SWING HARP

The first woman to play swing harp was Adele Girard. We hear her and 1950s jazz harpist Betty Glamann as the Phantom Dancer feature artists on this week’s Phantom Dancer radio mix.

There’s also a set of Harry ‘The Hipster’ Gibson from 1944 Muzak and radio recordings, a set of 1930s Ella Fitzgerald radio, and two hours of non-stop swing and jazz mixed live by me from 1920s-60s radio recordings and vinyl.

PHANTOM DANCER

Hear this week’s Phantom Dancer (after 5 Feb) and past Phantom Dancers at 2ser.com.
Hear the show live every Tuesday 12:04-2pm on 107.3 2SER Sydney

BETTY GLAMANN

Betty Glamann Voorhees was a jazz and classical harpist who began learning harp at age ten. She graduated from a music conservatory and for three years was harpist for the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra.

She then played with Spike Jones in 1948 and founded the Smith-Glamann Quintet in 1955. That same year Duke Ellington wrote music for her and had her in his orchestra, as did Marian McPartland and then Oscar Pettiford in whose band we hear her in 1957 radio broadcasts. She recorded on the Kenny Dorham album Jazz Contrasts in 1957 and was involved in a Michel Legrand recording session with John Coltrane and Miles Davis. She played with Eddie Costa in 1958 and with the Modern Jazz Quartet in 1960. She recorded one album under her own name, Swinging on a Harp and was in the Steve Allen Show TV orchestra.

ADELE GIRARD

Adele Beatrice Girard was the first woman to play jazz harp. Only Casper Reardon had played jazz harp before her.

She began learning harp at age fourteen but her first professional music job was as a singer for the Harry Sosnik orchestra in Chicago in 1933. She was nineteen. When Sosnik learned she could play harp, he bought her one. She performed with the Dick Stabile orchestra in New York City in 1935 and in 1936 with the Three Ts, the Teagarden brothers (Jack and Charles) and Frankie Trumbauer at the Hickory House in New York City. She replaced harpist Casper Reardon, who had been hired for a Broadway show.

When the Ts toured, Girard worried that she would be unable to continue payments on her first harp. She asked the proprietor of the Hickory House to keep her on, and he introduced her to Joe Marsala. In 1937 she wed Marsala and became a member of his jazz band. which included Eddie Condon and Buddy Rich. The Marsalas worked in the house band at Hickory House for ten years.

Girard had perfect pitch and could improvise any tune on the spot. Among her fans were James Bond author Ian Fleming and Harpo Marx, who asked her for lessons.

VIDEO

This week’s Phantom Dancer video of the week is a 1940s soundie of ‘Harp Boogie’ by Adele Girard with her Trio. Enjoy!

5 FEBRUARY PLAY LIST