Other Deaths

by Derek Coller

Keith Smith

A potent trumpet player in the Louis Armstrong tradition, Keith Smith was energetic in both his music-making and his promotions, which encompassed concert tours, his own record label, video releases, a record store and frequent trips to the U.S.A., including a time living in New Orleans.

A Londoner, born on March 19, 1940, Smith did not take up the trumpet until he was 17 but was soon playing with local jazz bands before moving on to better known groups, led by Mickey Ashman and Bobby Mickleburgh. After his first visit to New Orleans in 1962 he formed his own Climax Jazzmen. Early in 1966 he organized a European tour by the New Orleans All Stars, a band which also included Alvin Alcorn, trumpet; Jimmy Archey, trombone; Darnell Howard, clarinet; Alton Purnell, piano; Pops Foster, bass; and Cie Frazier, drums. That same year he recorded in New Orleans with George Lewis, while in 1969 he was in a band with Chris Barber and Sandy Brown which recorded with pianist Sammy Price.

In January 1972 he joined the Papa Bue Viking Jazz Band in Denmark, remaining with it until late 1974. With clarinetist Ian Wheeler he formed Hefty Jazz in early 1976, continuing as leader when Wheeler left in 1979. The band recorded in 1977 with Dick Wellstood for its own label, Hefty Jazz, and played a date at Eddie Condon's club in 1985.

It was in the 1980s that Smith started to promote various tribute shows, beginning with "The Wonderful World of Louis Armstrong," followed by "A Hundred Years of Dixieland Jazz." These shows toured in 1981, 1983 and 1984. American musicians were featured, several of whom had played with the Armstrong All-Stars. Bassist Arvell Shaw and drummer Barrett Deems were on each tour, with Big Chief Russell Moore, Peanuts Hucko and Dick Cary on the 1981 trip. Johnny Mince, Bob Havens, Johnny Guarnieri and Nat Pierce appeared on the later tours. For the next 20 years these successful promotions were followed by tributes to Hoagy Carmichael ("Stardust Road"), Cole Porter, George Gershwin and "From Basin Street to Broadway" (with singer Georgie Fame). He produced Hefty Jazz CDs and videos on a regular basis, as well as promoting occasional jazz concerts with Acker Bilk, Martin Litton and others.

Keith Smith's story was told in The Mississippi Rag in the October and November 1999 issues, and he was editing his autobiography, provisional title The Albino Kid, before his death.

In addition to the Louis Armstrong influence, Keith Smith also paid tribute to Henry "Red" Allen in his powerful playing and phrasing. He died on Jan. 4, 2008.

Tommy McQuartor

Tommy McQuator was perhaps the major jazz trumpet figure in Britain before World War II, a shade ahead of his contemporaries Nat Gonella, Norman Payne and Duncan Whyte. Born in Scotland Sept. 4, 1914, he began playing in a local brass band at the age of 11. As a teenager he played mainly in a dance band led by pianist Lon Freeman until, in 1934, he was invited to join the Jack Payne orchestra. When Nat Gonella left the Lew Stone band it was McQuator who replaced him. Then, in 1936, he joined Ambrose and his Orchestra, at this period the finest big band in the U.K. His friend, trombonist George Chisholm, was also with Ambrose, and the two were to play together for many years thereafter. During this time they recorded with Benny Carter (1936 and 1937) and Danny Polo (1937).

In 1939 they helped to create the Heralds of Swing, an early but short-lived attempt to form a small jazz group able to perform on a fulltime basis. After the outbreak of war, McQuator and Chisholm became founder members of the RAF Dance Orchestra, better known as the Squadronaires. The orchestra continued after the war, but McQuator subsequently left to go into the studios, first with the B.B.C. Show Band, then freelance, and later with drummer Jack Parnell's TV Orchestra. He was involved with The Muppet Show, 1976-1981 and provided the music for "Lips," the trumpet player in the Muppet band.

Among his numerous other recordings were sessions with John Dankworth and George Chisholm. He was in Benny Goodman's big band which recorded in London in 1969 and played two concerts with Goodman in 1971. Tommy McQuator died Jan. 4, 2008.

Frank Chace

Writing 40 years ago, Chicago jazz historian John Steiner said, "Frank Chace is certainly the finest young Dodds-Pee Wee-Tesch student." On recorded evidence the Pee Wee Russell influence, plus touches of Frank Teschemacher, were very strong in Chace's clarinet playing.

Chace was born in Chicago on July 22, 1924. He had toyed with the flute as a youngster but did not start to play the clarinet until the Army sent him to New York in 1945, where he heard Pee Wee Russell at Nick's. His devotion to Russell's playing continued from that year on. Throughout the 1950s he was associated with Marty Grosz and other young men struggling to keep Chicago jazz alive. Under the Grosz name there was a fine "Hooray For Bix" album (1957) on Riverside, reissued on CD by Good Time Jazz, and two albums on Audio Fidelity (1959) which paired Chace and Grosz with Max Kaminsky, Cutty Cutshall and Don Ewell.

In 1951 Chace had played an engagement in Boston at George Wein's Storyville club with Wild Bill Davison, and in 1952 he was a member of Don Ewell's group at the Barrel Club in St. Louis, where the trumpet players were Jack Ivett, followed briefly by Lee Collins, and then Dewey Jackson. Recordings from the Barrel Club, under Jackson's name, have recently been issued on Delmark DE246. Chace worked with Marty Grosz at the Gaslight Club in Chicago in the late 1950s. During the 1960s he worked with the Salty Dogs, leaving them in 1969, when he seems to have taken day jobs. He played in various Chicago jazz events during the 1980s and 1990s. Playing with Chace at a Bob Koester bash in September 2001, drummer Wayne Jones wrote that "Frank sounded not the least dimmed by the passing years"!

Among his other recordings are those with Dave Remington, Jabbo Smith, Natty Dominique, Doc Evans, the Salty Dogs (Windin' Ball CD), Butch Thompson, Wild Bill Davison, and a Jimmy Archey-Don Ewell double-CD on GHB BCD461/462.

Reviewing the Salty Dogs CD on Windin' Ball CD105, Michael Steinman said, "Anyone who studies Chace, daring the fates in ensemble or solo, will learn more than a semester's worth about inspired improvisation."

Frank Chace died Dec. 28, 2007.

March 2008 issue | © 2008 The Mississippi Rag

P.O. Box 19068, Minneapolis, MN 55419.