Norman Granz
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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Norman Granz (Los Angeles, USA, August 6, 1918 - Geneva, Switzerland, November 22, 2001) was an American jazz music impresario and producer. Born in Los Angeles, son of Jewish immigrants from Tiraspol, Granz was a fundamental figure in American jazz, especially from about 1947 to 1960. He was the founder of five record labels: Clef, Norgran, Down Home, Verve and Pablo.
Life and career
He first emerged into the public view with a memorable concert in Los Angeles' Philharmonic Auditorium on july 2, 1944, under the heading of "Jazz at the Philharmonic" or JATP (1944 - 1983), from which he produced perhaps the first live Jam session recordings to be distributed to a wide market; until then this kind of music was generally considered to be either an avant-garde style or, less charitably, a cacophony. The title of the concert had been shortened by the printer of the advertising supplements from "Jazz at the Philharmonic Auditorium", to "Jazz at the Philharmonic"; Norman Granz organised the concert with about $200 of borrowed money. The group which performed at that concert featured Nat King Cole, Illinois Jacquet, Jack McVea, J.J. Johnson, Shorty Sherock, Johnny Miller, Red Callender, Lee Young, Les Paul a.o. After several similar concerts in Los Angeles, Granz began producing annual JATP tours, in USA and Canada, in 1945. Granz recorded many of the JATP concerts, and sold/leased (from 1945 to 1947) the recordings to Asch/Disc/Stinson Records (record producer Moses Asch's labels).
Norman Granz signed an agreement with Mercury Records in 1948, for the promotion and the distribution of the JATP recordings and other recordings, this agreement expired in 1953. From 1953, he issued the JATP recordings and other recordings on Clef Records (founded 1946) and Norgran Records (founded 1953). Down Home Records was meant to be reserved for traditional jazz works. JATP ceased touring the United States in 1957, but continued intermittently (mainly in Europe and Japan) until 1983 (very last JATP concerts: Tokyo, Japan, fall, 1983).
Many of the names that made history in jazz signed with one of his labels, including Cannonball Adderley, Louis Armstrong, Count Basie, Louie Bellson, Ray Brown, Benny Carter, Buck Clayton, Paulinho Da Costa, Buddy DeFranco, Roy Eldridge, Duke Ellington, Herb Ellis, Tal Farlow, Stan Getz, Dizzy Gillespie, Lionel Hampton, Bill Harris, Coleman Hawkins, Johnny Hodges, Billie Holiday, Milt Jackson, Illinois Jacquet, Hank Jones, Barney Kessel, Gene Krupa, Howard McGhee, Thelonious Monk, Bill Evans, Gerry Mulligan, Anita O'Day, Charlie Parker, Joe Pass, Oscar Peterson, Flip Phillips, Bud Powell, Buddy Rich, Charlie Shavers, Sonny Stitt, Art Tatum, Ben Webster and Lester Young.
It was in 1956 that Ella Fitzgerald finally joined Norman Granz's "community", and Granz unified his activities under the common label of Verve Records. Granz became Fitzgerald's manager, and remained so until the end of her career. Fitzgerald's memorable series of eight "Songbooks", together with the duet series (notably Armstrong-Peterson, Fitzgerald-Basie, Fitzgerald-Pass and Getz-Peterson) achieved a wide popularity and brought acclaim to the label and to the artists.
In December 1960, Verve Records was sold to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and Granz retired to Switzerland, where he founded his last label (Pablo Records) in 1973.
Norman Granz died of cancer in 2001.
Anti-racism
Norman Granz is generally remembered also for his notable anti-racist position and for the battles he consequently fought for his artists (many of whom were black, perhaps the majority), in times and places where skin color was the cause of open discrimination. In 1955, in Houston, Texas, he personally removed the labels "White" and "Negro" that would have separated the audience in the auditorium where two concerts were to be performed by (among others) Ella Fitzgerald and Dizzy Gillespie; between the two shows they were found playing cards in the dressing room and arrested by local police, but after some nervous negotiations allowed to perform the second show, and only formally released after that. Oscar Peterson recounted how Granz once continued to insist that white cabdrivers take his black artists as customers even while a policeman was pointing a loaded pistol at his stomach from close range (Granz won). Granz also was among the first to pay white and black artists the same salary and to give them equal treatment even in minor details, like dressing rooms. Template:Facts
Beloved by his artists (in part because he paid more than average), he had three main goals, as he repeatedly and frankly declared: to fight against racism, to give listeners a good product, and to earn money from good music.
See also
