The son of Russian Jewish immigrant parents, Benny Goodman grew up in one of Chicago’s toughest, gang riddled neighborhoods, but by his teenage years he was already a virtuoso jazz clarinetist. Eventually he had his own band, The Benny Goodman Orchestra, and was at the center of two key moments in popular music history. Playing the syncopated rhythms they’d learned from Fletcher Henderson and with a current radio hit “King Porter Stomp”, his band kick-started the swing era when they were enthusiastically received by a huge crowd at the Palomar Ballroom in Los Angeles on August 21, 1935 at the start of a three week run. Before too long, Goodman was dubbed “The King of Swing”.

         On January 16, 1938 Goodman and his orchestra again made history by bringing jazz to New York’s famed classical music temple, Carnegie Hall, an event that critic Bruce Elder called “the single most important jazz or popular music concert in history.” Among the players that night were members of Duke Ellington and Count Basie’s bands. Indeed, the white Goodman is rightly regarded as a racial pioneer, including celebrated black musicians Teddy Wilson and Lionel Hampton in his 1930s trio and quartet at a time when this simply wasn’t done.

         Among his best-loved recordings are “Moonglow”, “Stompin’ at the Savoy”, and the number that brought down the house at Carnegie Hall, “Sing, Sing, Sing (With a Swing)”.

         -Steve Williams (5/8/23) – Blog Post #8