Life and Impact of the Count

Life and Impact of The Count

Every genre of music has its defining artist who epitomizes every aspect of the music. When it came to the big band and swing jazz era, that man was the Count, whose simple and effortless approach to making music is exhibited by the title quote. William Basie was born on August 21, 1904 in Red Bank, New Jersey, where a local theater was dedicated to him soon after his passing in 1984. His parents, Harvey and Lilly, had another son, James, who died when William was still a young boy. For twenty-five cents per lesson, William took piano lessons on the piano that the family had always owned. After helping out with the movies and vaudeville shows at one of the local theaters, William secretly filled in for the house piano player during one show.

Basie’s first musical passion, however, was not the piano. He played the drums until he learned of a more talented young drummer who he did not want to compete with named Sonny Greer, who lived in a nearby town and would later go on to great success as would Basie. William and Sonny teamed up to win a music competition years later. After leaving high school in his junior year, Basie moved between Red Bank and Asbury Park, where he and several friends had pretty regular gigs. However, his time playing there ended when he moved to Harlem in 1924. It was there in New York that William saw great stride pianists such as James P. Johnson, Willie “The Lion” Smith, and Fats Waller, who was one of Basie’s most important musical influences and mentors. Soon after arriving in New York, Basie was already playing as an accompanying pianist for various vaudeville shows.

The Count found himself in Kansas City in 1927, accompanying silent films on the organ until he joined Walter Page’s Blue Devils. Although he spent less than two years with Page’s group, every member of the Blue Devils would eventually be featured in Basie’s big band. After playing with various local bands, Basie worked his way into one of the premier bands in Kansas City, the Bennie Moten Band, as a backup pianist and arranger. Moten is credited by Basie for bestowing the “Count” nickname upon him, and the two of them had a great respect for one another as pianists.

However, after problems within Moten’s band, the members voted to replace Moten with Basie as its leader. Upon Moten’s death in 1935, Basie and saxophonist Buster Smith brought together members of the Blue Devils and Moten’s band to form Count Basie’s Barons of Rhythm. Their legend expanded beyond Kansas City fortunately because of radio broadcasts from the Reno Club, where the band played for many years. These broadcasts brought him into contact with producer and journalist John Hammond, who paved the way for the creation of the Count Basie Orchestra and their signing to Decca Records in 1937.

Featuring a rhythm section of Walter Page, Jo Jones, and Freddie Green, Basie’s band was rounded out with such past and future stars such as Lester Young, Oran “Hot Lips” Page, and Jimmy Rushing. This original band recorded such hits as “Sent for You Yesterday,” “Jumpin at the Woodside,” “Taxi War Dance,” and “One O’ Clock Jump.” When searching for a replacement or a new member to add to his band’s sound, Basie seemed to have a knack for perfectly filling whatever gap he heard in his music. However, a combination of the American involvement in World War II and the popular decline of the big band in the 1940’s led to the dissolution of the Count Basie Orchestra. After several years of playing with a scaled down six- to nine-piece version of his original big band, the “New Testament” Basie Orchestra was founded. This new big band featured almost