Clark Terry


Clark Virgil Terry Jr. was an American swing and bebop trumpeter, a pioneer of the flugelhorn in jazz, and a composer and educator.
He played with Charlie Barnet, Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Quincy Jones, and Oscar Peterson. He was with The Tonight Show Band on The Tonight Show from 1962 to 1972. His career in jazz spanned more than 70 years, during which he became one of the most recorded jazz musicians, appearing on over 900 recordings. Terry also mentored Quincy Jones, Miles Davis, Herbie Hancock, Wynton Marsalis, Pat Metheny, Dianne Reeves, and Terri Lyne Carrington.
WWW Official Site

Early life

Terry was born to Clark Virgil Terry Sr. and Mary Terry in St. Louis, Missouri, on December 14, 1920. He attended Vashon High School and began his professional career in the early 1940s, playing in local clubs. He served as a bandsman in the United States Navy during World War II. His first instrument was valve trombone.

Big band era

Blending the St. Louis tone with contemporary styles, Terry's years with Basie and Ellington in the late 1940s and 1950s established his prominence. During his period with Ellington, he took part in many of the composer's suites and acquired a reputation for his wide range of styles, technical proficiency, and good humor. Terry influenced musicians including Miles Davis and Quincy Jones, both of whom acknowledged Terry's influence during the early stages of their careers. Terry had informally taught Davis while they were still in St Louis, and Jones during Terry's frequent visits to Seattle with the Count Basie Sextet.
After leaving Ellington in 1959, Clark's international recognition soared when he accepted an offer from the National Broadcasting Company to become a staff musician. He appeared for ten years on The Tonight Show as a member of the Tonight Show Band until 1972, first led by Skitch Henderson and later by Doc Severinsen, where his unique "mumbling" scat singing led to a hit with "Mumbles". Terry was the first African American to become a regular in a band on a major US television network. He said later: "We had to be models, because I knew we were in a test.... We couldn't have a speck on our trousers. We couldn't have a wrinkle in the clothes. We couldn't have a dirty shirt."
Clark has many relationships in the music world and they all speak highly of him. One of those relationships was Quincy Jones, who wrote the preface to Terry's autobiography. Jones led a band for the musical Free and Easy in 1959, and Terry left Duke Ellington Orchestra to join them in Belgium.
Terry continued to play with musicians such as trombonist J. J. Johnson and pianist Oscar Peterson, and led a group with valve-trombonist Bob Brookmeyer that achieved some success in the early 1960s. In February 1965, Brookmeyer and Terry appeared on BBC2's Jazz 625. and in 1967, presented by Norman Granz, he was recorded at Poplar Town Hall, in the BBC series Jazz at the Philharmonic, alongside James Moody, Dizzy Gillespie, Coleman Hawkins, Benny Carter, Teddy Wilson, Bob Cranshaw, Louie Bellson and T-Bone Walker.
In the 1970s, Terry concentrated increasingly on the flugelhorn, which he played with a full, ringing tone. In addition to his studio work and teaching at jazz workshops, Terry toured regularly in the 1980s with small groups and performed as the leader of his Big B-A-D Band. After financial difficulties forced him to break up the Big B-A-D Band, he performed with bands such as the Unifour Jazz Ensemble. His humor and command of jazz trumpet styles are apparent in his "dialogues" with himself, on different instruments or on the same instrument, muted and unmuted.

