Ben Pollack born 23 June 1903

Ben Pollack (June 22, 1903 – June 7, 1971) was a drummer and bandleader from the mid 1920s through the swing era. His eye for talent led him to either discover or employ, at one time or another, musicians such as Benny Goodman, Jack Teagarden, Glenn Miller, Jimmy McPartland and Harry James. This ability earned him the nickname "Father of Swing".

One of the more successful bandleaders of the late 1920s and early 1930s, Ben Pollack was born in Chicago, Illinois. He played drums in school and formed groups on the side. He got his professional start in Chicago in the early 1920s playing drums for Dick Schoenberg's orchestra. He subsequently worked for Izzy Wagner in Fox Lake, Wisconsin, before joining the New Orleans Rhythm Kings in 1921. He later traveled to the West Coast, spending a week with Larry Shields and eleven months with the Harry Bastin Band.

From California Pollack returned to Chicago with plans to take over his family's fur business but was unable to get music out of his blood. He headed for New York in late 1924 and wasn't there long before he received an offer from Bastin to take over his band. He went back to the West Coast, remaining there for a year before returning to Chicago in 1926. He worked briefly with Art Kassel and then formed his own orchestra that May. He took his new band back to California the following year and then to New York, where it spent much of its time at the Park Central Hotel.

Producing some of the most exciting music of its era, Pollack's orchestra was chocked full of talent. At various times it featured such future stars as Glenn Miller, Benny Goodman, Jack Teagarden, Smith Ballew, Charlie Spivak, Bud Freeman, Fud Livingston, Ray Bauduc, Nappy Lamare, and Gil Rodin. Pollack often sang. The group recorded on Victor from 1926 to 1929, on the Banner label in 1930 and 1931, and on the Columbia label in 1933 and 1934.

Ben Pollack & The Boswell Sisters

From about 1928, with involvement from Irving Mills, members of Pollack's band moonlighted at Plaza-ARC and recorded a vast quantity of hot dance and jazz for their dime store labels — Banner, Perfect, Domino, Cameo, Lincoln, Romeo — under the names Mills' Merry Makers, Goody's Good Timers, Kentucky Grasshoppers, Mills' Musical Clowns, The Lumberjacks, Dixie Daises, The Caroliners, The Whoopee Makers, The Hotsy Totsy Gang, Dixie Jazz Band, and Jimmy Bracken's Toe Ticklers often without Pollack’s approval. Combining Pollack's regular recordings with these side groups made Pollack's one of the more prolific bands of the 1920s and 1930s.

                             

Though Pollack may have had an all-star line-up he was unable to keep most of them for very long. By 1930 Goodman, Miller, and many others had left, forcing Pollack to revise the group's direction. Pollack's band of the 1930s, while still talented, was not as consistent as his 1920s grouping. It also suffered because of 

Pollack's inattentiveness. In the early 1930s Pollack fell in love with vocalist Doris Robbins, and the two eventually married. As he began to concentrate more and more on her career and less on the orchestra his musicians became disgruntled. Finally, in 1934, they quit en masse and formed a new group under sax player Gil Rodin, which later went on to fame under Bob Crosby's name.

Inspired by the commercial success of swing Pollack formed a new orchestra in late 1935. Though it featured a then unknown Harry James and Freddie Slack, as well as trumpeter Shorty Sherock, clarinetist Irving Fazola, and saxophonist Dave 

Matthews, it failed to live up to its predecessor and soon disbanded. Pollack attempted to put together another band on the West Coast, but it too was short-lived, breaking up in 1938. Pollack's later groups recorded on Vocalion and Brunswick in 1936 and on Decca in 1937 and 1938. Vocalists for Pollack during the 1930s include Peggy Mann, Paula Gayle, Jim Hardy, Frances Hunt, Carol McKay, and Lois Still.

After the demise of his big bands Pollack soldiered on, never venturing far from the Dixieland style that he favoured He led bands in New Orleans, Chicago, and Los Angeles, where Muggsy Spanier became an alumnus. In 1942, he became the leader of the touring band working behind music/comedy star Chico Marx. By this time, the field of big-band music was dominated by his former alumni, most notably Miller, Goodman, and James. In 1945 he founded his own record label Jewel and employed Henry Stone as an executive for A&R. Pollack was working out of New Orleans in the late '40s, and hosted the Second Annual Dixieland Jubilee in 1949, after which he led a sextet.

Pollack and Doris Robbins, who had no children, were divorced in 1957. By the late 50’s he went into the business world, operating his own club in Los Angeles. In 1966 he moved to Palm Springs, California where he and his sister ran a successful reteraunt. In later years, after suffering a series of financial losses, Pollack grew bitter and despondent, often filing lawsuits against various big bands. Ben Pollack committed suicide in 1971, hanging himself in his bathroom of his Palm Springs home.

In 1992, Ben Pollack was inducted into the Big Band and Jazz Hall of Fame. 

(Edited mainly from parabrisas.com, AllMusic & Wikipedia)