Eugene Bertram Krupa

Background

Eugene Bertram Krupa was born on January 15, 1909 in Chicago, Illinois, United States. He was the son of Bartley Krupa, an alderman, and Ann Oslowska. His first instrument was the saxophone.

Education

Krupa dropped out of Immaculate Conception High School before graduating. In 1925, Krupa's mother persuaded him to attend St. Joseph's College, a preparatory seminary, in Rensselaer, Indiana.

In the early 1930's Krupa studied privately with Stanford Moeller, who taught him the full arm movements that gave Krupa's drumming a dramatic and flashy style, along with prodigious volume.

Career

Gene returned home and began playing, in his words, at "every joint and hole-in-the-wall around Chicago. " At this time important influences on his musical development were drummers Tubby Hall, Zutty Singleton, and Baby Dodds of New Orleans.

Krupa's first recording took place on December 9, 1927, for Okeh Records. The band was co-led by Red McKenzie and Eddie Condon. In April 1928 Krupa again recorded with McKenzie and Condon. These recordings announced a new development of jazz, called the "Chicago style, " and establish Krupa's reputation as a jazz drummer.

To further his career, Krupa went to New York City, the jazz capital. Work was hard to find, but he did record with Eddie Condon (1928), Red Nichols (1929, 1930, and 1931), Fats Waller (1929), and Hoagy Carmichael (1930). The Carmichael session included Bix Biederbecke, Tommy and Jimmy Dorsey, and Benny Goodman. As he had done on the South Side of Chicago, Krupa often went to Harlem to listen to African-American musicians, especially drummers Chick Webb and Cuba Austin.

In 1930 Krupa worked in orchestras for two of George Gershwin's musicals, Girl Crazy and Strike Up the Band.

From 1931 to 1934 Krupa worked with nonjazz big bands. But at the urging of John Hammond, at the end of 1934 he joined the newly formed swing band of Benny Goodman. At first audience reaction was negative, but the band began a rapid rise to success, beginning with a job at the Palomar in Los Angeles in the summer of 1935. Playing with Goodman's big band, quartet, and trio, the young, handsome, and musically uninhibited Krupa became a pop music star. Not only a fine musician, Krupa was also a consummate showman: when he played he exuded excitement, with a full range of facial expressions, hair falling in his face, and arms wildly flailing away at the drums. The zenith of Krupa's stay with Goodman was reached on January 16, 1938, at a concert at New York's Carnegie Hall, where the audience went wild over Krupa's thundering playing on "Sing, Sing, Sing. " But problems soon surfaced between Krupa and Goodman. Musically, Krupa played too heavily on many of the arrangements, and more important, Krupa had become more popular with audiences than Goodman. In March 1938 Krupa left to form his own band. Soon "Gene Krupa and His Orchestra" rivaled the popularity of the Goodman band, particularly when vocalist Anita O'Day and trumpeter Roy Eldridge joined the band in 1941. Important recordings from this period are Drummin' Man (1938), Drum Boogie (1941), and Let Me Off Uptown (1941). Krupa also appeared in several movies, including Some Like It Hot, with Bob Hope (1939), and Ball of Fire (1941).

In 1942, he was arrested by federal narcotics agents who found a small amount of marijuana, supposedly owned by Krupa, in the possession of Krupa's seventeen-year-old valet. On May 18, 1943, Krupa was found guilty of the misdemeanor of possession and sentenced to ninety days' imprisonment. On a second charge of contributing to the delinquency of a minor by inducing him to transport an illegal substance, Krupa was sentenced to San Quentin for one to six years. On August 9, 1943, he was released pending an appeal. Krupa believed his career was over, but Benny Goodman convinced him to join his band for a USO tour of army camps in the fall of 1943. All went well, but Krupa was still frightened about how the public would react. Without any publicity he joined Tommy Dorsey for an engagement at the Paramount Theatre in New York City. The audience gave Krupa a standing ovation. Continuing to play, Krupa stood and bowed, then burst into tears. He remained with Dorsey until he was found not guilty of contributing to the delinquency of a minor. On June 11, 1944, he left to form his own band. Krupa's new big band reflected the changing developments in jazz, including the hiring of such modernists as Gerry Mulligan. But by 1951 it was economically too difficult to maintain. Krupa began leading trios and quartets, a format he would continue for the next two decades. Also, between 1951 and 1953 he appeared in Norman Granz's world-touring concert series, Jazz at the Philharmonic. In 1954, along with Cozy Cole, he founded a school for drummers in New York City. He appeared in the films The Glenn Miller Story (1954) and The Benny Goodman Story (1955). The Gene Krupa Story (1959) is historically inaccurate, but does feature Krupa's drumming on the soundtrack.

Krupa occasionally appeared with a reformed Benny Goodman Quartet in the 1960's. Krupa's last recording date in April 1972 was with the person responsible for his first one, Eddie Condon. The session was released by Chiaroscuro Records as Jazz at the New School. Krupa's last public appearance was with the Benny Goodman Quartet on August 18, 1973.

Achievements

• Krupa was the best-paid drummer in the world, making $25, 000 per year. Krupa was the first jazz drummer to function as a major soloist. Before him, drummers provided a rhythmic foundation for the music and seldom took extended solos.

Works

More photos

• book

  • Gene Krupa: The Pictorial Life of a Jazz Legend, Book & CD

    (Gene Krupa: The Pictorial Life of a Jazz Legend is a phot...)

  • Gene Krupa Drum Method

    (This method features transcriptions from the video Gene K...)

Connections

In June 1933 Krupa married Ethel Fawcett, telephone operator of his hotel. In 1941, Krupa divorced his wife. In the latter part of 1946 Krupa married Ethel again, this time in Mexico. She had been very supportive of him in adversity: while visiting him in prison she had offered to return the hundred thousand dollars he had given her when they were divorced. They had no children. He married Patricia Bowler in 1959; they adopted two children. This marriage ended in divorce in 1968.

Father:

Bartley Krupa

alderman

Mother:

Ann Oslowska

Spouse:

Ethel Fawcett

telephone operator

Spouse:

Patricia Bowler

References

• What Would Gene Krupa Do?: Gene Krupa Designer Notebook
• Gene Krupa and his Orchestra Volume One 1935-1946
• Gene Krupa: His Life and Times
• World of Gene Krupa: That Legendary Drummin' Man