Remembering Buddy DeFranco

His first instrument was, of all things, the mandolin, which he began playing at the age of five. Four years later, lucky for the world of jazz, he switched to clarinet. He attended Mastbaum School (then a music magnet school) in Philadelphia, where he was classically trained, and began in the jazz business when he won a national Tommy Dorsey talent contest. His entry into the world of name bands occurred when he was 16 years old with the big band of actor/singer/trumpeter Johnnie “Scat” Davis.

His reputation quickly grew. In 1943, he spent a few months with drummer Gene Krupa’s crew. The following year was his real breakthrough, when he joined the orchestra of the volatile trombonist Tommy Dorsey, whose ensemble was nicknamed “The General Motors of the Band Business.” Swing clarinet was king in those days, given the fame of players like Benny Goodman and Artie Shaw, and DeFranco was right up there with them in terms of ability. But things began to change when DeFranco heard bebop for the first time by way of recordings by Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, and others.

Dorsey could hear DeFranco practicing bop licks in the band room and didn’t like it one bit. He demanded that the clarinetist play the exact same, note-for-note solos nightly, particularly on hit recordings like “Opus One.” It was clearly time for DeFranco to move on, and he did so in 1948.

He signed with Capitol Records and recorded a marvelous series of bop sides, spent a few years in Count Basie’s small group of the early 1950s, and later recorded a number of acclaimed tracks in small groups that included ultra-modernists like pianists Kenny Drew and Sonny Clark, accordionist Tommy Gumina, and drummer Art Blakey. He also recorded prolifically for Norman Granz’s Verve Records, including a now-legendary date with piano giant Art Tatum.

Changing fashions

Unfortunately, the clarinet — whether swing, bop, or otherwise — fell out of favor as the 1960s approached, and though DeFranco continued to win all the polls, he just wasn’t getting the gigs. In 1966, he was offered a lucrative deal by the estate of Glenn Miller to take over leadership of the Miller “ghost” band (Miller died in 1944). Musically, it wasn’t great. Financially, it was. DeFranco led the Miller band for eight years, and in 1974, realizing that the climate had again changed for his type of jazz — this time for the better — he decided to return to jazz full-time.

DeFranco didn’t lose a beat and was better, more fluent, and more inventive than he ever had been, particularly when he teamed up with the swinging vibraphonist Terry Gibbs. As time went on, he was treated and regarded with reverence as a jazz giant and one of the few certifiable legends still on the scene. The annual Buddy DeFranco Jazz Festival at the University of Montana began in 1980. According to DeFranco's widow, Joyce, the fest will continue.

Of his playing, top jazz clarinet player Ken Peplowski said: "Buddy DeFranco almost single-handedly was the clarinetist who moved the harmonic and rhythmic language forward from where Benny Goodman left off.”

As a person, DeFranco was one of the few in the world of jazz or elsewhere that you never, ever heard a bad word about. “Beautiful guy,” was what you always heard. You can tell when you hear him play. It was always beautiful.

Enjoy these two clips of DeFranco: on The Tonight Show in 1982 and in Japan with Les Brown in 1983.