Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, March 9, 1993 TAG: 9303090272
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 6 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: PITTSBURGH LENGTH: Medium
POPULAR SINGER-BANDLEADER BILLY ECKSTINE DIES AT 78
Singer-bandleader Billy Eckstine, whose warm baritone graced a string of '40s and '50s hits such as "Fools Rush In" and "Everything I Have Is Yours," died Monday. He was 78.Eckstine died Monday morning at Montefiore Hospital in Pittsburgh, said hospital spokesman Mark Kanny. He had suffered a stroke last year.
Known as "Mr. B," Eckstine sang romantic ballads in a strong, vibrant baritone, with impeccable diction.
He was one of America's most popular vocalists in the late 1940s and early '50s, and the first black singer to make the cover of Life magazine and to become a national sex symbol. Hip young men copied his style of dress, shirts with rolled collars and jackets draped off the body.
His hit records between 1945 and 1951 also included "A Cottage for Sale," "Prisoner of Love," "I Surrender, Dear," "Everything I Have is Yours," "Blue Moon," "My Foolish Heart," "Caravan," "Body and Soul" and "I Apologize." His last big hit was "Passing Strangers," a duet with Sarah Vaughan.
Eckstine played valve trombone as well as singing. In his band at one time or another were Dizzy Gillespie, Fats Navarro, Miles Davis, Gene Ammons, Dexter Gordon, Charlie Parker, Sonny Stitt, Art Blakey, Lucky Thompson and Vaughan.
Unlike the kind of accompaniment most swing bands had provided singers, the Eckstine band played powerful, thick chords and rhythmically complex figures behind Eckstine and Vaughan.
William Clarence Eckstine was born July 8, 1914, in Pittsburgh. He grew up in Washington, D.C., and attended Howard University. He won an amateur show by imitating Cab Calloway, singing a nursery-rhyme lyric with interpolated scatting. He worked in small clubs, moving west to Chicago.
He was hired as vocalist with Earl "Fatha" Hines' Grand Terrace Orchestra in 1939.
Eckstine heard Vaughan at an amateur show in 1942 and encouraged Hines to hire her. While with Hines, Eckstine taught himself to play trumpet and valve trombone. He recorded as vocalist on two blues hits, "Jelly, Jelly" and "Stormy Monday."
Eckstine left Hines in 1943 and spent a year as a solo nightclub act before founding his own big band, which featured the then-emerging bebop style.
The band was active only three years, 1944 to 1947, because of economic difficulties but had pivotal influence on bebop. He took up singing of the love songs that pushed him to wider stardom.