Harry Haag James was born on March 15, 1916, and died on July 5, 1983. He was an American musician best known for leading a big band as a trumpet player. His band achieved great commercial success from 1939 to 1946. In 1947, he temporarily ended his band. However, he quickly reorganized it and continued leading the band until his death in 1983. Musicians admired his skill and the quality of his trumpet sound. He influenced many new trumpet players from the late 1930s through the 1940s. He also acted in several films, which often included his band performing.

Early life

James was born in Albany, Georgia, United States, to Everett Robert James, a bandleader in a traveling circus called the Mighty Haag Circus, and Myrtle Maybelle (Stewart), an acrobat and horseback rider. He began performing with the circus at a young age, first as a contortionist at four years old, and later as a snare drummer in the band starting around six years old. At six years old, James was nearly trampled by trick horses during a performance when he wandered onto the circus track. His mother’s pet horse protected him by standing over him until the other horses passed.

At eight years old, James began taking trumpet lessons from his father. By twelve, he was leading the second band in the Christy Brothers Circus, where his family was working. His father required him to follow a strict daily practice schedule. During each session, James was given several pages from Arban’s book to learn and was not allowed to engage in other activities until he mastered them. In 1924, his family moved to Beaumont, Texas. In the early 1930s, when James was fifteen, he began playing in local dance bands. While still a student at Dick Dowling Junior High School, he regularly participated in Beaumont High School’s Royal Purple Band. In May 1931, he won first place as a trumpet soloist at the Texas Band Teacher’s Association’s Annual Eastern Division contest in Temple, Texas.

Career

James's first job was playing at the Peabody Hotel in Memphis. He often performed with Herman Waldman's band and was noticed by popular musician Ben Pollack during a show. In 1935, James joined Pollack's band but left in 1937 to join Benny Goodman's orchestra, where he stayed until 1938. He earned the nickname "The Hawk" early in his career because he could read music quickly. A common joke was that if a fly landed on his sheet music, Harry James could still play it perfectly. His lower notes had a warm sound similar to a cornet or flugelhorn, but recordings often focused on his bright, high notes.

With help from Benny Goodman, James started his own big band in Philadelphia in January 1939. The band did not become successful until 1941, when a string section was added. Known as Harry James and His Music Makers, the band created the hit song "You Made Me Love You," which reached number 5 on Billboard's National Best Selling Retail Records chart for the week ending November 18, 1941. The song stayed on the chart for 18 weeks and spent ten non-consecutive weeks in the Top Ten from early November 1941 until late January 1942. James and his band appeared in four Hollywood films: Private Buckaroo and Springtime in the Rockies (both 1942), Two Girls and a Sailor (1944), and Best Foot Forward (1943). He continued touring with the band into the 1980s, and as of July 2018, the Harry James Orchestra, led by Fred Radke, was still active.

James's band was the first well-known orchestra to include vocalist Frank Sinatra, who signed a one-year contract with the band in 1939 for $75 a week ($1,589 a week in 2022). James wanted to rename Sinatra "Frankie Satin," but Sinatra refused. Sinatra left the band after seven months to join Tommy Dorsey's group. The band's main female vocalist was Helen Forrest, and later members included drummer Buddy Rich, bassist Thurman Teague, saxophonist Johnny MacAfee, and young saxophonist Corky Corcoran.

James's orchestra took over a program sponsored by Chesterfield Cigarettes in 1942 after Glenn Miller's band disbanded for military service. In 1945, James's band replaced Danny Kaye's program on CBS. He also led the orchestra for Call for Music, which aired on CBS from February 13, 1948, to April 16, 1948, and on NBC from April 20, 1948, to June 29, 1948.

James recorded many popular songs and appeared in several Hollywood films. He was in the 1942 musical short Trumpet Serenade and played trumpet in the 1950 film Young Man with a Horn, dubbing actor Kirk Douglas. The movie's album reached number 1, with James supporting singer and actress Doris Day. His recording of "I'm Beginning to See the Light" appears in the movie My Dog Skip (2000). His music is also in the Woody Allen film Hannah and Her Sisters. James's version of "It's Been a Long, Long Time" is featured in Captain America: The Winter Soldier and Marvel's Avengers: Endgame.

Musical style and reception

James grew up as a musician in a traveling circus. This experience helped him develop a showy style that used techniques like heavy vibrato, half valve and lip glissandi, valve and lip trills, and valve tremolos. These techniques were popular during the "hot" jazz era, which was led by James's idol, Louis Armstrong. However, by the 1950s, these techniques became less popular with the rise of "cool" jazz. James practiced intensely as a child, which gave him strong skills in classical techniques like range, fingering, and tonguing. Growing up in the South, James also learned about blues music, which influenced his playing style. James once said, "I was brought up in Texas with the blues – when I was eleven or twelve years old down in what they call 'barbecue row,' I used to sit in with the guys that had the broken bottlenecks on their guitars, playing the blues; that's all we knew." After performing with Benny Goodman's band, Armstrong told his friend Lionel Hampton, "That white boy – he plays like a jig!"

