Josif Weinstein
Josif Wladimirowitsch Weinstein ( Russian Иосиф Владимирович Вайнштейн , English transcription Yosif Vainshtein ; born October 28, 1918 in Bila Zerkwa ; † September 1, 2001 in Canada ) was a Russian big band leader, especially of swing in Leningrad .
Weinstein moved from Ukraine to Moscow in the late 1920s and to Leningrad in 1931. During military service on the cruiser Aurora, he learned the trumpet, which he then studied in Leningrad from 1937 to 1941 at the Musgorsky Music School. As early as 1938 he led his own jazz band in the Hotel Europa. In 1942 he directed an orchestra in Kronstadt , which played in Leningrad even during the very difficult years of the 1943 siege. Then he led a military band of the Baltic Fleet in Tallinn . After the war he returned to the Hotel Europa as head of the house band. Due to intrigue, he lost this post in 1949 and returned to the military. He was jailed in 1952 on false allegations but was released in 1954. He re-founded a big band that became one of the leading swing bands in the Soviet Union in the 1950s (alongside that of Oleg Lundstrem ).
The big band was initially a typical dance orchestra, resorted to the classic US big band repertoire ( Glenn Miller , Harry James , Duke Ellington , but also Count Basie , Charlie Barnet , Neal Hefti ), but also used more modern arrangements, even by Charles Mingus . The decisive factor here were jazz musicians in the big band such as Gennadi Golstein and Konstantin Nossow , to whom Weinstein left the arranging. Also Dawid Semjonowitsch Goloshchekin and Roman Kunsman belonged temporarily to big band. In 1959 they made their first recordings. In 1962 its success was temporarily interrupted after a devastating review in Pravda by Dmitri Kabalewski. Since she also received support, her concert activity continued soon afterwards and she took part in the jazz festivals in Tallinn and Leningrad in 1966 and 1967. Until the mid-1970s she played in numerous cities in the Soviet Union.
In 1983 Weinstein emigrated to Canada.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Frederick Starr Red and Hot , Hannibal 1990, p. 212
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Weinstein, Josif |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Вайнштейн, Иосиф Владимирович (Russian spelling) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Russian big band leader and trumpeter |
| DATE OF BIRTH | October 28, 1918 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Bila Tserkva |
| DATE OF DEATH | September 1, 2001 |
| Place of death | Canada |