Mel Tormé
Melvin Howard " Mel" Tormé (* September 13, 1925 in Chicago, Illinois, † June 5, 1999 in Los Angeles, California ) was an American singer in the field of jazz and popular music, also known as a drummer, composer, arranger, writer and actor came into existence. His press agent coined for him nicknamed The Velvet Fog (such as " the velvet fog " ), which referred to the Tormes gently smooth baritone voice.
Biography
Mel Tormé, son of Russian immigrants, already singing at the age of 4 years, several months with the Coon -Sanders Orchestra. He worked as his colleague Mickey Rooney or Sammy Davis Jr. as a child star in the radio series, as he grew up in an active environment artist. From the age of seven, he moved on drums before he tried again as a singer. His first record he recorded with Harry James at the age of 15 years. 1942 brought him Ben Pollack in the Chico Marx Orchestra. As a film actor Tormé debuted in 1943 on the side of Frank Sinatra in the film Higher and Higher. Together with Les Baxter and Ginny O'Connor, he formed shortly before he was drafted into the U.S. Army and then again in 1947, the vocal group Mel -Tones; first recordings were made for Jewell and Decca Records, after the Second World War for Musicraft Records, partly accompanied by Artie Shaw Orchestra. Carlos Gastel, who had promoted the careers of Nat King Cole and Peggy Lee, brought him to Capitol Records and MGM, which turned out him as a pop star; but after a few years, Tormé decided to work with smaller labels and tend to return more to jazz. This was followed by albums like Musical Sounds Are the Best Songs for Coral in 1954, It's a Blue World on Bethlehem. The mid-1950s he played with Marty Paich in the band Mel Tormé with Marty Paich the Dektette; they took together four albums, like Mel Tormé Sings Fred Astaire (Bethlehem, 1956) and on Verve Tormé (1958), Back in Town ( 1959) and as a highlight and re-union of the Mel -Tones finally Mel Tormé Swings Shubert Alley in which Paich and Tormé Broadway songs processed as Comden / Green's " Just in Time ", " Too Darn Hot ", Harold Arlen's "A Sleepin 'Bee " or Frank Loesser "Once in Love with Amy". Her accompanying musicians were, inter alia, Art Pepper, Frank Rosolino, Red Callender and Mel Lewis.
In the years 1963 and 1964 Tormé was working as a clerk for the Judy Garland show in which he also appeared. The experience he processed later in the book The Other Side of the Rainbow. In the 1960s created for Atlantic and Columbia more productions with studio orchestras, including led by Shorty Rogers and Al Porcino. An intensive collaboration began Tormé in the late 1970s with pianist George Shearing and his band; from this time he also wrote his arrangements themselves. In the 1980s created a series of albums for Concord Jazz, including with Rob McConnell Big Band. In 1988 he took on the reunion album with West Coast musicians such as Bob Enevoldsen, Jack Sheldon and Pete Jolly.
In the 1990s he worked with Cleo Laine (Nothing Without You ) and Ken Peplowski ( Sing, Sing, Sing ); his last album was the Velvet and Brass for Concord recorded in July 1995. In August 1996, Mel Tormé would have in common with George Shearing, the Newport Jazz Festival will open. But the concert had to be canceled at the last second: Tormé had suffered a stroke. He is expected to recover from this never more: The singer was not able to perform live in the sequence.
Mel Tormé died on 5 June 1999 to the consequences of a further stroke.
Disco Graphical Notes
7 " singles (selection)
- A Day in the Life of Bonnie & Clyde ( Liberty 15064 picture cover 1968)
Filmography (selection)
Bibliography
- The Other Side of the Rainbow ( 1970)
- Wynner (1978 )
- It Was not All Velvet ( 1988)
- Traps The Drum Wonder: The Life of Buddy Rich (1991 )