Home » Jazz Musicians » Kenny Dorham
Kenny Dorham
Overshadowed for most of his career by the likes of Dizzy Gillespie, Fats Navarro, Miles Davis, Clifford Brown, and Lee Morgan, Kenny Dorham's abilities as a composer and unique voice as an advanced bop trumpet player are underrated to this day.
McKinley Howard Dorham was born on August 30, 1924 on a ranch called Post Oak, near Fairfield, Texas. He attended Anderson High School in Austin, where he began teaching himself to play piano and trumpet, and spending much of his time on the school boxing team. He later enrolled at Wiley College in Marshall, Texas, studying chemistry and minoring in physics. During this time he experimented with arranging, writing for the stage band, where he met such players as Wild Bill Davis, Harold Land, and Roy Porter.
He was drafted into the army in 1942 (spending some time with the army boxing team) and was discharged about a year later.
In late 1943 he joined the Russell Jacquet orchestra in Houston, and he spent much of 1944 playing the band of Frank Humphries. By 1945, Dorham had gained positions with Dizzy Gillespie's short-lived first big band, and then replaced Fats Navarro in Billy Eckstine's orchestra. In 1946 he recorded with the Be Bop Boys (aka the 52nd Street Boys, including Fats Navarro), and spent time playing in the bands of Lionel Hampton and Mercer Ellington.
During this time, Dorham continued to compose and arrange (he arranged "Okay for Baby" for Lucky Millinder and Benny Carter, and "Malibu" for Cootie Williams), ghosting arrangements for Walter 'Gil' Fuller which were sold to several name big bands, including Harry James, Jimmy Dorsey, and Gene Krupa.
In 1948, Dorham studied composition and arranging at the Gotham School of Music under the G.I. Bill. On Christmas Eve of that year, Dorham performed for the first time as replacement for Miles Davis in the Charlie Parker quintet, where he would play for about a year (Davis had recommended Dorham for the job), including an appearance at the 1949 Paris Jazz Fair.
After a two-year hiatus starting in 1950, during which Dorham lived and worked day jobs in California, he settled in New York City and began a busy career as a free-lance musician, perorming with players such as Bud Powell, Sonny Stitt, Thelonious Monk, and Mary Lou Williams. In 1952 Dorham recorded with Monk and in late 1953 led his first recording as a leader, a 10-inch record on the Debut label.
Read moreTags
Thelonious Monk: Celebrating 75 Years Of His First Recordings Revisited
by Stefano Merighi
Affrontare oggi queste pagine monkiane significa non solo riconsiderare l'importanza cruciale di un repertorio senza tempo, ma provare proprio un'ebbrezza dell'ascolto difficilmente eguagliabile. Thelonious Monk marchia a fuoco con la sua personalità tutta un'epoca del jazz che è quella rivoluzionaria del bebop--nonché quella “riformista" dell'hard bop--e stabilisce molte delle coordinate che ispirano la migliore musica africana-americana di oggi, sia di orientamento free che di stampo armonico progressive. In questo caso, la collana ezz-thetics realizza un'operazione davvero interessante, assemblando ...
Continue ReadingKenny Dorham: From 'Round Midnight At The Cafe Bohemia To Matador Revisited
by Chris May
In his mostly sane and admirable book Black Nationalism and the Revolution In Music (Pathfinder Press, 1970), Frank Kofsky describes Kenny Dorham as “house trained." The calculated insult attempts to conflate Dorham's respect for form and structure with an Uncle Tom outlook on the world. Some might say Dorham would have been justified in following (or, rather, anticipating) the example of the writer Stanley Crouch, who on spotting in a Manhattan restaurant a critic who had recently dissed one of ...
Continue ReadingThelonious Monk: Celebrating 75 Years Of His First Recordings Revisited
by Chris May
Another stone resurrection from the Swiss-based ezz-thetics label, Celebrating 75 Years Of His First Recordings Revisited collects 23 of the tracks Thelonious Monk recorded for Blue Note between 1947 and 1952, remastered by ezzthetics' sonic jedi Michael Brändli at Hardstudios in Winterthur. Situated north of Zurich, Winterthur is Switzerland's equivalent of Silicon Valley and Hardstudios looks like something out of a sci-fi movie. The audio quality Brändli achieves there for ezz-thetics' has been raved about many times on these pages. ...
