The Legendary Count Basie Orchestra will take the stage at 7 p.m. Wednesday (Oct. 15, 2014) at the Miller Performing Arts Center in Jefferson City.
That evening, ticket sales will start at 6 p.m. and the doors will open at 6:30 p.m. Season tickets to the Jefferson City Concert Association's concert series are still available, President Don Otto said.
Tickets can be purchased by visiting www.thejcca.org or at the door. Credit cards are now accepted.
Who is this legend?
In the history of jazz music, only one bandleader holds the distinction of having his orchestra perform sold-out concerts all over the world, despite having passed away 30 years ago.
Pianist and bandleader William James "Count" Basie was, and still is, a titan of American jazz who shared the stage with many of our country's greatest musicians and singers - people such as Duke Ellington, Billie Holliday and Frank Sinatra.
To help you better enjoy this week's concert, here are 10 things you may want to know about the man who played with some of America's greatest musicians:
- Basie's mother was a laundress who took in all the washing and ironing for several well-to-do families. Recalling memories of his mother, Basie - who was born in 1904 in Red Bank, New Jersey - said: "I used to promise her when I grew up she would never have to do that kind of work anymore, because I was going to take care of her ... and be somebody that she would be proud of." She would reply, "I'm already proud of you, Billy."
- In the 1920s, Basie worked as a piano player on the TOBA circuit - an entertainment-business network of independent venues officially known as the Theater Owners Booking Association, but often called Tough on Black Asses - in a vaudeville show billed as Gonzelle White and the Big Jazz Jamboree.
- One of Basie's early gigs in Kansas City was playing the organ during silent movies at the Eblon Theater, 1822 Vine St. He got the job by barging in and playing the organ without permission.
- Basie was slightly hung over the morning he heard the "big band" sound for the first time. The Oklahoma City Blue Devils were playing in the street below his room. The experience was a turning point in his career and he later called it "the greatest thing I had ever heard in my life."
- In the mid-1930s men in the Count Basie Orchestra earned $18 a week, working all seven nights from 9 p.m. to 6 a.m.
- Walter Page - leader of the Oklahoma City Blue Devils and later a bassist with the Count Basie Orchestra - was a Lincoln University alumnus.
- Basie's band has survived in one form or another for 78 years, despite the fact he died in 1984.
- His band was the first to play for Queen Elizabeth II in the Royal Variety Show at the London Palladium in the mid-1950s. The band proved to be the most popular act of the evening and became a "royal sensation" overnight. It was fitting occasion for a man always called "Count."
- People would ask how much he practiced piano at home, but the answer was always: "None." For Basie, making the music was always a matter of collaborating with other musicians.
- When an opportunity finally presented itself to meet his future wife, Catherine Morgan, he offered to buy a round of drinks for the whole group. She only allowed him to purchase a soft drink, teasing him: "Oh, the last of the big spenders, huh?" and telling him that others had warned her about him. Later that evening he walked her out to a car. The couple had their pinkie fingers entwined. It was then that he vowed to marry her one day.
Information for this article was gleaned from the book, "Good Morning Blues: The Autobiography of Count Basie," as told to Albert Murray.