HERMAN, WOODY

born May 16, 1913, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, U.S. died October 29, 1987, Los Angeles, California byname of Woodrow Charles Herman American jazz clarinetist, saxophonist, vocalist, and bandleader who was best known as the front man for a succession of bands he dubbed "Herds." Herman was a child prodigy who sang and danced in vaudeville at six years of age. Soon after he began playing the saxophone and later the clarinet. Billed as the Boy Wonder of the Clarinet, he cut his first record, "The Sentimental Gentleman from Georgia," at age 16. After studying music at Marquette University in Milwaukee for a term, Herman became a touring musician, joining the Tom Gerun band in 1930. In 1934 he became part of Isham Jones Juniors, and when it disbanded in 1936, Herman used its most talented sidemen to form his own ensemble, which he publicized as the "Band That Plays the Blues." The group was propelled to stardom in 1939 with the success of "Woodchopper's Ball"; more than one million copies of the song were sold, and it became Herman's theme. During the 1940s Herman's band took on bass player Chubby Jackson, arrangers Neal Hefti and Ralph Burns, tenor saxophonist Flip Phillips, and trombonist Bill Harris. The band, then known as the Thundering Herd, was noted for its exuberance and technical brilliance. It had its own radio show, appeared in motion pictures, and in 1946 performed Ebony Concerto, a piece written specifically for it by Igor Stravinsky, at Carnegie Hall. With the demise of most of the big bands, Herman disbanded the original Herd in 1946 but some six months later formed his second Herd, featuring Stan Getz and Zoot Sims. The band pioneered the combination of three tenor saxophones and one baritone saxophone and became identified with the "Four Brothers sound" (for the song "Four Brothers" that popularized it); this sound was retained by the Herman big bands into the 1950s. After the second Herd disbanded in 1949, Herman continued to form and lead ensembles, many of which incorporated "Herd" in their titles. During the 1960s and '70s, Herman became stylistically more eclectic, using material by artists as diverse as Charles Mingus and the Beatles. He toured almost continuously throughout the 1970s and '80s and in 1986 released Woody Herman and His Big Band 50th Anniversary Tour. An autobiography, The Woodchopper's Ball (cowritten with Stuart Troup), was published posthumously in 1990.