When James left Benny Goodman's band in 1939 to start his own group, he learned that leading a successful band required more skills than just being a talented musician. His band faced financial problems, and it became hard to pay musicians and keep the group together. In 1940, James lost his contract with Columbia Records (he returned in 1941), and Frank Sinatra left the band that January. James then decided to change his style to a "sweeter" sound by adding strings to the band and focusing on pop music. This change helped his band achieve commercial success, and a 1945 U.S. Treasury report listed Harry James and Betty Grable as the highest-paid couple in the nation.

While James remained successful and dedicated to his music, some critics criticized his work. In a 1999 biography, Dan Morgenstern, a respected jazz critic, noted that the 1941 recording of "You Made Me Love You" was a song that jazz critics never forgave James for recording. During the 1940s, James's playing style on pop hits was often called "schmaltzy" and dismissed by critics. However, radio recordings from this time show that James continued to value jazz. His jazz recordings during this period included arrangements by musicians like Neal Hefti and Frank Devenport. As bop became more popular than swing by the late 1940s, James was open to its influence.

By the mid-1950s, James reevaluated his career. Inspired by Count Basie's successful comeback with his "16 Men Swinging" band, James wanted to create a band with a similar style. In 1955, he signed with Capitol Records and released new versions of his earlier songs. He also recorded ten new tracks for an album called Wild About Harry!, which marked the start of a series of Capitol and later MGM releases featuring arrangements by Basie-style musicians like Ernie Wilkins.

Although James did not fully regain the approval of jazz critics during his lifetime, modern opinions of his work have improved. Recent reissues of his music, such as Capitol's 2012 The Capitol Vaults Jazz Series: Gene Krupa and Harry James, have led to more positive reviews. In 2014, Marc Myers of JazzWax wrote that James's band in the mid-1940s was more modern than many major groups and that his 1949 band was among the best of the year. Myers also noted that James's recordings from 1958 to 1961 were consistently high quality, even compared to bands led by musicians like Basie, Maynard Ferguson, and Stan Kenton.

James cared deeply about the music he played and recorded. In 1972, during an interview in London, he told the jazz critic Steve Voce that his music was not just for commercial purposes. James said, "If you're playing for a jazz audience, I'm pretty sure that some of the jazz things we do would be a lot more popular than 'Sleepy Lagoon,' and if we're playing at a country club or playing Vegas, in which we have many, many types of people, then I'm sure that 'Sleepy Lagoon' would be more popular at that particular time. But I really get bugged about these people talking about commercial tunes, because to me, if you're gonna be commercial, you're gonna stand on your head and make funny noises and do idiotic things. I don't think we've ever recorded or played one tune that I didn't particularly love to play. Otherwise, I wouldn't play it."

Personal life

James was married three times. His first wife was singer Louise Tobin, and they married on May 4, 1935. They had two sons, Harry Jeffrey James and Timothy Ray James. They divorced in 1943. Later that same year, he married actress Betty Grable. They had two daughters, Victoria Elizabeth and Jessica, and divorced in 1965. In December 1967, James married Las Vegas showgirl Joan Boyd. They had a son named Michael and divorced in 1970.

James owned several Thoroughbred racehorses that won races, including the California Breeders' Champion Stakes in 1951 and the San Vicente Stakes in 1954. He was also one of the first people to invest in the Atlantic City Race Course. His understanding of horse racing was shown during a 1958 appearance on The Lucy–Desi Comedy Hour episode titled "Lucy Wins A Racehorse."

Death

James smoked a lot, drank alcohol, and gambled. In 1983, he was diagnosed with lymphatic cancer but kept working. He performed his final professional job with the Harry James Orchestra on June 26, 1983, in Los Angeles. He died nine days later in Las Vegas, Nevada, on July 5, 1983, at age 67. Frank Sinatra gave the eulogy at his funeral, which was held in Las Vegas.

Discography

Harry James has created a large collection of music. This includes 30 studio albums, 47 shorter albums called EPs, three albums from movies or plays, and many live recordings and collections of songs from different times. He also played with other musicians as a supporting artist. During his career, he released more than 200 songs. Nine of these songs reached the top of the charts, 32 were in the top ten, and 70 were in the top 100 on the U.S. pop charts. Seven of his songs also appeared on the U.S. R&B charts.

Awards

As of 2016, two recordings by Harry James had been added to the Grammy Hall of Fame. This special award was created in 1973 to recognize recordings that are at least 25 years old and have "important quality or historical value."

Metronome magazine held yearly polls where readers voted for the top jazz musician on each instrument. Winners were invited to join a group called the Metronome All-Stars, which performed studio recordings. These sessions took place between 1939–1942, 1946–1953, and 1956. Each session usually produced two tracks, giving each musician a chance to play a solo lasting one chorus. Harry James was selected to play trumpet with the Metronome All-Stars in 1939, 1940, and 1941.

A similar yearly poll by Downbeat magazine named James the best trumpet player in 1937, 1938, and 1939, and the favorite soloist in 1942.

For his work in the motion picture industry, James received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6683 Hollywood Boulevard on February 8, 1960.

He was added to the Big Band and Jazz Hall of Fame in 1983.

Writings

• Harry James Studies and Improvisations for Trumpet, written by Harry James and edited by Elmer F. Gottschalk, published in New York by Robbins Music in 1939
• Harry James Trumpet Method, written by Harry James and Everette James and edited by Jay Arnold, published in New York by Robbins Music in 1941