At 72, Jazz Trombone Titan Slide Hampton Still Makes Music He Loves

ZAN STEWART

Newhouse News Service

Slide Hampton, arranger, composer and trombone marvel, doesn't think about what to write. He just feels it. "All my stuff is by inspiration, not by theory or even experience," said Hampton, 72. "I just write what I'm inspired to write, let it go wherever it goes. I take the blame if it's not so great, (I'm) glad if it's not so bad."

Hampton is definitely being self-deprecating about the quality of his work. His compositions and arrangements, marked by engaging themes, lustrous voicings and supple swing, have been grabbing grabbing musicians and jazz cognoscenti for more than 40 years -- since he started making a name for himself with trumpeter Maynard Ferguson in the late 1950s.

Ricardo, Gerri Granger & Slide Hampton

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Shortly thereafter came his famous octets, then later charts for his all-trombone band, World of Trombones, as well as Gillespie's United Nation Orchestra, the Dizzy Gillespie All-Star Big Band and the Vanguard Jazz Orchestra.

Hampton -- born Locksley Wellington but given the moniker "Slide" by a sister because of his choice of instrument -- is being properly feted this year. In January, he received a National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Masters Fellowship. Previous NEA Jazz Masters include Gillespie, Miles Davis, Sonny Rollins, Horace Silver, Barry Harris and other giants.

And Hampton's remarkable work, "Past Present & Future," won a Best Instrumental Arrangement Grammy last month. The number, based on variations on John Coltrane's "Giant Steps" harmonic concept, is included on Vanguard's "The Way -- Music of Slide Hampton" Planet Arts CD. (He won his first Grammy in 1997, for Best Instrumental Arrangement accompanying a singer, for "Cottontail," written for singer Dee Dee Bridgewater and included on her "Dear Ella" Polygram album.)

He's currently drafting some new arrangements of such Gillespie standards as "Con Alma" and "Groovin' High" for the All-Star Band; the works will debut in performances this summer at the Blue Note in New York. He's also performing at the Blue Note this month as part of James Moody's 80th birthday celebration. He's set to craft new octet arrangements for a date at the Chicago Jazz Festival this summer. Hampton is musical director of the All-Star Band. Anything involving Dizzy is like going home for Hampton. The innovative trumpeter and composer's breakthrough '40s big band was a primary influence on the then-budding writer and trombonist.

Born in Jeanette, Pa., Hampton was raised in Indianapolis in a family of musicians. His parents, five brothers and four sisters all played various instruments, and wrote as well. They performed as the Hamptonians, traveling mainly in the South, opening for the likes of the influential saxophonist and singer Louis Jordan.

They also toured the Midwest and Northeast and appeared in New York at Carnegie Hall, the Savoy Ballroom and Apollo Theater. Hampton made his professional debut as a singer with the band at age 5, then toured, as a trombonist -- he picked up the instrument at age 10 -- in 1945-52.

The Hamptonians played the music of Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Glenn Miller and others. But when Hampton heard Gillespie's big band on record in the mid-'40s, then saw the band in person in Indianapolis, he knew he'd heard his future -- just as bebop innovator J.J. Johnson set the standard for Hampton's trombone work.

That was the direction I wanted to go. And did go, first with some charts for Lionel Hampton (no relation) in the mid-'50s, and then with Ferguson. Maynard really gave you a chance to write and play, he said. In 1959, Hampton got a monumental career and inspirational boost when he joined Gillespie's big band -- though the two-year stint was as trombonist rather than writer; Benny Golson, Ernie Wilkins and Melba Liston handled most of the arranging.

"It was so overwhelming," he said. "Dizzy was at his peak, and the music -- every note, every melody had a great deal of quality, of value. We're still playing some of those arrangements (in the All-Star Band), and they are still fantastic." Songs such as Golson's "Stablemates," Gillespie's "Things to Come" and Dizzy's version of Thelonious Monk's "'Round Midnight" "are fun to play, and the band sounds great playing them. They hold up. That music should be played more often." Hampton helped Gillespie organize his United Nation Orchestra in the late '80s. After Gillespie's death in 1993, he led the dedicated-to-Diz Jazz Masters large ensemble (not to be confused with the NEA award). He was also part of a small Gillespie tribute group that eventually evolved into the All-Star Band.

Music is like being in heaven, Hampton said. Getting to hear and play all this great music -- you can't even hope you'd have something like that in your life. To be that blessed is almost unreal." Zan Stewart is a staff writer for The Star-Ledger of Newark, N.J. He can be contacted@ zstewartstarledger.com.

"That band's music was a shock at first, it's so different than all the other music," he said. "Dizzy (and his writers, such as the protean Tadd Dameron) had an arranging concept that dealt more with what musicians were playing. They were writing the same kinds of melodies that somebody would improvise.