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Cozy, Dizzy, Ives, and Company

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Portrait of Cozy Cole, New York, N.Y.(?), ca. Sept. 1946. Photograph by William P. Gottlieb.

Many virtual servings of cake and ice cream are on hand this week in the Music Division, as we celebrate the birth dates of a veritable constellation of stars in the musical firmament.  These October children grew to be the august personages who populate the Performing Arts Encyclopedia with dulcet tones – or, in some cases, a racket in rhythm.

Jazz drum legend William Randolph “Cozy” Cole was born October 17, 1909. Cole played with legendary jazzmen like Cab Calloway, Benny Carter, and Louis Armstrong, but also had a crossover hit with the instrumental “Topsy Part Two,” which reached number 3 on the Billboard pop charts in 1958.  In 1954 Cole and drummer Gene Krupa opened a school for drummers in New York City.  See photos of Cozy Cole in the William P. Gottlieb Collection.

Composer Charles Ives was born October 20, 1874.   To quote the Ives biography from the web presentation Song of America,  the composer “established innovations in rhythm, harmony and form…  Ives’s life-long impulse to break free of European musical models and to develop his personal means of self-expression — thereby forging new musical paths for a distinctly American music as well — parallels the pioneering spirit, cultural development and expanding perspective of the growing American nation. ” Listen to Thomas Hampson perform Ives’s  ”In Flanders Field” here.

Jazz trumpet legend Dizzy Gillespie was born October 21, 1917. See photos of Gillespie in the William P. Gottlieb Collection. Remember this exuberant jazz icon by listening to his blistering recordings with fellow be-bop titan Charlie Parker, or just play the Afro-Cuban jazz classic “Manteca” really really loud.

Detail from Portrait of Dizzy Gillespie, Famous Door, New York, N.Y., ca. June 1946. Photograph by William P. Gottlieb.

The Music Division provides shelter and climate-controlled comfort to the  Franz List Collection. The Hungarian composer was born October 22, 1811.  The collection includes published musical scores; books; microfilm; cassette tapes; reel-to-reel tapes; videotapes; business papers; publicity material; and  concert programs.

We also put a roof over the Ned Rorem Collection. The composer, who Time magazine called “the world’s best composer of art songs,” was born October 23, 1923.  The collection consists of the composer’s manuscripts, correspondence, daybooks, and other writings.  See Ned Rorem in dialogue with fellow composers Milton Babbitt, George Perle, Ellen Taaffe Zwilich and others in Great Conversations: The Composers, a series produced by Eugene Istomin and available to be viewed in its entirety in the Performing Arts Encyclopedia.

Finally, another set of photos from the William P. Gottlieb Collection were released to Flickr Commons today. This week’s release includes photos of legends like Charlie Parker, Les Paul, Louis Prima, Django Reinhardt, Max Roach, and Frank Sinatra.  The set also also features lesser-known figures such as American Federation of Musicians union leader James Petrillo, famous for instituting a commercial recording ban from 1942-1944; and the cigar-wielding doorman Gilbert J. Pinkus, then known as “The Mayor of 52nd Street.”

Comments

  1. Check out my books about Ives——hopefully they will point the interested listener to the way to approach his music, and knock down some of the myths that have diminished him:

    “Charles Ives and his Road to the Stars”
    2013, & second expanded ed., 2016
    Also can be found online——free download,
    and:

    “Charles Ives’s Musical Universe”
    2015

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