Stan Getz

Stan Getz (born Stanley Gayetski; February 2, 1927 – June 6, 1991) was an American jazz saxophonist. Playing primarily the tenor saxophone, Getz was known as "The Sound" because of his warm, lyrical tone, with his prime influence being the wispy, mellow timbre of his idol, Lester Young. Coming to prominence in the late 1940s with Woody Herman's big band, Getz is described by critic Scott Yanow as "one of the all-time great tenor saxophonists". Getz performed in bebop and cool jazz groups. Influenced by João Gilberto and Antônio Carlos Jobim, he also helped popularize bossa nova in the United States with the hit 1964 single "The Girl from Ipanema".

Stan Getz was born Stanley Gayetski on February 2, 1927, at St. Vincent's Hospital in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Getz's father, Alexander ("Al"), was born in Mile End, London, in 1904; his mother, Goldie (née Yampolsky), was born in Philadelphia in 1907. His paternal grandparents Harris and Beckie Gayetski were originally from Kyiv, Ukraine, but had emigrated to escape the anti-Jewish pogroms to Whitechapel, in the East End of London. While in England, they owned the Harris Tailor Shop at 52 Oxford Street for more than 13 years. In 1914, Harris and Beckie emigrated to the United States with their three sons Al, Phil, and Ben, following several siblings that had recently emigrated there. Getz's original family name, Gayetski, was changed to Getz upon arrival in America.

The Getz family initially settled in Philadelphia but moved to New York City during the Great Depression, seeking better employment opportunities. Getz worked diligently in school, achieving straight A's and finishing sixth grade near the top of his class. His main passion was musical instruments. He began playing various instruments, starting with a harmonica he received at the age of twelve. When he turned thirteen, his father bought him his first saxophone, a $35 alto saxophone. He quickly progressed to playing all types of saxophones and the clarinet. Still, he developed a passion for the tenor saxophone and began practicing for eight hours a day while studying with Bill Shiner, a well-known saxophone teacher in the Bronx. According to Getz, he only had about six months of lessons and never studied music theory or harmony.

Getz attended James Monroe High School in the Bronx. In 1941, he was accepted into the All-City High School Orchestra of New York City, which provided him with the opportunity to receive private, free tutoring from Simon Kovar, a bassoon player with the New York Philharmonic. During this time, he also played the saxophone at dances and bar mitzvahs. He eventually dropped out of school to pursue his musical career but was later sent back to the classroom by truancy officers of the school system.

In 1943, at the age of 16, he joined Jack Teagarden's band and, because of his youth, he became Teagarden's ward. Getz also played along with Nat King Cole and Lionel Hampton. A period based in Los Angeles with Stan Kenton was brief. Following a comment from Kenton that Getz's main influence, Lester Young, was too simple, Getz quit.

After performing with Jimmy Dorsey and Benny Goodman, Getz was a soloist with Woody Herman from 1947 to 1949 in the Second Herd, and he first gained wide attention as one of the band's saxophonists, who were known collectively as "The Four Brothers"; the others being Serge Chaloff, Zoot Sims, and Herbie Steward. With Herman, he had a hit with "Early Autumn" in 1948.

After leaving the Second Herd, Getz was able to launch his solo career. In 1950, he was a guest soloist with Horace Silver's trio at the Club Sundown in Hartford, Connecticut. He subsequently hired them for touring gigs, gaining Silver his earliest national exposure. For an unknown period, he didn't pay Silver, instead using the money due to the pianist to buy heroin. Silver finally left in June 1952. In the same period, Getz performed with pianists Al Haig and Duke Jordan and drummers Roy Haynes and Max Roach, as well as bassist Tommy Potter, all of whom had worked with Charlie Parker. Guitarists Jimmy Raney and Johnny Smith were also associated with the saxophonist in this period. Getz enhanced his profile with his featured performance on Johnny Smith's version of the song "Moonlight in Vermont", recorded in 1952, which became a hit single and stayed on the charts for months. A DownBeat readers' poll voted the single as the second best jazz record of 1952. The later album Moonlight in Vermont, reconfigured from two 10-inch LPs (RLP-410 and RLP-413) for a 12-inch release (LP-2211), was issued in 1956. By 1956, Ben Selvin, bandleader and record producer known as the "Dean of Recorded Music", featured Getz's recordings on national radio networks as part of the RCA Thesaurus transcriptions library.

