Bix Beiderbecke

• Born: March 10, 1903
• Birthplace: Davenport, Iowa
• Died: August 6, 1931
• Place of death: New York, New York

American jazz cornetist

Beiderbecke forged his own legend as an early and influential white jazz musician of the 1920’s. His symphonic tone and melodic approach to improvisation were a precursor to the cool era of jazz.

The Life

Leon Bismark “Bix” Beiderbecke (BI-dur-behk) was born in Davenport, Iowa. His father, Bismark Herman Beiderbecke, supported the family by operating a fuel and lumber business. His mother, Agatha Jane Hilton, was an accomplished pianist who gave Beiderbecke piano lessons.

Although highly intelligent, Beiderbecke never applied himself in his high school studies, and consequently his parents enrolled him in Illinois’s Lake Forest Academy. Because of poor grades, he was dismissed in 1922. From 1923 to 1925 he drifted from one orchestra to another, then enrolled at the University of Iowa in 1925 in an attempt to major in music. His college career lasted just eighteen days because he failed to comply with academic requirements.

Beiderbecke then traveled with various jazz bands around the country, ultimately joining the famous Paul Whiteman Orchestra in 1927. For two years he and his saxophonist friend Frankie “Tram” Trumbauer toured the country with small groups. Although his personal life was in disorder, he was enjoying increasing popularity. While playing college engagements, Bix met many notable jazz musicians, including Benny Goodman, Jimmy and Tommy Dorsey, Artie Shaw, and Gene Krupa. His last years were consumed with hospital stays because of his alcoholism and his deteriorating health. In August, 1931, an ailing Beiderbecke moved to Queens and died from his lifelong excess intake of bootleg liquor and pneumonia.

The Music

At a time when the rage was hot jazz with energetic tempi and forceful beat, Beiderbecke offered an alternative with his expressive tone and style based on European classical traditions. During a brief twelve-year career, he established a new sound in his improvisations, heavily influenced by composer Claude Debussy. Beiderbecke chose restraint, clean technique, and a mellow tone while still delivering powerful musical statements.

Hot Jazz. Beiderbecke’s first exposure to jazz was a recording of “Tiger Rag” by the all-white Original Dixieland Jass (after 1917 spelled Jazz) Band. He was particularly influenced by trumpet player Nick La Rocca. By 1919 he owned his own Conn Victor cornet and was playing on a truck with his high school band at football games. Two years later he formed his first band, the Bix Beiderbecke Five.

The early 1920’s was the era of hot jazz with a driving beat, featuring individual and collective improvised solos at incredibly quick tempi. Hot jazz ignited careers of such luminaries as Louis Armstrong and Jelly Roll Morton. The Benson Orchestra personified hot jazz, and in 1923 Beiderbecke performed with it professionally. A year later Beiderbecke became the featured soloist with the newly formed Wolverine Orchestra housed at the Stockton Club in Hamilton, Ohio. The Wolverines completed their first recordings in 1924 with “Fidgety Feet” on one side and the classic “Jazz Me Blues” on the other. Several more recordings followed, which further enhanced his reputation among jazz musicians.

Departing the Wolverines in 1924, Beiderbecke joined the Jean Goldkette Orchestra. His tenure with this group was a frustrating experience because this orchestra employed trained musicians who could read music, a skill in which Beiderbecke never gained proficiency. After two months he was fired and then remarkably rehired. Goldkette valued his improvised solos, and by then Beiderbecke had learned some of the music by memory.

On the Road. Beiderbecke then drifted around the country from one prominent orchestra to another, performing with Red Nichols and the Five Pennies, the California Ramblers, the Charlie Straight Orchestra, and the Breeze Blowers. In late 1926 Beiderbecke rejoined the Goldkette Orchestra, which now employed arranger Bill Challis. Challis’s arrangements proved to be a catalyst for Beiderbecke because they provided space for his gifted improvisations, showcasing Beiderbecke’s lyrical and mellow tone and his considerable technique tempered by subtlety.

