Bill Finegan

[joelf]

IMO arrangers count too, and are often uncredited or undercredited.

Do people here know Bill's work? I think he was an all-time great (also a great man and important mentor to myself and others).

He was first known in his early 20s for arranging monster hits for Glenn Miller, such as Little Brown Jug. He gained more renown as partner w/Eddie Sauter in Sauter-Finegan. I never did find out who wrote what, since when I asked he modestly rejoined 'We wrote everything together'. He showed a sense of humor on those recordings by beating on his chest on Sleigh Ride.

Went on to arrange for top singers and instrumentalists too numerous to mention. He knew classical music inside out as well, and string writing in any style was mother's milk for him.

Later in life he taught at, I believe, the University of Bridgeport (he lived in nearby Monroe, CT and taught privately there) and helped turn out some first-class musicians.

The respect other top musicians had for he and his work ran very deep: Jim Hall, Bob Brookmeyer and Dr. Billy Taylor praised him highly to me and publicly---every chance they got. He was advisor to both Mr. Hall and Brookmeyer.

Examples of his charts to be posted later...

[Webby]

Love Finegan!
We play some of his Charts with my Big Band.
Dropbox - Gramophoniacs_Big_Band-Chloe.mp4 - Simplify your life

This is a Clip from a dance Festival we played at last year. The tune is called Chloe.

[joelf]

Interview with Loren Schoenberg, comments by Jim Hall: