Sidney Bechet: Biography from Answers.com Mobile

Sidney Bechet

(born May 14, 1897, New Orleans, La., U.S. — died May 14, 1959, Paris, France) U.S. saxophonist. He took up the clarinet at age six, later switching to the more powerful soprano saxophone. His emergence as a soloist from the New Orleans tradition of collective improvisation (see Dixieland) established his reputation in the mid-1920s. He produced a large, warm tone with a wide and rapid vibrato. His mastery of drama and his use of critically timed deviations in pitch ("note bending") had a long-lasting influence, because they were absorbed by his disciple Johnny Hodges. From the late 1940s he was based in Paris.

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