nobody but
me—my left hand was my bass drum and my bass, you see? Mohr: Some of your favorite compositions like
Rosetta and My Monday Date and others, when did those come to be
created, was that in the Armstrong era in Chicago or later? Hines Rosetta was later. Monday Date was with
Armstrong. That happened when Louis used to stand me up and we used to
go someplace and Louis said "I'll see you tomorrow about 11" and I said
"allrlght!" and I'd miss him and something happened and I asked Louis
"what happened?" "I don't know, I got turned around!" so I used to say:
"Don't forget our Monday Date that you promised me last Tuesday!" That's
how it came up in a gag. Then there came up a recording session and we
gave it the name Monday Date. Like I also did Child-disordered Brain and
also 57 Varieties. They were putting out a new piano that was
electrified and they were trying to advertise it and I just sit down
there and call myself "working out the piano" getting all I could get
out of it for the people to find out whether this type of piano would be
profitable—would it sell? —so I just played. And we just called it
"Child-disordered Brain" because so many things went on then. I never
played it again, I just was "working the piano out". On the other side
was Body And Soul. Then when Louis and I were resting I was just
fooling around on the piano to keep my fingers warm—it was the winter
time in Chicago—and so I was playing and I don't know that they are back
there recording this and one dame came out and quietly said "finish
it!" and I said "what?" and just finished it. After the record stopped I
said "what happened? What's going on?" He says: "We just recorded
that!" So then they waited ‘til the wax cooled—that's when we had hot
wax—you had to wait for it to cool before you played it again—so I said,
"well, what are you gonna do with that?" They said: "What shall we call
it?" and they started a discussion back there, so finally they said:
"Well, your name is Hines and 57 Varieties of Hines' Pickle Factory!"
Well, I never played that again!
Mohr: Yes, that 57 Varieties is really , beautiful
rhythm number, I have it in my collection. Did you just play this off
the cuff as a sort of exercise?
Hines Yes. And at that time I had nothing on my mind but music.
Mohr: What about the musical elements concerning
harmony in your playing. What predominant elements were used at that
time, was it the "seventh chord" that was used then?
Hines Well, the funny thing about it, the seventh
chord came in while we were at the Sunset. And we thought that was
unusual to make a seventh!
Mohr: Was that a discovery of yours?
Hines Oh, no, no, no! This came in through
arrangements. I really can't pinpoint who did it. Some stock
arrangements came out with this seventh chord in it. We thought it was a
little unusual then too. Well, that's about as far as it went, the
seventh chord and then after that seventh chord the band started to get
arrangers and they then started venturing out and they came into all
different ideas, different conceptions of chords and stretching out and
voicing the band, putting the proper instrument into the right place.
Now, Ellington at that time was making unusual chords, now whether his
were seventh chords or not I don't know. But his inversions of his
instruments—he would use a baritone playing a top note and use an alto
playing a bottom note—would give you that weird sound. The sound was
very different, very creative. This is Duke's life!
Mohr: Before leaving the Armstrong era in Chicago,
was there any other significant technical aspect besides the seventh
chord harmony that came into play at that time?
Hines Well, the only thing that I could think of
was the fact that Louis brought into prominence that high note. Being
able to play it in that upper register there was nobody thinking about
that at that time, see? And Louis got to the place where he would
develop a beautiful tone, he insisted on having a good tone and being
able to play with an open horn and not being obnoxious to other people
by being open. At the same time he developed the idea of being able to
hit those high notes very smoothly. In fact, during those days we almost
had jam-sessions every time we'd meet. Not for the enviousness but for
the learning. So, Louis developed this high note, being able to play up
there and with a lot of soul and a lot of feeling and I think that was
the beginning of the trumpet going as high as it can go.
Mohr: Was that also the era that you developed your famous trills?
Hines Well, I used to use the tremolo, because
trying to play a trumpet player's things I wanted to hold and I would
use sustaining pedal to hold it but reduced the weight of the note, the
note would get thinner. And this way (using the tremolo) I was able to
hold it.
Mohr: Did you at that time already use the tenth in the left hand?
Hines ah, yes, I learned that in Pittsburgh from a
fellow named Jim Fellman and he used to stretch a tenth. And he is
another guy from whom I learned how to play piano without a rhythm
section. He could play the smoothest piano, his hands all chords and
rhythm and I learned it from him. He used to like Mail Pouch (chewing
tobacco) and beer, so, I was making $15 a week and gave him Mail Pouch
and beer and he helped me develop my left hand. And then there was
another guy by the name of Johnny Watters with a terrific right hand,
stretching twelve keys on his right hand. He used to play a melody in
his middle fingers and harmony with his other fingers in the right hand.
Now, I couldn't do that but I learned how to make a tenth in my right
hand from watching him, so that's where I got mine from there. And I
developed as I went along, as my hands grew. Mohr: Did your classical training also help you in achieving this technical perfection? Hines Yes. In my classical training you "jump" the
chords but the more advanced books after I became a teenager had the
tenths for some people who naturally had big hands. My hands happened to
be in between. Mohr: Did you at that time hear Willie 'the Lion' Smith? Hines I heard him a few years later when I went to
New York. I never heard him before that. But I heard of different piano
players around New York—James P. Johnson, Willie the Lion Smith—but
records weren't plentiful then. Didn't hear him until I went to New York
and we made this club with Luckey Roberts where he was working and he
used to try to scare all piano players: "I'm the Lion" and would roar
like a lion to try to scare you. I never was a man to challenge anybody!
I went to listen to learn. Fats and I used to play with each other; Art
Tatum and I used to sit down and we used to play understandable piano,
we used to sit there and play for a couple of hours—just us—playing. We
had a Club in Chicago and Tatum was working downstairs and he'd come
back up to our club and we used to have a thing after 4 o'clock called
the "House of Blue Lights" and he'd sit there all night and when I used
to come down to check with my secretary on my beverages and what have
you at 11 o'clock he'd still be in there with bottles of beer and stuff
he'd bought all night - I left the waiter to wait on him and he is
paying the whole bill, nobody's paying but him, Art Tatum, but he just
loved to play! He was the greatest soloist, I don't think there'll ever
be another one—that a rhythm section was in his way, 'cause he did as
much with his left hand as he did with his right. But he never knew what
he was gonna do. I don't believe the man knew how much piano he could
play, he'd just make impossible things! Mohr: I knew that you wrote Blues for Tatum,
recorded on one of your albums from which I gather that Tatum is very
high in your books. Hines Oh, yes. He is a man who didn't go around
taking advantage of people. He felt very fortunate to be able to play
and he didn't realize how much piano he could play, that's the first
thing to start off with! And this is what made him so high in my
calendar. Mohr: Then in 1928, while Louis Armstrong and Zutty
Singleton joined Carroll Dickerson's Orchestra once again, now playing
at Chicago's Savoy Ballroom you yourself joined Jimmie Noone at the Apex
Club and recorded extensively again? Hines Yes, besides recording with Jimmie Noone I
also recorded with Armstrong under a variety of titles such as Louis
Armstrong and his Hot Five, Louis Armstrong and His Savoy Ballroom Five
and Louis Armstrong and His Orchestra, Then I went to New York to make a
series of QRS piano solos and while at New York during that time I was
contacted by Lucky Millinder from Chicago who was desperately trying to
organize a band to open a new Chicago night club, the Grand Terrace. He
phoned me and asked me whether I had a band and I told him that I did.
He asked me whether I would come out to Chicago and I said yes. I had
rehearsed with a small group before leaving for New York. I then went to
Chicago and opened up the Grand Terrace with an upright piano on
December 28, 1928, and stayed there for twelve years.
Mohr: What ever made you go to Chicago from Pittsburgh? Hines Working with Lois Deppe at the Liederhaus in
Pittsburgh for $15 a week. Lois Deppe had been in show business for many
years and he is the one who found me. Deppe moved to Chicago and sent
for me after he settled there, and I started to play at an after hours
place from 12 to 6 called Elite, No.2 and I was always tall and thin and
all of the show people used to go there after hours and they got out an
article there on "this skinny kid from Pittsburgh". So then I had a guy
Lovie Taylor—one of the world's greatest tap dancers at that time. And
he heard me in Pittsburgh and when I came to Chicago he was like my
publicity man, Teddy Weatherford—another piano player—had his gang. And
Lovie Taylor had his gang with me, and then people heard me. Then
Carroll Dickerson asked me whether I wanted to join a big band after he
came down to hear me and he had a big band at the Entertainers' Cabaret.
I joined him at the Entertainers' and we then went on a forty-two-week
tour of the Pantages vaudevi1le circuit which took us to California and
back. We went into the Sunset Cafe after that tour and got Louis to join
us as I told you before.
Mohr: Now I would like to hear more about the Armstrong All-Stars. When was the band formed?
Hines It was formed before I joined them and Glaser
came and got me in '48 and I stayed with them for three years from 1948
to 1951. They were going to make a trip to Europe with Panassie and he
wanted me to come over with Armstrong. So I had a club in Chicago and
Glaser flew out there to talk to me about it. So I talked to him and
said I might go with Louis.
Mohr: What were the major highlights of that band? Hines Well, they were all experienced musicians.
Jack Teagarden, Barney Bigard, Arvell Shaw, Big Sid Catlett, Louis and
myself. They were all finished musicians You had nothing to worry about.
All you had to do was start a tune, they all knew it. Everybody knew
his position. Barney knew what register to play in, Jack knew what the
trombone's parts were and we all knew all the tunes. Mohr: Were there a lot of arrangements you played, did you have an arranger? Hines Oh, no, no, no, no! As I said before, everybody knew their position. Louis carried the melody. Mohr: And you took care of the rhythm and how to hold everything together! Hines That's right! We also had a good rhythm
section. When you have a man like Big Sid Catlett who is strictly a
rhythm drummer you're just gonna have a ball! Mohr: Was there anything harmonically new added? Hines No. The big band went out of style and they
were not doing so hot. That's why we all got together after Jack
Teagarden conceived the idea to take us bandleaders who had this
experience of being bandleaders plus being musicians so we had made
ourselves a little reputation and Louis' band wasn't doing anything and
mine wasn't doing anything and Jack's wasn't doing anything—so we
decided this organization would be—when you cut it down to all of the
bandleaders—which they called All-Stars—something for the public to look
at. So that's what started that. We went into a lot of places where
they used to have big bands but we were so expensive because we all
charged so much money, so this is where Glaser in some of the places
lost money. Mohr: Did the All-Stars get disbanded for economic reasons? Hines No, we all quit individually. I only joined
the band for a limited duration. And after three years I decided to have
my own group again. The same with Jack.
Program : 16 'The Fatha' was the Daddy of Them All: The Music of Earl 'Fatha' Hines by Dick Hyman
On this edition of Riverwalk Jazz, piano master Dick Hyman
joins The Jim Cullum Jazz Band to explore the musical legacy of Earl
Hines, arguably the most influential jazz pianist of the late 1920s and
30s. In the early 1900s, pianos functioned as “one-man-bands,” and
performances were in ragtime and later stride piano styles. The
left-hand provided the bass and middle accompanying parts while the
right played the melody. A solo piano performance in this “orchestral”
style is self-sufficient. BONUS CONTENT Earl Hines was one of the first pianists to do more than simply
supply rhythm to the jazz ensemble. The simplified style Hines developed
supported and complemented the other rhythm instruments. But his
soloing was revolutionary. He created a technique of playing a melody in
octaves, often called the “trumpet” style of soloing, which allowed for
“linear” improvisation on piano similar to a horn player. Many consider
Hines to be the “father” of modern jazz piano playing. Earl Hines was born in 1905 in Duquesne, Pennsylvania, a suburb of
Pittsburg. As a boy, he loved to watch the magnificent draft horses used
to pull beer wagons for local breweries. When Hines was young, he
watched his stepmother play the family’s parlor organ, and imitate her
by putting paper on a chair and pretending to play along. His father
noticed, and realizing his son was interested in music, soon brought a
piano into the house and found a teacher for him. Earl Hines loved music
and studied hard. His cousin Pat Patterson discovered that Earl could
play piano by ear, and loved having him around to play popular songs of
the day. The story goes that when his cousin Pat went out with the
ladies, he’d take Earl along to entertain them. Everywhere they went
there was a piano, and Earl would play and the girls would gather
around. Cousin Pat told his girlfriends, “To keep Earl playing, just
give him a little hug and a kiss.” That’s what they did, and Earl played
all night long without a clue as to what was going on until years
later. A key figure in the history of jazz, Earl Hines collaborated with
Louis Armstrong on the Hot Five and Hot Seven sessions of the late
1920s, contributing to recordings that are among the most important in
the genre. Tunes featured on this show from these classic recordings
are: "Weather Bird," “Beaukoo Jack” and “Hear Me Talkin’ to Ya.” From
1928 into the 30s, Hines recorded a series of widely influential piano
solos, among them "A Monday Date," "Cavernism," and "Fifty Seven
Varieties," performed here by the piano duo of John Sheridan and Dick
Hyman.
