When
Luigi Paulino Alfredo Francesco Antonio Ballassoni began playing the drums and also auditioned in a competition in tapdancing, he was only three years of age.
Luigi´s Italian parents had arrived to the USA to Rock Falls, Illonois, in 1922 and the little
Luigi was born two years later in 1924.
At the age of 16 Luigi had his name changed from
Luigi Paulino Alfredo Francesco Antonio Ballassoni to the more american sounding name
Louie Bellson.
Then in 1940 he won the
GENE KRUPA - drums competition in front of 40.000 other competitors throughout the USA, and from then on he made himself a career as one of the major Big Band drummers in jazz music in the 1940´s-1950´s.
First
Louie Bellson played the drums in the
Benny Goodman Orchestra, then with the
Tommy Dorsy Big Band, then the
Harry James Orchestra and finally the
Count Basie Orchestra in 1950, before he made it with
THE DUKE - Duke Ellington from 1951, while he had his own sextet with
Charlie Shavers and
Terry Gibbs.
First recording with
THE DUKE was the album "Ellington Uptown", Columbia Records 1952. Then he toured around the world in
The Duke´s band untill 1955, where he left the band and began teaching back home in Rock Falls, Ill., and
Louie Bellson wrote 7 books on drumming. He also accompained his wife Pearl Bailey occationally.
In 1967 he was the leader of two individual Big Bands.
Louie Bellson has performed
THE DUKE`s suite "Black, Brown And Beige", more times than any other jazz musician during the 1990´s.
From 1967
Louie Bellson had become a celebrity in drumming, having been the first drummer at the age of 15 to expand the drums with two kicking drums, of course having the exclusive master of drumming in the past
GENE KRUPA for his personal idol.
The following years 1967-1991 he recorded, performed and toured with musicians like
Benny Carter, Harry "Sweet" Edison, Milt Hinton, Joe Williams, Louis Armstrong, Dizzy Gillespie, Ella Fitzgerald, Tony Bennett, Lionel Hampton, Oscar Peterson and
Woody Herman.
For many years
Louie Bellson was connected to the
Norman Granz record company Pablo, and he was at the Montreux Jazz Festival every year in a new band. He was a regular member of the famous
Oscar Peterson Big 6 band, counting
Peterson (piano)
Joe Pass (guitar),
Milt Jackson (vibes)
Toots Thielemans (harmonica) and the great dane
Nils Pedersen a.k.a.
NHØP (double bass). Listen to
Oscar Peterson and the Big 6 on the album "The Big 6 at Montreux 1975", by Pablo Records 1975.
From the middle of the 1990´s
Louie Bellson began composing music for various members of symphony orchestras and smaller string bands.
Some of
Louie Bellson´s best (IMHO) recordings are:
"Louie Bellson Quintet", by Norgran Records 1954
"Big Band Jazz From The Summit", by Roulette Records 1962
"The L. B. Big Band - 150 MPH", by Concord Records 1974
"Louie Bellson Jam", by Pablo Records 1978
"The L. B. Big Band - Dynamite" by Concord Records 1979
"The London Gig", by Pablo Records 1982