Yet Another "Dream Band"

Jack Bowers

Senior Contributor since 1997

A former newspaper writer / editor who has been writing about big-band Jazz for more than fifteen years.

Recent articles (1,749 total)

Published: July 10, 2008

Besides workshops, panel discussions and the presentation of papers, the symposium will include keynote addresses by Nat Hentoff, Lewis Porter, Nick Catalano, Don Glanden and Alan Hood, and the premiere of Glanden's video documentary, "Brownie Speaks." Glanden is head of Graduate Jazz Studies at Philadelphia's University of the Arts. For information, contact Maryanne Mele (mmele@uarts.edu) or phone 215-717-6127.

Bill Finegan

Bill Finegan, a renowned big band arranger who co-led the groundbreaking Sauter-Finegan Orchestra in the 1950s, died June 4 at age 87. Finegan began arranging in the late 1930s for Tommy Dorsey and Glenn Miller (for whom he arranged such hit songs as "Little Brown Jug," "Song of the Volga Boatmen," "Sunrise Serenade" and "Serenade in Blue," among others). After working for a time with Horace Heidt and Les Elgart, he became the main arranger for the Dorsey band. In 1952, his friend Eddie Sauter suggested that they form their own band. In spite of its complex music, often featuring a fife and piccolo on top and tuba and bass trombone on the bottom, the band was a critical if not popular success and recorded about a dozen albums. Its biggest hit was "The Doodletown Fifers," based on a Civil War song, "Midnight Sleigh Ride." In 1985, four years after Sauter's death, Finegan conducted a 30-year reunion of the S-F Orchestra at the University of Bridgeport in Connecticut. Even though immobilized for the last twenty years of his life by a spinal injury, Finegan continued to write and teach music.

And that's it for now. Until next time, keep swingin'!

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