Earl Hines 1929 poster permission by The Big Bands Database at nfo.net
In 1928 Hines and his orchestra opened at Chicago's Grand Terrace
Cafe. For many years, the Hines big band broadcast live from the Grand
Terrace, garnering a huge nationwide audience. Many future piano greats
later said their education in jazz came from listening to these
broadcasts, among them Nat Cole, Jay McShann, Teddy Wilson and Art
Tatum. “Rosetta” was Earl Hines’ signature tune written in 1932 with his
arranger Henry Wood. He played the tune thousands of times and sometimes
would play it two or three times a night adapting it to every style
imaginable. On our show, Jim Cullum tells this story: Hines and Wood
were working together in Kansas City and every time Hines needed Wood,
he’d be off somewhere with his girlfriend Rosetta. So Hines told Wood to
bring Rosetta along, and he’d personally pay for whatever she wanted to
eat or drink while they worked. It was the only way Hines could be sure
that Wood would show up for the gig. The tune “Rosetta” began as a
little impromptu piece Hines played on the job. When Wood heard it, they
worked it up and couldn’t help but name it after Wood’s girlfriend—
“Rosetta.” Hines led his big band for 20 years, right up to the demise of big
swing bands in the postwar period. During the WWII years, the Hines band
was a hotbed of experimentation and new directions in jazz. Both
Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie worked with Hines, as did Benny
Carter, Wardell Gray and Gene Ammons. Hines’ featured singers were Billy
Eckstein and Sara Vaughan. And Budd Johnson updated Hines' arrangements
to reflect the new musical vocabulary of Parker and Gillespie. Hines’ "bebop" band never recorded due to wartime materials shortages
and recording bans. But we have the testimony of many who heard it.
Charlie Parker's biographer wrote:
"...The Earl Hines Orchestra of 1942 had
been infiltrated by the jazz revolutionaries. Each section had its cell
of insurgents. The band’s sonority bristled with flatted fifths, off
triplets and other material of the new sound scheme. Fellow bandleaders
of a more conservative bent warned Hines that he had recruited much too
well and was sitting on a powder keg."
By the 1950s Hines returned to work with Louis Armstrong on his
All-Stars band. Eventually Hines settled in the Bay Area, forming his
own Dixieland band. In 1971 Hines recorded a series of piano solos for
the Audiophile label (My Tribute to Louis), at that time owned
by Jim Cullum and his father. The "direct-to-disc" LPs were engineered
by the pioneering recordist Ewing Nunn. The three-LP set features eight
songs associated with Armstrong, including "Struttin' with Some
Barbeque," "A Kiss to Build a Dream On," "Someday You'll Be Sorry" and
two versions of Armstrong's theme "When It's Sleepy Time Down South." A few years before his passing in 1983, Earl Hines appeared in San
Antonio for an all-star "World Series of Jazz" concert organized by Jim
Cullum. The concert band consisted of pianist Earl Hines, bassist Bob
Haggart, drummer Ray Bauduc and jazz violinist Joe Venuti. Photo credit for Home Image: Earl Hines 1929 poster permission by The Big Bands Database at nfo.net.
Earl Hines was a legendary jazz pianist. He had two suggestions that
pertained to life and performance; “You may have holes in your shoes,
but don’t let the people out front know it. Shine the top,” and, “I
always challenge myself. I get out in deep water and I always try to get
back. The audience never knows, but that’s when I smile the most, when I
show the most ivory.” These statements were reflected in his style,
which was so unique it was hard to imitate. It featured complex rhythms
and melodies that sound like a trumpet. Hines grew up in a musical family. His father was a cornetist
and his stepmother played the organ at church. He originally intended
to follow in his father’s footsteps, but decided that blowing on a horn
hurt his ears, so he took up the piano instead. He started piano at age 9
and after three years of traditional lessons he shifted his emphasis to
jazz, and by 15 he was leading his own trio. Hines describes jazz as
the trunk of a tree. “After the tree has grown, many branches have
spread out. They’re all with different leaves and they all look
beautiful. But at the end of the season, they fold back up and it’s
still the tree trunk.” Hines’ career involved both solo work and a partnership with Louis Armstrong.
Believing he had a photographic memory for chords, he said, “I don’t
think when I play . . . when I’m playing the right chords appear in my
mind like photographs long before I get to them.” Hines is known as the
“Father of Modern Jazz Piano” and in fact his nickname was “Fatha.”
Earl Kenneth Hines, known as Earl "Fatha" (for "Father") Hines (December 28, 1903 – April 22, 1983), was an African-American jazz pianist. Earl Hines is one of jazz music’s most legendary pianists and one of
the greatest. His airy, volatile rhythmic sense makes him immediately
recognizable and stands in stark contrast to the more massive quality of
the Harlem stride style that developed around the same time. Hines’
style is also known as “trumpet style,” because his right hand’s octaves
played the melody on the piano much in the same way as a trumpet would.
Though the nickname “Fatha” indicates the immense respect younger
pianists always had for him, Hines’ style was far too unique to be
easily imitated. The rhythmic complexity of his music also makes Hines a
precursor of modern jazz.
Early life
Earl Hines was born in the Pittsburgh suburb of Duquesne,
Pennsylvania. His father was a brass band cornetist and his stepmother a
church organist. Hines at first intended to follow his father's example
and play cornet but "blowing" hurt him behind the ears—while the piano
didn't. He took classical piano lessons but also developed an ear for
popular show tunes and was able to remember and play songs he heard in
theaters. Hines claimed that he was playing piano around Pittsburgh
"before the word 'jazz' was even invented."
Career overview
Unlike that of most jazz musicians, Earl Hines' long and
distinguished career can be divided into four clearly distinct phases in
which he excelled in different ways. After his initial years of
training, Hines became the main partner of young Louis Armstrong
in his revolutionary years (mid to late 1920s). In the 1930s, Hines led
his own successful big band. Towards the end of the 1940s, Hines found
himself playing again with Louis Armstrong as part of Louis’
“All-Stars.” This was a more traditional period that was continued by a
few years of playing Dixieland
on the West Coast. Finally, after a period of inactivity and little
press, Hines spent the latter part of his life as a star of his own,
playing around the world in solo and small group performances.
Early career: Cooperation with Louis Armstrong
At the age of 17, Hines moved away from home to take a job playing
with Lois Deppe, a singer, in a Pittsburgh nightclub. His first
recordings were with this band—four singles recorded with Gennett
Recordings in 1922. Around 1923, he moved to Chicago, Illinois, then the world's "jazz" capital, home (at the time) to Jelly Roll Morton and King Oliver. He played piano with Carroll Dickerson's band and made his first acquaintance with Louis Armstrong.
Armstrong and Hines played together in Carroll Dickerson's band at
the Sunset Cafe, which in 1927, became Louis Armstrong's band under the
direction of Hines. Armstrong was astounded by Hines's avant-garde
"trumpet-style" piano-playing, often using dazzlingly fast octaves. That
year, Armstrong revamped his Okeh Records recording band, "Louis
Armstrong's Hot Five," and replaced his wife, Lil Hardin Armstrong, with
Hines. Armstrong and Hines recorded what are regarded as some of the
most important jazz records of the 1920s, most famously the 1928
"Weatherbird" duet. From The Penguin Guide to Jazz on CD:[1]
…with Earl Hines arriving on piano, Armstrong was already approaching
the stature of a concerto soloist, a role he would play more or less
throughout the next decade, which makes these final small-group sessions
something like a reluctant farewell to jazz's first golden age. Since
Hines is also magnificent on these discs (and their insouciant
exuberance is a marvel on the duet showstopper "Weather Bird") the
results seem like eavesdropping on great men speaking almost quietly
among themselves. There is nothing in jazz finer or more moving than the
playing on "West End Blues," "Tight Like This," "Beau Koo Jack," &
"Muggles."
Hines's solo recordings from that year, notably his own composition
"My Monday Date," provided titles reused much later in Hines's career.
After a brief stay in New York, Hines returned to Chicago, where he ended up in Jimmie Noone's band at the Apex Club.
Chicago years: The big band
In 1928 (on his 25th birthday), Hines began leading his own big band.
For over 10 years his was "The Band" in Al Capone's Grand Terrace
Cafe—Hines was Capone's "Mr Piano Man." From the Grand Terrace in
centrally located Chicago,
The Earl Hines Orchestra broadcast over many years, coast to coast
across America. Hines's band became the most broadcast band in the
nation. Hines led his big band until 1947, taking time out to front the Duke Ellington orchestra in 1944, while Duke was ill.
Though the Hines' band never became a “classic” big band like those of Duke Ellington or Count Basie,
and though Hines remains primarily a great soloist in the history of
jazz, his big band produced a considerable amount of wonderful music.
The leader’s acrobatic piano often provided an exciting contrast to the
band’s homogeneous mass, but sometimes the entire band would pick up the
piano’s jumpy, airy quality, thus creating a unique sound, as in Tiger Rag
where the alto saxophone and trumpet solos continue in exactly the same
vein as Hines’ piano solo. Hits by the Hines band include “Cavernism”
(1933), “Boogie Woogie on the St. Louis Blues” (1940) “Jelly, Jelly”
(vocal by Billy Eckstine), and Hines’ most famous composition, “Rosetta”
(1933). For several years, the band benefited from the presence of the great
arranger Jimmy Mundy and at various times it included musicians such as
trombonist Trummy Young, tenor saxophonist Budd Johnson, trumpeter Ray
Nance, and singer Billy Eckstine. Even more importantly perhaps, the
Hines Orchestra became the starting point for the careers of Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Sarah Vaughan, and other pioneers of bop. Not unlike tenor saxophonist Coleman Hawkins,
with whom he made some excellent studio recordings, Hines had the
necessary creativity and flexibility to become part of the be-bop
revolution in its early stages.
Louis Armstrong’s All-Stars and the return to Dixieland
Forced to disband in at the end of the big band era in the late
1940s, Earl Hines joined Louis Armstrong’s newly created “All-Stars,” a
small group of mostly outstanding musicians playing an updated version
of what essentially remained Louis’ initial style. The group propelled
Armstrong to world fame. Though he was certainly at ease playing with
his old friend and other familiar musicians in a traditional style,
Hines undoubtedly aspired for something more. Nevertheless, when leaving
the All-Stars in 1951, Hines found himself fronting another Dixieland-style
small formation on the West Coast. The band, often including white
trumpeter Mugsy Spanier, fit into of the Dixieland nostalgia of the time
and was somewhat remote from Hines’ own sophistication.
Rediscovery: The triumphant late career
At the start of the jazz-lean 1960s, Earl Hines settled in Oakland,
California, and came close to giving up the profession. Then, in 1964 he
was suddenly rediscovered by jazz critic Stanley Dance and performed in
a series of concerts in New York. He then became the 1965 "Critics'
Choice" for Down Beat Magazine's "Hall of Fame." From then till he died he recorded endlessly both solo and with jazz notables like Buck Clayton, Roy Eldridge, Ella Fitzgerald, Paul Gonsalves, Lionel Hampton, Coleman Hawkins,
Johnny Hodges, Jimmy Rushing, Stuff Smith, and Ben Webster. Not
surprisingly, the list also includes much more modern players like Elvin
Jones and Charles Mingus.
But his most acclaimed recordings of this period were his dazzling and
endlessly inventive solo performances, which could show him at his very
best, "a whole orchestra by himself".[2] Solo tributes to Louis Armstrong, Hoagy Carmichael, Duke Ellington, Cole Porter, and George Gershwin were all put on record in the 1970s. Hines also toured Europe again regularly at this time, and added Asia, Australia and the Soviet Union
to his list of State Department–funded destinations. On his world
tours, Hines would often play in a rhythm trio including drummer Oliver
Jackson, with the additional presence of tenor saxophonists Lucky
Thompson or Buddy Tate. It is not uncommon for jazz musicians to have their significance
recognized after a period of obscurity when their style was considered
out of date. However, the revivals of their careers have been either
short-lived (like the Boogie-Woogie craze around 1940), or the musicians
did not live long enough to really benefit from the revival (for
example, Jelly-Roll Morton), or their capacity to perform had declined
so much that they were mostly enshrined as historical curiosities. Hines
is a rare case of a jazz great whose style slowly matured to perfection
after an already brilliant beginning—thus making him both a precocious
player and a late bloomer. Whether playing solo or with his small
ensemble (he would alternate on the same night), Hines thus played with
the perfection of maturity without missing any of his original vitality.
The last few years of his life are without question the ones where he
could be most fully appreciated as a piano great. In 1975, he made an hour-long "solo" film for British TV out-of-hours in a Washington nightclub: The New York Herald Tribune
described it as "The greatest jazz-film ever made." He played solo in
The White House and played solo for the Pope—and played (and sang) his
last job a few days before he died in Oakland, quite likely somewhat
older than he had always maintained.
Style and influence
If Hines stands as a lonely giant, rather than as the main figure of a
school or style, he nevertheless exerted considerable influence on many
pianists, including a young Count Basie, Teddy Wilson, Nat King Cole,
Erroll Garner, Mary-Lou Williams, Ahmad Jamal, and numerous modern
pianists. In spite of his age and the fact that his style remained
anchored in traditional jazz, some have thus called him the first modern
jazz pianist. Hines’ sense of rhythm was unparalleled. He was capable of juggling
with notes and silences alike, never losing control, though always
seeming to be on the brink. His touch was light but incredibly intense,
as if he was hitting the keys with a hammer. The intentionally uneven
rhythmic dialogue between the right and left hands, with sudden stops as
if he were stumbling on purpose, didn’t prevent him from developing
beautiful melodic lines and an intense swing effect. When fronting his
band, he was also perfectly capable of including sequences where his
left hand would stomp evenly like the stride pianists did. Hines’ style
can be contrasted with that of Art Tatum.
