Clora Bryant

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Clora Bryant (born May 30, 1927 in Denison , Texas , † August 25, 2019 in Los Angeles , California ) was an American jazz trumpeter and composer. She is considered one of the most respected trumpet players on the west coast and has worked in big bands, show bands and jazz combos .

Life

Bryant, who sang in the gospel choir as a child and grew up in Los Angeles , was taken to concerts by her single father at an early age and saw Jimmy Lunceford , Count Basie and Duke Ellington as a teenager . When her brother was called up for military service, she took over his trumpet, which she initially taught herself to play . In high school, she played in the dance orchestra. From 1944 attended Prairie View College in Houston , where she soon played as the first female trumpeter in the women's band Prairie View College Co-Eds and performed with them every weekend, even at the Apollo Theater . In 1946 she played with the International Sweethearts of Rhythm and later with the Darlings of Rhythm and the Queens of Rhythm , other women's bands. In 1947 she discovered the bebop on a radio broadcast and stylistically based herself on Dizzy Gillespie .

In 1948 she married bassist Joe Stone in Los Angeles ; after the baby break she worked as a musician again. Although she bore and raised other children, she continued to perform on stage in the 1950s as she regularly played at jam sessions . She also appeared on television with a women's quintet around Ginger Smock , the Sepia Tones . In 1957 she recorded the album The Gal with the Horn for Mode Records , on which she can also be heard as a singer. In the early 1960s she worked as a musician in Las Vegas , where she also appeared in the film Pepi with Harry James , Sammy Davis Jr. and Damita Jo . Then she worked with the Billy Williams Band until 1964 . For the next two years she toured with her brother, Mel Bryant. She also worked in the big bands of Ellington, Basie, Lionel Hampton , Bill Berry and Count Basie . From 1975 she was also active as a composer; she wrote the suite To Dizzy with Love and has won two National Endowment for the Arts awards for composition and execution.

She also appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show and was the first American jazz musician to perform in the Soviet Union at the request of Mikhail Gorbachev .

Book publication

literature

  • Sally Placksin Women in Jazz. From the turn of the century to the present Vienna: Hannibal 1989 (pp. 177–181); ISBN 3-85445-044-3
  • Linda Dahl: Stormy Weather. The Music and Lives of a Century of Jazzwomen. London: Quartet Books, 1984 (pp. 211-218); ISBN 0-7043-2477-6
  • Sherrie Tucker Swing Shift: "All-Girl" Bands of the 1940s. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2000. ISBN 0-8223-2485-7

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Giovanni Russonello: Clora Bryant, Trumpeter and Pillar of LA Jazz Scene, Dies at 92. In: The New York Times , September 1, 2019. Retrieved September 3, 2019.
  2. ↑ Placksin Women in Jazz , p. 177
  3. ↑ Clora Bryant at Allmusic (English)
personal data
SURNAME Bryant, Clora
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American jazz musician
DATE OF BIRTH May 30, 1927
PLACE OF BIRTH Denison , Texas
DATE OF DEATH August 25, 2019
Place of death Los Angeles , California