Jazz-funk: “Kentucky Fried Chicken”

George Duvivier was an American jazz double bassist with extensive experience in swing, bebop and cool jazz styles. He had a warm tone and an amazing sense of time, and his specialty was to play fast notes in the upper register while providing a sustained and deep support. He was one of the best studio double bassists from the early 1950s to the early 1980s. Born in New York, he studied violin and cello at the Conservatory of Music and Art. He later switched to double bass and enrolled in the New York University, where he learned arrangements and composition. In the early 1940s he played with father of jazz tenor saxophone Coleman Hawkins and saxophonist and clarinetist Eddie Barefield.

Duvivier also toured with Lucky Millinder’s rhythm and blues and swing big band, and then with that of singer Cab Calloway, bringing many tunes to both. After military service, Duvivier made arrangements for Jimmy Lunceford’s big band and later joined Sy Oliver’s as a double bassist and arranger. During the 1950s he toured Europe with singers Lena Horne and Nellie Lutcher, as well as appearing in commercials, television shows and film soundtracks. From 1953 to 1957 he collaborated with bebop pianist Bud Powell, in 1956 released his only album as a leader with the French pianist Martial Solal, and from 1957 to 1959 was a member of tenor saxophonist Eddie “Lockjaw” Davis’s quartet.

From then on Duvivier was exclusively a studio musician accompanying countless artists, such as singers Sarah Vaughan, Shirley Scott, Etta Jones and Frank Sinatra; alto saxophonists Sonny Stitt and Al Cohn; alto saxophonist, flautist and bass clarinetist Eric Dolphy; tenor saxophonists Lester Young, Ben Webster, Gene Ammons, Stan Getz and Stanley Turrentine; baritone saxophonist Gerry Mulligan; clarinetist Benny Goodman; trumpeters Dizzy Gillespie, Red Rodney, Clark Terry and Art Farmer; guitarists Kenny Burrell and George Benson; vibraphonist Milt Jackson; pianists Count Basie, John Lewis, Oliver Nelson, Randy Weston and Mal Waldron; organist Jimmy Smith; double bassist Ron Carter; drummer Shelly Manne, and many others. In the late 1970s he toured with saxophonist Benny Carter’s and pianist Hank Jones’s groups. Duvivier died in 1985 of cancer at the age of 64.