In 1952, Getz signed with Norman Granz for his labels Clef and Norgran Records, which would be consolidated into Verve Records by 1956. A December 1953 date with Dizzy Gillespie found Getz also in the company of Oscar Peterson, Herb Ellis, Ray Brown, and Max Roach for Diz and Getz, released in 1955. Other notable Getz albums issued by Granz during this time include West Coast Jazz in 1955 and The Steamer in 1957. Getz moved to Copenhagen in 1958. Here, he performed with pianist Jan Johansson and bassist Oscar Pettiford, among others, at the Club Montmartre.

Returning to the U.S. from Europe in 1961, Getz recorded the album Focus with arrangements by Eddie Sauter, who created a strings backing for the saxophonist. In a March 2021 article for the All About Jazz website, Chris May wrote of it as "one of the great masterpieces of mid-twentieth century jazz" and compared it to the work of Béla Bartók.

Getz became involved in introducing bossa nova music to the American audience teaming with guitarist Charlie Byrd, who had just returned from a U.S. State Department tour of Brazil. In 1962, they recorded the album Jazz Samba featuring their cover of Antonio Carlos Jobim's "Desafinado" which became a hit and won Getz the Grammy for Best Jazz Performance of 1963. It sold more than one million copies, and was awarded a gold record. His second bossa nova album, also recorded in 1962, was Big Band Bossa Nova with composer and arranger Gary McFarland. As a follow-up to Jazz Samba, Getz recorded the album Jazz Samba Encore!, with one of the originators of bossa nova, Brazilian guitarist Luiz Bonfá. It also sold more than a million copies by 1964, giving Getz his second gold disc.

He then recorded the album Getz/Gilberto in 1963 with João Gilberto, his wife Astrud, and Antônio Carlos Jobim. A single from the album, "The Girl from Ipanema" became a hit (1964) and won a Grammy Award. Getz/Gilberto won two Grammys (Best Album and Best Single). Getz and producer Creed Taylor claimed that the music's success was a result of their discovery of the talent of Astrud Gilberto, who had never recorded as a vocalist. She and Gilberto and later their son, Marcelo, disputed Getz and Taylor's version of the story, and alleged that Getz contrived it to deprive her of the royalties she was due.

A live album, Getz/Gilberto Vol. 2, followed, as did Getz Au Go Go (1964), a live recording at the Cafe au Go Go in New York City. While working with the Gilbertos, he recorded the jazz album Nobody Else But Me (1964), with a new quartet including vibraphonist Gary Burton, but Verve Records, wishing to continue building the Getz brand with bossa nova, refused to release it until 30 years later, after Getz had died.

In June 1970, he discovered the trio Eddy Louiss on Hammond organ, René Thomas on guitar, and Bernard Lubat on drums playing at the Apollo in Paris. He hired them and toured with this "European group" in Europe, North America, and South America. He recorded the remarkable live album Dynasty with them in March 1971, during a gig at Ronnie Scott's Jazz Club in London.

In 1972, Getz recorded the jazz fusion album Captain Marvel with Chick Corea, Stanley Clarke and Tony Williams, and in this period experimented with an Echoplex on his saxophone. He had a cameo in the film The Exterminator (1980).

In the mid-1980s, Getz worked regularly in the San Francisco Bay area and taught at Stanford University as an artist-in-residence at the Stanford Jazz Workshop until 1988. In 1986, he was inducted into the DownBeat Jazz Hall of Fame. During 1988, Getz worked with Huey Lewis and the News on their Small World album. He played the extended solo on part 2 of the title track, which became a minor hit single.

His tenor saxophone of choice was the Selmer Mark VI.

Getz married Beverly Byrne, a vocalist with the Gene Krupa band, on November 7, 1946, in Los Angeles; the couple had three children.

In 1954, Getz held up a Seattle drugstore to obtain narcotics for his heroin addiction. After his arrest he attempted suicide by overdose. He suffered from drug and alcohol dependency on and off for decades. In 1983, he began attending Alcoholics Anonymous meetings regularly.

Getz died of liver cancer on June 6, 1991. His ashes were poured from his saxophone case six miles off the coast of Marina del Rey, California.

Grammy Award for Best Jazz Performance, Soloist or Small Group (Instrumental) "Desafinado", 1962

Grammy Award for Record of the Year, "The Girl from Ipanema", 1964

Grammy Award for Album of the Year, Getz/Gilberto, Stan Getz and João Gilberto (Verve) 1964

Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Jazz Performance, Small Group or Soloist With Small Group, Getz/Gilberto, Stan Getz 1964

Grammy Award for Best Jazz Solo Performance, "I Remember You", 1991