Bob Florence, a pianist, arranger, composer and bandleader who won a Grammy and two Emmy awards in a career reaching back to the late '50s, died Thursday at Barlow Respiratory Hospital in Los Angeles after a lengthy bout with pneumonia. He was 75.
Although his schedule of activities was cut back a few months ago because of his illness, he had remained active, leading his Bob Florence Limited Edition big band in October and writing composing commissions from the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers, the International Assn. for Jazz Education, and the Los Angeles Jazz Institute.
Despite his multi-hyphenate skills, Florence was best known as a skillful and sophisticated arranger, especially adept at writing for big jazz band instrumentation. His first assignments came in the late '50s as the big-band era was giving way to vocal pop music and rock 'n' roll. He provided arrangements for Harry James, Louis Bellson, Sy Zentner and others.
Early in his career, Florence came face to face with the fact that arrangers -- who transform the melodies and harmonies of songs into full-blown works for an infinite variety of instrumentations -- rarely receive appropriate praise or financial reward for the work they do. A light-hearted, rock-tinged arrangement of “Up A Lazy River" that he wrote resulted in a 1961 Grammy award for Zentner, but it wasn't until the 1999 Grammys that Florence and his band won.
According to Florence's account in his website biography, “Si never acknowledged that I wrote the arrangement. . . . I got paid scale while Hoagy Carmichael made a lot more money." There was a hidden benefit for Florence, however. “Word got out," he explained, “and this was a wonderful 'launching pad.' It took me away from being strictly [known as] a jazz writer."
