Tommy Dorsey

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Biography

Thomas Francis " Tommy " Dorsey, Jr. (November 19, 1905 - November 26, 1956 at Find a Grave) was an American jazz trombonist , trumpeter , composer , and bandleader of the Big band|Big Band era. He was known as "The Sentimental Gentleman of Swing", due to his smooth-toned trombone playing. He was the younger brother of bandleader Jimmy Dorsey . After Dorsey broke with his brother in the mid-1930s, he led an extremely popular and highly successful band from the late 1930s into the 1950s.

Early life

Thomas Francis Dorsey, Jr. was born in Shenandoah, Pennsylvania, the second of four children born to Thomas Francis Dorsey, Sr. and Theresa (née Langton) Dorsey.Dorsey, Thomas Francis Jr. ('Tommy,' 'The Sentimental Gentleman of Swing')
The Dorsey brothers' two younger siblings were Mary and Edward (who died young). At age 15, Jimmy Dorsey recommended his brother Tommy as the replacement for Russ Morgan in the germane 1920s territory band "The Scranton Sirens." Tommy and Jimmy worked in several bands, including those of Tal Henry , Rudy Vallee , Vincent Lopez , Nathaniel Shilkret , and especially Paul Whiteman . In 1929, the Dorsey Boys had their first hit with "Coquette" for OKeh records. The Dorsey Brothers band signed with Decca Records|Decca records in 1934, having a hit with "I Believe In Miracles". Future bandleader Glenn Miller was a member of the Dorsey Brothers Orchestra in 1934 and 1935, composing " Annie's Cousin Fanny " and " Dese Dem Dose " both recorded for Decca Records|Decca for the band. Ongoing acrimony between the brothers, however, led to Tommy Dorsey's walking out to form his own band in 1935, just as the orchestra was having a hit with "Every Little Moment."

His own band

Tommy Dorsey's first band was formed out of the remains of the Joe Haymes band. This began Dorsey's long-running practice of raiding other bands for talent. If he admired a vocalist, musician, or arranger, he would think nothing of taking over their contracts and careers. Dorsey had a reputation for being a perfectionist. He was volatile and also known to hire and fire (and sometimes rehire) musicians based on his mood.Peter Levinson quotes Tommy Dorsey as saying "Nobody leaves this band. I only fire people." Drummer Louis Bellson sees a more a benign Dorsey, as the same website quotes him, "e wanted you to play your best every night." see http://www.jerryjazzmusician.com/mainHTML.cfm? page=levinson-dorsey.htmlOn George Spink's website saxophonist Bud Freeman says that he quit twice and was fired three times during his employment with Dorsey. Also the same website says that singers Jo Stafford and the Pied Pipers quit the Dorsey band in 1942 because of an argument with Dorsey. see http://www.tuxjunction.net/tommydorsey.htm The new band was popular from almost the moment it signed with RCA Victor with "On Treasure Island", the first of four hits for the new band in 1935. The Dorsey band had a national radio presence in 1936 first from Dallas and then from Los Angeles. Tommy Dorsey and his Orchestra took over comedian Jack Pearl's radio show in 1937.All radio references from "Dorsey, Thomas, Francis, Jr."