Tatum’s extreme virtuosity allowed him to play massive amounts of notes
and chords in a ceaseless sequence, whereas Hines would make his
equally brilliant moves without ever settling for a fixed pattern.
Notes
↑ Richard Cook and Brian Morton, The Penguin Guide to Jazz on CD: Seventh Edition (Penguin, 2004). ISBN 0-14-101416-4
↑ Donald Clarke, "Hines, Earl," MusicWeb Encyclopedia of Popular Music.
References
Dance, Stanley. 1983. The World of Earl Hines. Da Capo Press. ISBN 978-0306801822
Doerschuk, Robert L. 2001. 88: The Giants of Jazz Piano. Backbeat Books. ISBN 978-0879306564
Palmer, Robert. 1981. "Pop Jazz; Fatha Hines Stom[p]ing and Chomping on at 75," The New York Times. August 28, 1981.
Schuller, Gunther. 1991. The Swing Era: The Development of Jazz, 1930-1945. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0195071405
Read The Original Liner Notes To A Masterpiece Of Piano Jazz
November 15th 2017
VinylMePlease
When the store opens this week, we’ll be issuing a special edition of Org Music’s reissue of Earl Hines’ Tour De Force.
Heralded as one of the best pianists in the history of jazz—if
sometimes forgotten— this album is a must own for the jazzbos. Here, we
are printing the original liner notes from the back of the album when it
was first issued in 1972.
Stamina,
one of the essentials for any jazz. performer, is easy enough to
achieve when the artist is young and possibly gifted. But staying power
is far more elusive, especially in any more significant sense than
merely managing to keep in the public eye (and even that has proved an
impossible task for many musicians who undoubtedly were gifted, thanks
to the merciless economic laws of the music business). But Earl Hines,
having celebrated the 50th anniversary of the start of his recording
career, has not only survived two periods of comparative neglect but
continues to create still more new ideas and to develop, quite
literally, more power to his elbows. For Hines, in his sixty-ninth year
at the time, to play with such boundless energy and startling invention
is indeed a tour de force. The comparison is often made with
Earl’s friend and contemporary Louis Armstrong, with whom he worked in
Chicago in the late Twenties and again from 1948 to 1951 in the early
days of the Armstrong All-Stars, and it is a comparison which is
especially valid at the stylistic level. But it does ignore the
inescapable fact that the trumpet requires strong facial muscles and
unfailing lung power, while playing the piano (though certainly not to
be underestimated as pure physical exercise) is accomplished mainly by
precise control of the hands and forearms. Thus even the slender
frame of a Willie ‘The Lion’ Smith (born 1897) or a Eubie Blake (1883)
still produced extraordinarily vital, hard-hitting music. Earl Hines, of
course, belongs stylistically to the generation after these
ragtime-influenced pianists and, at least since the day he tore into
Weather Bird on that historic 1928 duet with Louis Armstrong, has been
recognized as the most daring improviser of his generation. It
hardly seems necessary to underline the fact that all the music in this
album is improvised, and yet how many pianists, faced with one of these
standard songs, would not play a theme chorus of relatively monochrome
approach (however individualistic in itself) and then proceed to a solo
whose accompaniment was more or less predictable? With Hines, nothing is
predictable or to be taken for granted, whether the theme, the
harmonies or the rhythm.“When
Your Lover Has Gone,” (incidentally one of those songs which would have
never survived if Armstrong had not remodelled it in the first place)
finds him taking liberties in all directions. The theme gets quite short
shrift, the chord-sequence is bent at times to suit the direction of
the improvisation and the rhythm, fairly understated at the outset and
almost implying the presence of a guitar-bass-drums team, later break
into a fast waltz before a brief excursion into stride piano. “Mack
The Knife” affords a particularly good opportunity to study the variety
of Hines’s left-hand work–not only stride, but walking basses (both in
single notes and tenths), passages of suspended time where the left hand
suddenly becomes a second right hand, and of course the drum like
accent which comes amongst and between everything else. Another
delight in this set is the disguised theme of “Say It Isn’t So” with its
atmospheric ponderous chording and, in a later chorus, an amazing
passage of polyrhythmic pyrotechnics which somehow fails to disturb the
relaxed medium tempo. The deceptive minor introduction to “Indian
Summer” which recurs at the very end also appears three-quarters of the
way through, shortly after a series of three slides or glissandi–down
and up the white notes, and then down the black keys of the piano. Listen
out, too, for the suggestions of half tempo in the middle of “I Never
Knew,” which not only tantalize with their implications but prepare one
for the cutting of the tempo in the last two choruses, and for the brief
references to the theme in the middle of “Lonesome Road,” not as a
basis for improvisation (cf. the pre-Armstrong generation) but rather as
landmarks in a densely wooded landscape. The essentially
improvisatory nature of Hines’s music is borne out by the facy that all
these pieces were recorded as first takes and, though one may feel a
certain overfamiliarity with these songs in their natural state, and
profess to know the pianist quite well, it would be best to follow Earl
Hines’s quite magnificent example and take nothing for granted!
Earl
“Fatha” Hines was one of the greatest jazz pianists of all time.
Frequently he would play ringing octaves with his right hand (called
“trumpet style piano”) that allowed him to be heard over the loudest
ensembles. Dubbed by some as “the first modern jazz pianist,” Hines
could play stride piano with the best, keeping time with his left hand
by jumping between bass notes and chords, but he also loved to challenge
himself by taking death-defying breaks. Led by what could be considered
the trickiest left hand in jazz, he often defied time and played wild
passages with his two hands before somehow returning without missing a
beat. This sounded very modern in 1928 and was still a bit futuristic in
1978. Among his many admirers were Duke Ellington, Nat King Cole, and
Art Tatum. Earl Hines had a long and episodic career. He was born
December 28, 1903 in Duquesne, Pennsylvania, which is close to
Pittsburgh. Since his father played cornet with a local brass band, that
became Hines’ first instrument before he switched his focus to the
piano when he was nine. He took some classical piano lessons and played
organ in his Baptist church while largely creating his own style. When
he was 17, Hines joined singer Lois Deppe’s Symphonian Serenaders. A
little-known fact is that in 1921 Hines and Deppe became the first
African-Americans to perform on the radio. In 1923 he made his recording
debut with Deppe’s ten-piece group, taking a solo on “Congaine.” He
also recorded four spirituals in which he accompanied Deppe’s vocals. After a stint with the Harry Collins Orchestra, Hines moved to
Chicago where he worked with the Carroll Dickerson Orchestra for a year,
meeting a kindred spirit in Louis Armstrong. In 1927 they recorded
together for the first time with Johnny Dodds’ Black Bottom Stompers. By
then Armstrong had taken over the Dickerson band and that ensemble was
featured on a recording of “Chicago Breakdown” which was released under
the trumpeter’s name. But all of this was just a prelude to 1928. If
Earl Hines had only made his recordings of 1928 and had retired by
year-end, he would still be remembered today by jazz collectors as one
of the all-time greats. Hines’ regular night job for much of that year
was working with clarinetist Jimmie Noone’s Apex Club Orchestra at the
Apex in Chicago, seven nights a week from midnight until 6 a.m. He
recorded regularly with Noone in the clarinetist’s unusual quintet that
almost always had altoist Joe Poston playing the melody behind Noone’s
solos. Hines also recorded with singer Lillie Delk Christian, “I Ain’t
Got Nobody” with Stovepipe Johnson, and two titles with Carroll
Dickerson’s Savoyagers.
But,
more importantly, he was a member of Louis Armstrong’s Savoy Ballroom
Five, a recording group that was the successor to Armstrong’s Hot Five
with Hines taking the place of Lil Hardin. The pianist constantly
challenged Armstrong to play at his most adventurous on such titles as
“Fireworks,” Hines’ “A Monday Date,” “Sugar Foot Strut,” “Knee Drops,”
the original version of “Basin Street Blues,” “Beau Koo Jack,” and—most
notably—the magnificent “West End Blues” and “Weather Bird.” The latter,
a trumpet-piano duet, has Armstrong excelling in Hines’ world of
heart-stopping breaks while the two play at their most competitive. In
addition, in 1928 Hines recorded 15 unaccompanied piano solos including
“Chicago High Life,” two versions of “A Monday Date,” and the
often-miraculous “57 Varieties.” Throughout that year, he was arguably
jazz’s top pianist, building on the earlier innovations of Jelly Roll
Morton and James P. Johnson to form his own distinctive style. And, as if that were not enough, on December 28, 1928 (his 25th
birthday), Hines opened at the Grand Terrace Café with his new big band.
The Earl Hines Orchestra performed at the gangster-owned club (which
for a time was owned by Al Capone) for the next 12 years. They usually
took three months off to tour and in 1931 became the first major
African-American orchestra to tour the South. Earl Hines, who was
the sophisticated element on two recording dates with Clifford Hayes’
Louisville Stompers in February 1929, was mostly heard on record in the
1930s either in his big band or on rare piano solos. His orchestra
always featured strong musicianship, swinging arrangements, and hot
solos including from the leader. Among his key sidemen at various times
during that decade were clarinetist-altoist Omer Simeon,
trumpeter-singer Walter Fuller, drummer Wallace Bishop, Darnell Howard
on clarinet, alto and violin, arranger Jimmy Mundy, trombonist Trummy
Young, and tenor-saxophonist Budd Johnson. Herb Jeffries made his first
recordings with Hines in 1934 as did trumpeter-singer Ray Nance in 1938
and Billy Eckstine, who became the band’s regular vocalist in 1940.
During the latter year Hines had his biggest hit with “Boogie Woogie On
St. Louis Blues,” Billy Eckstine scored with Hines on “Jelly, Jelly,”
and the pianist’s songs “You Can Depend On Me,” “Rosetta,” and “My
Monday Date” had become standards and were performed regularly by other
bands. Hines had also become a major influence on other pianists
including Nat King Cole, Jay McShann, Jess Stacy, Joe Sullivan and Art
Tatum. The
Grand Terrace Ballroom closed under mysterious circumstances in
December 1940. Earl Hines (who was spontaneously given the nickname of
“Fatha” by a radio announcer) reorganized his group, went on the road,
and kept leading big bands until 1948. In 1943, with Eckstine’s urging,
Hines hired Sarah Vaughan as both a singer and second pianist and added
such modernists as trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie and altoist Charlie Parker
(who played tenor with the band). While Hines did not change his very
individual style, he was open to the newer sounds. Unfortunately
the Musicians Union recording strike of 1943-44 resulted in this
legendary early bebop orchestra going completely unrecorded. Not even a
single radio broadcast exists to let future listeners know what the
group actually sounded like. Hines experimented with other bands during 1943-44. Frustrated by so
many of his musicians being drafted for World War II, he put together an
all-female orchestra that lasted two months, and then expanded with a
large co-op band that included strings; neither ensemble was ever
documented on record. After recording a combo date and being a sideman
on sessions led by Cozy Cole and Charlie Shavers, Earl Hines and his big
band returned to records in the fall of 1944. His later orchestra at
times included trumpeter Willie Cook, trombonist Bennie Green,
tenor-saxophonist Wardell Gray, bassist Charles Mingus, and singers
Betty Roche and Johnny Hartman. But it was a struggle that Hines gave up
in February 1948 when he accepted an offer to become a member of the
Louis Armstrong All-Stars. It sounded like a good idea for Hines
at first, teaming up with his old friend Armstrong in an all-star group
also featuring Jack Teagarden, Barney Bigard, and Sid Catlett (soon
succeeded by Cozy Cole). Hines would no longer have to be concerned with
meeting payrolls and getting engagements for his orchestra.
Unfortunately, he no longer had the temperament to be a mere sideman. He
soon became restless with Armstrong’s set show, weary from the nonstop
touring, and he felt neglected. Despite having occasional opportunities
to lead his own recordings and making appearances in some films with
Armstrong (including The Strip), in 1951 he left the All-Stars after
three years. Earl Hines at first put together a swing-oriented
combo that included trumpeter Jonah Jones and singers Etta Jones and
Helen Merrill. He next briefly co-led a combo with Muggsy Spanier, had a
septet that toured the country with the Harlem Globetrotters led the
“Esquire All-Stars” (which included trombonist Dicky Wells), and headed
his New Sound Orchestra. None of those ventures lasted long. In 1955
Hines accepted an offer to lead a band based at San Francisco’s Club
Hangover which to his surprise was a Dixieland-oriented group that
included trumpeter Marty Marsala, trombonist Jimmy Archey, clarinetist
Darnell Howard, and bassist Ed Garland. Later members included Muggsy
Spanier and bassist Pops Foster. While the music was not overly
challenging, Hines was able to have a stable lifestyle (he settled in
Oakland) and he spiced things up by often performing the repertoire
(which was full of warhorses) at very fast tempos, to the excitement of
the audience. The group’s many live broadcasts find Hines adjusting his
style to fit the style, putting on a fine show. While he had an
opportunity to tour Europe with a group co-led by Jack Teagarden in 1957
and made some solo and trio recordings (also appearing on records with
Benny Carter, Barbara Dane, and Jimmy Witherspoon at his historic set at
the 1959 Monterey Jazz Festival), Hines was thinking seriously of
retiring as he turned 60 in 1963. That
all changed on March 7, 1964 when, with the help of his champion,
critic Stanley Dance, he was booked into the Little Theatre in New York.
