Champion Jack Dupree born 23 July 1909

William Thomas "Champion Jack" Dupree (July 23, 1909 or July 4, 1910 – January 21, 1992) was an American blues and boogie-woogie pianist and singer. His nickname was derived from his early career as a boxer.

Dupree was a New Orleans blues and boogie-woogie pianist, a barrel-house "professor". His father was from the Belgian Congo and his mother was part African American and Cherokee. His birth date has been given as July 4, July 10, and July 23, 1908, 1909, or 

1910; the researchers Bob Eagle and Eric LeBlanc give July 4, 1910. He was orphaned at the age of eight and was sent to the Colored Waifs Home in New Orleans, an institution for orphaned or delinquent boys (about the same time, Louis Armstrong was also sent there as a child, after being arrested as a "dangerous and suspicious character"). Dupree taught himself to play the piano there and later apprenticed with Tuts Washington and Willie Hall, whom he called his father and from whom he learned "Junker's Blues". He was also a "spy boy" for the Yellow Pocahontas tribe of the Mardi Gras Indians. He soon began playing in barrel-houses and other drinking establishments.

He began a life of travelling, living in Chicago, where he worked with Georgia Tom, and in Indianapolis, Indiana, where he met Scrapper Blackwell and Leroy Carr. He also worked as a cook. In Detroit, after Joe Louis encouraged him to become a boxer, he fought 107 bouts, winning Golden Gloves and other championships and picking up the nickname Champion Jack, which he used the rest of his life.

In 1940, Dupree made his recording debut for Chicago A&R man extraordinaire Lester Melrose and OKeh Records.

Many of Dupree's songs were later credited to Melrose as composer, and Melrose claimed publishing rights to them.

Dupree's 1940-1941 output for the Columbia subsidiary exhibited 
a strong New Orleans tinge despite the Chicago surroundings; his driving "Junker's Blues" was later cleaned up as Fats Domino's 1949 debut, "The Fat Man." Dupree's career was interrupted by military service in World War II. He was a cook in the United States Navy and was held by the Japanese for two years as a prisoner of war. Following Franklin D. Roosevelt's death in office, Dupree composed the "F.D.R. Blues".

After World War II Dupree decided tickling the 88s beat pugilism any old day. He spent most of his time in New York and quickly became a prolific recording artist, cutting for Continental, Joe Davis, Alert, Apollo, and Red Robin (where he cut a blasting "Shim Sham Shimmy" in 1953), often in the company of Brownie McGhee. King Records corralled Dupree in 1953 and held onto him through 1955 (the year he enjoyed his only R&B chart hit, the relaxed "Walking the Blues.") Dupree's King output rates with his very best; the romping "Mail Order Woman," "Let the Doorbell Ring," and "Big Leg Emma's" contrasting with the rural "Me and My Mule". Contracts meant little; Dupree masqueraded as Brother Blues on Abbey, Lightnin' Jr. on Empire, and the truly imaginative Meat Head Johnson for Gotham and Apex.

                                  

His biggest commercial success was "Walkin' the Blues", which he recorded as a duet with Teddy McRae. This led to several national tours and eventually a European tour. In 1959, he played an unofficial (and unpaid) duo gig with Alexis Korner at the London School of Economics.

Dupree moved to Europe in 1960, settling first in Switzerland and then Denmark (in the anarchist-occupied Freetown Christiania in Copenhagen), England, Sweden and, finally, Germany.On June 17, 1971, he played at the Montreux Jazz Festival, in the Casino Kursaal, with King Curtis, backed by Cornell Dupree on guitar, Jerry Jemmott on bass and Oliver Jackson on drums. The recording of the concert was released in 1973 as the album King Curtis & Champion Jack Dupree: Blues at Montreux on the Atlantic label.

In the 1970s and 1980s, he lived at Ovenden in Halifax, England, after marrying a Halifax native, Shirley Ann Harrison, whom he met in London. A piano he used was later discovered at Calderdale College in Halifax. He continued to record in Europe with the Kenn Lending Band, Louisiana Red and Axel Zwingenberger and made many live appearances. He also worked again as a cook, specializing in New Orleans cuisine. He returned to the United States from time to time and performed at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival.

