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Shorty Rogers

One of the leading figures of West Coast jazz, Shorty Rogers' decision to stop performing and switch to full-time studio work in 1962 marked the end of its golden era. Rogers played with a number of big bands in the late 1940s, and began to attract attention as an arranger while working with Woody Herman. Stan Kenton then hired him away from Herman and Rogers' compositions and arrangements for Kenton made him as much of a star as any of Kenton's soloists. Rogers left Kenton and pulled together a small group that included Art Pepper, Shelley Manne, Jimmy Giuffre, and Hampton Hawes to record Modern Sounds for Capitol. Rogers' tight and innovative arrangements on this recording are considered by many to be as influential as Gil Evans' for Miles Davis' small group on Birth of the Cool.

Rogers formed a small group he called the Giants and recorded a series of albums for RCA, including The Cool and the Crazy and Shorty Courts the Count. Marlon Brando wanted Rogers to provide the soundtrack for his movie, The Wild One, but the studio refused, hiring Leith Stevens to provide most of the score. Rogers was featured on screen, though, in Frank Sinatra's The Man With the Golden Arm, leading the jazz group Sinatra's character played with. Rogers also worked with Perez Prado on a concept album titled Voodoo Suite.

Rogers was a dramatic character but a thoroughly professional musician, and he moved to the financial security of writing for television and movies when the West Coast jazz scene began to fade in the early 1960s. He was a prolific contributor to television and to a lesser extent films through the 1980s. Among the series he scored or wrote incidental music for were "The Partridge Family," "The Mod Squad," "The Rookies," "Starsky and Hutch," and "The Love Boat." His tune "Chelsea Memorandum" shows up in the midst of Lalo Schifrin's cuts on the second "Mission: Impossible" soundtrack album. He also composed and conducted the music for a number of the innovative UPA cartoons featuring the work of Theodore Geissel (Dr. Seuss) and Stan Freberg.

During this period, Rogers continued to work occasionally on pop and jazz recordings, but primarily as an arranger. He and Claus Ogerman split arranging duties on Mel Torme's 1962 hit album, "Coming Home, Baby." Late in the 1960s, he was responsible for one of those assimilation-via-train wreck creations that incredibly strange music fans love, Bobby Bryant's "The Jazz Excursion into 'Hair'". He pops up as arranger in a variety of places, from Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass' Christmas album to Bud Shank's mellow album of Lovin' Spoonful covers for Liberty to Frances Faye's now sounds album, "Go Go Go." One of his ignominious credits is the arrangement for Wayne Newton's cover of "These Boots are Made for Walking."

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9
Reassessing

Shorty Rogers: Short Stops

Read "Shorty Rogers: Short Stops" reviewed by Richard J Salvucci


In the 1980s, trumpeter and Kenton alum Mike Vax put together a Supersax-type group called TRPTS. It released an album of harmonized trumpet classics, one of which was “Short Stop." There are lots of great tunes including “Night in Tunisia," “Trumpet Blues and Cantabile," and “Heckler's Hop." Oh yeah, one I never heard, Shorty Rogers' Short Stop. Really? How do you get to 35 years of age, listen to jazz almost daily, and not know about Shorty Rogers? I vaguely ...

145
Extended Analysis

Shorty Rogers: Four Classic Albums

Read "Shorty Rogers: Four Classic Albums" reviewed by David Rickert


Shorty RogersFour Classic AlbumsAvid Group 2011 Trumpeter Shorty Rogers was one of the few jazz musicians to embrace the big band sound long after the commercial appeal for the genre was over, and despite the lack of commercial viability, he produced a series of terrific albums in the 1950s. Part of his success was due to the large pool of studio musicians on the West Coast who also happened to be ...

