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I (Jerry Tyree) was born in Indiana in 1934.  My mother had a master’s degree in music so music was always in my life.  “I would listen to the old remote radio broadcasts late at night when I was 9 years old and hear “…from New York, this is Harry James”, “…from Chicago, this is Harry James”, “…from Los Angeles, this is Harry James”.  That sounded great to me and I told my mother I wanted a trumpet.  Her response was “I did not know that you knew anything about music.”  She had me there.  She told me that if I did 6 months of studying piano and theory with her, and I was still interested, we would talk about the trumpet.

I was still wanting the trumpet, so that Xmas, I got one.  A year or so later, I got to study with Noble Howard in Indianapolis, at the Jordan Conservatory.  He played the euphonium with the John Phillip Sousa band and also for Merle Evans with the Ringling Brothers Circus Band.  He could straight tongue as fast as I could double tongue.  He blew me away.  I was with him for seven years.

When I graduated from High School, I went to Indiana University to study with William Adam.  He made me play in the Philharmonic and the Opera Orchestra.   I could do it but it was not my first love.  He wanted me to listen to Brahms, Beethoven, and Bach and I wanted to listen to Bird, Brownie, and Blakey.  I finally won out and moved to New York in late 1957.

 I was prepared for New York by being able to play with the big bands of Al Cobine and David Baker.  Cobine had a great dance book with lots of jazz in it and David had straight ahead Be Bop.  Both were great schools and I learned a lot. 

The first week in New York, I contacted two friends from Indiana, a piano player John Bunch and a trombone player “Slide Hampton”.  Both were playing with Maynard Ferguson’s Birdland Dream Band.  They needed a second trumpet player and with John and ‘Slides” help I got the job.  

The first gig was two weeks in Birdland opposite the Miles Davis Quintet.  The week before that I was in Indiana listening to these people on records.  Now I was on the same bandstand.  I could play, but I was also very lucky to be there at the right time. 

No trumpet players played jazz on the band before that.  Slide wrote a chart on “Oleo” and gave me a solo.  Maynard was great and always encouraged me.  Later we did a live album in Birdland and recorded “Oleo”.  Maynard was the ideal band leader.   The way he played, he didn’t need to be an arrogant guy.  We all hung out in the same band rooms when we were on the road.  They would give Maynard a “star dressing room”.  He would thank them and then tell us we had two band rooms.  We had no stars.  We just had a damn good band. 

After leaving Maynard the first time I got a call from Nat Pierce about Woody’s band.  I went with Woody for a year.  Another good band, but not like Maynard’s.  Woody was very up front about how he ran his band.  He didn’t care what you did as long as it did not do damage to his music.  He told me that when anyone got into any trouble with the law, that was the exact moment they were on their own and no longer employed by him.  He said “I spent half my time keeping the Four Brothers band out of jail and I no longer do that.”   Couldn’t argue with that.

After Woody, I went home to New York and again played with Maynard.  We did quite a few Newport Jazz Festivals and continued to play in Birdland and recorded for Roulette Records, both owned by Morris Levy.   Morris loved the band.

After leaving Maynard the second time, “Slide” left also and started an Octet.  I played with that group and really got to play in a real jazz setting.  We had great players like George Coleman, Freddie Hubbard, Ronnie Cuber, Pete La Roca, Bob Cranshaw, and Slide’s writing, and playing.  We recorded for Atlantic Records.

After that I worked around New York with lots of different people, playing everything musicians had to play to make a living.  I worked for Richard Maltby doing transcription work and Muzak recordings.  No jazz, but very good players.

I worked the Billy May band, also with good players.  Chick Corea played piano.  Walt Stuart played and wrote charts so we always had new music coming in.  That was good.  It kept up the reading chops.  With Maynard, we had Slide, Willie Maiden and Don Sebesky writing helping the reading chops.

While in Indiana visiting and doing some playing, I was mugged.   Hit with a lead pipe or something similar, it broke my cheek bone and knocked it out of the socket.  It severed the nerves in my face and I couldn’t play for almost a year.  The left side of my face is still numb but the control muscles are cool so I can still play, just not like before.

While living in Indiana waiting to heal, I played only at home after a year.  I began to do some gigs playing third and fourth parts and gradually worked up to playing second parts and some jazz.  I finally set my sights on being the best second player and jazz player.  I did not play lead because I never was a high note player.  If you can read well, play second and good jazz, it helps getting gigs.   That’s me! 

Also while in Indiana, a mutual friend introduced me to a beautiful lady from Chicago, named Nancy Arnold.  That was thirty-one years ago and we are still married.  Living with me for thirty years makes the lady a sainte.  Again, good luck for me.

We moved to Florida in 1980 and I began playing here with lots of people I knew in New York.

One advantage of growing up in Indiana was getting to play with the Montgomery Brothers:  Wes, Buddy, and Monk.  When I got to play with a guitar player in Florida named Rich Walker, I was blown away by his playing.  He obviously loved Wes and he was writing for a ten piece band that was hot.  We played jazz tunes and Rich sings the blues like nobody else.  Great fun!  We have one CD out and Rich has small group CD’s with Ira Sullivan and a tenor player named Rex Wertz, also a monster player.

I’m now, in 2006, seventy-two years old and 98% retired in Florida, waiting for the next hurricane.

Jerry

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Thank you for visiting my website.  I hope those who visit can learn about jazz history from someone who has and is still living it.  Please come back soon and often.