He divorced Shirley in 1976 and moved to Copenhagen, where he lived in the Freetown Christiania. This period of his life was the subject of the 1975 film Barrel-house Blues - Feelings and Situations by the artists Laurie Grundtand Eva Acking which includes several filmed performances, including one where Dupree plays drum set. He later moved to Zurich and finally settled in Hanover, Germany

Perhaps sensing his own mortality, Dupree returned to New Orleans in 1990 for his first visit in 36 years. While there, he played the Jazz & Heritage Festival and laid down a zesty album for Bullseye Blues, Back Home in New Orleans.

Two more albums of new material were captured by the company the next year prior to the pianist's death from cancer in Hanover, Germany on January 21.  (Edited from Wikipedia & AllMusic)

Don Patterson born 22 July 1936

Don Patterson (July 22, 1936, – February 10, 1988 was an American jazz organist known for very quick bebop lines, which, rumour has it, he played using just three fingers on his right hand. Patterson often used no percussion, but he pulled the last drawbar out to get a whistle sound.

Patterson was born in Columbus, OH, on July 22, 1936, and 

began studying piano as a child. He was heavily influenced by Erroll Garner in his youth. In 1956, he switched to organ after hearing Jimmy Smith play the instrument.

The trio of Patterson, guitarist Paul Weeden and drummer Billy James struck up a fruitful cooperation with saxophone giant Sonny Stitt from 1959 to 1964 (Patterson and Billy James kept recording with Sonny Stitt throughout the sixties); Patterson also played on albums of Eddie “Lockjaw” Davis and sax prodigy  

Eric Kloss. Many of his Prestige albums included the crackerjack guitar work of Pat Martino.

Overshadowed by pioneering legend Jimmy Smith and ‘the Coltrane of organ jazz’ Larry Young, Patterson nevertheless contributed significantly to organ jazz playing. A melodic player and a master of restraint, Patterson squeezed every little bit out of the tenor/organ combo format and cooperated with first-class adventurous musicians as Booker Ervin and Eddie Daniels. Having started out as a pianist, Patterson favored a combination of long, flowing bebop lines and tasteful blues statements.

                                

If not a quantum leap, Patterson’s development from Goin’ Down Home to his official 1964 debut as a leader, The Exciting New Organ Of Don Patterson, is remarkable. His Cadet album fits nicely in the format of the Chess subsidiary label, focusing on basic but nifty r&b and blues lines. A big foot remains in the field of 
forefather Wild Bill Davis, as Patterson employs a rather dated ‘open register’. It’s the kind of work Patterson delivered on the 1962 albums of Eddie ‘Lockjaw’ Davis, I Only Have Eyes For You and Trackin’ and Sonny Stitt and Gene Ammons’ Boss Tenors In Orbit.

A smaller foot is set in the area of intense, linear playing with the modern jazz sound as invented by Jimmy Smith. Patterson’s rare ability to stack surprise upon surprise in John Brown’s Body (a tune Patterson played on Stitt/Ammons’ Boss Tenors In Orbit and revisited on Satisfaction) cautiously foreshadows the 

adventurous hard bop of 'S Bout Time from The Exciting New Organ Of Don Patterson. A striking aspect of the album is the spirited interplay between Patterson and Billy James. And you’ll want this album for Patterson’s version of Duke Ellington’s I’m Just A Lucky So-And-So. Blues seldom comes as graceful as this.

His most commercially successful album was 1964's Holiday Soul, which reached #85 on the Billboard 200 in 1967. Patterson also played with numerous other soul-jazz sax greats over the course of the '60s, before settling in Gary, IN, toward the end of the decade. 

Drugs-related problems haunted Patterson at the turn of the decade.

Patterson made a comeback in the early seventies with two albums
on Muse, arguably Patterson’s ‘masterpieces’: The Return Of Don Patterson and These Are Soulful Days

In the 1980's he moved to Philadelphia and made a small comeback, but his health worsened, forcing him to take dialysis frequently. He recorded one more album "Legacy" by John Simon Trio Featuring Don Patterson before he died on February 10, 1988.

(Edited  from Wikipedia & flophouse magazine)

Sonny Clark born 21 July 1931

Conrad Yeatis "Sonny" Clark (July 21, 1931 – January 13, 1963) was a pianist who was a wonderful accompanist and gifted writer, admired especially for his amazing right-hand lines and incredible rhythmic drive.

