About Benny Goodman 1909 – 1986

Benny Goodman grew from the humblest of beginnings to earn the well-deserved title “King of Swing” for his contribution to bringing jazz into the commercial mainstream. He was one of 12 children of Jewish immigrants, raising their children in a three story tenement building in a Chicago ghetto. Mr. Goodman took his boys to the free band concerts in Douglas Park and built into them an appreciation for band music. When the local synagogue began lending out instruments and giving lessons for 25 cents a week, Benny was on his way to leaning to play the clarinet. Benny showed exceptional talent and went on to private lessons. By age 14 he was supplementing the family income by playing in the dance halls of Chicago’s south side. By age 15 he had dropped out of school and was playing professionally, and at age 16, he traveled with the Ben Pollack band to Los Angeles and settled in California. In 1934, at age 25, he moved to New York and put together his own band, and the “Swing Era” was born. He headlined on a new radio program called “Let’s Dance” which broadcast from New York all night long. The Big Band sound gained national exposure and Benny Goodman played to sold-out houses in Los Angeles, Chicago, New York and cities in between. In 1938 he achieved his dream of playing Carnegie Hall, and the live recording of that concert became one of the best selling jazz albums of all time.

Benny Goodman never looked back. He spent the next 40 years expanding his experiences into the international realm, touring with numerous groups. He performed very successfully in Russia and the Far East, and at the Brussels World’s Fair in 1959. In 1978, exactly 40 years after his first wildly successful appearance there, he again played Carnegie Hall.

In his later years, as popular interest in Big Band music waned, he became interested in classical music and mixed classical performances with his jazz work. He was quite successful as a classical clarinetist, but never quite as successful as he had been with jazz and swing. He died at home in 1986, reportedly with clarinet in hand.

Benny Goodman’s legacy includes induction into the Big Band and Jazz Hall of Fame in 1978, and the Radio Hall of Fame in 1988. In 1956 he appeared in a film of his life, titled “The Benny Goodman Story.” In 1982 he was one of five recipients of the Kennedy Center Honors. In 1996 he had his own US postage stamp, one of four “Legends of American Music” choices. After his death, Goodman’s personal collection went to the Yale University Library, where many rare recordings and unpublished photos are preserved for posterity. His greatest legacy may be that his music continues to find an audience even now among a wide range of age groups.

Beryl McHenry