Scoville Brown

Scoville Browne, often identified with the endearing nickname of "Toby," was a Georgia boy whose professional musical career began in Chicago in the late '20s with groups such as Junie Cobb's Band and the raucous Midnight Ramblers. From 1931 through the following year Browne blew both alto sax and clarinet for the drummer and bandleader Fred Avendorph. Following that, Louis Armstrong would come into Browne's life for the first and not last time. Each of these encounters would result in extensive growth to the Browne discography, as if someone was scattering sunflower seeds on freshly turned earth. In between stints with Armstrong in 1933 and 1935, the reedman also worked with Jesse Stone and Jack Butler. In the second half of the '30s he gigged with pianist Claude Hopkins, backed up singer Blanche Calloway and in the final years of the decade began studying formally at the Chicago College of Music. Browne was holding forth with the finest in the '40s, climbing onstage with the likes of Slim Gaillard, Fats Waller, Buddy Johnson and Hot Lips Page. He was playing in a trio led by Eddie Heywood when Uncle Sam nabbed him for the war effort. The swinging commenced anew when peace broke out, Browne going back to work for the steadily grooving Hopkins as well as forming a new alliance with the solid trumpeter Buck Clayton. Browne also continued his classical music studies and in the '50s and '60s began to step forward as a bandleader himself. He was a main clarinet soloist with the Lionel Hampton band in 1956 and 1957, and toured overseas with Muggsy Spanier as the '50s came to a close. His relationship with Hopkins continued through the '60s and early '70s, as did his bandleading activities. He doesn't seem to have been given an opportunithy to reacord as a leader,...