By 1939, Dorsey was aware of criticism that his band lacked a jazz feeling. He hired arranger Sy Oliver away from the Jimmie Lunceford band."Jazz Wax""When I moved from the Lunceford band to Tommy Dorsey, I didn't change my writing approach. He made the transition. The band that Dorsey had when I joined him was Dixieland-orientated , and my sort of attack was foreign to most of the fellows he had. We both knew that to be the case, but he wanted a Swing band—so he changed personnel until he got the guys that could do it." Sy Oliver. see http://www.jazzprofessional.com/interviews/SyOliver_1.htm Sy Oliver's arrangements include "On The Sunny Side of the Street" and "T.D.'s Boogie Woogie"; Oliver also composed two of the new band's signature instrumentals, "Well, Git It" and "Opus One". In 1940, Dorsey hired singer Frank Sinatra from bandleader Harry James. Frank Sinatra made eighty recordings from 1940 to 1942 with the Dorsey band. Two of those eighty songs are "In The Blue of Evening" and "This Love of Mine". Frank Sinatra achieved his first great success as a vocalist in the Dorsey band and claimed he learned breath control from watching Dorsey play trombone."Encyclopedia of Jazz Musicians"Later Sy Oliver and Frank Sinatra would do a posthumous tribute album to Tommy Dorsey on Sinatra's Reprise records."I Remember Tommy" appeared in 1961. See http://www.billboard.com/album/frank-sinatra/i-remember-tommy/143607/review#/album/frank-sinatra/i-remember-tommy/143607/review In turn Dorsey said his trombone style was heavily influenced by that of Jack Teagarden ."Teagarden's technique had an enormous influence on trombonists after him. Tommy Dorsey, who was to become one of the most popular trombonists of the swing era, so respected Teagarden's playing that he refused to play a solo while Teagarden was in the same room." see "Online Trombone Journal" by David Wilken, http://www.trombone.org/articles/library/evojazz2.asp Among Dorsey's staff of arrangers was Axel StordahlSimon Says p.297 also see "Jerry Jazz Musician: Interview With Peter Levinson" http://www.jerryjazzmusician.com/mainHTML.cfm? page=levinson.html who arranged for Frank Sinatra in his Columbia Records|Columbia and Capitol Records|Capitol records years. Another member of the Dorsey band was trombonist Nelson Riddle , who later had a partnership as one of Sinatra's arrangers and conductors in the 1950s and afterwards."Yes, the musical discipline of Tommy Dorsey, that was such an ingredient of everything he did, was something that Nelson grabbed on to. As an arranger, Dorsey knew what he wanted and Nelson had to deliver a high standard of arranging. As Bill Finegan pointed out to me, playing all of those Sy Oliver charts gave Riddle the sense of how to write very dynamic arrangements, which he did about ten years later for Sinatra." see "Jerry Jazz Musician: Interview with Peter Levinson" Another noted Dorsey arranger, who in the 1950s, married and was professionally associated with Dorsey veteran Jo Stafford, was Paul Weston . Bill Finegan , an arranger who left Glenn Miller's civilian band, arranged for the Tommy Dorsey band from 1942 to 1950.

The band featured a number of future famous instrumentalists, singers and arrangers in the 1930s and '40s, including trumpeters Zeke Zarchy , Bunny Berigan , Ziggy Elman ,"Elman played a month with violinist Joe Venuti's band, then joined Tommy Dorsey's orchestra in August , at a salary of $500 a week (other players might have been getting, say, $100). But he also had some extra responsibility, and became Tommy's right-hand man, acting as 'straw-boss,' conducting rehearsals, filling in as director when Dorsey was momentarily off the bandstand during the course of a night, or, just for fun, when Tommy would play trumpet and Elman would play trombone." see: "Ziggy Elman: Fralich In Swing" by Chris Popa Carl "Doc" Severinsen , and Charlie Shavers , pianists Milt Raskin , Jess Stacy , clarinetists Buddy DeFranco , Johnny Mince ,Harvey Pekar and Peanuts Hucko . Others who played with Dorsey were drummers Buddy Rich , Louie Bellson , Dave Tough and singers Frank Sinatra, Jack Leonard , Edythe Wright , Jo Stafford with The Pied Pipers , Dick Haymes
and Connie Haines In 1944, Dorsey hired The Sentimentalists who replaced The Pied Pipers .Levinson 174-175 Dorsey also performed with singer Connee Boswell Dorsey
hired ex-bandleader and drummer Gene Krupa after Krupa's arrest and scandal for marijuana possession in 1943.
In 1942 Artie Shaw broke up his band and Dorsey hired the Shaw string section. As George Simon in Metronome magazine notes at the time, "They're used in the foreground and background (note some of the lovely obbligatos) for vocal effects and for Tommy's trombone."

As Dorsey became successful he made business decisions in the music industry. He loaned Glenn Miller money to launch Miller's successful band of 1938, but Dorsey saw the loan as an investment, entitling him to a percentage of Miller's income. When Miller balked at this, the angry Dorsey got even by sponsoring a new band led by Bob Chester , and hiring arrangers who deliberately copied Miller's style and sound. Dorsey branched out in the mid-1940s and owned two music publishing companies, Sun and Embassy.Dorsey, Thomas Francis Jr. After opening at the Los Angeles ballroom, The Hollywood Palladium on the Palladium's first night, Dorsey's relations with the ballroom soured and he opened a competing ballroom, The Casino Gardens circa 1944. Dorsey also owned for a short time a trade magazine called The Bandstand .