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Album Review

Shorty Rogers: Shorty Goes To Hollywood

Read "Shorty Goes To Hollywood" reviewed by Nic Jones


This is volume three in an ongoing series devoted to the music of trumpeter Shorty Rogers, released by Giant Steps. The temptation to say that what's on this set is unlikely to win any new converts to his music is great, but while it might be apposite the case is a little more complicated than that. The quintet that Rogers led with reedman Jimmy Giuffre in the front line is arguably the best band he ever led, ...

369
Album Review

Shorty Rogers: Bossa Nova/Jazz Waltz

Read "Bossa Nova/Jazz Waltz" reviewed by David Rickert


Like Stan Kenton, Shorty Rogers led a big band that featured some of the greatest names in West Coast jazz. No less than Shelley Manne, Jimmy Giuffre, and Bob Shank appeared on early classics like The Big Shorty Rogers Express and Portrait of Shorty. However, Rogers’ band always seemed like a lot more fun to be in than Kenton’s, since Rogers exhibited a goofy sense of experimentation and a knack for writing peppy horn charts that exhibited a great deal ...

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Album Review

Shorty Rogers and His Giants: Portrait of Shorty

Read "Portrait of Shorty" reviewed by Jack Bowers


This Portrait of Shorty is an unfinished portrait, of course, but no less pleasing because of it. Rogers called his big band “The Giants,” which is entirely appropriate, as he himself was widely recognized as one of the giants of the so–called West Coast school of “cool Jazz” that was born in the early ’50s and flourished for the next decade and beyond. While Portrait, recorded in 1957, gives a pretty fair representation of Shorty’s skills as big–band composer / ...

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Video / DVD

Shorty Rogers: Centennial

Shorty Rogers: Centennial

Source: JazzWax by Marc Myers

Sunday, April 14, will mark the 100th anniversary of Shorty Rogers' birth. The trumpeter, flugelhornist, composer and arranger who was a founding father of West Coast jazz died in 1994 from melanoma at age 70. Today, in celebration of Rogers' contribution to jazz, I've assembled 10 of my favorite clips plus three bonus clips: Here's one of Rogers' first recorded arrangements, on Heads Up for Woody Herman's Woodchoppers combo performed in March 1946 at Carnegie Hall, featuring Sonny Berman (tp), ...

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Recording

Backgrounder: Shorty Rogers - Cool and Crazy

Backgrounder: Shorty Rogers - Cool and Crazy

Source: JazzWax by Marc Myers

One of Shorty Rogers's finest albums was available originally in the new 10-inch LP format or as a pair of extended-play 45s. Cool and Crazy dates back 70 years to March and April of 1953 and features a slam-bang band at the dawn of West Coast jazz. Rogers' compositions and arrangements are glorious, with loads of contrapuntal lines, and his band delivers enormous instrumental punch.  His orchestra included: Shorty Rogers, Conrad Gozzo, Maynard Ferguson, Tom Reeves and John Howell (tp); ...

Recording

Backgrounder: Shorty Rogers Plays Richard Rodgers

Backgrounder: Shorty Rogers Plays Richard Rodgers

Source: JazzWax by Marc Myers

With spring less than a week away, it's time for upbeat West Coast jazz. The last time I posted on Shorty Rogers was over the holidays when I highlighted The Swingin' Nutcracker. Before that, I featured Chances Are It Swings as a Backgrounder. This week, it's the finger-snapping Shorty Rogers Plays Richard Rodgers, as suggested by Todd Selbert. Recorded in the winter of 1957 between January and April, the album for RCA is a swinger loaded with top West Coast ...

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Music Industry

Shorty Rogers: The Swingin' Nutcracker

Shorty Rogers: The Swingin' Nutcracker

Source: JazzWax by Marc Myers

Once again, it's that time of year to announce my choice for induction into the JazzWax Vintage Holiday Album Hall of Fame. This year marks the Hall's 15th season and one of JazzWax's oldest traditions. This year, let's welcome Shorty Rogers's The Swingin' Nutcracker, a hip and happening original interpretation of Tchaikovsky's music. You'll find the album here. The Nutcracker Suite was first performed in 1892 as a two-act ballet choreographed by Marius Petipa and Lev Ivanov. George Balanchine updated ...

