Eddie Vinson

Eddie "Cleanhead" Vinson

Eddie "Cleanhead" Vinson (born December 18, 1917 in Houston , Texas , † July 2, 1988 in Los Angeles ) was an American jazz and rhythm and blues saxophonist who has also emerged as a blues singer.

Live and act

Vinson's parents, both pianists, introduced him to music at an early age. He started playing the saxophone in high school. He became a member of Chester Boone's band in 1935 , who also belonged to T-Bone Walker at the time . From 1936 to 1941 he played with saxophonists Arnett Cobb and Illinois Jacquet in Milt Larkin's band .

In 1941 he went to New York City and became a blues shouter with the Cootie Williams Orchestra, where he recorded classics like "Cherry Red". In 1945 he founded his own band, which also included the then unknown John Coltrane . Some of his best pieces were created here, including a. "Kidney Stew" and the legendary "Cleanhead Blues". He entered the R&B (“Race Records”) charts in 1947 with “Old Maid Boogie” (# 2).

He briefly played in Count Basie's band , and in the 1960s he worked on the Johnny Otis Show . In the 1970s and 1980s he was particularly successful in Europe with his characteristic mixed style of jazz and blues and had made several records, for example with Joe Pentzlin . He also made records in the USA, including an album with the Roomful of Blues group and a live album with Arnett Cobb and Alan Dawson .

Trivia

When Eddie Vinson played for Cootie Williams, he wanted to straighten his frizzy locks, in keeping with the fashion of the time. The success was that his hair was running out in clumps - he couldn't perform like that, so he had to be shaved. Shortly afterwards he took up the "Cleanhead Blues", which stormed the hit parades of the time. When his hair recovered a few months later, he stuck to the daily skull shave for the rest of his life, because curly he could not perform the "blues of the bald man". The young John Coltrane, who played the second alto saxophone in Mister Cleanhead's band at the time, had to switch to the tenor saxophone in order to find his own solos - the success is well known.

Discographic notes

• Cleanhead and Cannonball ( Milestone , 1961/62) with Cannonball & Nat Adderley , Joe Zawinul , Sam Jones , Louis Hayes
• Kidney Stew is Fine (Delmark, 1969) with Hal Singer , Jay McShann , T-Bone Walker
• Jamming The Blues (Black Lion, 1974)
• Redux: Live at the Keystone Korner (savant, 1979)
• Cleanhead Blues (Camden, 1978–1982) with Ray Bryant , George Duvivier , Alan Dawson
• I Want a Little Girl (OJC, 1981)

Lexigraphic entries

• Ian Carr , Digby Fairweather , Brian Priestley : Rough Guide Jazz. The ultimate guide to jazz music. 1700 artists and bands from the beginning until today. Metzler, Stuttgart / Weimar 1999, ISBN 3-476-01584-X .
• Leonard Feather , Ira Gitler : The Biographical Encyclopedia of Jazz. Oxford University Press, New York 1999, ISBN 0-19-532000-X .

Web links

• Works by and about Eddie Vinson in the catalog of the German National Library