BIX BEIDERBECKE

Leon Bismark “Bix” Beiderbecke (March 10, 1903August 6, 1931– died at age 28) was an American jazz cornetist and composer, as well as a skilled classical and jazz pianist. Beiderbecke was one of the leading names in 1920s jazz. Bix Beiderbecke recorded a number of titles that later would become jazz standards, including “Riverboat Shuffle” (1924, 1927), “Copenhagen” (1924), “Davenport Blues” (1925), “Singin’ the Blues” (1927), “In a Mist” (1927), “Mississippi Mud” (1928), “I’m Coming, Virginia” (1927), and “Georgia On My Mind” (1930).

Bix Beiderbecke was born in Davenport, Iowa, the son of Bismark Herman and Agatha Jane (Hilton) Beiderbecke. His father, a moderately successful businessman, was the son of German immigrants; his mother was the daughter of a Mississippi riverboat captain and played the organ at Davenport’s First Presbyterian Church.[3] Bix Beiderbecke was the youngest of three children. His brother, Charles Burnette “Burnie” Beiderbecke, was born in 1895 and served stateside during World War I. When he returned to Davenport at the end of 1918, Burnie brought with him a Victrola phonograph machine and several records, including “Tiger Rag” and “Skeleton Jangle” by the Original Dixieland Jazz Band.[4] From these records Bix Beiderbecke first learned to love hot jazz; he taught himself to play cornet by listening to Nick LaRocca‘s horn lines. Beiderbecke also listened to jazz music off the riverboats that docked in downtown Davenport. Louis Armstrong and the drummer Baby Dodds claimed to have met Beiderbecke when their New Orleans-based excursion boat stopped in Davenport. Historians disagree over whether that’s true.

Beiderbecke’s first recordings were made on February 18, 1924, with the Wolverines. The group recorded “Riverboat Shuffle”, written for the band by Hoagy Carmichael, and “Copenhagen”, written by Charlie Davis. Carmichael, then a law student, had booked the band’s appearance at Indiana University in 1924.

Bix Beiderbecke became a sought-after musician in Chicago and New York City. He made innovative and influential recordings with Frankie Trumbauer (“Tram”) and the Jean Goldkette Orchestra. In 1927, he played cornet on the landmark Okeh recording “Singin’ the Blues”, with Frankie Trumbauer on C-melody saxophone and Eddie Lang on guitar, one of the most important and influential jazz recordings of the 1920s. The orchestra on that session also included Jimmy Dorsey on clarinet and alto saxophone, Miff Mole on trombone, Chauncey Morehouse on drums, and Paul Madeira Mertz on piano. When the Goldkette Orchestra disbanded after their last recording (“Clementine (From New Orleans)”), released as Victor 20994, in September 1927, Beiderbecke and Trumbauer, a ‘C’ melody and alto saxophone player, briefly joined Adrian Rollini‘s band at the Club New Yorker, New York. Beiderbecke then moved on to the Paul Whiteman Orchestra, the most popular and highest paid band of the day.