Kai Winding

Kai Winding
Kai Winding
	Winding in New York, c. January 1947
Background information
Birth name	Kai Chresten Winding
Born	May 18, 1922; Aarhus, Denmark
Died	May 6, 1983 (aged 60); Yonkers, New York, U.S.
Genres	Jazz
Occupation(s)	Musician, composer
Instrument(s)	Trombone
Years active	1940–1983

Kai Chresten Winding (/ˈkaɪ ˈwɪndɪŋ/ KY WIN-ding;^[a] May 18, 1922 – May 6, 1983)^[2] was a Danish-born American trombonist and jazz composer. He is known for his collaborations with fellow trombonist J. J. Johnson. His version of "More", the theme from the movie Mondo Cane, reached in 1963 number 8 in the Billboard Hot 100 and remained his only entry here.

Biography

Winding was born in Aarhus, Denmark.^[2] His father, Ove Winding was a naturalized U.S. citizen, thus Kai, his mother and sisters, though born abroad were already U.S. citizens. In September 1934, his mother, Jenny Winding, moved Kai and his two sisters, Ann and Alice. Kai graduated in 1940 from Stuyvesant High School in New York City and that same year began his career as a professional trombonist with Shorty Allen's band. Subsequently, he played with Sonny Dunham and Alvino Rey,^[2] until he entered the United States Coast Guard during World War II.

After the war, Winding was a member of Benny Goodman's orchestra, then Stan Kenton's.^[2] He participated in Birth of the Cool sessions in 1949,^[3] appearing on four of the twelve tracks, while J. J. Johnson appeared on the other eight, having participated on the other two sessions.

In 1954, at the urging of producer Ozzie Cadena, Winding began a long association with Johnson,^[2] recording trombone duets for Savoy Records, then Columbia. He experimented with instruments in brass ensembles. The album Jay & Kai + 6 (1956) featured a trombone octet and the trombonium. He composed and arranged many of the works he and Johnson recorded.

During the 1960s, Winding began an association with Verve Records and producer Creed Taylor. He released the first version of "Time Is On My Side" in 1963 before it was recorded by Irma Thomas and The Rolling Stones. His best selling recording from this period is "More," the theme from the movie Mondo Cane, which reached number 8 in the Billboard Hot 100 and remained his only entry here.^[4] Arranged and conducted by Claus Ogerman, "More" featured what is probably the first appearance of the French electronic music instrument the ondioline on an American recording. Although Winding was credited with playing the ondioline, guitarist Vinnie Bell, who worked on the session, claimed that it was played by Jean-Jacques Perrey, a pioneer of electronic music. Winding experimented with ensembles again, recorded solo albums, and one album of country music with the Anita Kerr Singers. He followed Creed Taylor to A&M/CTI and made more albums with J. J. Johnson. He was a member of the all-star jazz group Giants of Jazz in 1971.^[2]

His son, Jai Winding, is a keyboardist who has worked as a session musician, writer and producer in Los Angeles.^[5]

Kai Winding was taken to a hospital because of a reoccurring brain disease that he found out about while in Yonkers, New York, and later died from complications there sometime in 1983.^[6]

Discography

As leader/co-leader

Loaded (1945)
Kai Winding All Stars (Roost, 1949–51 [1952])
Arrangements by Gerry Mulligan (1951)
Brass Fever (1956)
Trombone Panorama (Columbia, 1956)
The Trombone Sound (Columbia, 1956)
The Axidentals with the Kai Winding Trombones (ABC-Paramount, 1958)
The Swingin' States (Columbia, 1958)
Dance to the City Beat (Columbia, 1959)
The Incredible Kai Winding Trombones (Impulse!, 1960)
Kai Olé (Verve, 1961)
Brand New Swinging Together Again (1961)
Suspense Themes in Jazz (Verve, 1962)
The Great Kai Winding Sound (1962)
Soul Surfin' (Verve, 1963) featuring Kenny Burrell – also released as !!!More!!!
Solo (Verve, 1963)
Kai Winding (Verve, 1963)
That's Where It Is (SESAC, 1963)
Mondo Cane No. 2 (Verve, 1964)
Modern Country (Verve, 1965)
Rainy Day (Verve, 1965)
The In Instrumentals (Verve, 1965)
Dirty Dog (Verve, 1966)
More Brass (Verve, 1966)
Penny Lane & Time (Verve, 1967)
Danish Blue (1974)
Caravan (Glendale, 1977)
Jazz Showcase (1977)
Lionel Hampton Presents Kai Winding (1977)
Duo Bones (Red, 1979) with Dino Piana
Giant Bones '80 (Sonet, 1980) with Curtis Fuller
Bone Appétit (Black & Blue, 1980) with Curtis Fuller
Trombone Summit (MPS, 1981) with Albert Mangelsdorff, Bill Watrous, Jiggs Whigham
In Cleveland 1957 (1994)

