ERC042M Kenny Dorham – Quiet Kenny
15 November 2018 by The Electric Recording Co.
After learning to play trumpet while at high school, Kenny Dorham played in several late 40s big bands, including Lionel Hampton’s and more significantly given his musical leanings, the bop-orientated outfits of Dizzy Gillespie and Billy Eckstine. In 1948 he succeeded Miles Davis as trumpeter with Charlie Parker’s quintet, and in 1954 joined Horace Silver in what the first edition of what became Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers. Although rightly viewed as one of the outstanding bebop trumpeters, stylistically Dorham’s playing reflected his awareness of the roots of jazz and the blues. Universally admired among his contemporaries Dorham’s death led unfairly...