Pops Foster

George Murphy Foster called, Pops Foster ( born May 18, 1892 in McCall in Ascension Parish, Louisiana; † 30 October 1969 in San Francisco), was an American jazz bassist of the New Orleans Jazz. He also played tuba and trumpet. Foster is considered the first important jazz bassist.

Life and work

He was born on a plantation in South Louisiana ( in Ascension Parish ) near Baton Rouge. At age ten, he moved with his family to New Orleans. While his older brother began to play the banjo and guitar, he started with cello and then switched to bass. From 1907 he started professionally in bands like those of Armand Piron, Kid Ory and King Oliver to play in New Orleans. 1918-1921 he played on the riverboat orchestras of Fate Marable ( where he played tuba). He went with Kid Ory to Los Angeles and was in the mid 1920s in St. Louis with Charlie Creath and Dewey Jackson. In 1928 he went to New York City to King Oliver and played in the 1930s, then there at the Luis Russell Orchestra and with Louis Armstrong. In the 1940s, he brought it in the then " Dixieland " Revival of great popularity, for example, with Mezz Mezzrow, Art Hodes, Bob Wilber and Sidney Bechet (1945 ). In 1942 he went as a worker with the New York subway. In 1946 he took up with Dan Burley, in the late 1940s and 1952 ( with Jimmy Archey ) he toured Europe (especially France). In the early 1950s he played regularly in the Central Plaza Hotel in New York and in 1954 with Papa Celestin in New Orleans. Between 1956 and 1961 he played with Earl Hines in San Francisco and 1963-1964 with the trio of Elmer Snowden. In 1966 he visited with the New Orleans All Stars Europe. He had his last residence in San Francisco, where he dictated his memoirs ( the posthumously published in 1971 ).

Mark of his game was the slapping bass ( recoil of the string against the fingerboard ). Foster has been married twice ( in 1912 with Bertha Foster, 1936, Alma).

Disco Graphical Notes

• GeorgePops Foster ( American Music, 1968) with Art Hodes