Continue ReadingJoe Henderson: The Complete Joe Henderson Blue Note Studio Sessions
by Scott Gudell
If an artist stamps his jazz passport with any one of these labels--Blue Note, Verve, Milestone--it's pretty much a guarantee that you've arrived in style. Tenor saxophonist Joe Henderson has traveled with all three and more. The 2021 reissue from the prestigious Mosaic Records focuses on Henderson's 1960s tenure with Blue Note offers a new opportunity to experience an abundance of rich and creative jazz from the decade. Big band and bop were duking it out in the ...
Continue ReadingCharlie Parker: Be Bop Live
by Mark Corroto
The name of the record label is ezz-thetics, which was also a composition by George Russell and an album of the same name (which featured Eric Dolphy) released by Riverside Records in 1961. Maybe a better moniker for the label is “Lest We Forget." Not that we could ever abandon Charlie Parker, but today when streaming services replace CDs and LPs, which also replaced 78s and live radio broadcasts (the streaming service of its day), Parker has the possibility of ...
Continue ReadingCharlie Parker Quintets: Be Bop Live
by Stefano Merighi
Benvenuti a uno dei convegni di bellezza più eccitanti che il jazz abbia mai prodotto. Royal Roost, New York City, dicembre 1948-febbraio 1949, due mesi in cui Charlie “Bird" Parker teneva il cartellone nel club della Quarantasettesima, sconvolgendo il pubblico con alcune tra le sue esibizioni più brillanti. Il bop era già linguaggio assimilato ormai, ma l'eccezionalità di quelle serate confermava Parker come punta di diamante di tutta la cultura africana-americana, al di là delle correnti jazzistiche.Questo doppio ...
Continue ReadingHard Bop Trumpet - Kenny Dorham, Dizzy Reece, Blue Mitchell (1962 - 1964)
by Russell Perry
This is the final hour of a four-part sequence featuring important tenor players and trumpeters who propelled hard bop into the 1960s. In this hour, we will continue with the Trumpet Players, Part 2, featuring lesser-known players—unsung veteran Kenny Dorham who recorded with both Dizzy and Bird in the 1940s, London-based Jamaican trumpet player Dizzy Reece, and Blue Mitchell who got his start with Cannonball Adderley and had a long tenure in the Horace Silver Quintet in the early 1960s. ...
Continue ReadingKenny Dorham's Centenary
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
August 30 will mark the 100th anniversary of Kenny Dorham's birth. The trumpeter and singer was born in Texas in 1924 and always seemed to be at the right place at the right time. Early on, he played in the bop bands of Billy Eckstine and Dizzy Gillespie and jump blues band of Lionel Hampton. From 1948 to '50, Dorham was a member of the Charlie Parker Quintet that was often recorded live. In 1951 he recorded with Thelonious Monk, ...
read more
Backgrounder: Kenny Dorham: Una Mas, 1963
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
The second to last studio album trumpeter Kenny Dorham released as a leader before he died in 1972 was Una Mas (One More Time). Featuring just three original songs, the album was one of his best. An early adapter of bebop in the mid-1940s, Dorham was most famously in Charlie Parker's quintet of 1948 and '49, the one that recorded live during a run at New York's Royal Roost and became an important box set. From there, Durham had a ...
read more
Jazz Musician of the Day: Kenny Dorham
Source:
Michael Ricci
All About Jazz is celebrating Kenny Dorham's birthday today!
Overshadowed for most of his career by the likes of Dizzy Gillespie, Fats Navarro, Miles Davis, Clifford Brown, and Lee Morgan, Kenny Dorham's abilities as a composer and unique voice as an advanced bop trumpet player are underrated to this day. McKinley Howard Dorham was born on August 30, 1924 on a ranch called Post Oak, near Fairfield, Texas. He attended Anderson High School in Austin, where he began teaching himself ...
read more
Jazz Musician of the Day: Kenny Dorham
Source:
Michael Ricci
All About Jazz is celebrating Kenny Dorham's birthday today!
Overshadowed for most of his career by the likes of Dizzy Gillespie, Fats Navarro, Miles Davis, Clifford Brown, and Lee Morgan, Kenny Dorham's abilities as a composer and unique voice as an advanced bop trumpet player are underrated to this day. McKinley Howard Dorham was born on August 30, 1924 on a ranch called Post Oak, near Fairfield, Texas. He attended Anderson High School in Austin, where he began teaching himself ...
read more
Jazz Musician of the Day: Kenny Dorham
Source:
Michael Ricci
All About Jazz is celebrating Kenny Dorham's birthday today!