Clark was born and raised in Herminie, Pennsylvania, a coal mining town east of Pittsburgh. His parents were originally from Stone Mountain, Georgia. His miner father, Emery Clark, died of a lung disease two weeks after Sonny was born. Sonny was the youngest of eight children. At age 12, he moved to Pittsburgh.

Hearing the music of Art Tatum, Fats Waller, Cout Basie, and Duke Ellington on the radio, he fell in love with jazz.  Attending high school in Jeanette he played bass and vibes with his high school band and also performed as a piano soloist. He performed professionally around Pittsburgh while still in school.  At age 15 Sonny appeared on the bill of the historic “Night of the Stars” Concert held at the Syria Mosque to celebrate the music of Pittsburgh’s jazz superstars.  Presented by the Frog Club and the Pittsburgh Courier on August 7, 1946 the show featured an all star cast of legendary Pittsburgh pianists Earl Hines, Mary Lou Williams, Billy Strayhorn, and Erroll Garner and jazz greats Billy Eckstein, Roy Eldridge, Maxine Sullivan, Ray Brown, Louis Deppe and more.

In 1951, when Sonny was 19, his older brother, also a pianist, took him on a trip to visit their aunt in Los Angeles.  Sonny decided to stay in California and found work performing with Wardell Grey and Vido Musso.  Working in California Sonny played with the key figures in the West Coast jazz movement including Stan Getz, Art Farmer. Wardell Grey, Anita O’Day, and Shelly Manne.  His was one of the few African Americans performing West Coast jazz.   Sonny made with recording debut in 1953 with saxophonist Wardell Grey on the Verve label. 

He joined Oscar Pettiford’s band and moved to San Francisco.  In San Fransisco he joined Buddy DeFranco’s band.  Sonny performed with Buddy DeFranco for two and a half years beginning with a tour of Europe and the U.S in 1954.  Sonny recorded his first album as a trio leader in 1955.  Titled “Oakland” it featured   bassist Jerry Good and drummer Al Randall and was recorded at the Mocambo Club in Oakland in January of 1955,  Sonny joined the Lighthouse All Stars in Hermosa Beach playing with them throughout 1956.   Wanting to travel back East and to visit his family in Pittsburgh on the way, Sonny took a job touring with Dinah Washington in February of 1957.  

Settling in New York in 1957 he worked dates with West Coast jazz artists including two weeks at Birdland with Stan Getz and a weekend with Anita O'Day.  Switching from West Coast Jazz to Hard Bop Sonny quickly became a requested sideman playing with hard bop players John Coltrane, Dextor Gorden, Kenny Burrell, and more. He began recording on the prestigious Blue Note label at age 26. Sonny recorded 29 Blue Note sessions as a band leader and a sideman.  He made 17 recordings in 1957 including five album recordings for Blue Note.  His first recording as a band leader was “Dial S for Sonny” released in 1957. His second release in 1957 was “Sonny‘s Crib” that featured a band comprised of John Coltrane and Paul Chambers. The album Sonny Clark Trio with Paul Chambers Philly Joe Jones was also released in 1957. 

                               

The classic “Cool Struttin’ album and the “Standards” albums were released in 1958.  Critic Thom Jurek of Allmusic.com calls the title tract “Cool Struttin: “one of the preeminent swinging medium blues pieces in jazz history.”  The album “My Conception” featuring 
tenor saxophonist Hank Mobley was released in 1959.  The “Sonny Clark Trio” album with George Duvivier and Max Roach was released in 1960.  His last album “Leapin' and Lopin” released in 1961 featuring four song composed by Clark includes the classics tracts “Vodoo” and “Something Special”.  Writer Michael G. Nastos of Allmusic.com calls “Leapin and Lopin” one of the definitive recording for all time in the mainstream jazz idiom.

In 1962 Sonny performed with Dexter Gordon on two of his classic Blue Note albums “Go” and “A Swinging Affair”.  He was Gorden’s favourite piano accompanist.  Sonny also recorded in 

1962 the albums Blue and Sentimental and Easy Living with Ike Quebec, Born to be Blue and Nigeria with Grant Green, the Jackie McLean Quintet and  Tipping' the Scales with Jackie McLean, and Jubliee Shout with Stanley Turrentine.

