Giuseppe "Joe" Venuti was an American jazz musician and pioneer jazz violinist.
34 Facts About Joe Venuti
2.
Joe Venuti recorded commercial dance records for OKeh under the name "New Yorkers".
3.
Joe Venuti worked with Benny Goodman, Adrian Rollini, the Dorsey Brothers, Bing Crosby, Bix Beiderbecke, Jack Teagarden, Frank Signorelli, the Boswell Sisters, and most of the other important white jazz and semi-jazz figures of the late 1920s and early 1930s.
4.
However, following Lang's death in 1933, Joe Venuti's career began to wane, though he continued performing through the 1930s, recording a series of commercial dance records for the dime store labels, as well as OKeh and Columbia, plus the occasional jazz small group sessions.
5.
Joe Venuti was a strong early influence on western swing players like Cecil Brower.
6.
Joe Venuti was with him during that time, and was active with the Las Vegas Symphony Orchestra during the 1960s.
7.
Joe Venuti recorded an entire album with country-jazz musicians including mandolinist Jethro Burns, pedal steel guitarist Curly Chalker and former Bob Wills sideman and guitarist Eldon Shamblin.
8.
Joe Venuti was well known for giving out conflicting information regarding his early life, including his birthplace and birth date as well as his education and upbringing.
9.
Joe Venuti was classically trained in the violin from a young age, and studied solfeggio with his grandfather.
10.
Joe Venuti later said that while he studied music from him, he did not learn any one instrument but rather music theory in general.
11.
Joe Venuti began studying the violin in Philadelphia, and later claimed to have studied at a conservatory, without providing any corroborating details.
12.
Joe Venuti spent time in the early 1900s playing in the James Campbell School Orchestra in the violin section.
13.
Between 1927 and 1929, Lang and Joe Venuti were leading bands and performing in Atlantic City.
14.
Joe Venuti then returned to New York in 1929 to play with Paul Whiteman's orchestra from 1929 to 1931.
15.
Joe Venuti appeared in the film King of Jazz with the band.
16.
Joe Venuti was less successful as a big band leader than as a soloist, and the band folded in 1943.
17.
Joe Venuti moved to California in 1944 to become a studio musician with MGM, in addition to playing with other film and radio studios.
18.
Joe Venuti appeared regularly on Bing Crosby's radio show during this time.
19.
Later, Joe Venuti returned to a small group format and continued to play and record in and around Los Angeles, while touring frequently.
20.
Joe Venuti continued to tour and play until his death in 1978.
21.
Joe Venuti pioneered the violin as a solo instrument to the jazz world.
22.
Joe Venuti was known for a fast, "hot" playing style characteristic of jazz soloists in the 1920s.
23.
Joe Venuti's solos have been described as incredibly rhythmic with patterns of duplets and running eighth and sixteenth notes.
24.
Joe Venuti favored a lively, fast tempo that showed off his superior technique.
25.
Joe Venuti was a virtuosic player with a wide range of techniques, including left-hand pizzicato and runs spanning the length of the fingerboard.
26.
Joe Venuti frequently implemented slides common in blues and country fiddle playing.
27.
Apart from his impressive playing style, Joe Venuti was known for his practical jokes.
28.
Joe Venuti was known to play inexpensive violins, since many of his former band members have said that he had been known to crack these over the heads of other musicians on occasion.
29.
Joe Venuti was well known for having called every bass player in the New York phonebook and asking them to meet with him on a street corner.
30.
Joe Venuti once tipped the inebriated and unconscious Bix Beiderbecke into a bath filled with purple jello.
31.
Wingy Manone reported that Joe Venuti was married to a woman named "Sally", and in 1950, the Los Angeles Times reported on his divorce from a woman named "Dorothy".
32.
Joe Venuti suffered from alcoholism in his middle age, throughout the 1950s and early 1960s.
33.
Joe Venuti was able to recover, and to regain his former acclaim for his playing.
34.
Joe Venuti died on August 14,1978 in Seattle, Washington, of either cancer or a heart attack.