Coleman Hawkins was one of the leading American jazz players of the pre-war era
and is widely credited with the being one of the first to see the potential of
the tenor sax as a solo instrument in jazz.
Hawkins attended high school in Topeka, Kansas and benefited from a musical
education which included studying harmony and composition as well as learning
the piano and cello. He moved to New York in the early 1920s joining the Jazz
Hounds led by vaudeville singer Mamie Smith. In the 1930s Hawkins' reputation as
a gifted sax player grew and he performed on some of the best known...