Later career

From the 1970s through the 1990s, Terry performed at Carnegie Hall, Town Hall, and Lincoln Center, toured with the Newport Jazz All Stars and Jazz at the Philharmonic, and was featured with Skitch Henderson's New York Pops Orchestra. In 1998, Terry recorded George Gershwin's "Let's Call the Whole Thing Off" for the Red Hot Organization's compilation album Red Hot + Rhapsody, a tribute to George Gershwin, which raised money for various charities devoted to increasing AIDS awareness and fighting the disease.
In November 1980, he was a headliner along with Anita O'Day, Lionel Hampton and Ramsey Lewis during the opening two-week ceremony performances celebrating the short-lived resurgence of the Blue Note Lounge at the Marriott O'Hare Hotel near Chicago.
Prompted early in his career by Billy Taylor, Clark and Milt Hinton bought instruments for and gave instruction to young hopefuls, which planted the seed that became Jazz Mobile in Harlem. This venture tugged at Terry's greatest love: involving youth in the perpetuation of jazz. From 2000 onwards, he hosted Clark Terry Jazz Festivals on land and sea, held his own jazz camps, and appeared in more than fifty jazz festivals on six continents. Terry composed more than two hundred jazz songs and performed for eight U.S. Presidents.
He also had several recordings with major groups including the London Symphony Orchestra, the Dutch Metropole Orchestra, and the Chicago Jazz Orchestra, hundreds of high school and college ensembles, his own duos, trios, quartets, quintets, sextets, octets, and two big bands: Clark Terry's Big Bad Band and Clark Terry's Young Titans of Jazz.
In February 2004, Terry guest starred as himself, on Little Bill, a children's television series. Terry was a resident of Bayside, Queens, and Corona, Queens, New York, later moving to Haworth, New Jersey, and then Pine Bluff, Arkansas.
His autobiography was published in 2011. Taylor Ho Bynum wrote in The New Yorker that it "captures his gift for storytelling and his wry humor, especially in chronicling his early years on the road, with struggles through segregation and gigs in juke joints and carnivals, all while developing one of most distinctive improvisational voices in music history."
The Penguin Guide to Jazz Recordings notes that Terry appears on more of its listed recordings than any other artist. According to his own website Terry was "one of the most recorded jazz artists in history and had performed for eight American Presidents." He was adept in the challenging technique of circular breathing, by which an instrumentalist can play for extended periods without stopping for breath, and in 1976 he published his Clark Terry's System of Circular Breathing for Woodwind and Brass Instruments.
In April 2014, the documentary Keep on Keepin' On, followed Terry over four years, to document his mentorship of the 23-year-old blind piano prodigy Justin Kauflin, as Kauflin prepared to compete in an elite, international competition.
In December 2014 the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis and Cécile McLorin Salvant visited Terry, who had celebrated his 94th birthday on December 14, at the Jefferson Regional Medical Center. A lively rendition of "Happy Birthday" was played.

Death and tributes

On February 13, 2015, it was announced that Terry had entered hospice care to manage his advanced diabetes. He died on February 21, 2015.
Writing in The New York Times, Peter Keepnews said Terry "was acclaimed for his impeccable musicianship, loved for his playful spirit and respected for his adaptability. Although his sound on both trumpet and the rounder-toned flugelhorn was highly personal and easily identifiable, he managed to fit it snugly into a wide range of musical contexts."
Writing in UK's The Daily Telegraph, Martin Chilton said: "Terry was a music educator and had a deep and lasting influence on the course of jazz. Terry became a mentor to generations of jazz players, including Miles Davis, Wynton Marsalis and composer-arranger Quincy Jones."
Interviewing Terry in 2005, fellow jazz trumpeter Scotty Barnhart said he was "... one of the most incredibly versatile musicians to ever live... a jazz trumpet master that played with the greatest names in the history of the music..."
Southeast Missouri State University hosts the Clark Terry/Phi Mu Alpha Jazz Festival, an annual tribute to the musician. The festival began in 1998, and has grown in size every year. The festival showcases outstanding student musicians and guest artists at the university's River Campus.
The University of New Hampshire hosts the Clark Terry Jazz Festival every year; it showcases middle- and high-school jazz musicians from all over New England.

Awards and honors

Over 250 awards, medals and honors, including:

Discography

As leader/co-leader

Clark Terry The Jazz School with Joe Gordon, Paul Gonsalves Serenade to a Bus Seat Duke with a Difference Out on a Limb with Clark Terry – rec. 1957In Orbit with Thelonious Monk Top and Bottom Brass Color Changes – rec. 1960Everything's Mellow Clark Terry Plays the Jazz Version of All American Back in Bean's Bag – rec. 1962Tread Ye Lightly What Makes Sammy Swing The Happy Horns of Clark Terry Tonight with Bob Brookmeyer – rec. 1964The Power of Positive Swinging with Bob Brookmeyer Gingerbread Men with Bob Brookmeyer Mumbles Spanish Rice with Chico O'Farrill It's What's Happenin' Soul Duo with Shirley Scott At the Montreux Jazz Festival – rec. 1969In Concert: Live Previously Unreleased Recordings with Bob Brookmeyer Clark Terry's Big B-A-D Band Live at the Wichita Jazz Festival Oscar Peterson and Clark Terry with Oscar Peterson Wham/Live at the Jazz House Professor Jive The Globetrotter Clark After Dark: The Ballad Artistry of Clark Terry Ain't Misbehavin' Mother———! Mother———!! with Zoot Sims – rec. 1979Memories of Duke Yes, the Blues To Duke and Basie Live 1964 – live rec. 1964Portraits Squeeze Me Having Fun Live at the Village Gate Music in the Garden What a Wonderful World Marian McPartland's Piano Jazz with Guest Clark Terry Mellow Moods Big Band Basie with Frank Wess The Second Set: Recorded Live at the Village Gate Clark Terry with Peewee Claybrook and Swing Fever Live in Chicago Vol. 1 Live in Chicago Vol. 2 Top and Bottom Clark Terry Express The Songs Ella & Louis Sang with Carol Sloane One on One The Hymn – live rec. 1993Live in Concert Friendship with Max Roach Live on QE2 George Gershwin's Porgy and Bess Live at Marihans Louie and Clark Expedition 2 with Louie Bellson
  • ''Carnegie Blues: The Music of Duke Ellington''

