After the marriage of Thomas Francis Dorsey and Theresa Langton early in the 20th century, they lived in Shenandoah, Pennsylvania and had four children although we are only concerned with the two oldest—James or Jimmy (born in 1904) as he was known and Thomas Francis, Jr. or Tommy (born 1905). The elder Thomas was a coal miner who played the trumpet and eventually became a bandleader and music teacher. He taught both his sons to play the trumpet which both did quite well. In 1913, Jimmy was playing trumpet in J. Carson McGhee’s King Trumpeters. By 1915, he started learning sax and then clarinet after that.
Tommy, on the other hand, also started learning the trombone. At 15, Jimmy got Tommy a gig in a territorial band called the Scranton Sirens which he also belonged to. But after a while, the Dorsey brothers decided to form their own band—Dorsey’s Novelty Six—with Tommy usually on trombone and Jimmy usually on clarinet or sax but neither of them gave up the trumpet and continued to play and record with it throughout their careers.
The Rhythm Jugglers from 1925. Tommy Dorsey stands at far right. The man with his arm around him is the great Bix Beiderbecke.
In 1928, the Dorseys started their own band on the Okeh label simply called the Dorsey Brothers. Although personnel changed over time, the band contained some of the top-notch white New York jazzmen such as Jack Teagarden on trombone, Eddie Lang on guitar, Bunny Berigan on trumpet, Joe Venuti on violin, Frank Shoemacher on sax, Stan King on drums, Artie Bernstein on bass, Joe Tarto on brass bass, Arthur Schutt on piano and vocalists as Mildred Bailey, Johnny Mercer, Bing Crosby and Bob Crosby. Also a guy named Glenn Miller played trombone for them. They were a studio band and did not tour but were quite popular.
The Dorsey Brothers from 1934. The female vocalist is Kay Weber. To the left of her is Tommy Dorsey. Jimmy stands to the right and Glenn Miller is next to him.
Over the years, the Dorsey Brothers changed labels going to Melotone in 1931, then Columbia that same year and then Brunswick in 1932. They stayed with Brunswick through 1934 until the brothers split up in 1935 and each went their separate ways. They simply were not agreeing on musical direction. Jimmy loved fast-paced, hot swing numbers whereas Tommy wanted to slow things down. The fights were horrible with each brother screaming at the other and smashing their instruments against walls and floor causing crucial rehearsals to be called off. But, in 1935, the band’s last released recordings contained two #1 hits: “Lullaby of Broadway” featuring Bob Crosby on vocals and “Chasing Shadows.”
As solo artists, Tommy would rack up 17 hits while Jimmy would get 11. They would not play together again for a decade when they finally made a V-disc together in 1945. V-discs were recordings made specifically for armed forces fighting overseas. They combined their orchestras for the live sessions. They played together again in 1947 for the movie called “The Fabulous Dorseys.” With their differences ironed out, Tommy and Jimmy wanted to start collaborating again and the public was anxious to see it happen.
Their popularity was such that they were given their own television variety program,
Stage Show (created by Jackie Gleason), in the early to mid-50s. There was no other bandstand show on television at that time so the show had high exposure and was extremely popular. They had many musical guests from jazz and from the new-fangled rock and roll including Elvis Presley who debuted on national television on the Dorsey program in 1956. The sky seemed to be the limit for the brothers when Tommy suddenly died that year by choking to death in his sleep. Tommy had trouble sleeping and started using tranquilizers but was so sedated this time that he didn’t awaken when saliva collected in his throat and he simply choked to death. Jimmy was heartbroken and died the following year of cancer. Jimmy’s last recording, released in 1957 posthumously on the Fraternity label, was appropriately titled “So Rare” as it was a rock and roll recording and very different from anything he had done before! He certainly plays with the fire that had always spurred him on. It sold 500,000 copies earning him a gold record and a #2 slot on the charts. It’s quite good:
Jimmy Dorsey - "So Rare" - YouTube
Tommy Dorsey - I'm Getting Sentimental Over You - YouTube
“Getting Sentimental Over You” is considered Tommy Dorsey’s signature song which demonstrates his skill and substitutes a flatted fifth for the normally flatted seventh which adds a deeper dimension of emotion that is bolstered by his amazing fluidity in the upper register normally only achievable by the trumpet. The harmonies of the reed section are beautiful. The song enjoyed a bit of a rebirth in the early 60s when it was used in an episode of “The Twilight Zone” called “Static” about a bitter, aging man who finds his old radio in the basement and tunes into a live broadcast of Dorsey’s band. When informed that the station had long ago shut down and that Dorsey had died some years before, the man eventually finds himself transported back in time where he has a chance not the let the opportunities go by that he had missed before. I saw this episode as a young boy in the 60s—the first time I had ever heard of Tommy Dorsey and I never forgot him. For years afterward, whenever I heard anybody’s version of “Sentimental” I would feel a little shiver.
The Dorsey band continued on after the deaths of its founders first led by Warren Covington who garnered a #1 hit in 1958—“Tea for Two Cha-Cha.” Sam Donahue took over leadership in 1961 for quite a number of years and then it was taken over by Buddy Morrow who ran the band until his death in 2010. I do not know if the orchestra is still going.
The impact of the Dorseys on jazz cannot be underestimated. Tommy’s trombone playing possessed an impressive pure tone, a marvelous vibrato and could burn through the upper register of an instrument that normally plays baritone. He could play long phrases never losing that pure tone. Virtually anyone who takes up trombone is required to study the playing of Tommy Dorsey.
Jimmy Dorsey picked up a great deal of skill going from Jean Goldkette’s band to Red Nichols and then to Ted Lewis (himself a marvelous clarinetist). He was certainly Goodman’s closest rival on the clarinet and Jimmy deserves a place among the sax greats as Coleman Hawkins and Lester Young and had an even greater impact on be-bop than the other two. Charlie Parker talked about how much he loved to listen to Jimmy play extremely fast staccatos of notes, each precise and clean and musically related and not just filler. This is exactly what inspired Bird to play in his style that would revolutionize the genre.
We should not go so far as to proclaim Dorsey a bopper, he was not. He was a big band man—that was his bread and butter, that was his audience and he certainly knew that a new jazz audience would not likely accept him but Dorsey also knew how to update his sound with intelligence and taste to avoid sounding stale and dated. Jimmy’s band doing a flag-waver from 1944:
SUNSET STRIP ~ Jimmy Dorsey & His Orchestra 1944 - YouTube
While Jimmy was more forward-looking than his brother, we should not write Tommy off as a lightweight. I have seen old 50s footage of Tommy playing with some of the bop greats and, while he does not appear completely at ease (he was staunchly old school) he was certainly not lost and fumbling either.
The Dorseys certainly had something that set them apart from other great white jazzmen who started at the same time but who could not last far into the 30s such as Red Nichols and Miff Mole (but who nevertheless left behind a good body of recorded work). The Dorseys not only hung on for three decades but died at the height of fame. That kind of longevity does not happen without the approval of layman and musician alike.
In 1996, the U.S. Postal Service released a Dorsey Brothers commemorative stamp:
