Tex Beneke - Early Life

Early Life

Beneke was born in Fort Worth, Texas. He started playing saxophone when he was nine, going from soprano to alto to tenor saxophones and staying with the latter. His first professional work was with bandleader Ben Young in 1935, but it was when he joined Miller three years later that his career hit its stride. Beneke said: "It seems that Gene Krupa had left the Goodman band and was forming his own first band. He was flying all over the country looking for new talent and he stopped at our ballroom one night . Gene wound up taking two or three of our boys with him back to New York. wanted to take but his sax section was already filled." Krupa knew that Glenn Miller was forming a band and recommended Beneke to Miller.

Whatever concerns Miller might have had about Beneke's playing were quickly dismissed; Miller immediately made Beneke his primary tenor sax soloist and Beneke played all but a few of the tenor solos on all of the records and personal appearances made by the Miller band until it disbanded in 1942. On the August 1, 1939, recording made of the Joe Garland composition "In The Mood", Beneke trades two-measure tenor solo exchanges with his fellow section-mate Al Klink. Miller's 1941 recording of "A String of Pearls" (composed by the band's arranger, Jerry Gray) also has Beneke and Klink trading two-measure tenor solo phrases. Beneke appears with Miller and his band in the films Sun Valley Serenade (1941) and Orchestra Wives (1942), both of which helped propel the singer/saxophonist to the top of the Metronome polls. Tex Beneke is listed in the personnel of the 1941 Metronome All-Star Band led by Benny Goodman. In 1942, Glenn Miller's orchestra won the first Gold Record ever awarded for "Chattanooga Choo Choo"; the song was written by Harry Warren and Mack Gordon as part of the score for the 1941 Twentieth Century Fox movie "Sun Valley Serenade" which was primarily made for the purpose of putting the Miller band in a motion picture. " Tex Beneke was the featured singer in the movie and on the Victor/Bluebird recording that also featured band vocalist Paula Kelly and the Modernaires, a vocal group of four male singers, who were also regular members of the Miller entourage. "Chattanooga Choo Choo", catalogue number Bluebird 11230-B, was recorded by the Miller band at the Victor recording studios in Hollywood, California, May 7, 1941. Hoping to repeat the success of "Chattanooga" the following year, songwriters Warren and Gordon composed "I've Got A Gal In Kalamazoo" for the "Orchestra Wives" score. That arrangement also featured Beneke, the Modernaires and band vocalist Marion Hutton in a not-too-dissimilar fashion. Not surprisingly, "Kalamazoo" became another hit record for Miller, Beneke and the band though not to the extent that "Chattanooga" had been the year before. By then, the U.S. was involved in World War II and "Kalamazoo's" success was also short-lived partially because Miller disbanded his group only three months after the record was made and four months following the filming of "Orchestra Wives".

When Miller broke up the band in August 1942 to join the Army Air Force, Beneke played very briefly with Horace Heidt before joining the Navy himself, leading a Navy band in Oklahoma. While employed with Miller, Beneke was offered his own band, as Miller had done with colleagues and employees like Hal McIntyre, Claude Thornhill and Charlie Spivak. Beneke wanted to come back to Miller after the war and learn more about leading a band before being given his own band. Beneke led two bands in the navy and kept in touch with Glenn Miller while they were both serving in the military. By 1945, Beneke felt ready to lead his own orchestra.