Harry James

Harry James was born in Albany, Georgia on on March 15th 1916, the son of a bandleader of a traveling circus. By age 10 he was taking trumpet lessons from his father. His father had him on a very strict practicing schedule every day. He was given one page to learn out of the Arban's book every day and could not do anything until he learned that page.In 1931 the family settled in Beaumont, Texas and James began playing with local dance bands. James joined the nationally popular Ben Pollack band in 1935. At the start of 1937 he left Pollack to join Benny Goodman's orchestra, where he stayed through 1938.In February of 1939 Harry James debuted his own big band in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He continued touring with the band into the 1980s. His was the first "name band" to employ vocalist Frank Sinatra, in 1939. In 1943 he married actress Betty Grable... lucky stiff!Harry James was an amazing trumpet player, he had a style unlike any other trumpeter of the period and even today. I am doing this page as a tribute to the great Harry James who recorded such amazing songs as Trumpet Blues, 9:20 Special, Sleepy Lagoon, You Made Me Love You, Skylark and the song that made Frank Sinatra famous... All Or Nothing At All.So, as I build this site, I hope you Big Band fans will enjoy the music here on this page as you will find out, it is hard to find such famous recordings of his music here on Myspace.I edited my profile with Thomas' Myspace Editor V4.4