Overshadowed for most of his career by the likes of Dizzy Gillespie, Fats Navarro, Miles Davis, Clifford Brown, and Lee Morgan, Kenny Dorham's abilities as a composer and unique voice as an advanced bop trumpet player are underrated to this day. McKinley Howard Dorham was born on August 30, 1924 on a ranch called Post Oak, near Fairfield, Texas. He attended Anderson High School in Austin, where he began teaching himself ...
read more
Jazz Musician of the Day: Kenny Dorham
Source:
Michael Ricci
All About Jazz is celebrating Kenny Dorham's birthday today!
Overshadowed for most of his career by the likes of Dizzy Gillespie, Fats Navarro, Miles Davis, Clifford Brown, and Lee Morgan, Kenny Dorham's abilities as a composer and unique voice as an advanced bop trumpet player are underrated to this day. McKinley Howard Dorham was born on August 30, 1924 on a ranch called Post Oak, near Fairfield, Texas. He attended Anderson High School in Austin, where he began teaching himself ...
read more
Kenny Dorham in 10 Tracks
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
Trumpeter Kenny Dorham never received the recognition he deserved. I'm not sure why. Part of the problem, I suppose, is that he was a gentler soul among hotter players such as Dizzy Gillespie, Miles Davis, Fats Navarro, Clifford Brown and others. He certainly was on plenty of remarkable recording sessions, and his playing was pretty and engaging. Listening to him yesterday, I figured why not blow him out a bit today to show just how remarkable he was. Choosing 10 ...
read more
Jazz Musician of the Day: Kenny Dorham
Source:
Michael Ricci
All About Jazz is celebrating Kenny Dorham's birthday today!
Overshadowed for most of his career by the likes of Dizzy Gillespie, Fats Navarro, Miles Davis, Clifford Brown, and Lee Morgan, Kenny Dorham\'s abilities as a composer and unique voice as an advanced bop trumpet player are underrated to this day. McKinley Howard Dorham was born on August 30, 1924 on a ranch called Post Oak, near Fairfield, Texas. He attended Anderson High School in Austin... Read more.
Place our Musician ...
read more
Jazz Musician of the Day: Kenny Dorham
Source:
Michael Ricci
All About Jazz is celebrating Kenny Dorham's birthday today!
Overshadowed for most of his career by the likes of Dizzy Gillespie, Fats Navarro, Miles Davis, Clifford Brown, and Lee Morgan, Kenny Dorham\'s abilities as a composer and unique voice as an advanced bop trumpet player are underrated to this day. McKinley Howard Dorham was born on August 30, 1924 on a ranch called Post Oak, near Fairfield, Texas. He attended Anderson High School in Austin... Read more.
Place our Musician ...
read more
Jazz Musician of the Day: Kenny Dorham
Source:
Michael Ricci
All About Jazz is celebrating Kenny Dorham's birthday today!
Overshadowed for most of his career by the likes of Dizzy Gillespie, Fats Navarro, Miles Davis, Clifford Brown, and Lee Morgan, Kenny Dorham\'s abilities as a composer and unique voice as an advanced bop trumpet player are underrated to this day. McKinley Howard Dorham was born on August 30, 1924 on a ranch called Post Oak, near Fairfield, Texas. He attended Anderson High School in Austin... Read more.
Place our Musician ...
read more
Michael Parkinson
trumpet
Brian Lynch
trumpet
Tim Fox
piano
Dan Miller
trumpet
Steve Lambert
trumpet
Chet Chwalik
trumpet
J.Q. Whitcomb
trumpet
Ellister van der Molen
flugelhorn
Paul Tafoya
trumpet
Elliot Bild
trumpet
Jun Iida
trumpet
Marshal Herridge
bass
Robert Vega-Dowda
trumpet
Mikko Karjalainen
trumpet
Tomi Nikku
trumpet
Zachary McDonald
bass, electric
Kriz Flew aka Christoph Flueler
trumpet
Stephen Enos
trumpet
Thomas Fryland
trumpet
Bianca Love
trumpet and vocalsPhotos
Music
Similar
Miles Davis
trumpet
Charlie Parker
saxophone, alto
Freddie Hubbard
trumpet
Art Blakey
drums
Cannonball Adderley
saxophone
McCoy Tyner
piano
Lee Morgan
trumpet
Jackie McLean
saxophone, alto
Woody Shaw
trumpet
Fats Navarro
trumpet
Blue Mitchell
trumpet
Howard McGhee
trumpet
Lester Bowie
trumpet
Ted Curson
trumpet
Nat Adderley
trumpet
