Frank Morgan, 73, a Bebop Progenitor

Frank Morgan, who died Friday in Minneapolis on Friday at 73, was a bebop original, a hard-paying protégé of New Jazz’s inventor, Charlie Parker.Morgan emulated Parker in more ways than one. In addition to being the exemplar of bebop’s purest and most expressively baroque form, he also acquired Parker’s infamous drug habit. This stunted what could have been one of the all-time great careers in jazz, as Morgan wound up spending most of what should have been his most productive years in prison. Yet he blossomed in the mid-1980s, and spent the last two decades touring and recording to make up for lost time.Born December 23, 1933, in Minneapolis, Morgan was raised in Milwaukee, the son of a guitarist best known for his work with the popular vocal quartet the Ink Spots. His father exposed him to Charlie Parker in 1940, while Parker was still playing in Jay McShann’s orchestra, and years before he shattered jazz by inventing bebop.Parker not only inspired the young Morgan to play alto sax, but recommended that he begin his training on clarinet. Parker even picked out Morgan’s first horn. “I am a bebopper stone through, I was a be-bop criminal. I’m a bebop actor. I want to do that throughout my life,” Morgan told allaboutjazz.com.Morgan remained close with Parker until his death in 1955. He once told critic Gary Giddins, “Bird once said to me that he believed in playing the blues on everything. You could say he was playing the blues all the time, whether it was ‘Parker’s Mood’ or ‘April in Paris.'”When he was 14, Morgan’s family moved to Los Angeles, where he was taught by the famous classical reed instructor Merle Johnston and encouraged by jazz great Benny Carter. He also continued to learn from Parker, and saw him play whenever he came to Hollywood.Morgan’s earliest known recordings are a series of home-recorded jazz sessions taped at the California ranch belonging to painter Jirayr Zorthian in July, 1952. By this time, Morgan was a precocious leading figure on the modern jazz scene of Central Avenue, Los Angeles’s famous Afro-American neighborhood and the West Coast’s equivalent of Harlem or Swing Street.In 1955 and 1956, Morgan recorded two sessions for producer Gene Norman which were issued as a 12″-LP under Morgan’s name, to the surprise of the saxophonist. It would be his first album as a leader, and his last for three decades. Like many other rising young hornists, Morgan’s emulation of Parker spilled over to drugs. “We were all there at the California Club when we heard that Bird had died and […] we proceeded to celebrate Bird’s death by doing the very thing that killed him. That’s the way we celebrated Bird’s passing, to go out and do some junk,” Morgan told Mr. Giddins in “Faces In The Crowd.”Though his drug habit landed him in the California penal system for most of the next two decades, Morgan was surprisingly not bitter about it in later interviews. He played in prison bands, occasionally sharing the stage with fellow bebop alto great (and addict) Art Pepper. “The greatest big band I ever played with was in San Quentin,” he told Mr. Giddins. “We played every Saturday night for what they called a Warden’s Tour … People would take that tour just to hear the band.”But unlike his band mate and fellow inmate Pepper, who died at 56, Morgan got a second act, playing into the 21st century. He recorded a dozen albums between 1985 and 1996, working for both major labels and independents, collaborating with veterans and younger stars such as Roy Hargrove and Wynton Marsalis. To his surprise, he became an elder statesman of jazz, and was much-profiled.A stroke in 1996, when he was 63, slowed him. But in the last few years he enjoyed another comeback. A triumphant week of performances at the Jazz Standard in November, 2003, became the source of (so far) three successful CDs on High Note; in 2006, the label also released a new studio album, “Reflections.” In the last year of his life, Morgan appeared at both the Jazz Standard and Joe’s Pub, and was also mentoring a young jazz prodigy, the same way that Parker had taught him. Morgan’s playing is strong and poignant as ever on that final album. As Mr. Marsalis said in 1988, “There is no one around who is better on alto saxophone. What comes out of his horn is soulful, full of fire, and timeless.”Mr. Friedwald is the Sun’s jazz critic.

Frank Morgan, 73, a Bebop Progenitor

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