Sonny died of a heart attack on Sunday, January 13, 1963 at the age of 31. He had been in poor health due to his heroin and alcohol addictions.  Sonny played his last gigs two nights before his death on January 11 and 12 at Junior’s Bar on at the Alvin Hotel on Fifty-second and Broadway.  Jazz patron, Baroness Pannonica de 
Koenigswarter who was also Sonnys friend, phoned Clark’s older sister in Pittsburgh to tell her of her brother’ passing.  The baroness paid to transport Sonny’s body back to Pittsburgh and paid for his funeral.  Sonny’s grave lies in the Greenwood Cemetery in Sharpsburg, PA.  Regarded as the quintessential hard bop pianist, Clark never got his due before he passed away, despite the fact that it can be argued that he never played a bad recording date either as a sideman or as a leader.  (Edited from Sound Projections)

Lola Albright born 20 July 1924

Lola Jean Albright (July 20, 1924 – March 23, 2017) was an American singer and actress who appeared on screen in more than 40 films from the late 1940s. She was best known for playing the sultry singer Edie Hart, the girlfriend of private eye Peter Gunn, on all three seasons of the TV series Peter Gunn.

Albright was born in Akron, Ohio, to Marion A. (née Harvey) and John Paul Albright, both of whom were gospel music singers. Lola's mother also was born in Ohio but her father was a native of North Dakota, who in 1930 supported the family by working as an inspector in a local insulating business.

Albright attended King Grammar School and graduated from West High School in Akron in 1942. She sang in public at a young age and studied piano for 20 years. Beginning when she was 15 years old, she worked after school as a receptionist at radio station WAKR in Akron. She left WAKR at the age of 18 and moved to Cleveland, taking a job as a stenographer at WTAM radio. There she met and quickly 

married, in 1944, the radio announcer Warren Dean. The couple moved to Chicago, but divorced five years later, after which she went to Los Angeles and was soon spotted by a talent scout from MGM during a modelling shoot, which led to her moving to Hollywood at the age of 23.

The studio changed her name to Lola Deem and cast her as a singing extra in The Pirate with Gene Kelly and Easter Parade (both 1948) with Fred Astaire and Judy Garland. Snapped up by Harry Cohn at Columbia Pictures, and now calling herself Lola Albright, she appeared in almost 20 features between 1949 and 1951 including the romantic drama Tulsa (1949), the thriller Frightened City and the western 

Lola & Kirk Douglas

Sierra Passage (all 1950). Throughout the early 1950s she also modelled for the pin-up painter Gil Elvgren.

After featuring in the spy-drama Arctic Flight (1952), she appeared in the romantic drama The Brave and the Beautiful (1955) with Anthony Quinn and Maureen O’Hara. In 1950, Lola Albright had married the actor Jack Carson. But cracks in the marriage appeared early on; he wanted a wife and homemaker, she wanted the movies, and they divorced in 1957, the same year that Peter Gunn debuted.

                             

She then became one of television’s busiest actresses, guest-starring on popular television shows such as Gunsmoke and, from 1955-57, appearing as Kay Michaels on The Bob Cummings Show. She also released the albums Lola Wants You (1957), and Dreamsville (1959), for which she collaborated with Henry Mancini, the composer of the Peter Gunn theme. 

Lola with Henry Mancini

In 1961 she married the pianist and restaurant owner William Chadney. They separated shortly afterwards, finally divorcing in 1974. Also in 1961, she starred in Alexander Singer's A Cold Wind in August. Her performance gave fresh impetus to her film career, leading to roles in Elvis Presley's musical Kid Galahad in 1962, in which she played the hard-boiled, long-time girlfriend of a cynical boxing manager played by Gig Young; and in French director René Clément's Joy House as a wealthy widow with a passion for handing out meals to the poor (albeit with an ulterior motive). In Lord Love a Duck (1966) she portrayed a 
cocktail waitress who turns suicidal when she thinks she has ruined her daughter Tuesday Weld's life. The next year she was in the Western epic The Way West.

She spent the early 1960s predominately on the small screen with appearances in The Beverly Hillbillies and Wagon Train. When the actress Dorothy Malone fell ill, Lola Albright was drafted in to play her role as Constance McKenzie in the soap opera Peyton Place (1964). Thereafter she cropped up in comedies such as Lord Love a Duck (1966), as well as The Man from U.N.C.L.E. and, with David Niven, The Impossible Years (1968), after which she announced her retirement. Chadney objected to her long working hours in the studios. “I’ve always put the man in my life ahead of my happiness and my career,” she said, before divorcing him and returning to work.

