Bill Holman

Stan Kenton: Salute!

by Jack Bowers
February 16, 2023

Stan Kenton, one of the most renowned and influential bandleaders of the twentieth century, died on August 25, 1979. Fortunately—for the sake of history in general and creative music in particular—Kenton's remarkable legacy lives on, and in a perceptive and open-minded world would endure forever. Even to this day, small but devoted groups of enthusiasts share a wish that some previously hidden array of his material might come to light, satisfiying for the moment their craving for more memorable music ...

Los Angeles Jazz Institute Festival "Big Band Spectacular" 2017, Part 4-4

by Simon Pilbrow
July 18, 2017

Los Angeles Jazz Institute Festival Big Band Spectacular LAX Westin Hotel Los Angeles, CA May 24-28, 2017 Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 Roger Neumann's Rather Large Band Roger Neumann has led this happy band for many decades. One current member, trumpeter Jack Coan, was also a foundation member in 1975. They play a repertoire of standards and classic jazz tunes, using the ...

Bill Holman

by Marcia Hillman
January 22, 2010

Bill Holman is a man with many milestones. Known primarily for years of unique and complex arrangements, Holman's continuing and long-running career as a composer and saxophonist reaches another milestone this month when he will be awarded the title of NEA Jazz Master. A California native, Holman took up clarinet in junior high school and tenor saxophone in high school where he was leading his own band. In the late '40s, after a stint in the US Navy and engineering ...

Bill Holman: Hommage & The Lost Bill Holman Charts

by Fred Bouchard
March 12, 2008

Bill Holman Hommage Jazzed Media 2007 Carl Saunders The Lost Bill Holman Charts MAMA Foundation 2007 Bill Holman's varied and florescent career as composer-arranger shines on in the vanguard of a pack of scribes for Stan Kenton, Maynard Ferguson, Gerry Mulligan and Woody Herman. Playing tenor through the '50s for Kenton, Charlie Barnet and Shorty Rogers, Holman quit horn for pen in the '60s and ...

Bill Holman Band: Hommage

by Jack Bowers
May 19, 2007

Sometimes it's a matter of perspective. Having attended the concert in May 2006 at which most of Bill Holman's latest album, Hommage, was recorded, I must acknowledge a modest level of disappointment. It didn't seem up to the maestro's usual standards, an opinion I later shared with Graham Carter, head of Jazzed Media Records.

Okay, so I got it wrong. It wasn't the first time, nor will it be the last. Perhaps I was tired and out of sorts that ...

Bill Holman Band: Live

by Jim Santella
July 5, 2005

Recorded at last year's four-day big band tribute to Maynard Ferguson in Los Angeles, this one-hour session comes straight from the hip. Bill Holman, who always communicates with his audience on several levels, introduces each piece and is sure to recognize each of his band's soloists. Make no mistake about it: they're some of the best in the business. It takes three important qualities to run a highly successful big band like Holman's: top-notch musical arrangements, top-of-the-line improvising soloists, and ...

The Bill Holman Band Live

by Jack Bowers
June 18, 2005

The Bill Holman Band Live Jazzed Media 2005

Big band album of the year? It's too early to say, but the first-ever live recording by the superlative Bill Holman Band has earned front-runner status for that honor and will surely be hard to trump. Holman, an acknowledged master in the realm of writing and arranging for large ensembles, already has one Grammy Award in the trophy case (for Brilliant Corners, his ingenious adaptation of ...

Bill Holman: Octets, 1950s

Source: JazzWax by Marc Myers
November 14, 2018

One of my favorite West Coast jazz arrangers is Bill Holman. His pen is absolutely gorgeous for ensembles of all sizes, from quintets to big bands. While listening to Richie Kamuca albums in 1956 and '57 yesterday, I was thunderstruck by an octet session Bill played on and arranged. Which made me think about how superb all of Bill's many octet sessions are—whether he's playing in one or or arranging. So I dipped into Tom Lord's Jazz Discography to count ...
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The Hidden Bill Holman

