Bandleader Woody Herman was born Woodrow Wilson Herman in 1913, starting in vaudeville with his parents at the age of nine, where he was billed as 'Boy Wonder Of The Clarinet'. By 1936, he had taken over the Isham Jones Orchestra. The Band That Plays The Blues (The Best Of Woody Herman) and was featured extensively on clarinet and alto in arrangements that fluctuated between Dixieland and swing.
In 1939, the band recorded the million selling Woodchopper's Ball and popularity was assured. The First Herd was recruited in 1944, a glittering array of outsize personalities like trombonist Bill Harris, tenorman Flip Phillips, drummer Dave Trough, trumpet prodigy Sonny Berman and arranger - pianist Ralph Burins. It was a band of enthusiasts, and it still sounds like it on record. The good - humored vocal on Caldonia capped by the wildly exciting trumpet unison, Phillips booting solo on The Good Earth, Harris' idiosyncratic brilliance on Bijou, all remain classics of the period (The Best Of Woody Herman, CBS) while the sheer exuberance of the band on Apple Honey, Wild Root or Your Father's Moustache has seldom be equaled. With arrangements by Neil Hefti, Burns and Shorty Rogers, the First Herd scored a radio show sponsored by Wildroot Cream Oil Charlie that took the sound into a million homes. Airshots capture the spontaneity of the band better than the studio dates, and the trio of releases is worth hunting down (The Great Herd and Woody Herman - His Orchestra & The Woodchoppers, Vols 1 & 2) .
Personnel changes occurred before the band broke up in 1946, Don Lammond replaced Tough at the drums, Shorty Rogers replaced Hefti and vibraphonist Red Norvo replaced Marjorie Hyams.
The Second Herd, despite pessimistic predictions, proved every bit as good. The sax section comprised Stan Getz, Zoot Sims, Herbie Steward and Serge Chaloff, three tenors and a baritone. Jimmy Giuffre scored the famous Four Brothers to spotlight the section, and the smooth, low, close - formation ensemble became a trademark: bebop out of Lester Young (The Best Of Woody Herman, CBS) . The Ralph Burns feature for Getz, Early Autumn, made the tenorist's cool lyricism famous overnight. Bebop began to show in the trumpet section with the arrival of Red Rodney, while Shorty Rogers wrote numbers like Keeper Of The Flame and Lollypop, the latter a follow - up to George Wallington's famous Lemon Drop (Early Autumn) . Again, airshots are worth a listen (Boiled In Earl) particularly as the recording ban kept the Second Herd out of the studios for a year.
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