Hines, who had already recorded a solo album earlier that day, was
featured leading a group that also included bassist Ahmed Abdul-Malik,
drummer Oliver Jackson and, on some numbers, tenor-saxophonist Budd
Johnson. The New York critics, who had been asleep on Hines’ work of the
past 15 years, were amazed that the pianist was even more exciting and
adventurous than they had remembered. Earl Hines’ performance was
considered a sensation and the success of that night led not only to his
rediscovery but to a renaissance that lasted the rest of his life. For the next 19 years, Earl Hines was kept quite busy, performing with
his trio/quartet, showcased during special solo concerts, and recording
over 100 albums. He had opportunities to record with such notables as Coleman Hawkins, Roy Eldridge, Ray
Nance, Jaki Byard (piano duets), Johnny Hodges, Jimmy Rushing, Maxine
Sullivan, Paul Gonsalves, Jonah Jones, Stephane Grappelli, Barney
Bigard, Joe Venuti, Lionel Hampton, and Harry “Sweets” Edison. In 1974
alone Hines recorded 20 albums. He toured Europe regularly and also
performed in South America, Asia, Australia, Japan, at the White House,
and for a 1966 tour of the Soviet Union. The pianist began to slow
down after 1978 but he stayed active up until the end, never declining
either in his technical abilities or in his desire to stretch himself.
Earl Hines’ last performance took place in San Francisco, just a few
days before he died in Oakland on April 22, 1983 at the age of 79. Thirty-five
years after his death, Earl Hines continues to rank at the top of his
field. His recordings still sound fresh, unpredictable, lively, and full
of joy.
Earl "Fatha" Hines' band featured the likes of Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie.
(
Express / Getty Images
)
By
1928, Earl Hines was jazz's most revolutionary pianist, for two good
reasons. His right hand played lines in bright, clear octaves that could
cut through a band. His left hand had a mind of its own. Hines could
play fast stride and boogie bass patterns, but then his southpaw would
go rogue — it'd seem to step out of the picture altogether, only to
slide back just in time. Hines might have focused on a career as dazzling pianist, like Art Tatum.
But after working in various orchestras, he itched to lead one of his
own. Hines opened at Chicago's Grand Terrace ballroom in time for New
Year's 1929. Jazz's center of gravity was shifting to New York, but the
Grand Terrace would be his home base until 1940. Al Capone invited him
not to leave. Hines was outside the jazz capital. But by 1933, two years before the
swing era exploded, he was that rare bandleader who had all the pieces
lined up: the precision drills, the bantering dialogues between brass
and reeds, the way every detail pushed the music on — and pushed the
dancers onto the floor. An example: "Take It Easy" by Jimmy Mundy, who
became one of Benny Goodman's top arrangers. Hines is the subject of a new Mosaic box, Classic Earl Hines Sessions 1928-1945. Seven
CDs is a lot, though it's fascinating to track one leader's progress
from the incubation of the swing era to its decline. But even top bands
recorded some nothing tunes, dubious vocals and numbers that mimicked
competitors' hits. The Hines band's "Ridin' and Jivin'" is a perfect
mash-up of Cab Calloway strutting and Duke Ellington's torrid brass, with Walter Fuller on trumpet. It's nice, but where's the piano? Leading a band put Earl Hines in a box; swing orchestras were smooth
and synchronized, but he was at his best fighting conformity. So he'd
lay low, restraining himself — until one of those features when his
piano beat back the band. If only some smart producer had recorded more solo or small-group
Earl Hines back then. There were a few of those sessions, like a 1940
jam sparked by the great New Orleans drummer Baby Dodds, with
clarinetist Sidney Bechet and Ellington band cornetist Rex Stewart. By the early '40s, both the world and the music world were in
turmoil. The big bands were doomed but didn't know it yet. The spotlight
was shifting to singers, and Hines had one of the best: Billy Eckstine
set the style for a raft of bedroom baritones. Together, they helped lay
groundwork for postwar rhythm-and-blues, as with their hit "Stormy
Monday Blues." In 1942, the musicians' union called a strike on recording, to
leverage benefits for its members. That successful campaign wreaked
havoc with Earl Hines' legacy — it kept him from recording his legendary
band with young beboppers Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker and Sarah Vaughan. Hines quit bandleading after the war to tour with Louis Armstrong,
before leading smaller groups. Even in the 1960s, when Earl Hines had
an acclaimed solo act, he still yearned to lead a big band. He could not
get that sound out of his system.
For
some unjustifiable reason, when you think of the most important piano
players in jazz, Earl “Fatha” Hines is rarely on the top 5 list. The
fact is that there would be no Mehldau, Tyner, Jarrett, Evans, Peterson
or even Tatum if it weren’t for the guy who took jazz piano out of its
rigid stride and started opening up the left hand with single note
improvisations. It was a radical concept at the time, (think of the
first guy that ate an egg, and you get the idea) and completely changed
the direction of “hot” music. Not only did Hines do that with the piano,
but his big band recordings served as the fertile soil for another
radical change in music, that of setting the tone for a strange new
sound called bebop in the early 40s. This 7 cd set has all of the
important sessions of Hines performing solo masterpieces, leading a
swinging and forward looking big band, and even leaving enough space for
a handful of hip small group tunes. Hines’ solo performances during 1928 were during the period when he
was transforming jazz with a chap by the name of Louis Armstrong. Here,
he takes the spotlight by himself and delivers mind boggling pieces such
as “A Monday Date” and “Blues In Thirds.” Melodically, they are second
to none; stylistically, they set the jazz world aflame. And, while to
today’s standards you might think that his style and technique is stiff,
just remember that today’s airplanes make the Wright Brothers’ biplane
look archaic as well. But, please keep in mind that in both cases these
were the first ones to get off the ground and fly when everyone else was
tied to the earth. His 1929 band from Chicago was “hotcha” hot, with
material like “Beau Koo Jack” and “Everybody Loves My Baby” looking
forward to the swing era. His ’32 orchestra was a step in the right
direction with the addition of George Dixon/tp and Omer Simeon/cl who
keep the energy high and mighty on “Oh, You Sweet Thing” , an
Ellington-sounding “Blue Drag,” (with some jaw dropping work by Hines)
and the classic signature tune “Rosetta.” The definitive band started its genesis when tenor titan Budd
Johnson climbed aboard the Chicago express in 1937. He starts off in a
cooking little quartet take of “Honeysuckle Rose” with Simeon, and Hines
sounds digitally inspired by the company. Hines still finds time
between big band sessions to record some more electrifying solo
sessions, with a take of “Body and Soul” sounding overwhelmingly lovely. During the late 30s and early 40s, Swing and Boogie Woogie were the
infectious thing, and Hines’ orchestra reflected the times with
“Swingin’ on C”, “Second Balcony Jump” and “Boogie Woogie.” By the mid
40s the band was sounding fuller, with Trummy Young’s trombone and Jimmy
Mundy’s tenor as well as some clever arrangements hitting the roof with
“A Madhouse.” Billy Eckstine enters the band during this period, and
completely radicalizes male vocals with his deep, sensuous and rich
baritone. His singing on “Jelly Jelly” and “I’m Falling For You”
transformed singers, black ones at least, from jivey jokesters or
falsetto-ed dandies into real men. Eckstine threw down the gauntlet on
“Stormy Monday Blues” with Hines and the orchestra sonically realizing
that they were on to something special. His version of “All Or Nothing
At All” is staggeringly visceral. The horn sections are amazingly tight,
witht the team of saxes as thick as molasses. Budd Freeman delivers
some breathy solos, with his work on “Windy City Jive” a breezy delight.
A final trio performance with Al Casey and the firebrand Oscar
Pettiford shows that Hines was changing with the times with aplomb, and
not resting any laurels. Due to the economics of the times, Hines’ 1945
big band was the last call of an era, but with neo boppers like Wardell
Grey/ts and Willie Cook/tp, he went out swinging. When you imagine the sounds, songs and stars of the Big Band era,
names like Goodman, Basie, Ellington, Shaw, Herman and Lunceford come
first to your mind. This excellent limited edition 7 cd set serves as a
convincing argument for including Chicago-based Hines and his orchestra
into the club. The booklet with informative notes by Brian Priestley
just adds icing to the cake. Don’t let this one get away.
Earl "Fatha" Hines, a brilliant innovative keyboard virtuoso, is recognized as one of jazz's greatest pianists. He was also an influential band leader. His popular Hines Orchestra launched the careers of many jazz greats and was the incubator for Be-Bop jazz. Hines was also a pioneering recording artist who made some of the definitive recordings of jazz history including the Hot Five and Hot Seven sessions with Louis Armstrong. Throughout his career he recorded prolifically leaving behind a discography of over one hundred albums and hundreds of recordings as a sideman and session accompanist.
Earl Hines was a popular national radio star. He and Lois Deppe were the first African American musicians ever to perform on radio in 1921. The Hines Orchestra heard seven days a week on live national radio was the most broadcast band in America during the Depression and the early 1940s. The Hines Orchestra scored many hit records such as “You Can Depend on Me”, “Jelly Jelly”, “G.T. Stomp,” and “Harlem Laments”. On its frequent tours of the country the Hines Orchestra was mobbed by fans at its sold out shows. Hines gave many great jazz artists their start in his orchestra such as Sarah Vaughn, Billy Eckstein, Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, and Nat King Cole. After the big band days Earl Hines toured the world with Louis Armstrong and as a solo artist.
With his contributions to jazz piano, his leadership of an influential band and jazz artists, his broadcast popularity, and his extensive recordings, Earl Hines created a lasting influence on generations of jazz musicians. His contributions to jazz are recognized by his inductions into the Big Band and Jazz Hall of Fame and the Downbeat Jazz Hall of Fame.
Earl Hines was highly respected by great jazz pianists.
"The greatest piano player in the world" – Count Basie
"When you talk about greatness, you talk about Art Tatum and Earl Hines". – Erroll Garner
“He has a completely unique style. No one can get that sound, no other pianist" – Horace Silver
"In his pioneering work with Louis Armstrong in the late 1920's, Mr. Hines virtually redefined jazz piano." - Jon Pareles New York Times
Earl Hines was the first modern jazz pianist. He redefined the role of piano in jazz freeing it from a limited role as a rhythm instrument. He originated the "trumpet style" of jazz piano, playing hornlike solo lines in octaves with his right hand and rich chords with his left hand. Using his classical training he added depth to jazz with rich dissonant chords. Hines defined for generations of jazz pianists the role of each hand in jazz piano and added richness to it chord structures. Playing with Louis Armstrong he expanded the role of piano in jazz with improvisational solos. Art Tatum, Teddy Wilson, Nate King Cole and other pianist where inspired by Earl listening to him play live on the radio while growing up. Hines is credited by music historians as being the first of the Pittsburgh School of piano jazz that includes Mary Lou Williams, Erroll Garner, Ahmad Jamal and others.
Growing up in Duquense
Earl Kenneth Hines was born on December 25, 1905 in Duquesne, Pa. His father Joseph Hines was a foreman on the coal docks who supervised the loading of coal barges. Earl's mother died when he was three and his father remarried. His parents, his step brother and sister, grandparents, uncles and cousins all lived in a twelve room house at the end of town on top of Grant Avenue. On their property they had a large garden and raised chickens and hogs. Earl had to walk 25 blocks down hill to get to school. His family was one of only 12 African American families in Duquense which had a population of 19,000.
During World World I, African Americans from the South migrated to Duquense for work in the steel industry. Forced by segregation Earl's family moved down the hill andacross the tracks to Fourth Street into a neighborhood of illegal Hungarian and Austrian immigrants and southern migrants.
Earl Hines' family was very musical. His father, a cornet player, formed and headed the fourteen member Eureka Brass Band that performer at summer picnics in the Mon Valley towns of McKeesport, Braddock, Duquense, and Homestead. An uncle on his mother's side played several brass instruments. His mother' sister Sadie Philips was a light opera singer who performed in Pittsburgh.
Earl's step mother owned a parlor
organ and gave Earl his first keyboard lessons.
She traded in the organ for a piano so that Earl could take piano lessons. He began piano studies in 1914 at age 9 with Emma D.
Young of McKeesport. Learning quickly he
advanced through several teachers. German
trained pianist Von Holtz taught him the music of the European masters. As his skill grew Hines competed in
classical music competitions organized by Von Holtz. At age eleven Earl played the organ weekly at his
Baptist Church.
Earl's
parents took him to see theatrical shows in Pittsburgh. With a good
ear and a
good memory Earl learned popular songs that he heard just one time at
those shows. He was able to play show tune months before the sheet music
was released. His cousin Pat Patterson took Earl to parties and had
him perform all night Earl said his cousin treated him as his own
"Victrola". Hines said he
played piano around Pittsburgh "before the word 'jazz' was even
invented".
When he was 14, Hines moved to Pittsburgh to live with his aunt Sadie Phillips so that he could attend Schenly High School His goal was to major in music to become a classical pianist Aunt Sadie took him to music reviews where her heard ragtime performed by Eubie Blake and other artists. At age 15 Hines went with his older cousins and an uncle to a nightclub on Wyle Avenue in Pittsburgh where he heard jazz for the first time. Hooked on jazz, he abandoned his classical music ambitions. Earl formed a popular music trio in 1921 with violinist Emmet Jordan and drummer Harry Williams. They performed at school functions, church socials, rent parties and nightclubs.
