musicians are often judged by the reach of their fluence on others, but Charles Ellsworth Russell's irinet was one of a kind, so personal and eccentric at it offered little to any would-be disciples. He rived in New York in 1927 from the Midwest, riere he had played with Bix Beiderbecke and her Chicago-area musicians. There he built a solid putation playing a relatively standard hot clarinet ith Red Nichols.
By the time he joined Louis Prima on 52nd :reet in 1935, however, his tone had taken on a tart owl and his phrasing swung with a lumpy, off-centre lirkiness that seemed to thumb its nose at notions virtuosity. It gave his playing an 'authentic' quality Lat appealed to renegade jazz fans in rebellion against ie professionalism of swing. From the late 1930s on, : was part of Eddie Condon's stock company of aditionalists. He made his most characteristic records ?r Commodore from 1938-45. Zlar'met, bandleader, composer, 1910-2004) the 1930s comes down to about half a dozen great rand names, Artie Shaw's is surely one of them. After mch freelancing in the early 1930s and several years f band-building, Shaw (nee Arthur Arshawsky) hit his ride just as Benny Goodman peaked in 1938.
Shaw had a big, broad-should that could turn diamond-hard in high His lines were long, bobbing an fluent. Many clarinetists committed h solo to memory. When drummer Budc in 1939, the band acquired a superchai if Shaw loved music and the perquisite disliked the spotlight. He abandoned r the end of 1939, returning sporadically of writing and well-publicized marriage the Gramercy Five in 1953-54. Ultim; in his prime, he disowned the clarinet