Lola Albright retired for good from the screen in the 1980s having won a new generation of fans with roles in Kojak, Columbo, Starsky and Hutch, The Incredible Hulk and Airwolf.

Following her retirement from acting, Albright spent her remaining years living in Toluca Lake, California. In 2014, she fell and fractured her spine, an injury that contributed to a general decline in her health over the next three years, but despite her problems she continued to dress with a style that left those who met her in no doubt that she had once been a star. “Your forties are your best time,” she said in one of her last interviews. “If I had my druthers about when to live a whole life, I would say in the forties. Just stay there.”

On March 23, 2017, Albright died of natural causes in a home in the Toluca Lake enclave of Los Angeles at the age of 92.  (Edited from Wikipedia & The Telegraph)

Here's a clip of Lola Albright performing  "How High the Moon." from the television series Peter Gunn (Season 1, Episode 5, entitled "The Frog") Featuring Shorty Rogers on the flugelhorn.

George Hamiltom IV born 19 July 1937

George Hege Hamilton IV (July 19, 1937 – September 17, 2014) was an American country musician. He began performing in the late 1950s as a teen idol, switching to country music in the early 1960s.

Hamilton was born in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Whilst being a 19-year-old student at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 
Hamilton recorded "A Rose and a Baby Ruth" for a Chapel Hill record label, Colonial Records. The song, written by John D. Loudermilk, climbed to No. 6 on the United States Billboard Hot 100 chart. By 1960, "A Rose and a Baby Ruth" had attained gold record status for ABC-Paramount (which had acquired the song from Colonial). The self-penned B-side of the record, "If You Don't Know", revealed Hamilton's ambitions to be a rockabilly-country singer.

After a string of pop hits, Hamilton joined the Rockabilly Tour playing with Eddie Cochran, Buddy Holly, Everly Brothers, Little Richard and several others throughout the country. George was 

then invited to Washington, DC to become a member of the cast of the Jimmy Dean Show where he performed regularly with Patsy Cline and Jimmy Dean. He also appeared on Dick Clark’s “American Bandstand”, Arthur Godfrey “Talent Scouts”, and the Perry Como Show. Hamilton also went on to host his own National Television Musical/Variety shows on ABC and CBS in the late 1950’s. In late 1959, Hamilton moved his family to Nashville, Tennessee to further his work as a country musician. On February 8, 1960, Hamilton officially became a member of the Grand Ole Opry. Later that same year, he began recording for RCA Records, having been signed by Chet Atkins.

                             

Hamilton's breakthrough hit was the 1961 song "Before this Day Ends". His biggest hit came two years later with "Abilene", another song penned by Loudermilk and Bob Gibson. The song spent four weeks at No. 1 on Billboard's country singles chart and reached the 

Gene Vincent, George and Eddie Cochran April 1957.

Top 20 of the Hot 100. The success of "Abilene" was followed with the song "Fort Worth, Dallas or Houston" (a Top 5 hit in late 1964).

In 1962, Hamilton started the first Music City USA & Homes of the Stars Bus Tour in Nashville. By the mid-1960s, Hamilton's music began showing a decidedly folk influence. This was especially evident with 1966's "Steel Rail Blues" and "Early Morning Rain" (both by Gordon Lightfoot), and 1967's "Urge for Going" by Joni Mitchell. Another 1967 hit was "Break My Mind" (by John D. Loudermilk). One more Hamilton song of this genre was a moderate hit in 1969—the Ray Griff-penned "Canadian Pacific". His last Top 5 single came in 1970, with "She's a Little Bit Country".

George with Roy Orbison & Dottie West - 1965

After his American chart success declined in the early 1970s, Hamilton began touring the world, across the Soviet Union, Poland, Australia, the Middle East, and East Asia. These widely acclaimed international performances earned Hamilton the nickname The International Ambassador of Country Music. He also hosted several successful television programs in the UK and Canada during the 1970s, and in the 1990s he played himself in the West End musical Patsy, based on the life of Patsy Cline. In 1980’s Hamilton appeared with Billy Graham on Ministry Tours throughout the US, Canada, and including the UK tour 'Mission England'.

In 2004, he recorded an acoustic gospel album with producer Dave Moody titled On a Blue Ridge Sunday which earned Hamilton a Dove Award nomination in the "Best Bluegrass Album of the Year" category by the members of the Gospel Music Association.

