Jimmy Forrest(1920-1980)
- Soundtrack
Afro-American jazz musician and composer. A hard-driving,
modern-intoned tenor saxophonist, he began with the Jeter-Pillars
Orchestra and then worked during the mid- and late
1930's with Fate Marable and Dewey Jackson in the St. Louis area. In 1940, he joined Jay McShann
in Kansas City, playing in the same section of the band as
Charlie Parker. After a spell
with Andy Kirk in New York, 1943-47,
he returned to St. Louis, leading his own small combo. Forrest had a
massive hit with the all-time jazz standard "Night Train", which,
however, owed much to a composition by
Duke Ellington, "Happy-Go- Lucky Local".
He was part of Ellington's organisation for one year, from 1949 to
1950. During the next three decades, Forrest became a prolific
free-lance recording artist, who often combined elements of bebop and
R&B with mainstream jazz. After leading several groups of his own, he
worked with Count Basie and the
Clarke-Boland Big Band in the 1970's.
