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One of the all-time great jazz tenor saxophonists, born Lawrence Freeman in Chicago on April 13th 1906. He was an early alumnus of the Austin High School Gang (which evolved into the Chicagoans and then became Husk O'Hare's Wolverines). The nucleus of these groups included at various times such illustrious personnel as the cornettist Jimmy McPartland, pianist Joe Sullivan, clarinettist Benny Goodman, guitarist/banjoist Eddie Condon, drummers Gene Krupa and George Wettling, plus the short-lived clarinet and alto sax player Frank Teschemacher. These men essentially represented what became known as the high energy, free-wheeling 'Chicago-style' of jazz.
Having switched from C Melody to tenor sax by 1925, Freeman went on to a prolific and varied career which encompassed being the front man of several recording groups, to plying his trade as a saxophonist on the transatlantic cruise ship Ile de France, followed by stints in Paris (with his close friend, the drummer Davey Tough) and New York (with cornettist Red Nichols). Adopting what has been described as 'expressionistic swing' (a derivation of the Chicago style of music), Freeman worked with many of the famous big bands of the 1930's, including those of Gene Kardos (1933), Ray Noble (1935-36) and Tommy Dorsey (1936 to 1938: noted for his solos on famous tracks like 'Maple Leaf Rag', 'After You've Gone' and 'Beale Street Blues'), the Casa Loma Orchestra and Eddie Condon's group, with which he recorded his own composition 'The Eel'. Despite a lack of formal training, Freeman maintained a reputation for high-spirited, skillful and fluent playing, often creating his own rhythm by prodigious use of unison riffs. He was said to have been an influence on the great Lester Young.
Freeman briefly led his own band, the Summa Cum Laude Orchestra from April 1939 to July 1940, even participating in a short-lived musical revue, "Swinging that Dream". During wartime military service, he fronted an army band based at Ft. George, Maryland, and subsequently in the Aleutians. For the remainder of his career, Freeman worked as a sideman or as leader of smaller combos, including at the Gaffer Club in Chicago (which he part-owned), a trio with residency at the Copacabana Hotel in Rio de Janeiro (1947), and, another, at the Metropole Café in New York (1954). He toured Europe in 1967 with the musical "Jazz from a swinging Era'. From 1969 to 1971, he made concert appearances and copious recordings with an association known as The World's Greatest Jazz Band. A self-described Anglophile, Freeman spent most of the 1970's living in London, but eventually returned to Chicago in 1980. Among his extensive free-lance recordings are sessions with Jess Stacy, Lee Wiley, Jack Teagarden, Wingy Manone and Teddy Wilson. Freeman's best-known compositions include 'After Awhile', 'The Eel', 'Craz-e-ology' and 'Tillie's Downtown Now'.