In 1927, a productive period in his life, Beiderbecke performed in ballrooms, on radio broadcasts, and in recordings for the Victor Company. On February 4, Beiderbecke recorded the critically acclaimed “Singin’ the Blues”; the other side featured the classic “Clarinet Marmalade,” with his friend Tram. Another series of recordings followed, with different combinations of musicians producing “Way Down Yonder in New Orleans,” “Riverboat Shuffle,” “Royal Garden Blues,” and “Jazz Me Blues.” The Goldkette Orchestra was in financial ruin by the middle of 1927 and disbanded. Beiderbecke briefly experimented with the New Yorkers, but after a few weeks that group disbanded as well. In October, Beiderbecke joined the famous Paul Whiteman Orchestra. Although Whiteman was nicknamed the King of Jazz, he was the leader of a commercial brand of jazz, far removed from the hot jazz so popular a few years earlier. (Whiteman was renowned for commissioning George Gershwin to compose and perform the epic Rhapsody in Blue.) Beiderbecke achieved a significant milestone of his own when his composition for solo piano, “In a Mist,” was recorded by the Okeh Record Company and performed with the Whiteman Orchestra at Carnegie Hall in October, 1928.

His body ravaged by alcohol, Beiderbecke was still able to perform with Whiteman on the Old Gold radio broadcasts and for a few more recordings. Fittingly, his last Whiteman recording in September, 1929, was “Waiting at the End of the Road,” presaging Beiderbecke’s death. His final endeavors were recording “I’ll Be a Friend with Pleasure”—one of his best, according to critics, which also hinted at the emerging swing style of the 1930’s—and copyrighting “Candlelights,” “Flashes,” and “In the Dark” with the Robbins Music Company in 1930 and 1931. They were published in 1938.

Musical Legacy

Some jazz historians maintain that Beiderbecke was the only cornet player ever to rival the proficiency and popularity of Louis Armstrong during the decade of the 1920’s. Some even assert that Beiderbecke surpassed Armstrong. Comparisons are inevitable but unnecessary. Ultimately, a jazz musician’s legacy is defined by influences, contributions, and innovations. Beiderbecke’s improvisations provided a foundation for the cool movement in jazz, popularized in the 1950’s, with its uncluttered textures and lighter approach.

Bibliography

Berton, Ralph. Remembering Bix: A Memoir of the Jazz Age. New York: Harper and Row, 1974. The author met Bix as a boy. Berton’s interpretive memoir includes photographs, bibliography, and discography.

Evans, Philip R., and Linda K. Evans. Bix: The Leon Bix Beiderbecke Story. New York: Prelike Press, 1998. An in-depth probe of his life, with numerous photographs and a collection of letters written by Beiderbecke.

James, Burnett. Bix Beiderbecke. London: Cassell, 1959. Biography of Beiderbecke and analysis of his jazz cornet style. Photographs and a short discography.

Sudhalter, Richard M., and Philip R. Evans. Bix: Man and Legend. New Rochelle, N.Y.: Arlington House, 1974. Photographs, diary, and discography. Nominated for a National Book Award.

Tirro, Frank. Living with Jazz. Orlando, Fla.: Harcourt Brace, 1996. A textbook for jazz history courses.

Wareing, Charles, and George Garlick. Bugles for Beiderbecke. London: Sidgwick and Jackson, 1958. Life and music of Beiderbecke in a biographical format with a discography.

Principal Recordings

albums:Bix Beiderbecke and the Chicago Cornets, 1924; Bix Beiderbecke and the Wolverines, 1924; Riverboat Shuffle, 1924; Davenport Blues, 1925; Bix Beiderbecke, Volume 1: Singin’ the Blues, 1927; Bix Beiderbecke, Volume 2: At the Jazz Band Ball, 1927; Bixology, 1927; Jazz Me Blues, 1927; Bix Beiderbecke with Paul Whiteman, 1927-1928, 1928.