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Donald's Encyclopedia of Popular MusicA B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y ZSMITH, Stuff(b Leroy Gordon Smith, 13 August 1909, Portsmouth OH; d 25 September 1967, Munich, Germany) Violinist, composer, leader, vocalist. One of the few jazz violinists and the most influential, he played it in an unorthodox manner, having learned how best to make it swing; Fritz Kreisler was a fan. He worked with Alphonso Trent in Dallas; to Buffalo with Trent and formed own group there c.'30; took a sextet to the Onyx Club late '35 and began to play amplified violin; the group's forté was comedy and singing as well as good music (as Trent's was); Stuff was an irrepressible entertainer. They recorded his speciality 'I'se A Muggin'' on two Vocalion sides '36 and 15 more sides with Jonah Jones on trumpet, most with Cozy Cole on drums, including 'You'se A Viper', with a Jones vocal. Five more sides on Decca '37 were also by 'Stuff Smith And His Onyx Club Boys' adding Buster Bailey, with the underrated Clyde Hart on piano (b 1910, Baltimore MD; d 19 March 1945, NYC), eight more on Varsity '39-40 by 'Stuff Smith And His Orchestra'. He continued leading small groups through the '50s, touring Europe '57. He recorded with Nat Cole on Capitol, Dizzy Gillespie on Savoy and Verve, Ella Fitzgerald on Verve; co-starred on Violins No End with Stéphane Grappelli and the Oscar Peterson Quartet on Verve, Violin Summit on MPS with Grappelli, Svend Asmussen and Jean-Luc Ponty. His own albums were Black Violin on MPS; Desert Sands (with Peterson's trio), Have Violin, Will Swing and Stuff Smith on Verve; Swingin' and Stuff on EmArcy. CDs on Storyville are Hot Violins with Asmussen, Live At Montmartre 1965 and Swingin' Stuff; on Progressive a '43 trio with Jimmy Jones and John Levy (World Transcriptions produced by Milt Gabler). Pianist Billy Taylor told Cadence in 1995:
The AB Fable label in England (go here) has issued previously unreleased material from the 1940s by jazz violinists Smith, Ray Nance and many others (the Nance item includes Ben Webster playing fascinating clarinet, and another item is called Odds And Svends.) There is a good long interview with Stuff in Stanley Dance's The World Of Swing. In writing Stuff's biography Desert Sands/Up Jumped the Devil '95, AB Fable's Anthony Barnett discovered a birth certificate: Stuff celebrated his birthday on the 14th but the certificate says 13th. He was sometimes called Hezekiah or 'Hez' but this was not a given name; it is said that 'Stuff' may have come from his habit of calling other people that if he could not remember their names. |