Working with Lois Deppe
Sometime in 1921 singer Lois B. Deppe
heard Earl Hines and his trio play at a rent party. Deppe was amazed
with Earl's piano playing. Deppe was a popular singer who had performed
classic music concerts in Pittsburgh and sang popular songs at the
Collins Inn on Wyle Avenue.
In 1921 Lois Deppe hired Earl Hines to be his piano accompanist for a year long
engagement at the Leider House (later known as the Crawford Grill). Deppe hired him because he could read music. Earning $15 a week with two meals a day it
was Hines’s first steady job. Hines lived at the Lieber
House before he moved into an apartment on 1521 Wyle Avenue He spent
his free time learning from other musicians at Hill district clubs. Earl
had lessons in rhythm from a banjoist named Verchet and
learned jazz piano techniques from Johnny Waters and Jim Fellman.
Deppe slowly expanded his ensemble hiring drummer Harry Williams and Earl's Duquense friend violinist Emmett Jordan. Hines went back to Schenely High School in the Fall but continued to work nights and weekends with Deppe. As his night time bookings increased his teachers advised him to drop out of school in his junior year to pursue his music career. Hines worked iwht Deppe at the Lieder House for two years. As Deppe’s ensemble grew in popularity the Pittsburgh Courier dubbed Earl Hines “The Best in Town”.
Deppe and Hines appeared as a duet on KDKA radio in 1921. They were the first African Americans performers ever to appear on radio. The broadcast was played over a loud speaker on Wylie Avenue. Crowns mobbed the street to listen and then stayed to cheer Deppe and Hines when they made it back to the Hill.
In 1922 Deppe added more players to form an orchestra that he named "Deppe’s
Seranaders". It was Pittsburgh first
swing band. The Seranaders appeared at Pittsburgh's Paramount Inn, the
Collins Inn, and on the popular river boat cruises called “The
Palace of the Rivers”. The Seranaders went on tour playing on night
stands in small towns across Ohio and West
Virginia.
As the Seranders grew in size Hines devised a way
to have his un-amplified piano heard. Combining the techniques of two pianists
that he listen to on the Hill, Johnny Waters and Jim Fellman, Hines developed his unique octave “trumpet-style” of
piano playing to cut through the sound of the other instruments.
First Recordings
In October of 1923
shortly after recording was invented, Lois Deppe and the Seranaders recorded at
the Gennett studio in Richmond, Indiana.
They recorded four songs of which two were released. One of the songs was Earl Hines’ original
composition “Congaine” that featured Earl with a solo. They recorded more songs a month later that
were released by Gennett. The records were a hit in Pittsburgh. Hines left Deppe’s
Seranaders in 1924 and played piano with the house band at the Collins
Inn. He formed his own band in Pittsburgh with legendary saxophonist
Benny Carter, Cuban Bennett on trumpet, and Emmett Jordan on violin, and
his old fried Harry Williams on drums. They started out playing the
the Grapevine club and later worked at the Collins Inn and the Leider
House.
Eubie Blake Counsels Earl with his Cane
Ragtime
pianist Eubie
Blake who appeared frequently in Pittsburgh was a friend of Earl’s Aunt
Sadie. Eubie heard Earl play at his aunt’s
house several times. Blake told Sadie "This boy's a genius. He has no
business staying here". One one visit to Aunt Sadie's Blake advised
Earl that if he wanted
to make it in show business he had to leave Pittsburgh. He told Earl, “Son, you have no business here. You
got to leave Pittsburgh. I’m going to take this cane and wear it out
all over your head if you’re not gone when I come back.”’ The opportunity soon came knocking when Harry Collin, the
owner of the Collin’s Inn, asked Earl if he would play at his new Elite #2 club on State Street in
Chicago
On to Chicago and a National Tour
Hines
moved to Chicago to play with Vernie Robinson at the Elite #2. It was
an after hours club open from midnight to 6 A.M. World quickly spread
among musicians about the innovative new pianist at Elite #2. Jelly
Roll Morton, Teddy Weatherford, band leader Carol Dickerson and other
prominent musicians came out to see Earl. Dickerson persuade Earl to join his band working at the larger Entertainers Café in 1925. Hines went on a 42 week national tour with Dickerson's band in 1926 that took them all
the way to California.
Playing with Louis Armstrong
On his return to Chicago
Earl met a 24 year old trumpet player by the name of Louis Armstrong in the
pool room of the Chicago Musicians Union.
Earl talked Louis into working with him in Dickerson’s band. Later in 1828 Louis Armstrong, Earl Hines, and
drummer Zutty Singleton formed a trio that performed as the mobster club Café
Sunset. When that club closed Hines joined
clarinetist Jimmy Noone’s band performing at the Apex Club.
Records with Armstrong and the Hot Five
In sessions for Okeh Records in June and
December of 1928 Hines recorded 18 songs with Louis Armstrong and the Hot Five. Jazz historians consider the Hot Five
sessions to be a turning point the in the history of jazz producing master
pieces of early jazz. Armstrong emerged
as the first virtuoso performed in jazz and create the basis of swing rhythm..
Hines brought the trumpet style of piano to prominence. Those sessions produced
the landmark recording of “Weather Bird” a remarkable improvisational
trumpet-piano duet between Armstrong and Hines.
The recording of Hines’ original song “A Monday Date” showcased the
piano as a solo instrument in jazz. The Hot Five and Seven sessions also
produced the classics "West End Blues," "Fireworks", and
"Basin Street Blues". Hines
also recorded with Jimmy Noone’s band in 1928. He also recorded his first solo piano releases
for Okeh and QRS Records during this
period.
Grand Terrace Ballroom and National Radio
In December of 1928 at age
25 Hines formed his own 28 member orchestra beginning a ten year engagement at the
prestigious Grand Terrace Ballroom in Chicago. Partly owned by Al Capone, the Grand Terrace was the
Cotton Club of Chicago. The band played
jazz and dance music seven days a week, performing three shows a night on weekdays
and four shows on Saturdays. The Hines
Orchestra became national known through tours, coast to coast radio broadcasts,
and hit recordings during the 1930s through 1948. They toured the country two to three months
of the year. They were one of the first
African-American bands to tour the South beginning in 1931. Beginning in 1934 the Hines Orchestra was broadcast
live on national radio from the Grand Terrace for many years, sometimes seven
nights a week. They became the most broadcast band in America. The Grand Terrace closed suddenly in December
1940 when the manager, Ed Fox, disappeared.
Hines kept his band together for another eight years playing on the road
and recording.
"Fatha Hines" is Born
Hines was christened with
the nickname of “Fatha” by the MC of his radio show. Before a show the MC was found passed out
drunk on a table. Earl lectured the MC about
his drinking. At the start of the show
the angry announcer, stinging from Earl’s fatherly advice, introduced Earl and
his band saying “Here comes Fatha Hines out of the forest with his children.” Earl hated the nickname “Fatha” but it stuck.
Before then Earl Hines was often referred to as “Gatemouth” because his teeth
were white the like the pearly gates and he always smiled when playing the
piano. Music historians say “Fatha” is an apt name as Earl Hines in one of the
fathers of jazz.
The Earl Hines Orchestra
recorded for several recording labels: Victor in 1929, Brunswick (1932–1934),
Decca (1934–1935), Vocalion (1937–1938), and for Bluebird starting in 1939 until
the industry-wide recording ban. In July
of 1942 the American Federation of Musician went on strike against the recording
companies demanding that artists be paid royalties for their recordings. All union
musicians stopped recording from 1942 through1945. During this period playing
in late night jam sessions members of the Hines' band that included Charlie
Parker and Dizzy Gillespie laid the foundations of Bebop. Duke Ellington said "the seeds of bop
were in Earl Hines's piano style". The band playing flatted fifth chords and
modern harmonies with Dizzy Gillespie doing runs on the trumpet section work. But
because of ban no recordings of this new sound was made. In 1942 Hines added Pittsburgh vocalist Billy
Eckstine to his band. With Eckstine the
band recording its biggest hits “Jelly Jelly”, “Boogie-Woogie on the St. Louis
Blues”. “The Jitney Man", and
“Stormy Monday Blues.” In 1943 Hines expanded his band to include an all-female
string section and a female vocal group.
Hines received Esquire Magazine’s Silver Award in 1944.
Hines split up his band in
1948 as the big dance band crazed died.
He joined Louis Armstrong’s All-Stars in 1948 and toured Europe for two
years. Wanting to be a band leader again
he left the All-Stars in 1951, moved to San Francisco, and formed the Dixeland
revival band “Hot Jazz”. Hines took a regular gig playing at the Hangover Club
in San Francisco from 1955 into the early 1960s. He continued record and tour in Canada,
England, and the European during this time.
In 1964, his unofficial manager Stanley Dance convinced Earl to perform three
solo concert recitals at The Little Theatre in New York. As Hines had always performed as a band
pianist, these were his first solo performances. The recitals were a critical and audience
sensation. Earl Hines was re-discovered
and came into great demand. He released
a series of solo, trio, and quartet and starred in several international tours.
They year of 1966 was a highlight in his
career. Hines traveled to Russia as a
goodwill ambassador playing with the State Department's jazz combo. The Down Beat Magazine readers elected Hines world's
"No 1 Jazz Pianist" for 1966, (He won five additional years),, and he
was inducted into the Down Beat’s Jazz Hall of Fame. His recordings won several
awards from Jazz Journal and he was named “Jazzman of the Year” by Jazz Magazine.
Hines appeared on the Johnny Carson and Mike Douglas televisions show in 66. During the 1970s Hines
continued to tour the world with his quartet. He released many outstanding recordings
during this period such as “Tour De Force” and “Quintessential Continued”. He also recorded with dozens of other artists
including Oscar Peterson, Dave Brubeck, Stan Getz, Duke Ellington, Dizzie
Gillespie, Roy Eldridge, Art Blakey, Charles Mingus. Ella Fitzgerald, Dinah
Washington, Sarah Vaughn, Elvin Jones, Etta
Jones, The Inkspots, Peggy Lee, and "Ditty Wah Ditty" with Ry Cooder. In 1975 he was featured in a one hour solo
performance special on British television.
Earl Hines continued to perform until the weekend
before his death at age 79 in 1983 at his home in Oakland, California. The “Gateman” left the world smiling with
enjoyment of his great music as he entered the pearly gates.
Earl Kenneth Hines, universally known as Earl "Fatha"[nb 1]Hines (December 28, 1903[nb 2] – April 22, 1983), was an American jazz pianist and bandleader.
He was one of the most influential figures in the development of jazz
piano and, according to one major source, is "one of a small number of
pianists whose playing shaped the history of jazz".[1] The trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie (a member of Hines's big band, along with Charlie Parker)
wrote, "The piano is the basis of modern harmony. This little guy came
out of Chicago, Earl Hines. He changed the style of the piano. You can
find the roots of Bud Powell, Herbie Hancock,
all the guys who came after that. If it hadn't been for Earl Hines
blazing the path for the next generation to come, it's no telling where
or how they would be playing now. There were individual variations but
the style of ... the modern piano came from Earl Hines."[2] The pianist Lennie Tristano said, "Earl Hines is the only one of us capable of creating real jazz and real swing when playing all alone." Horace Silver said, "He has a completely unique style. No one can get that sound, no other pianist".[3]Erroll Garner said, "When you talk about greatness, you talk about Art Tatum and Earl Hines".[4] Count Basie said that Hines was "the greatest piano player in the world".[5]
Biography
Early life
Earl Hines was born in Duquesne, Pennsylvania, 12 miles from the center of Pittsburgh, in 1903. His father, Joseph Hines,[nb 3] played cornet and was the leader of the Eureka Brass Band in Pittsburgh,[6] and his stepmother was a church organist.[7] Hines intended to follow his father on cornet, but "blowing" hurt him behind the ears, whereas the piano did not.[8][9][10] The young Hines took lessons in playing classical piano.[11] By the age of eleven he was playing the organ in his Baptist church.[12] He had a "good ear and a good memory" and could replay songs after hearing them in theaters and park concerts:[13]
"I'd be playing songs from these shows months before the song copies
came out. That astonished a lot of people and they'd ask where I heard
these numbers and I'd tell them at the theatre where my parents had
taken me." Later, Hines said that he was playing piano around Pittsburgh
"before the word 'jazz' was even invented".[10]
Early career
With
his father's approval, Hines left home at the age of 17 to take a job
playing piano with Lois Deppe and His Symphonian Serenaders in the
Liederhaus, a Pittsburgh nightclub. He got his board, two meals a day,[14] and $15 a week.[15][16] Deppe, a well-known baritone
concert artist who sang both classical and popular songs, also used the
young Hines as his concert accompanist and took him on his concert
trips to New York. In 1921 Hines and Deppe became the first African
Americans to perform on radio.[17] Hines's first recordings were accompanying Deppe – four sides recorded for Gennett Records in 1923, still in the very early days of sound recording.[18] Only two of these were issued, one of which was a Hines composition, "Congaine", "a keen snappy foxtrot",[19]
which also featured a solo by Hines. He entered the studio again with
Deppe a month later to record spirituals and popular songs, including "Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child"[20] and "For the Last Time Call Me Sweetheart".
In 1925, after much family debate, Hines moved to Chicago, Illinois, then the world's jazz capital, the home of Jelly Roll Morton and King Oliver. Hines started in Elite No. 2 Club but soon joined Carroll Dickerson's band, with whom he also toured on the Pantages Theatre Circuit to Los Angeles and back.
