Artie Shaw dies

I don't know much about him, but I heard that he just put down his instrument sometime in the 50s and never played again. Is this true? And if so, why?

One of jazz's finest clarinetists, Artie Shaw never seemed fully satisfied with his musical life, constantly breaking up successful bands and running away from success. While Count Basie and Duke Ellington were satisfied to lead just one orchestra during the swing era, and Benny Goodman (due to illness) had two, Shaw led five, all of them distinctive and memorable.

After growing up in New Haven, CT, and playing clarinet and alto locally, Shaw spent part of 1925 with Johnny Cavallaro's dance band and then played off and on with Austin Wylie's band in Cleveland from 1927-1929 before joining Irving Aaronson's Commanders. After moving to New York, Shaw became a close associate of Willie "The Lion" Smith at jam sessions, and by 1931 was a busy studio musician. He retired from music for the first time in 1934 in hopes of writing a book, but when his money started running out, Shaw returned to New York. A major turning point occurred when he performed at an all-star big band concert at

-the Imperial Theatre in May 1936, surprising the audience by performing with a string quartet and a rhythm section. He used a similar concept in putting together his first orchestra, adding a Dixieland-type front line and a vocalist while retaining the strings. Despite some fine recordings, that particular band disbanded in early 1937 and then Shaw put together a more conventional big band.

The surprise success of his 1938 recording of "Begin the Beguine" made the clarinetist into a superstar and his orchestra (who featured the tenor of Georgie Auld, vocals by Helen Forrest and Tony Pastor, and, by 1939, Buddy Rich's drumming) into one of the most popular in the world. Billie Holiday was with the band for a few months, although only one recording ("Any Old Time") resulted. Shaw found the pressure of the band business difficult to deal with and in November 1939 suddenly left the bandstand and moved to Mexico for two months. When Shaw returned, his first session, utilizing a large string section, resulted in another major hit, "Frenesi"; it seemed that he could not escape success. Shaw's third regular orchestra, who had a string section and such star soloists as trumpeter Billy Butterfield and pianist Johnny Guarnieri, was one of his finest, waxing perhaps the greatest version of "Stardust" along with the memorable "Concerto for Clarinet." The Gramercy Five, a small group formed out of the band (using Guarnieri on harpsichord), also scored with the million-selling "Summit Ridge Drive."

Despite all this, Shaw broke up the orchestra in 1941, only to re-form an even larger one later in the year. The latter group featured Hot Lips Page along with Auld and Guarnieri. After Pearl Harbor, Shaw enlisted and led a Navy band (unfortunately unrecorded) before getting a medical discharge in February 1944. Later in the year, his new orchestra featured Roy Eldridge, Dodo Marmarosa, and Barney Kessel, and found Shaw's own style becoming quite modern, almost boppish. But, with the end of the swing era, Shaw again broke up his band in early 1946 and was semi-retired for several years, playing classical music as much as jazz.

His last attempt at a big band was a short-lived one, a boppish unit who lasted for a few months in 1949 and included Zoot Sims, Al Cohn, and Don Fagerquist; their modern music was a commercial flop. After a few years of limited musical activity, Shaw returned one last time, recording extensively with a version of the Gramercy Five that featured Tal Farlow or Joe Puma on guitar along with Hank Jones. Then, in 1955, Artie Shaw permanently gave up the clarinet to pursue his dreams of being a writer. Although he served as the frontman (with Dick Johnson playing the clarinet solos) for a reorganized Artie Shaw Orchestra in 1983, Shaw never played again. He received plenty of publicity for his six marriages (including to actresses Lana Turner, Ava Gardner, and Evelyn Keyes) and for his odd autobiography, -The Trouble With Cinderella (which barely touches on the music business or his wives), but the outspoken Artie Shaw deserves to be best remembered as one of the truly great clarinetists. His RCA recordings, which were reissued in complete fashion in a perfectly done Bluebird LP series, have only been made available in piecemeal fashion on CD. ~ Scott Yanow, All Music Guide

Interesting guy. It's crazy how somebody so talented could just give it up completely like that, especially after having been so successful with it in the past.

I know I would not have done it his way at all.

What a talented musician. I've got a fair bit of his stuff on vinyl. I was once an aspiring, and very bad, player of the licorice stick.

There was an Artie Shaw piece on one of the first albums I listened to as a small kid. Some kind of mixed album the hamburgers owned. It caused me to listen to big band music and jazz - when most people around me were disregarding both.

He's definitely influenced the range of music I listen to now.

words to one of his greatest hits :


When they begin the Beguine, - It
brings back the sound of music so tender. -It
brings back a night of tropical splendour. - It
brings back a memory ever green. - I'm
with you once more under the stars. - And
down by the shore an orchestra's playing. - And-
even the palms seem to be swaying
When they begin the Beguine. - To
live it again is past all endeavour, Ex-
cept when that tune clutches my heart. - And
there we are swearing to love forever. - And promising
never, never to part. -What
moments divine, what rapture esrene. - Till
clouds came along to disperse the joys wehad tasted. - And
now when I hear people curse the chance that was wasted. - I
know but too well what they mean. - So don't
let them begin the Beguine. - Let the
love that was once a fire remain an ember. - Let it
sleep like the dead desire I only remember
When they begin the Beguine. - Oh yes
let them begin the Beguine, make them play - Till the
stars that were there before return above you - Till you
whisper to me once more "Darling I love you" - And we
suddenly kno what heaven we're in
When they begin the Beguine.
When they begin the Beguine

I wish the lad was still here. I kinda feel like dancing, or swaying, more like.

Took me many years to find out what a beguine was.

The clarinet was the first musical instruments I learned to play. I can remember listening to some of his music and wishing I could aspire to play like him.