Tommy Dorsey disbanded his own orchestra at the end of 1946. Dorsey might have broken up his own band permanently following World War II , as many big bands did due to the shift in music economics following the war, but Tommy Dorsey's album for RCA, "All Time Hits" placed in the top ten records in February, 1947. In addition, "How Are Things In Glocca Morra? " a single recorded by Dorsey became a top ten hit in March, 1947. Both of these successes made it possible for Dorsey to re-organize a big band in early 1947.VH1/William Rulmann/All Music Guide The Dorsey brothers were also reconciling. The biographical film of 1947, The Fabulous Dorseys describes sketchy details of how the brothers got their start from-the-bottom-up into the jazz era of one-nighters, the early days of radio in its infancy stages, and the onward march when both brothers ended up with Paul Whiteman before 1935 when The Dorsey Brothers' Orchestra split into two. In the early 1950s, Tommy Dorsey moved from RCA Victor back to the Decca Records|Decca record label."Tommy Dorsey" Billboard

Jimmy Dorsey broke up his own big band in 1953. Tommy invited him to join up as a feature attractionTommy and Jimmy Dorsey reunited on March 15, 1945 to record a V-Disc at Liederkranz Hall in New York City. Released in June, 1945, V-Disc 451 featured "More Than You Know" backed with "Brotherly Jump". The songs featured the combined orchestras of Tommy and Jimmy Dorsey. and a short while later, Tommy renamed the band the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra featuring Jimmy Dorsey. In 1953, the Dorseys focused their attention on television.see "Tommy Dorsey" IMDB http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0234186/ On December 26, 1953, the brothers appeared with their orchestra on Jackie Gleason 's CBS television show, which was preserved on kinescope and later released on home video by Gleason. The brothers took the unit on tour and onto their own television show, Stage Show (TV series)|Stage Show , from 1955 to 1956. On numerous episodes,they introduced future noted rock musician Elvis Presley to national television audiences, prior to Presley's better known appearance on the "Ed Sullivan Show".

Married life

Dorsey's married life was varied and, at times, lurid.Levinson 171-172 His first wife was 16-year-old Mildred Kraft, with whom he eloped in 1922, when he was 17. They had two children, Patricia and Tom (nicknamed "Skipper"). They divorced in 1943 after Dorsey's affair with his former singer Edythe Wright.Levinson 148 He then wed movie actress Patricia Dane|Pat Dane in 1943, and they were divorced in 1947,Levinson 211 but not before he gained headlines for striking actor Jon Hall when Hall embraced Dorsey's wife. Finally, Dorsey married Jane Carl New b. 20 October 1923 in Dublin, Laurens County, Georgia; d. 24 August 2003 in Bay Harbor Island, Miami-Dade County, Florida see at Find a grave on March 27, 1948 in Atlanta, Georgia. She had been a dancer at the Copacabana (nightclub)|Copacabana nightclub in New York City. Tommy and Jane Dorsey had two children, Catherine Susan and Steve.

Death and aftermath

On November 26, 1956, Tommy Dorsey died at age 51 in his Greenwich, Connecticut home. Dorsey had eaten a heavy meal and began choking in his sleep. Dorsey customarily began taking sleeping pills regularly at this time; therefore, he was so sedated that he was unable to awaken and died from choking.Levinson 299 Jimmy Dorsey led his brother's band until his own death of lung cancer the following year. At that point, trombonist Warren Covington assumed leadership of the band with Jane Dorsey's blessing"Tommy died with no will and reportedly left only about $15,000. Since Janie New continued to need money to support her family and because she legally owned the rights to Tommy's library of arrangements, she was naturally very interested when Alexander approached her about creating a Tommy Dorsey band." Levinson 308-309 as she owned the rights to her late husband's band and name. Billed as the "Tommy Dorsey Orchestra Starring Warren Covington", they topped the charts in 1958 with Tea For Two Cha-Cha .Levinson 309 After Covington led the band for a short period, Sam Donahue led it starting in 1961, continuing until the late 1960s.Levinson 309-310 Buddy Morrow conducted the Tommy Dorsey orchestra until his death on September 27, 2010. Jane Dorsey died of natural causes at the age of 79, in Miami, Florida in 2003. Tommy and Jane Dorsey are interred together in Kensico Cemetery in Valhalla, New York .Jane Dorsey date of death and internment facts from Levinson 320