Hines met Louis Armstrong in the poolroom of the Black Musicians' Union, local 208, on State and 39th in Chicago.[10] Hines was 21, Armstrong 24. They played the union's piano together.[21][nb 4] Armstrong was astounded by Hines's avant-garde "trumpet-style" piano playing, often using dazzlingly fast octaves so that on none-too-perfect upright pianos (and with no amplification) "they could hear me out front".[10][16]Richard Cook wrote in Jazz Encyclopedia that
[Hines's] most dramatic departure
from what other pianists were then playing was his approach to the
underlying pulse: he would charge against the metre of the piece being
played, accent off-beats, introduce sudden stops and brief silences. In
other hands this might sound clumsy or all over the place but Hines
could keep his bearings with uncanny resilience.[22]
Armstrong and Hines became good friends and shared a car. Armstrong joined Hines in Carroll Dickerson's band at the Sunset Cafe. In 1927, this became Armstrong's band under the musical direction of Hines.[23] Later that year, Armstrong revamped his Okeh Records recording-only band, Louis Armstrong and His Hot Five, and hired Hines as the pianist, replacing his wife, Lil Hardin Armstrong, on the instrument.
Armstrong and Hines then recorded what are often regarded as some of the most important jazz records ever made.
... with Earl Hines arriving on
piano, Armstrong was already approaching the stature of a concerto
soloist, a role he would play more or less throughout the next decade,
which makes these final small-group sessions something like a reluctant
farewell to jazz's first golden age. Since Hines is also magnificent on
these discs (and their insouciant
exuberance is a marvel on the duet showstopper "Weather Bird") the
results seem like eavesdropping on great men speaking almost quietly
among themselves. There is nothing in jazz finer or more moving than the
playing on "West End Blues", "Tight Like This", "Beau Koo Jack" and "Muggles".[24]
The Sunset Cafe closed in 1927.[nb 5] Hines, Armstrong and the drummer Zutty Singleton
agreed that they would become the "Unholy Three" – they would "stick
together and not play for anyone unless the three of us were hired".[25]
But as Louis Armstrong and His Stompers (with Hines as musical director
and the premises rented in Hines's name), they ran into difficulties
trying to establish their own venue, the Warwick Hall Club. Hines went
briefly to New York and returned to find that Armstrong and Singleton
had rejoined the rival Dickerson band at the new Savoy Ballroom in his
absence,[nb 6]
leaving Hines feeling "warm". When Armstrong and Singleton later asked
him to join them with Dickerson at the Savoy Ballroom, Hines said, "No,
you guys left me in the rain and broke the little corporation we had".[26] Hines joined the clarinetist Jimmie Noone at the Apex, an after-hours speakeasy,
playing from midnight to 6 a.m., seven nights a week. In 1928, he
recorded 14 sides with Noone and again with Armstrong (for a total of 38
sides with Armstrong). His first piano solos were recorded late that
year: eight for QRS Records in New York and then seven for Okeh Records in Chicago, all except two his own compositions.
Hines moved in with Kathryn Perry (with whom he had recorded
"Sadie Green the Vamp of New Orleans"). Hines said of her, "She'd been
at The Sunset too, in a dance act. She was a very charming, pretty girl.
She had a good voice and played the violin. I had been divorced and she
became my common-law wife. We lived in a big apartment and her parents
stayed with us".[27] Perry recorded several times with Hines, including "Body & Soul"
in 1935. They stayed together until 1940, when Hines "divorced" her to
marry Ann Jones Reed, but that marriage was soon "indefinitely
postponed".[28] Hines married singer 'Lady of Song' Janie Moses in 1947. They had
two daughters, Janear (born 1950) and Tosca. Both daughters died before
he did, Tosca in 1976 and Janear in 1981. Janie divorced him on June
14, 1979.
Chicago years
On December 28, 1928 (his 25th birthday and six weeks before the Saint Valentine's Day Massacre), the always-immaculate Hines opened at Chicago's Grand Terrace Cafe leading his own big band, the pinnacle of jazz ambition at the time. "All America was dancing", Hines said,[10] and for the next 12 years and through the worst of the Great Depression and Prohibition,
Hines's band was the orchestra at the Grand Terrace. The Hines
Orchestra – or "Organization", as Hines preferred it – had up to 28
musicians and did three shows a night at the Grand Terrace, four shows
every Saturday and sometimes Sundays. According to Stanley Dance, "Earl Hines and The Grand Terrace were to Chicago what Duke Ellington and The Cotton Club were to New York – but fierier."[29] The Grand Terrace was controlled by the gangster Al Capone, so Hines became Capone's "Mr Piano Man". The Grand Terrace upright piano was soon replaced by a white $3,000 Bechstein grand.[30] Talking about those days Hines later said:
... Al [Capone] came in there one
night and called the whole band and show together and said, "Now we want
to let you know our position. We just want you people just to attend to
your own business. We'll give you all the Protection in the world but
we want you to be like the 3 monkeys:
you hear nothing and you see nothing and you say nothing". And that's
what we did. And I used to hear many of the things that they were going
to do but I never did tell anyone. Sometimes the Police used to come in
... looking for a fall guy and say, "Earl what were they talking about?"
... but I said, "I don't know - no, you're not going to pin that on
me," because they had a habit of putting the pictures of different
people that would bring information in the newspaper and the next day
you would find them out there in the lake somewhere swimming around with
some chains attached to their feet if you know what I mean.[10]
Occasionally, Hines allowed another pianist sit in for him, the better to allow him to conduct the whole "Organization". Jess Stacy[34] was one, Nat "King" Cole and Teddy Wilson were others, but Cliff Smalls was his favorite.[35] Each summer, Hines toured with his whole band for three months, including through the South – the first black big band to do so.[36]
He explained, "[when] we traveled by train through the South, they
would send a porter back to our car to let us know when the dining room
was cleared, and then we would all go in together. We couldn't eat when
we wanted to. We had to eat when they were ready for us."[37] In Duke Ellington's America, Harvey G Cohen writes:
In 1931, Earl Hines and his
Orchestra "were the first big Negro band to travel extensively through
the South". Hines referred to it as an "invasion" rather than a "tour".
Between a bomb exploding under their bandstage in Alabama
(" ...we didn't none of us get hurt but we didn't play so well after
that either") and numerous threatening encounters with the Police, the
experience proved so harrowing that Hines in the 1960s recalled that,
"You could call us the first Freedom Riders".
For the most part, any contact with whites, even fans, was viewed as
dangerous. Finding places to eat or stay overnight entailed a constant
struggle. The only non-musical 'victory' that Hines claimed was winning
the respect of a clothing-store owner who initially treated Hines with
derision until it became clear that Hines planned to spend $85 on
shirts, "which changed his whole attitude".[38]
In 1942 Hines provided the saxophonist Charlie Parker
with his big break, until Parker was fired for his "time-keeping" – by
which Hines meant his inability to show up on time, despite Parker's
resorting to sleeping under the band stage in his attempts to be
punctual.[39]Dizzie Gillespie joined the same year.
The Grand Terrace Cafe had closed suddenly in December 1940; its manager, the cigar-puffing Ed Fox, disappeared.[40] The 37-year-old Hines, always famously good to work for,[41] took his band on the road full-time for the next eight years,[nb 7] resisting renewed offers from Benny Goodman to join his band as piano player.[40] Several members of Hines's band were drafted into the armed forces in World War II – a major problem.[42][nb 8] Six were drafted in 1943 alone. As a result, on August 19, 1943, Hines had to cancel the rest of his Southern tour.[43] He went to New York and hired a "draft-proof" 12-piece all-woman group,[43][44] which lasted two months.[45] Next, Hines expanded it into a 28-piece band (17 men, 11 women),[43] including strings and French horn. Despite these wartime difficulties, Hines took his bands on tour from coast to coast[46] but was still able to take time out from his own band to front the Duke Ellington Orchestra in 1944 when Ellington fell ill.
It was during this time (and especially during the recording ban during the 1942–44 musicians' strike ) that late-night jam sessions with members of Hines's band's sowed the seeds for the emerging new style in jazz, bebop. Ellington later said that "the seeds of bop were in Earl Hines's piano style".[47] Charlie Parker's biographer Ross Russell wrote:
... The Earl Hines Orchestra of
1942 had been infiltrated by the jazz revolutionaries. Each section had
its cell of insurgents. The band's sonority bristled with flatted
fifths, off triplets and other material of the new sound scheme. Fellow
bandleaders of a more conservative bent warned Hines that he had
recruited much too well and was sitting on a powder keg.[48]
As early as 1940, saxophone player and arranger Budd Johnson had "re-written the book"[28] for the Hines' band in a more modern style. Johnson and Billy Eckstine,
Hines vocalist between 1939 and 1943, have been credited with helping
to bring modern players into the Hines band in the transition between swing and bebop. Apart from Parker and Gillespie, other Hines 'modernists' included Gene Ammons, Gail Brockman, Scoops Carry, Goon Gardner, Wardell Gray, Bennie Green, Benny Harris, Harry 'Pee-Wee' Jackson, Shorty McConnell, Cliff Smalls, Shadow Wilson and Sarah Vaughan, who replaced Eckstine as the band singer in 1943 and stayed for a year.
Dizzy Gillespie said of the music the band evolved:
... People talk about the Hines
band being 'the incubator of bop' and the leading exponents of that
music ended up in the Hines band. But people also have the erroneous
impression that the music was new. It was not. The music evolved from
what went before. It was the same basic music. The difference was in how
you got from here to here to here ... naturally each age has got its
own shit.[49]
The links to bebop remained close. Parker's discographer, among others,[50] has argued that "Yardbird Suite", which Parker recorded with Miles Davis in March 1946, was in fact based on Hines' "Rosetta", which nightly served as the Hines band theme-tune.[51] Dizzy Gillespie described the Hines band, saying, "We had a
beautiful, beautiful band with Earl Hines. He's a master and you learn a
lot from him, self-discipline and organization."[52] In July 1946, Hines suffered serious head injuries in a car crash
near Houston which, despite an operation, affected his eyesight for the
rest of his life.[53] Back on the road again four months later, he continued to lead his big band for two more years.[54] In 1947, Hines bought the biggest nightclub in Chicago, The El Grotto,[55] but it soon foundered with Hines losing $30,000 ($385,444 today).[56] The big-band era was over – Hines' bands had been at the top for 20 years.
In early 1948, Hines joined up again with Armstrong in the "Louis Armstrong and His All-Stars"
'small-band'. It was not without its strains for Hines. A year later,
Armstrong became the first jazz musician to appear on the cover of Time
magazine (on February 21, 1949). Armstrong was by then on his way to
becoming an American icon, leaving Hines to feel he was being used only
as a sideman in comparison to his old friend. Armstrong said of the
difficulties, mainly over billing, "Hines and his ego, ego, ego ...",
but after three years and to Armstrong's annoyance,[57] Hines left the All Stars in 1951.
Next, back as leader again, Hines took his own small combos
around the United States. He started with a markedly more modern lineup
than the aging All Stars: Bennie Green, Art Blakey, Tommy Potter, and Etta Jones. In 1954, he toured his then seven-piece group nationwide with the Harlem Globetrotters. In 1958 he broadcast on the American Forces Network but by the start of the jazz-lean 1960s and old enough to retire,[58] Hines settled "home" in Oakland, California, with his wife and two young daughters, opened a tobacconist's, and came close to giving up the profession.
Then, in 1964, thanks to Stanley Dance,
his determined friend and unofficial manager, Hines was "suddenly
rediscovered" following a series of recitals at the Little Theatre in
New York, which Dance had cajoled him into. They were the first piano
recitals Hines had ever given; they caused a sensation. "What is there
left to hear after you've heard Earl Hines?", asked John Wilson of the New York Times .[59] Hines then won the 1966 International Critics Poll for Down Beat magazine's Hall of Fame. Down Beat also elected him the world's "No. 1 Jazz Pianist" in 1966 (and did so again five more times). Jazz Journal awarded his LPs of the year first and second in its overall poll and first, second and third in its piano category.[60]Jazz
voted him "Jazzman of the Year" and picked him for its number 1 and
number 2 places in the category Piano Recordings. Hines was invited to
appear on TV shows hosted by Johnny Carson and Mike Douglas.
But the most highly regarded recordings of this period are his solo performances, "a whole orchestra by himself".[61]Whitney Balliett wrote of his solo recordings and performances of this time:
Hines will be sixty-seven this year and his style has become involuted, rococo,
and subtle to the point of elusiveness. It unfolds in orchestral layers
and it demands intense listening. Despite the sheer mass of notes he
now uses, his playing is never fatty. Hines may go along like this in a
medium tempo blues. He will play the first two choruses softly and out
of tempo, unreeling placid chords that safely hold the kernel of the
melody. By the third chorus, he will have slid into a steady but implied
beat and raised his volume. Then, using steady tenths in his left hand,
he will stamp out a whole chorus of right-hand chords in between beats.
He will vault into the upper register in the next chorus and wind
through irregularly placed notes, while his left hand plays descending,
on-the-beat, chords that pass through a forest of harmonic changes.
