It's pretty difficult to talk about Harry James without mentioning his famous wife, Betty Grable, and indeed they were a well-known couple for over twenty years, a union that also produced two children. But this is a place for musical discussions, and although Betty did make a number of movies that included lots of singing and dancing, we're going to focus mostly on Harry.
I think I began noticing him about the time I first became a fan of swing music, although he didn't grab my attention the way the bigger names such as Goodman, Ellington, Dorsey and Miller did. But Harry was part of a landmark musical event that always fascinated me — Benny Goodman's 1938 Carnegie Hall concert — so I did notice him. When Benny put together the all-star group for that event, he included many of his former band-mates who'd gone on to form their own successful bands, and Harry was a prime example. He was featured as soloist on several songs in that concert.
He was probably the most talented former circus musician to ever hit the big time, but it didn't happen right away for him. His mother was an aerialist and his father was the bandleader for the Mighty Haag Circus, which certainly prepared young Harry for the life of a musician, but he still had to work his way into mainstream music. His biggest break occurred in 1936 when he was hired by Benny, who was a big star by then. Harry soon gained fame himself and left Benny's band to form his own group.
His band struggled at first, and that lack of success contributed to losing vocalist Frank Sinatra to the bigger and more successful Tommy Dorsey band. Even though Harry had given Sinatra his start, he understood the move and it just made him more determined to make his own band a success. After a couple of years of continued struggles, he finally softened and sweetened the sound of his band, even adding a string section, and began to build a following. (Although he lost some jazz fans.)
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