Source: JazzWax by Marc Myers
April 1, 2015

Yesterday I posted on three little known powerhouse albums with arrangements by Bill Holman (above). Today, I'm turning you on to a superb album from 2012 that Tom Lord's Jazz Discography wasn't aware featured Bill's work: The Pete Christlieb & Linda Small 11-Piece Band's Tall & Small: High on U (Bosco). Christlieb (above) is a West Coast saxophonist who has played and recorded with big bands and small groups since 1965, when he bean with Si Zentner. That's his tenor ...
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Arrangements by Bill Holman

Source: JazzWax by Marc Myers
March 31, 2015

As a kid, I spent way too much time in New York record stores like Sam Goody, King Karol, Footlight, Dayton and Record Mart running my fingers through their bins. In the days before computers, I was always on the prowl for covers of jazz albums I had missed with solid guys listed in the personnel on the back. I discovered dozens of artists and LPs this way. It was always about the hunt and the promise of coming across ...
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Bill Holman: 87 and Swinging

Source: Rifftides by Doug Ramsey
May 22, 2014

This is Bill Holman’s birthday. At 87, the great arranger shows no inclination to sit around basking in the glow of his achievements. He and his band are gearing up for a concert tomorrow night at the Los Angeles Jazz Institute’s Adventures In Big Band Jazz, a four-day celebration featuring music associated with 13 big bands. In the course of his career, Holman has written for at least half of them, including those of Woody Herman, Stan Kenton, Buddy Rich, ...
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NEA Jazz Master Bill Holman To Be Film Subject

Source: Kathryn King
April 16, 2014

Kathryn King Media has announced a Kickstarter campaign to fund the production of Charting Jazz: The Mastery of Bill Holman, a documentary about the National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Master. The film will shine a light on the extraordinary Mr. Holman, a tenor saxophonist, bandleader, arranger and composer long deeply respected and revered by his fellow musicians but not as well known to the general public as other accomplished musical innovators of his generation. The campaign was launched on ...
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Bill Holman: Jive for Five

Source: JazzWax by Marc Myers
March 24, 2014

Bill Holman in the 1950s was largely a West Coast big band saxophonist and arranger. Occasionally, he broke away and led small-group recording sessions. In May and June of 1958, Bill recorded with a quintet for Hollywood's Andex Records, a Keen subsidiary founded by John and Alex Siamas in 1957. John Siamas had made his money in the aerospace industry and started a series of short-lived labels as a business hobby. The labels didn't last long. The album was Jive ...
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The Bill Holman Film

Source: Rifftides by Doug Ramsey
March 7, 2014

The Bill Holman documentary that I helped with late last year is moving closer to reality. Its producer, Kathryn King, has launched a fund-raising drive to help her and her crew complete the filmon schedule. That is how many projects are accomplished these days when they don’t have the backing of big Hollywood investors. Few of them have that kind of support, especially when the ventures have to do with the arts. In November, I spent a few days in ...
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Bill Holman on Don Bagley

Source: JazzWax by Marc Myers
August 2, 2012

Don Bagley, a jazz bassist whose thick, meaty time-keeping became the heartbeat of leading West Coast big bands and ensembles of the 1950s and beyond, died July 26. He was 85. [Pictured above: Don Bagley with Julie London in Japan in May 1964] Bagley spent a good portion of the '50s and '60s in the rhythm section of Stan Kenton's most ferocious orchestras. Kenton's early admiration and appreciation of Bagley's role was evident in September 1952, when the bandleader singled ...
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Other Places: Bill Holman Lauded

Source: Rifftides by Doug Ramsey
February 15, 2011

On his Jazz Profiles website, Steve Cerra begins a tribute to Bill Holman with this passage:In Japan, a select few of those who maintain the country's artistic traditions or make a unique contribution to them are accorded the respect of the nation by being designated as a Living National Treasure [a considerable amount of schimolies also come with the title each year]. When it comes to composing and arranging for Jazz big bands, no one is more deserving of such ...
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Bill Holman: I Told You So

Source: JazzWax by Marc Myers
May 12, 2010

Bill Holman arranged only one album for the Count Basie band while Basie was alive. The little-known album is I Told You So, recorded in January 1976 for Pablo Records. What makes this Basie album exceptional is Bill's powerful musical intellect and explosive sense of swing.

Throughout Bill's career, Basie has been a recurring influence. Bill's decision in the late 1940s to become an arranger was influenced largely by the intoxicating appeal of the Basie band of that era. Then ...
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