Until the very late years of his life, Hamilton was a regular at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville and in country shows throughout the U.S. and the UK. Hamilton celebrated his 50th year as a Grand Ole Opry member in 2010. He mainly concentrated on gospel tours both at home and abroad. In 2007 he collaborated 

with Live Issue, a group from Northern Ireland, to record a live album based on the life of Joseph Scriven, who wrote the hymn "What a Friend We Have in Jesus". The two also toured together again in 2009.

In 2008, Hamilton released a parody of his classic hit "Abilene" in the height of the soaring U.S. gas prices called "Gasoline". The acoustic single featured "The Oil Spots" (a.k.a. the Moody Brothers & George Hamilton V) and became a hit with audiences during Hamilton's Opry appearances. Hamilton was also a regular participant in the Country's Family Reunion video series.

In 2010, Lamon Records released the album Old Fashioned Hymns, recorded transatlantic with producers Dave Moody in Nashville and Colin Elliott in Ireland. Hamilton was joined on the 28-track collection by a number of musical guests, including Ricky Skaggs, Marty Stuart, Gail Davies, Pat Boone, Del McCoury, Bill Anderson, Connie Smith, Tommy Cash, Cliff Barrows, and George Beverly Shea, among others.

Hamilton had a heart attack on September 13, 2014, and died on September 17 at Saint Thomas Midtown Hospital in Nashville. (Edited from Wikipedia)

Here’s a clip of George Hamilton IV singing"Truck Driving Man" / "Abilene" / "Early Morning Rain" / "Canadian Pacific" In-Concert on Irish Television with Sandy Kelly & Barbara Ellis along with the Sandy Kelly Band. (circa mid-2000s)

Don Bagley born 18 July 1927

Donald Neff "Don" Bagley (July 18, 1927 – July 26, 2012) was an American jazz bassist.

Don Bagley was born in Salt Lake City the youngest son of Lewis Loraine and Laurance Elaine Bagley. He received formal training in double bass also earning degrees from Los Angeles City College 
and Pierce College also in Los Angeles. Professionally, Don started with the Hollywood Teenagers in 1944. He studied in Los Angeles and played in 1945 with Shorty Sherock and Wingy Manone.

He then served in the Navy from 1945 until 1949, playing with the Navy band on location as assigned. Following his time in the service, In 1948 he played with Dick Pierce and then with Stan Kenton from 1950 until 1954 and again later in his career. During his time with Kenton, "A Study for Bass" by Bill Russo and "Bags" by Bill Holman were written to feature Bagley's playing.

Kenton surrounded by
Frank Capp, Don Bagley, and Lee Eliott.

In 1954 Bagley began heading his own bands. He was quite busy as a session musician as well; Bagley recorded in Los Angeles with Nat "King" Cole, Maynard Ferguson and Dexter Gordon from 1950-52, then did overseas dates with Zoot Sims, Lars Gullin and a sextet led by Frank Rosolino and Ake Persson in Paris and Sweden in 1953. Bagley worked extensively with Kenton again and with Les Brown between 1956 and 1967, but still found the time to record in 1957 and 1958 with bands whose rosters included at times Jimmie Rowles, Shelly Manne and Phil Woods.

                               

In 1957 and 1958 he recorded three albums under his own name. In 1959 he played with Pete Fountain and in 1961 he did a session with Ben Webster. In 1964 he performed in Japan with Julie London. Don was a much sought after and admired arranger, 
producer, composer and conductor and he continued to work on projects in his later years and was constantly augmenting his vast knowledge taking classes and participating in forums and workshops.

In his career he worked with Burt Bacharach and Shelly Manne, among countless others. He toured with legendary jazz performers and popular artists including June Christie and Sarah Vaughan. He arranged, played and conducted for many recordings including Carols De Christmas which went platinum. Don's work can also be heard in the many movies and T.V. shows, including the score for the first Spiderman movie.

A consummate Jazz bassist, Don released three solo albums, Basically Bagley, Jazz On The Rocks and Soft Sell. He conducted several Christmas productions with The London Symphony and The Mormon Tabernacle Choir. Don was a member of The Songwriter's Guild, The Composers and Lyricists Guild and The American Society of Music Arrangers and Composers where he served on its board of directors. In addition, he was a long time member of musicians local 47 in Los Angeles.

He died on July 26, 2012 in Northridge, California.