Don Rendell RIP

[BLUESNIK'S REVOX]

"Tributes are pouring in to Don Rendell who
has died at the age of 89. The saxophonist,
flautist and clarinettist who began his jazz
career as a teenager, later joining the Oscar
Rabin band and the Dankworth Seven, was
influenced by Lester Young and later John
Coltrane..." London Jazz Obit.

I've also seen US reports that Mark Murphy died this week.

BN.

[Alyn_Shipton]

BN in case you've not seen it, my mini obit of Don: http://www.jazzwisemagazine.com/brea...926-20-10-2015 And yes, Mark M has croaked his last.

[Lordgeous]

Sad news. My memories of Don come from a strange source: BBC Schools music programmes which we both worked on regularily in the 1960s/70s. Don played everything windy, myself everything keyboardy. A lovely man and a great musician.

[Ian Thumwood]

Don Rendell was one of the tutors when I went to Wavendon in 1991. He spoke humbly about jazz but I will always remember him for his dry sense of humour. He reduced one of the female students to tears of laughter with one of his stories and his presence was one of the highlights for me. There were several musicians on that course who made an impression and he was one of the best.

[BLUESNIK'S REVOX]

Don Rendell was one of the tutors when I went to Wavendon in 1991. He spoke humbly about jazz but I will always remember him for his dry sense of humour. He reduced one of the female students to tears of laughter with one of his stories and his presence was one of the highlights for me. There were several musicians on that course who made an impression and he was one of the best.

I always liked Ian Carr's story, I think from one of Alyn's programs, of Ian and Don standing outside the Flamingo in the early 60s with Don mumbling "its Sodom, Sodom in there, and out here". Mr Rendell being a Jehovah's Witness or similar.

Sodom indeed.

Some great records from that band.





BN,

[Tom Audustus]

The first real jazz gig I went to was to see Don Rendell playing as the guest soloist with the local house band at Newport Jazz club on a cold wet Autumn Monday evening in 1972(?). I was a spotty teenager who was into prog rock at the time and the pub function room was packed out with a great atmosphere. I was blown away by the experience and loved the music ever since.

[Tenor Freak]

RIP Don, I also learned a lot from hanging with him at the old JAWS workshops at WLIHE in Isleworth back in the 1980s. The way he played was described to me at the time as being Lester Young via Trane which I think was a fair assessment. I didn't get to know him all that well because there were two sax groups, and I was in the other (led by Tim Whitehead). However my overarching memory of him was of being a top bloke who would help anyone out. I have one of his books, about playing the flute (which has compositions by Barbara Thompson!).

Shit, it's not fair that so many of the British greats have passed on. It's not that long ago that you couldn't move through west London without seeing gigs by the like of Olav Vass, Bill Le Sage or Don Rendell advertised in venues now long since shut down or turned into branches of the Golden Arches. I didn't go. Now I wish I had.