With J. J. Johnson

The Four Trombones: The Debut Recordings (1953)
An Afternoon at Birdland (RCA, 1954)
Dec. 3, 1954 (Prestige, 1954)
Jay & Kai (Savoy, 1952–54 [1955])
K + J.J. (Bethlehem, 1955)
Trombone for Two (Columbia, 1955)
Trombone by Three (Prestige, 1949 [1956])
Jay and Kai + 6 (Columbia, 1956)
Dave Brubeck and Jay & Kai at Newport (Columbia, 1956)
Jay and Kai (Columbia, 1956)
The Great Kai & J. J. (Impulse!, 1960)
Israel (A&M/CTI, 1968)
Betwixt & Between (A&M/CTI, 1968)
Stonebone (A&M/CTI [Japan], 1969)

As sideman

With Ralph Burns and Leonard Feather

Winter Sequence (MGM, 1954)

With Quincy Jones

1963 Quincy Jones Plays Hip Hits (Mercury, 1963)
1965 Quincy Plays for Pussycats (Mercury, 1959-65 [1965])
1969 Walking in Space
1976 I Heard That!

With Stan Kenton

Stan Kenton's Milestones (Capitol, 1943–47 [1950])
Stan Kenton Classics (Capitol, 1944–47 [1952])
Artistry in Rhythm (Capitol, 1946)
Encores (Capitol, 1947)
The Kenton Era (Capitol, 1940–54, [1955])

With King Pleasure

1954 King Pleasure Sings/Annie Ross Sings
1954 The Original Moody's Mood
1955 King Pleasure

With Pete Rugolo

Rugolomania (Columbia, 1955)
New Sounds by Pete Rugolo (Harmony, 1954–55, [1957])

With Zoot Sims

1949 The Brothers
1952 Zoot Sims All Stars
1962 Good Old Zoot

With Sarah Vaughan

1955 In the Land of Hi-Fi
1957 The George Gershwin Songbook, Vol. 1
1958 The Rodgers & Hart Songbook
1965 Viva! Vaughan

With others

1950 Carnegie Hall X-Mas '49, Charlie Parker
1950 Chubby Jackson All Star Big Band, Chubby Jackson
1951 The George Wallington Trio, George Wallington
1954 Oscar Pettiford Sextet, Oscar Pettiford
1955 This Is Chris, Chris Connor
1955 Jumping with Ventura, Charlie Ventura
1956 Drummer Man, Gene Krupa
1957 Chris, Chris Connor
1957 Birth of the Cool, Miles Davis
1957 The Beat of My Heart, Tony Bennett
1959 Plays Gerry Mulligan Arrangements, Gene Krupa
1962 I Wanna Be Loved, Dinah Washington
1962 Rhythm Is My Business, Ella Fitzgerald
1962 Cabin in the Sky, Curtis Fuller
1963 Any Number Can Win, Jimmy Smith
1963 Broadway, Gerry Mulligan
1964 New Fantasy, Lalo Schifrin
1965 Jazz Dialogue , Modern Jazz Quartet
1965 The Shadow of Your Smile, Astrud Gilberto
1967 Prezervation, Stan Getz
1968 Summertime, Paul Desmond
1969 Chubby Jackson Sextet and Big Band, Chubby Jackson
1971 The Giants of Jazz with Art Blakey, Dizzy Gillespie, Thelonious Monk
1972 Strictly Bebop, Dizzy Gillespie
1973 The Art of the Modern Jazz Quartet, Modern Jazz Quartet
1975 Chase the Clouds Away, Chuck Mangione
1977 Featured with the Tadd Dameron Band, Fats Navarro
1978 Children of Sanchez, Chuck Mangione
1979 Giant Bones, Curtis Fuller
1979 The New Mel Lewis Quintet Live, Mel Lewis^[7]

Notes

^ "'my name is pronounced Kai as in fly, Winding as in woodwind,' he told Crescendo International, though not unreasonably many people mispronounced Kai to rhyme with Jay" (i.e., /ˈkeɪ/, presumably because Winding's partnership with J. J. Johnson led the pair to be nicknamed "Jay and Kai" in the titles of multiple albums).^[1]