Number one hits

Tommy Dorsey had a run of 286 Billboard chart hits.Levinson 308.
The Dorsey band had seventeen number one hits with his orchestra in the 1930s and 1940s including: "On Treasure Island", "The Music Goes 'Round and Around", "You", " Marie " (written by Irving Berlin ), "Satan Takes a Holiday", "The Big Apple", "Once in a While", "The Dipsy Doodle", "Our Love", "All the Things You Are", "Indian Summer", and "Dolores". He had two more number one hits in 1935 when he was a member of the Dorsey Brothers Orchestra: "Lullaby of Broadway", number one for two weeks, and "Chasing Shadows", number one for three weeks. His biggest hit was " I'll Never Smile Again ", featuring Frank Sinatra on vocals, which was number one for twelve weeks on the Billboard pop singles chart in 1940. "In the Blue of Evening""RCA Victor scored with 'There Are Such Things', which had a Sinatra vocal; it hit number one in January 1943, as did 'In the Blue of the Evening', another Dorsey record featuring Sinatra, in August, while a third Dorsey/Sinatra release, 'It's Always You,' hit the Top Five later in the year, and a fourth, 'I'll Be Seeing You', reached the Top Ten in 1944. see "Frank Sinatra Biography" at http://www.billboard.com/artist/frank-sinatra/bio/3626#/artist/frank-sinatra/bio/3626 was number 1 on the Billboard (magazine)|Billboard pop singles chart in 1943.The website "Tommy Dorsey A Songwriter's Friend" says: "the orchestra had over 200 top twenty recordings including the #1 hits ‘The Music Goes Round and Round’ (1935), ‘Alone’ (1936) ‘You’ (1936), ‘ Marie (1929 song)|Marie ’ (1937), ‘Satan Takes a Holiday’ (1937), ‘The Big Apple’ (1937), ‘Once in a While’ (1937), ‘The Dipsy Doodle’ (1937), ‘Music, Maestro, Please’ (1938), ‘Our Love’ (1939), ‘Indian Summer’ (1939), ‘All the Things You Are’ (1939), ‘I’ll Never Smile Again’ (1940), ‘Dolores’ (1941), ‘There are Such Things’ (1942), ‘In the Blue of the Evening’ (1943)." see http://www.songwritershalloffame.org/artists/C4006

Songs written by Tommy Dorsey

Written in 1929: "You Can't Cheat A Cheater" with Phil Napoleon and Frank SignorelliThe Red Hot Jazz website.

1932: "Three Moods"Tommy Dorsey recorded two takes of this song for OKeh records, August 6, 1932 in New York City. see http://www.redhotjazz.com/tommy.html which also lists Tommy Dorsey as composer.

1937:
" The Morning After (1937 song)|The Morning After "

1938:
"Chris and His Gang" with Fletcher and Horace Henderson

Also, Tommy Dorsey wrote the song "Peckin' With Penguins" for a 1938 Frank Tashlin directed Porky Pig cartoon, "Porky's Spring Planting" for the studio Warner Bros. "Tommy Dorsey" IMDB

1939:
" To You ","To You" appears as part of a medley by Glenn Miller, paired with "Stairway to the Stars" both sung by Ray Eberle for the Glenn Miller orchestra's performance at Carnegie Hall on October 6, 1939. See "Solid!-The Glenn Miller Carnegie Hall Concert" at http://www.parabrisas.com/m_millerg5.phpGlenn Miller recorded "To You" for Bluebird records on May 9, 1939 released as Bluebird 10276-B, with the "A" side, "Stairway To The Stars" both sung by Ray Eberle. see Moonlight Serenade: A Bio-discography , John Flower, Arlington House, New Rochelle, 1972, p.63 ISBN 978-0-87000-161-1 " This Is No Dream ", " You Taught Me To Love Again ", " In The Middle Of A Dream ", "Night In Sudan".According to the tsort.info database < http://tsort.info/music/jp6apj.htm>, "This Is No Dream" reached no. 9 on the Billboard singles chart in 1939, while "To You" reached no. 10 on the same chart, both staying on the chart for 7 weeks. "In The Middle Of A Dream" reached no. 7 on the Billboard chart in 1939, staying on the charts for 10 weeks.

1945:
"Fluid Jive" and "Fried Chicken"

1946:
"Nip and Tuck"

1947:
"Trombonology"Levinson 214 Levinson refers to the 1947 recording of Dorsey's composition as the band's "one important recording of that year." "Trombonology" was recorded July 1, 1947 and was released on an RCA Victor 78 rpm record, catalogue number Vic 20-2419. Information taken from the liner notes to the 1993 compact disc The Post-War Era , Bluebird/RCA 66156, written by Loren Schoenberg.

Tommy Dorsey also co-wrote "Bunch of Beats", "Mid Riff", and "Candied Yams" with Fred Norman.

