The world lost Cecil Payne today. He didn’t quite make it to his eighty-fifth birthday. Born on December 14, 1922, Payne was thought by many of his peers to be the greatest baritone saxophonist of the first bop generation. He anchored Dizzy Gillespie’s seminal big band from 1946 to 1949 and went on to play with dozens of leaders including James Moody, Duke Jordan, Kenny Dorham, Randy Weston, John Coltrane, Woody Herman, Tadd Dameron, Coleman Hawkins, Count Basie and Lionel Hampton.
Cecil Payne
Payne never got the recognition his talent should have brought him. The kindest and most considerate of men, his personality was reflected in the gentle tone with which he played even the most involved lines. Early in this century, beginning to lose his eyesight and not wishing to be a bother, he disappeared into the life of a virtual hermit in his Brooklyn home, eating little and growing weak. Concerned friends eventually arranged for meals to be taken to him and when he got his strength back saw that he had transportation to engagements with close colleagues and younger musicians. He continued playing until he went into a nursing home about a year ago. For a combination obituary and tribute go here.
This page has a selection of many of Cecil Payne’s CDs. The first album under his own name, Patterns Of Jazz (1956) is there, without a picture of the cover. Don’t overlook it. Savoy has evidently let that classic 1956 album with Kenny Dorham and Duke Jordan go out of print. It has an unforgettable version of Randy Weston’s “Saucer Eyes.” It is available from various web sites and auctions for as much as seventy-eight dollars. That makes this twenty-seven-dollar offering a bargain.