(There are so many push-me, pull-you contrasts going on in such a chorus
that it is impossible to grasp it one time through.) In the next
chorus—bang!—up goes the volume again and Hines breaks into a
crazy-legged double-time-and-a-half run that may make several sweeps up
and down the keyboard and that are punctuated by offbeat single notes in
the left hand. Then he will throw in several fast descending
two-fingered glissandos,
go abruptly into an arrhythmic swirl of chords and short, broken, runs
and, as abruptly as he began it all, ease into an interlude of relaxed
chords and poling single notes. But these choruses, which may be
followed by eight or ten more before Hines has finished what he has to
say, are irresistible in other ways. Each is a complete creation in
itself, and yet each is lashed tightly to the next.[62]
Solo tributes to Armstrong, Hoagy Carmichael, Ellington, George Gershwin and Cole Porter were all put on record in the 1970s, sometimes on the 1904 12-legged Steinway given to him in 1969 by Scott Newhall, the managing editor of the San Francisco Chronicle.
In 1974, when he was in his seventies, Hines recorded sixteen LPs. "A
spate of solo recording meant that, in his old age, Hines was being
comprehensively documented at last, and he rose to the challenge with
consistent inspirational force".[63]
From his 1964 "comeback" until his death, Hines recorded over 100 LPs
all over the world. Within the industry, he became legendary for going
into a studio and coming out an hour and a half later having recorded an
unplanned solo LP.[64] Retakes were almost unheard of except when Hines wanted to try a tune again in some other way, often completely different.[65] From 1964 on, Hines often toured Europe, especially France. He
toured South America in 1968. He performed in Asia, Australia, Japan
and, in 1966, the Soviet Union, in tours funded by the U.S. State
Department. During his six-week tour of the Soviet Union, in which he
performed 35 concerts,[66] the 10,000-seat Kiev Sports Palace was sold out. As a result, the Kremlin cancelled his Moscow and Leningrad concerts[67] as being "too culturally dangerous".[68]
Final years
Arguably still playing as well as he ever had,[nb 10]
Hines displayed individualistic quirks (including grunts) in these
performances. He sometimes sang as he played, especially his own "They
Didn't Believe I Could Do It ... Neither Did I".[10] In 1975, Hines was the subject of an hour-long television documentary film[69] made by ATV (for Britain's commercial ITV channel), out-of-hours at the Blues Alley nightclub in Washington, DC. The International Herald Tribune
described it as "the greatest jazz film ever made". In the film, Hines
said, "The way I like to play is that ... I'm an explorer, if I might
use that expression, I'm looking for something all the time ... almost
like I'm trying to talk."[10] In 1979, Hines was inducted into the Black Filmmakers Hall of Fame.[70] He played solo at Duke Ellington's funeral, played solo twice at the White House, for the President of France and for the Pope. Of this acclaim, Hines said, "Usually they give people credit when they're dead. I got my flowers while I was living".[71]
Hines's last show took place in San Francisco a few days before
he died in Oakland. As he had wished, his Steinway was auctioned for the
benefit of gifted low-income music students, still bearing its silver
plaque:
presented by jazz lovers
from all over the world. this piano is the only one of its kind in the
world and expresses the great genius of a man who has never played a
melancholy note in his lifetime on a planet that has often succumbed to
despair.[72][73]
The Oxford Companion to Jazz describes Hines as "the most important pianist in the transition from stride to swing" and continues:
As he matured through the 1920s, he
simplified the stride "orchestral piano", eventually arriving at a
prototypical swing style. The right hand no longer developed syncopated
patterns around pivot notes (as in ragtime) or between-the-hands figuration (as in stride) but instead focused on a more directed melodic line, often doubled at the octave with phrase-ending tremolos.
This line was called the "trumpet" right hand because of its markedly
hornlike character but in fact the general trend toward a more linear
style can be traced back through stride and Jelly Roll Morton to late ragtime from 1915 to 1920.[74]
Hines himself described meeting Armstrong:
Louis looked at me so peculiar. So I said, "Am I making the wrong chords?" And he said, "No, but your style is like mine". So I said, "Well, I wanted to play trumpet
but it used to hurt me behind my ears so I played on the piano what I
wanted to play on the trumpet". And he said, "No, no, that's my style,
that's what I like."
Hines continued:
... I was curious and wanted to
know what the chords were made of. I would begin to play like the other
instruments. But in those days we didn't have amplification, so the singers used to use megaphones
and they didn't have grand-pianos for us to use at the time – it was an
upright. So when they gave me a solo, playing single fingers like I was
doing, in those great big halls they could hardly hear me. So I had to
think of something so I could cut through the big-band.
So I started to use what they call 'trumpet-style' – which was octaves.
Then they could hear me out front and that's what changed the style of
piano playing at that particular time.[10]
In their book Jazz (2009), Gary Giddins and Scott DeVeaux wrote of Hines's style of the time:
To make [himself] audible, [Hines]
developed an ability to improvise in tremolos (the speedy alternation of
two or more notes, creating a pianistic version of the brass man's vibrato)
and octaves or tenths: instead of hitting one note at a time with his
right hand, he hit two and with vibrantly percussive force – his reach
was so large that jealous competitors spread the ludicrous rumor that he
had had the webbing between his fingers surgically removed.[75]
Hines was both a great soloist and a
great rhythm player. He has a beautiful powerful rhythmic approach to
the keyboard and his rhythms are more eccentric than those of Art Tatum or Fats Waller. When I say eccentric, I mean getting away from straight 4/4 rhythm. He would play a lot of what we now call 'accent on the and beat'. ... It was a subtle use of syncopation, playing on the in-between beats or what I might call and beats: one-and-two-and-three-and-four-and. The and between "one-two-three-four" is implied, When counted in music, the and
becomes what are called eighth notes. So you get eight notes to a bar
instead of four, although they're spaced out in the time of four. Hines
would come in on those and beats with the most eccentric patterns
that propelled the rhythm forward with such tremendous force that
people felt an irresistible urge to dance or tap their feet or otherwise
react physically to the rhythm of the music. ... Hines is very
intricate in his rhythm patterns: very unusual and original and there is
really nobody like him. That makes him a giant of originality. He could
produce improvised piano solos which could cut through to perhaps 2,000
dancing people just like a trumpet or a saxophone could.[76]
Jackson says that Earl Hines and Erroll Garner
(whose approach to playing piano, he says, came from Hines) were the
two musicians he found exceptionally difficult to accompany. Why? “They
could play in like two or three different tempos at one time … The left
hand would be in one meter and the right hand would be in another meter
and then you have to watch their pedal technique because they would hit
the sustaining pedal and notes are ringing here and that’s one tempo
going on when he puts the sustaining pedal on, and then this hand is
moving, his left hand is moving, maybe playing tenths, and this hand is
playing like quarter-note triplets or sixteenth notes. So you got this
whole conglomeration of all these different tempos going on”.[77]
Of Hines's later style, The Biographical Encyclopedia of Jazz says of Hines' 1965 style:
[Hines] uses his left hand
sometimes for accents and figures that would only come from a full
trumpet section. Sometimes he will play chords that would have been
written and played by five saxophones in harmony. But he is always the
virtuoso pianist with his arpeggios,
his percussive attack and his fantastic ability to modulate from one
song to another as if they were all one song and he just created all
those melodies during his own improvisation.[78]
Later still, then in his seventies and after a host of recent solo recordings, Hines himself said:
I'm an explorer if I might use that
expression. I'm looking for something all the time. And oft-times I get
lost. And people that are around me a lot know that when they see me
smiling, they know I'm lost and I'm trying to get back. But it makes it
much more interesting because then you do things that surprise yourself.
And after you hear the recording, it makes you a little bit happy too
because you say, "Oh, I didn't know I could do THAT![10]
Selected discography
Hines' first-ever recording was, apparently, made on October 3, 1923 at Richmond, Indiana, when he was aged 19.[79]
Records commercially available as new, as of February 2016, are shown emboldened in the lists below: many more usually available second-hand on eBay.
The 1930s, classic jazz and the swing era:
Louis Armstrong & Earl Hines: inc. "Weatherbird", "Muggles", "Tight Like This", "West End Blues": Columbia 1928: reissued many times inc. as The Smithsonian Collection MLP 2012
Jimmie Noone & Earl Hines: "At the Apex Club": Decca Volume 1 1928: reissued 1967 : Decca Jazz Heritage Series
Earl Hines Solo: 14 of his own compositions: QRS & Okeh: 1928/9: reissued many times (see below)
Earl Hines Collection: Piano Solos 1928-40: Okeh/Brunswick/Bluebird: Collectors Classics
That's a Plenty, Quadromania series 1928-1947 Membran, four CDs, 2006, an easily available collection
Earl Hines - The Grand Terrace Band: RCA Victor Vintage Series
[Besides the piano solos Hines recorded for QRS (1928) and Okeh (1928), in 1929 Hines signed with RCA Victor
and recorded a number of sides in 1929. In 1932, he signed with
Brunswick and recorded with them through mid-1934 when he signed with
Decca. He recorded 3 sessions for Decca in 1934 and early 1935. He did
not record again until February, 1937 when he signed with Vocalion, for
whom he recorded 4 sessions through March 1938. After another gap, he
signed with Victor's Bluebird label in July 1939 and recorded
prolifically right up the recording ban in mid-1942. During this
period, he was on several numbers with Sidney Bechet for a September 6, 1940 recording session.]
Swing to bebop transition years, 1939-1945:
(Big bands were particularly affected by the 1942-1944 American Federation of Musicians recording ban which also severely curtailed the recording of early bebop)
The Indispensable Earl Hines: Vols 1, 2, 1939-1940, Jazz Tribune/BMG
The Indispensable Earl Hines: Vols 3, 4, 1939-1942, 1945, Jazz Tribune/BMG
Earl Hines/Stephane Grappelli duets, The Giants: Black Lion 1974
Earl Hines/Joe Venuti duets: Hot Sonatas: Chiaroscuro 1975
Earl 'Fatha' Hines: The Father of Modern Jazz Piano
(five LPs boxed): three LPs solo (on Schiedmeyer grand) and two LPs with
Budd Johnson, Bill Pemberton, Oliver Jackson: MF Productions 1977
Earl Hines: In New Orleans: solo: Chiarascuro 1977
Controversy
persists over the origins of the name "Fatha". The most common account
is that a radio announcer (some say Ted Pearson), possibly after Hines
had accused him of being drunk, announced, slurringly, "Here comes
'Fatha' Hines thru the deep forest with his children", "Deep Forest"
being the band's signature tune. (Cook 2005[page needed])
Others have suggested it was because Hines had "... given birth to a
style – more than a style, a virtual language – of jazz piano". (Epstein 1999)[page needed]
Hines quotes his year of birth as 1905 (Dance 1983, p. 7). Most sources agree 1903 is correct.
Hines'
father was a foreman in the coal-docks. His mother had died when he was
three but Hines was always very appreciative of his upbringing in a
12-room house with his father, his stepmother ["who did a great job"],
his grandparents, two cousins, two uncles and an aunt. There was a
smallholding at the back with two cows, pigs, chickens. "We needed to
buy very little so far as food was concerned, because we raised nearly
everything that we ate." (Dance 1983, p. 7)
Also,
"According to Hines, he was sitting there playing 'The One I Love
Belongs to Somebody Else' when Armstrong walked in and began to play
along". (Collier 1983, p. 158)
At
various time Hines played much of Chicago's "Bright-Light" district:
The Elite Club, The Regal Theatre, The Apex Club, The Platinum Lounge,
The Vendome Theatre, The Grand Terrace, The New Grand Terrace, The
Sunset Café, The Savoy Ballroom, Warwick Hall. See key to map of Chicago
South Side jazz c.1915-1930 at University of Chicago Jazz Archive (The
Leon Lewis map).
The Jazz Age Chicago described the venue:
The Savoy Ballroom opened for
business on Thanksgiving Eve, November 23, 1927. With more than a
half-acre of dancing space, the Savoy had a capacity of over four
thousand persons. The ballroom's name recalled the enormously popular
and highly regarded dance palace of the same name in New York's Harlem,
which had opened a little more than a year earlier. ...
In its review of the Savoy, the Defender, Chicago's leading black
newspaper, extolled the modern features of the new ballroom: "Never
before have Chicagoans seen anything quite as lavish as the Savoy
ballroom. Famous artists have transformed the building into a veritable
paradise, each section more beautiful than the other. The feeling of
luxury and comfort one gets upon entering is quite ideal and homelike,
and the desire to stay and dance and look on is generated with each
moment of your visit. Every modern convenience is provided. In addition
to a house physician and a professional nurse for illness or accident,
there is an ideal lounging room for ladies and gentlemen, luxuriously
furnished, a boudoir room for milady's makeup convenience, an ultra
modern checking room which accommodates 6,000 hats and coats
individually hung so that if one comes in with his or her coat crushed
or wrinkled it is in better condition when leaving." Such modern
amenities not only lent an "atmosphere of refinement" to the ballroom
that reflected the class pretensions of upwardly mobile black
Chicagoans, but also decreased the likelihood that the Savoy would draw
fire from those advocating the closure of disorderly dance
establishments. An adjacent 1,000-space parking lot also likely appealed
to more prosperous black Chicagoans.
...
The music never stopped at the Savoy. From 1927 until 1940, two
bands were engaged every night to permit continuous dancing. When one
band took a break, another was on hand to play on. During these years,
the Savoy was open seven days a week, with matinees on Saturdays and
Sundays. Although most of the Savoy's patrons were black, growing
numbers of white Chicagoans visited the Savoy to hear and dance to the
great jazz bands of the day. ("Savoy Ballroom". Jazz Age Chicago. Archived from the original on March 24, 2004. Retrieved 1 June 2014.)