As sideman

With Gene Ammons
With Dave BaileyOne Foot in the Gutter Gettin' Into Somethin' – recorded in 1960
With Ray BryantGotta Travel On Lonesome Traveler
With Eddie "Lockjaw" DavisTrane Whistle Afro-Jaws – recorded in 1960
With Duke EllingtonEllington Uptown – recorded in 1947-51Premiered by Ellington Dance to the Duke! – recorded in 1953-54Ellington '55 – recorded in 1953-54Ellington Showcase – recorded in 1953-55Blue Rose A Drum Is a Woman Ellington at Newport Such Sweet Thunder Ella Fitzgerald Sings the [Duke Ellington Song Book] All Star Road Band – recorded in 1957Ellington Indigos – recorded in 1957Black, Brown and Beige Duke Ellington at the Bal Masque The Cosmic Scene Festival Session The Ellington Suites – recorded in 1959-72Blues in Orbit – recorded in 1958-59The Greatest Jazz Concert in the World – recorded in 1967
With Stan GetzBig Band Bossa Nova Stan Getz Plays Music from the Soundtrack of Mickey One
With Dizzy GillespieGillespiana Carnegie Hall Concert The Trumpet Kings Meet Joe Turner The Trumpet Summit Meets the Oscar Peterson Big 4
With Johnny GriffinThe Big Soul-Band White Gardenia
With Johnny HodgesCreamy Ellingtonia '56 Duke's in Bed The Big Sound
With Milt JacksonBig Bags For Someone I Love Ray Brown / Milt Jackson with Ray Brown
With J. J. JohnsonJ.J.! Goodies Concepts in Blue – recorded in 1980
With Quincy JonesThe Birth of a Band! I Dig Dancers – recorded in 1960The Quintessence – recorded in 1961Big Band Bossa Nova Quincy Jones Plays Hip Hits – recorded in 1962–63Quincy Jones Explores the Music of Henry Mancini Quincy Plays for Pussycats – recorded in 1959–65The Hot Rock OST – recorded in 1971
With Mundell LoweThemes from Mr. Lucky, The Untouchables and Other TV Action Jazz
With Herbie MannLatin Fever – recorded in 1962-64My Kinda Groove – recorded in 1964Our Mann Flute The Beat Goes On The Herbie Mann String Album
With Gary McFarlandThe Jazz Version of "How to Succeed in Business without Really Trying" – recorded in 1961Tijuana Jazz
With Charles MingusMingus Revisited/ – recorded in 1960The Complete Town Hall Concert – recorded in 1962
With Blue MitchellSmooth as the Wind – recorded in 1960-61A Sure Thing
With Gerry MulliganGerry Mulligan and the Concert Jazz Band at the Village Vanguard – recorded in 1960Gerry Mulligan '63 – recorded in 1962
With Oliver NelsonImpressions of Phaedra Full Nelson – recorded in 1962-63Oliver Nelson Plays Michelle Happenings Encyclopedia of Jazz – recorded in 1965-66The Spirit of '67 The Sound of Feeling – recorded in 1966-67
With Oscar PetersonOscar Peterson Trio + One Jousts – recorded in 1974-75The Trumpet Summit Meets the Oscar Peterson Big 4 Jazz at the Philharmonic – Yoyogi National Stadium, Tokyo 1983: Return to Happiness
With Dave PikeBossa Nova Carnival Jazz for the Jet Set – recorded in 1965
With Lalo SchifrinNew Fantasy Once a Thief and Other Themes
With Sonny StittThe Matadors Meet the Bull I Keep Comin' Back!
With Billy TaylorTaylor Made Jazz – recorded in 1957Kwamina
With Cal TjaderSeveral Shades of Jade Live at the Monterey Jazz Festival 1958–1980
With others