Honors and posthumous recognition

In 1982, the 1941 Victor recording " I'll Never Smile Again " was the first of a trio of Tommy Dorsey recordings to be inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame ." I'll Never Smile Again " was recorded February 17, 1941 with vocals by Frank Sinatra and the Pied Pipers. see the liner notes to the compact disc The Best of Tommy Dorsey by Mort Goode, 1991. Bluebird/RCA 51087-2. According to Peter Levinson in Livin In A Great Big Way , "I'll Never Smile Again" was recorded May 23, 1940. "I'll Never Smile Again" had the catalogue number for its initial 78rpm release as Victor 26628. Tommy Dorsey and/or RCA Victor also released the song as a V-Disc , V-Disc 582. See the website "Songs By Sinatra" at http://www.songsbysinatra.com/records/v-discs.html for discographical information about that V-Disc. His theme song, " I'm Getting Sentimental Over You " was inducted in 1998, along with his recording of " Marie " written by Irving Berlin in 1928.

Discography

1961: The One And Only Tommy Dorsey ( RCA Camden )

1966: '' Tommy Dorsey's Dance Party ( Vocalion )

1976: Tommy Dorsey (1937 - 1941) (AMIGA) see http://www.discogs.com/artist/Tommy+Dorsey for these album listings

The Essence of Tommy Dorsey (1935-1949 recordings under RCA, reissued under Phantom Sound & Vision)

This is Tommy Dorsey, Volume 1 (1935-1944 recordings under RCA, reissued by Collectibles)

1988: All-Time Greatest Dorsey/Sinatra Hits, Vol. 1-4 ( RCA )

1982: Frank Sinatra & the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra|The Dorsey/Sinatra Sessions ( RCA )

1990: Yes, Indeed! ( Bluebird Records|Bluebird/RCA )

1991: Music Goes Round and Round (Bluebird/RCA)

1994: Stop, Look and Listen (1994) ( ASV Records|ASV/Living Era Records )

1999: The V-Disc Recordings ( Collectors' Choice Music )

1999: 1937, Vol. 3

2001: This Is Tommy Dorsey & His Orchestra, Vol. 1 ( Collectables Records )

2004: 1939, Vol. 3

2004: Tommy Dorsey: The Early Jazz Sides: 1932 - 1937 (Jazz Legends)

2004: '' It's D'Lovely 1947-1950 '' ( Hep Records ) see which lists Tommy Dorsey's albumssee which lists Tommy Dorsey & His Orchestra's albums for reference

Filmography

Segar Ellis and His Embassy Club Orchestra (1929)_{needs citation}

Alice Bolden and Her Orchestra (1929)In the "Filmography" portion of the website "Thomas (Tommy) Dorsey 1905-1956", two movies are listed for 1929 that suggest that Tommy Dorsey appears in them. They are Segar Ellis and His Embassy Club Orchestra and Alice Boulden and Her Orchestra . Dorsey biographer Peter Levinson confirms that Tommy Dorsey appears in Alice Bolden and Her Orchestra and considers it to be mediocre. See Levinson 34

Tommy Dorsey and his Orchestra appear in the following films for the studios Paramount Pictures|Paramount , MGM , Samuel Goldwyn , Allied Artists Pictures Corporation|Allied Artists and United Artists :see individual films and their references for the studio that produced which movie

Las Vegas Nights (1941)

Ship Ahoy (1942)

Presenting Lily Mars (1943)

Girl Crazy (1943 film)|Girl Crazy (1943)

DuBarry Was a Lady (film)|Du Barry Was a Lady (1943)

Thrill of a Romance (1945)

The Great Morgan (1946)"Tommy Dorsey IMDB" uncredited role according to source.

The Fabulous Dorseys (1947)

A Song Is Born (1948)

Disc Jockey (1951)

The Dorsey Brothers appear in the 1953 sixteen-minute Universal-International film called The Dorsey Brothers Encore .

Noted sidemen

Ernani Bernardi|Noni Bernardi (1911–2006), big-band musician and member of the Los Angeles, California, City Council, 1961–93

Notes

Copyright Citations

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1. Don Ellis 2. Scott Joplin 3. Bobby Troup 4. Doc Severinsen 5. Hoagy Carmichael 6. Glenn Miller 7. Bob Wills 8. Sammy Cahn lyricist 9. Nanette Workman 10. Louie Bellson 11. Panama Francis 12. Earl Hines 13. Vassar Clements 14. Cahn Sammy 15. Young Victor 16. Clark Sisters 17. Meredith Willson 18. Bunny Berigan 19. Billie Holliday 20. Ednita Nazario 21. elvis 22. Gene Austin 23. Holiday, Billie 24. Irving Berlin 25. Jimmy Dorsey

Undetermined Music Artists