For their astonishing coast-coast schedule over the next eight years, see Dance 1983, pp. 299–334.
Hines
himself was only just outside draftable age. On 5 December 1942, a
Presidential Executive Order changed the age range for the Draft from
21-45 to 18-38 (3 weeks after the Order, on December 28 Hines was 39)
and ended voluntary enlistment. See Conscription in the United States.
Hines
played on a New Orleans-Cuba cruise with Getz, Gillespie & Ry
Cooder in 1977 and performed there with Cuban musicians in the early
days of the USA & Cuba "thaw".
Charles Fox writing in The Essential Jazz Records, Vol 1 said of Tour de Force
(solo recording from 1972), "The pianist was still at his dazzling best
when he made this LP at the age of 69. This is Hines in excelsis,
sounding as good as at any time in his long career". (p. 487) Writing
about Hines' July 3, 1974 Concert at the Royal Festival Hall in London,
Derek Jewell wrote in Britain's Sunday Times: "The packed house
must have regarded his opening unaccompanied solo as one of the greatest
jazz experiences of their lives." Hines was then 70 years old.
Citations
"Jazz: A Film by Ken Burns". PBS.org quoting The New Grove Dictionary of Jazz. Oxford University Press. Retrieved 2008-03-24.
Pittsburgh Music History. See External Links below.
Obituary. Daily Telegraph, April 23, 1983. See also Pittsburgh Music History (External Links, below).
Stanley Dance: liner notes to "Earl Hines at Home": Delmark DD 212. As well as The World of Earl Hines and The World of Duke Ellington, Dance also wrote The World of Count Basie (Da Capo Press, 1985), ISBN0-306-80245-7. See also Pittsburgh Music History (External Links, below).
"The
broadcast was played over a loud speaker on Wylie Avenue and crowds
mobbed the street to listen and then stayed to cheer Deppe and Hines
when they made it back to the Hill". Pittsburg Music History (see
External Links, below).
Epstein 1999, p. Chapter 1.[page needed]
"Every kid pianist in the Midwest copied Earl Hines. Little Nat Cole
learned to play jazz piano by listening to Gatemouth [Hines] on the
radio. And when the radio blew a tube the boy would sneak out of his
apartment on Prairie Avenue, run several blocks through the dark, and
stand outside the Grand Terrace nightclub, under the elevated train, and
listen to Earl's piano live from there. It inspired him to precocious
mastery of jazz."
Dance 1983, pp. 57–8. According to the pianist Teddy Wilson and the saxophonist Eddie Barefield,
"Art Tatum's favorite jazz piano player was Earl Hines. He [Tatum] used
to buy all of Earl's records and would improvise on them. He'd play the
record but he'd improvise over what Earl was doing ... course, when you
heard Art play you didn't hear nothing of anybody but Art. But he got
his ideas from Earl's style of playing – but Earl never knew that".
Allen, Steve. "The Return of Jess Stacy.". Unidentified newspaper, undated. Jess Stacy Collection, Southeast Missouri State University Special Collections and Archives.
Dance 1970.
For instance, according to Ray Nance, "Earl was wonderful to work for"
(p. 136); according to Willie Cook, "Earl used psychology. He had
everybody loving that band" (p. 179).
"Father Hines Loses Plenty of Children". Variety, August 18, 1943.
See Dance 1983, pp. 298–302 for detailed chronology.
Dance 1983,
p. 90. "Ellington had a way of saying serious things about music
casually but ... then I realized [Ellington] had in mind the revolution
Hines effected in the function of the jazz pianist's left hand".
Komara,
Parker's discographer, says, "Track 2 Yardbird Suite (Charlie Parker):
32 measures AABA chorus, based on the chords of "Rosetta" (Earl Hines):
key of C 4/4 meter" with a further page [p. 67] of detail. "The piece
dates back to Parker's tenure with Jay McShann in 1940-1942 when it was
known as "What Price Love" as well as "Yardbird Suite". The harmonic
model is "Rosetta" composed by Earl Hines and Henri Woode.
Of the four takes waxed by Parker for Dial, only the first and last
survive". (Komara 1998, 122). Reissued as 'Charlie Parker on Dial':
Spotlite SPJ-CD 4-101:The Complete Sessions CD 1993 [also on LP 1970,
Spotlite LP101 Vol I]
Spontaneous Improvisations and The Grand Terrace Band in the overall poll; Spontaneous Improvisations, The Real Earl Hines and Fatha in the piano category.
Clarke, Donald (1989, 2005). Hines, Earl. MusicWeb Encyclopedia of Popular Music. Retrieved August 1, 2006.
See, for instance, the producer George Avakian's sleeve notes to Columbia's 1951 solo album Piano Moods CL6171 and producer Hank O'Neal's sleeve notes to the 1977 solo album Earl Hines in New Orleans, Chiaroscuro CR(D) 200.
Dance 1983,
p. 5. A typical example of this is the three alternative and
dramatically different versions of "Rose Room" that Hines recorded over
less than half an hour in Paris in 1965 (all three are on the album Fatha's Hands).
"Falling", with Deppe's Serenaders, source: Tom Lord, The Jazz Discography
At São Paulo, Brazil, when Hines was aged 78: One O'Clock Jump with Eric Schneider and the 150 Band on "Fatha's Birthday" (source: Tom Lord, The Jazz Discography)
Kirchner, Bill, ed. (2000), The Oxford Companion to Jazz, New York: Oxford University Press, ISBN978-0-19-518359-7.
Komara, Edward M (1998), The Dial Recordings of Charlie Parker: A Discography, Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press, ISBN978-0-313-29168-5.
Lester, James (1994), Too Marvelous for Words: The Life and Genius of Art Tatum, New York: Oxford University Press, ISBN0-19-508365-2
Palmer, Robert (1981), "Pop Jazz: Fatha Hines Stom[p]ing and Chomping On at 75", New York Times, August 28, 1981, retrieved from New York Times, July 30, 2006, ISBN0-8050-7068-0.
Ratliff, Ben (2002), The New York Times Essential Library: Jazz, New York: Times Books, ISBN0-8050-7068-0.
The Rough Guide to Jazz (2004), 3rd ed., "Earl Hines", pp. 262–263, Rough Guides, ISBN1-84353-256-5.
Russell, Ross (1996), Bird Lives! The High Life and Hard Times of Charlie (Yardbird) Parker, New York: Da Capo Press, ISBN978-0-306-80679-7.
Schuller, Gunther (1991), The Swing Era: The Development of Jazz, 1930–1945, Oxford University Press, pp. 263–292, ISBN0-19-507140-9.
Simon, George T. (1974), The Big Bands, Macmillan.
Taylor, Jeffrey (2002), "Earl Hines and 'Rosetta'", Current Musicology, special issue, A Commemorative Festschrift in Honor of Mark Tucker (Spring 2001–Spring 2002), pp. 71–73.
One-hour TV documentary, produced and directed by Charlie Nairn. Filmed at Blues Alley jazz club in Washington, D.C. for UK ATV Television in 1975. [Original 16mm film, plus out-takes of additional tunes, archived in British Film Institute Library at BFI.org. Also at ITVStudios.com.
DVD copies available from the University of California-Berkeley's Jean
Gray Hargrove Music Library (which holds The Earl Hines
Collection/Archive). Also at University of Chicago's Hogan Jazz Archive,
Tulane University and at the Louis Armstrong House Museum Libraries. See also jazzonfilm.com/documentaries
Earl Hines at Music of the United States of America (MUSA)
Earl (Fatha) Hines, the father of modern jazz piano, died Friday in Oakland, Calif., after a heart attack. He was 77 years old.
In
his pioneering work with Louis Armstrong in the late 1920's, Mr. Hines
virtually redefined jazz piano. With what he called ''trumpet style,''
Mr. Hines played horn-like solo lines in octaves with his right hand and
spurred them with chords from his left. He thus carved a place for the
piano as a solo instrument outside the rhythm section and defined the
roles of both hands for the next generations of jazz pianists.
Mr.
Hines's strong right hand and angular melodic ideas continued to sound
contemporary throughout his career. In the 1930's and 1940's, he led a
Chicago big band that began the careers of the singers Billy Eckstine
and Sarah Vaughan and included the saxophonists Wardell Gray and Budd
Johnson. That band became an incubator for be-bop in the early 1940's,
when it featured the trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie and the saxophonist
Charlie Parker.
Son
of Two Musicians Earl Hines was born in Duquesne, Pa. His father was a
trumpeter and his mother played piano and organ. He took up the trumpet
as a child, but began studying classical piano at the age of 9. After
three years of lessons, he decided he was more interested in jazz piano,
and by the time he was 15 years old he was leading his own trio.
Mr.
Hines worked with big bands led by Lois B. Deppe in Pittsburgh and
Carroll Dickerson and Sammy Stewart in Chicago, and in 1927 he joined a
quintet led by Louis Armstrong at Chicago's Savoy Ballroom.
With
Mr. Armstrong, he made such recordings as ''West End Blues'' and
''Weather Bird,'' and in 1928 he recorded solos, including ''A Monday
Date'' and ''Caution Blues,'' that established his style and have had a
lasting influence on jazz piano.
Mr.
Hines started his own big band in 1928 at Chicago's Grand Terrace
Ballroom, and stayed in residence there for more than a decade, although
he toured for part of each year. His was one of the first black big
bands to tour the South.
The
band recorded his best-known composition, ''Rosetta,'' and had hits
with Mr. Eckstine's vocals on ''Jelly Jelly'' and ''Stormy Monday
Blues.'' Although he left the Grand Terrace in 1940, Mr. Hines led a big
band nearly continuously until 1947; at one point the group included an
all-female string section.
Origin
of Nickname A Chicago disk jockey called him ''Fatha'' in the 1930's
and the nickname - as in ''Father of modern piano'' -stayed with him.
After
dissolving his band, Mr. Hines worked with smaller groups. He rejoined
Mr. Armstrong from 1948 to 1951, then led his own groups.In 1957, he
toured Europe with an all-star group including the trombonist Jack
Teagarden; in 1966, the United States sponsored Mr. Hines' group on a
tour of the Soviet Union.
Since
the 1950's, Mr. Hines had been based in the San Francisco Bay Area, and
he continued to tour Europe, Jpana and the United States. His most
recent New York engagement was in August 1982 and he appeared in San
Francisco last weekend.
It is believed that Mr. Hines is survived by a granddaughter. He was divorced from his wife, Janie, in 1980.
A version of this obituary appears in print on April 23, 1983, on Page 1001010 of the National edition with the headline: EARL HINES DEAD; TOP JAZZ PIANIST. Order Reprints|Today's Paper
THE
MUSIC OF EARL HINES: AN EXTENSIVE VIDEO OVERVIEW, A CROSS SECTION OF
RECORDINGS, MUSICAL ANALYSIS AND COMMENTARY, PLUS VARIOUS INTERVIEWS
WITH EARL HINES:
Kofi Natambu, editor of and contributor to Sound Projections, is a writer, poet, cultural critic, and political journalist whose poetry, essays, criticism, reviews, and journalism have appeared in many literary magazines, journals, newspapers, and anthologies. He has written extensively about music as a critic and historian for many publications, including the Black Scholar, Downbeat, Solid Ground: A New World Journal, Detroit Metro Times, KONCH, the Panopticon Review,Black Renaissance Noire, the Village Voice, the City Sun (NYC), the Poetry Project Newsletter (NYC), and the African American Review. He is the author of a biography Malcolm X: His Life & Work (Alpha Books) and two books of poetry: The Melody Never Stops (Past Tents Press) and Intervals (Post Aesthetic Press). He was the founder and editor of Solid Ground: A New World Journal, a national quarterly magazine of the arts, culture, and politics and the editor of a literary anthology Nostalgia for the Present (Post Aesthetic Press). Natambu has read his work throughout the country and given many lectures and workshops at academic and arts institutions. He has taught American literature, literary theory and criticism, cultural history and criticism, film studies, political science, creative writing, philosophy, critical theory, and music history and criticism (Jazz, Blues, R&B, Hip Hop) at many universities and colleges. He was also a curator in the Education Department of Detroit’s Museum of African American History. Born in Detroit, Michigan, Natambu currently lives in Berkeley, California with his wife Chuleenan.
In 1928 Hines and his orchestra opened at Chicago's Grand Terrace
Cafe. For many years, the Hines big band broadcast live from the Grand
Terrace, garnering a huge nationwide audience. Many future piano greats
later said their education in jazz came from listening to these
broadcasts, among them Nat Cole, Jay McShann, Teddy Wilson and Art
Tatum.
In 1942 Hines provided the saxophonist Charlie Parker
with his big break, until Parker was fired for his "time-keeping" – by
which Hines meant his inability to show up on time, despite Parker's
resorting to sleeping under the band stage in his attempts to be
punctual.[39] Dizzie Gillespie joined the same year.
In early 1948, Hines joined up again with Armstrong in the "Louis Armstrong and His All-Stars"
'small-band'. It was not without its strains for Hines. A year later,
Armstrong became the first jazz musician to appear on the cover of Time
magazine (on February 21, 1949). Armstrong was by then on his way to
becoming an American icon, leaving Hines to feel he was being used only
as a sideman in comparison to his old friend. Armstrong said of the
difficulties, mainly over billing, "Hines and his ego, ego, ego ...",
but after three years and to Armstrong's annoyance,[57] Hines left the All Stars in 1951.
