Background
Sid Catlett was born on January 17, 1910 in Evansville, Indiana, United States.
(TRACKS: 1-12 ARE EDDIE HEYWOOD: 13-16 ARE EDMOND HALL SEX...)
TRACKS: 1-12 ARE EDDIE HEYWOOD: 13-16 ARE EDMOND HALL SEXTET 1. BEGIN THE BEGUINE 2. I COVER THE WATERFRONT 3. 'T AIN'T ME 4. (BACK HOME AGAIN IN) INDIANA 5. BLUE LOU 6. CARRY ME BACK TO OLD VIRGINNY 7. I CAN'T BELIEVE THAT YOU'RE IN LOVE WITH ME 8. LOVE ME OR LEAVE ME 9. SAVE YOUR SORROW 10. JUST YOU, JUST ME 11. 'DEED I DO 12. LOVER MAN 13. THE MAN I LOVE 14. DOWNTOWN CAFE BOOGIE 15. UPTOWN CAFE BLUES 16. COQUETTE
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Sid Catlett was born on January 17, 1910 in Evansville, Indiana, United States.
He received rudimentary training in playing the piano and played in the school band before his family moved to Chicago, where he continued his education at Tilden High School. He was taught to play the drums by Joe Russek before playing in a group led by clarinetist Darnell Howard.
In 1929 he joined Sammy Stewart's band for a theatrical engagement in Chicago, and thereafter went on tour with the group, having given his mother a promise to return every Christmas. Reaching New York in the spring of 1930, Catlett was hired by Elmer Snowden, whose band contained many famous jazz musicians; he remained with Snowden until 1932, when he began to work for another talented bandleader, Benny Carter. He next worked in a band led by his friend, the cornetist Rex Stewart, during a thirteen-month engagement at the Empire Ballroom on Broadway. By this time Catlett had earned a reputation in his profession, and he was much in demand for recording sessions and by other leaders. He worked for Sam Wooding and McKinney's Cotton Pickers before moving back to Chicago, where he led his own group for a short time. In 1935 he was with the well-known Jeters-Pillars band in St. Louis, and the following year found him with Fletcher Henderson; after that, he was with Don Redman until 1938, when he joined Louis Armstrong's band for a period of more than two years. Following short engagements with Roy Eldridge and Benny Goodman, he returned to Armstrong for several months before joining Teddy Wilson in 1942. He freelanced during World War II, often leading his own groups in New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles, but in 1947 he again went back to Louis Armstrong, who had reverted from a big band to a small group, similar to those that he, Armstrong, had been accustomed to in his early years. Possibly as a result of extensive touring, Catlett's health began to deteriorate, and he took a regular job in a Chicago club called Jazz Ltd. , where he worked with such celebrated musicians as Francis "Muggsy" Spanier and Sidney Bechet. After brief engagements in New York, where he fell ill with pneumonia in 1951, he returned to Jazz Ltd. While talking to bassist Leroy "Slam" Stewart backstage during an Easter jazz concert at the Chicago Opera House, he suffered a fatal heart attack. Catlett gained the nickname of "Big Sid" early in his career. Although he was technically among the most gifted of jazz drummers, Catlett was not an exhibitionist. In fact, he was a reluctant soloist, having been brought up in an era when the drummer's chief function was to accompany the other soloists and to support the ensemble. Catlett's unselfishness in this respect was one of the reasons why he was so popular within the profession. William "Dicky" Wells, a trombonist who worked with him in the Elmer Snowden and Benny Carter bands, described him as "a musician's drummer, " one who would ask the soloist what kind of rhythm pattern he wanted and consistently maintain it night after night unless asked to change it.
He was, indeed, an extremely flexible drummer, one of the few who were able to make the transition from swing to the "bop" idiom of the 1940's. Whether playing in a big or small band, Catlett's buoyant beat was always delivered with remarkably clean definition, while his highly sensitive attention to dynamics was generally recognized as exemplary. The predecessors who probably influenced him most were Arthur "Zutty" Singleton and William "Chick" Webb, his press rolls suggesting the former and his cymbal work the latter. Yet there were many innovative elements in his style, most notably in the variety of his accents on the bass drums, previously used primarily for the heavy time-keeping dictated by the needs of dancers in big ballrooms before amplication. Catlett was further likened to the piano virtuoso Art Tatum.
(TRACKS: 1-12 ARE EDDIE HEYWOOD: 13-16 ARE EDMOND HALL SEX...)
Quotes from others about the person
He was a happy, fun-loving man, whom Whitney Balliett described: "Well over six feet tall, with enormous shoulders and slender fingers the length of dinner knives, Catlett sat at his drums with Prussian erectness, his trunk motionless and his arms (weighed by hands that made drumsticks look like matches) moving so fast that they seemed to be lazily spinning in slow motion. "
"He was a lovable guy. All he had to say was, 'Let's go jam, ' and he had a mob following him. Everyone loved him for the way he would push you. "
"Catlett's ability to catch the dancers' steps and emphasize every tap just as they performed them, " wrote Rex Stewart, "made him the favorite of all the chorus girls. "
