Art Hodes

Bebop? Avant-garde? Yeah, I heard of them. I also heard of these kids called the Bright Brothers – Wright Brothers? – who claim they can make you fly. It'll never catch on, none of it.

In 1998, he was inducted into the Big Band and Jazz Hall of Fame.

He toured the UK in 1987, recording with drummer John Petters. In 1988, he returned to appear at the Cork jazz Festival with Petters and Wild Bill Davison. A tour, the "Legends of American Dixieland", followed in May 1989 with the same line-up.

He remained an educator and writer in jazz. During this period of his life and into the 1970s, Hodes resided in south suburban Park Forest, Illinois.

In the late 1960s, Hodes starred in a series of TV shows on Chicago style jazz called Jazz Alley. Here he appeared with musicians such as Pee Wee Russell and Jimmy McPartland. Episodes of the show have been released on DVD.

Later Hodes founded his own band in the 1940s and it would be associated with his hometown of Chicago. He and his band played mostly in that area for the next forty years.

Hodes was born in Ukraine. His family settled in Chicago, Illinois when he was a few months old. His career began in Chicago clubs, but he did not gain wider attention until moving to New York City in 1938. In that city he played with Sidney Bechet, Joe Marsala, and Mezz Mezzrow.

Art Hodes was born on November 14, 1904 in Nikolayev, Kherson Governorate, Russian Empire as Arthur W. Hodes.