Interview

Interview: Marshall Rogers on Shorty

Interview: Marshall Rogers on Shorty

Source: JazzWax by Marc Myers

Ninety-eight years ago today, Milton Rajonsky was born in Great Barrington, Mass. Milton would later become better known as Shorty Rogers, a trumpeter and flugelhornist and composer-arranger who was one of West Coast jazz's primary architects in the early 1950s. He also pioneered a brassy cool sound for TV shows and his music inspired Henry Mancini. Rogers died in 1994 at age 70. Among Rogers's milestone albums are Modern Sounds : Shorty Rogers And His Giants (1951), Cool & Crazy ...

Video / DVD

More Shorty Rogers, in 1953

More Shorty Rogers, in 1953

Source: JazzWax by Marc Myers

Yesterday, I received an enormous number of emails from readers who either love Shorty Rogers's Chances Are It Swings or were unfamiliar with the West Coast jazz masterpiece and were happy to be turned on to it. So today, I figured I'd provide clips of Shorty Rogers's transition into a leadership role for RCA in 1953. While Rogers had just three recording sessions as a leader that year, he played on and arranged for a sizable number of other musicians' ...

1

Recording

Shorty Rogers: Chances Are It Swings

Shorty Rogers: Chances Are It Swings

Source: JazzWax by Marc Myers

Trumpeter and flugelhornist Shorty Rogers first recorded for RCA in 1952 as Boots Brown and His Blockbusters. The four sides for two RCA 45s were honking instrumentals with a strong backbeat. According to my 2013 interview with Dave Pell, who was on the '53 session, the Boots Brown dates were for movies. “But then RCA released them as singles," said Dave. “I don’t know why—maybe to make a double profit or to feed the pipeline for its new 45-rpm format. ...

Video / DVD

Modern Sounds From California

Modern Sounds From California

Source: JazzWax by Marc Myers

West Coast jazz was the music of migrants. After World War II, work opportunities for skilled jazz musicians skyrocketed in Los Angeles, attracting gifted artists from different parts of the country. Two principal architects of the West Coast jazz sound in the early 1950s were Gerry Mulligan and Shorty Rogers—transplants from the East Coast. Many other participants were refugees from big bands that either broke up in Los Angeles or were touring there when musicians decided to quit. Big bands ...

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Video / DVD

Shorty Rogers: Nutcracker

Shorty Rogers: Nutcracker

Source: JazzWax by Marc Myers

What do Shorty Rogers, Larry Clinton, Les Brown, Hal Mooney, Duke Ellington, Herbie Fields, the Nutty Squirrels and Gene Krupa have in common? All recorded a jazz interpretation of Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker. Of the bunch, Rogers's The Swingin' Nutcracker is probably the hippest and most fun to hear. It still jumps like caramel popcorn on a hot skillet. The album was recorded for RCA in three sessions—one with a sax quintet and two with a big band. Overture for Shorty, Nutty ...

Recording

West Coast Jazz: Early Sounds

West Coast Jazz: Early Sounds

Source: JazzWax by Marc Myers

West Coast jazz has no real beginning and no specific founder. It's a sound that evolved from a range of influences, including Lester Young's relaxed sound on the tenor saxophone, Count Basie's swing and classical counterpoint. But West Coast jazz is also a product of experiences, including the beach breezes, the vastness and tranquilizing effect of the Pacific Ocean, the car culture, and the optimism of suburbia. When I interviewed Howard Rumsey in 2009, the bassist who managed The Lighthouse ...

Photos

Music

Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson

Shorty Goes To...

Giant Step Records
2007

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Modern Jazz Archive

RCA Records
2004

buy

Bossa Nova/Jazz Waltz

Collectables
2003

buy

Contours

RCA Records
2002

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Videos

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