Glenn Miller - Band Alumni

Band Alumni

Many of the Miller musicians went on to studio and touring careers in Hollywood and New York after World War II. Musicians who went from the Miller bands to important reputations afterwards include:

• George Siravo, 1916–2000 was an arranger with Glenn Miller's first band in the late 1930s. Siravo went on to become a staff arranger with Columbia Records in the 1940s, working with Frank Sinatra and Doris Day.

• Billy May, 1916–2004 a trumpeter and an arranger for the civilian band, became a much-coveted arranger and studio orchestra leader after that band broke up, going on to work with Frank Sinatra, Rosemary Clooney, Anita O'Day, and Bing Crosby, among other singers of the post-war era.

• Cornetist Bobby Hackett,1915–1976 solos on "A String of Pearls", with Miller in 1941, for Bluebird records. " Hackett went on to work with Jackie Gleason and Dizzy Gillespie.

• Johnny Desmond, 1919–1985 a lead vocalist from the Army Air Force Band, became a popular singer in the 1950s, and appeared on Broadway in the 1960s in Funny Girl with Barbra Streisand.

• Kay Starr, b. 1922 became a pop, jazz and country singer in the post-war period. In 1939, Marion Hutton, the regular "girl singer", became sick and sixteen year old Kay Starr was flown in to replace her. Kay Starr's two recordings with Glenn Miller were two 1939 sides, "Baby Me" and "Love With a Capital You".

• Artie Malvin, 1922–2006 Glenn Miller's AAF Band had a vocal group called "The Crew Chiefs". Artie Malvin was the baritone of the four men. After World War II and Miller's death, Malvin became heavily immersed in the popular music of the forties and fifties, being involved in everything from children's music to the nascent beginnings of rock to jingles for commercials. By the 1970s Artie Malvin was involved with "The Carol Burnett Show" doing special musical material.

• Paul Tanner, b. 1917 trombonist for the civilian band, went on to create the electrotheremin and perform on songs such as Good Vibrations by The Beach Boys

Some of the Army Air Force members went on to notable careers in classical music and modern jazz. Three such are:

• Norman Leyden b. 1917 an arranger from the Army Air Force Band later became a noted arranger in New York, composing arrangements for Sarah Vaughan, among other artists. His long career culminated with his highly regarded work for the Oregon Symphony, now as Laureate Associate Conductor.

• Mel Powell, 1923–1998, was the pianist and one of the arrangers in the Glenn Miller Army Air Force Band. Gary Giddins comments on " splendid forty-two-piece Army Air Force Band’s startling performance of 'Mission to Moscow.'” "Mission to Moscow" was arranged by Mel Powell, the former pianist for the Benny Goodman orchestra before he was drafted into the service and subsequently joined the Miller orchestra. "Pearls on Velvet" with the Air Force Band is also one of his compositions. "In 1949, he decided on a radical change of direction, setting aside jazz and enrolling as a pupil of the composer and teacher Paul Hindemith at Yale University." Powell started teaching at the California Institute for the Arts in Los Angeles in 1969.

• Addison Collins, Jr. played French Horn in the service band. He is featured as "Junior" Collins on the Miles Davis Birth of the Cool recordings of 1949–50.

Drummer and biographer:

• George T. Simon 1912–2001. George Simon knew and worked with Glenn Miller from his early sideman days to the days of leading his civilian band and finally, worked with him when he was stateside with the Army Air Force band. Simon was a drummer for some of the Miller bands. He helped his friend Glenn Miller with personnel using the connections that Simon had as editor with the now defunct Metronome magazine. George Simon wrote the liner notes for eleven Miller reissues, among them: Glenn Miller Army Air Force Band, 1955, Glenn Miller On The Air, 1963, and Glenn Miller: A Legendary Performer, 1974. During a long career, he also wrote articles with topics ranging from Miller and Frank Sinatra to Thelonious Monk. In 1974, Simon won a Grammy award for his liner notes for the RCA record: Bing Crosby: A Legendary Performer.