George Avakian

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George Mesrop Avakian (

While Avakian was still at Yale University, Decca Records Jack Kapp responded to his unrelenting letters, hiring him to produce his first recording, Chicago Jazz (1940), featuring musicians such as guitarist Eddie Condon, trumpeter Jimmy McPartland, and drummer George Wettling. This became known as the first "jazz album".^[2] It consisted of six 78rpm records, complete with Avakian's liner note essay providing full credits and background information, and set the template for future jazz releases.

By 1940, the swing era was in full bloom, and the

Avakian, in his third year at Yale, leapt at the opportunity to comb through Columbia's vaults in Bridgeport, Connecticut to research and assemble what was to be called the Hot Jazz Classics series. Using the format he established at Decca, Avakian created boxed sets devoted to Louis Armstrong, Bix Beiderbecke, Fletcher Henderson, Bessie Smith, and Billie Holiday, among many others. In the process, he found many unreleased sides and included them in the reissues.

Avakian discovered a number of unreleased Louis Armstrong Hot 5 and Hot 7 sides while researching the first album of the series, King Louis. A strong, decades-long working and personal friendship formed when the young producer brought a few test pressings to play for Armstrong.

While serving in the US Army following his graduation from Yale, he was recalled to the United States in 1944 for special training in European languages at

After the war, he returned to Columbia Records responsible for the Popular Music and International divisions, where he continued production of the Hot Jazz Classics series, as well as the Special Editions and Archives series. In addition to recording jazz and pop artists (such as Sidney Bechet, Arthur Godfrey, Doris Day, and Frank Sinatra), Avakian was assigned the role of head of popular albums, part of which involved issuing the first 100 pop records in the 331⁄3rpm long-playing format, a new technology perfected by Columbia that the company was determined to exploit to the full. Avakian was in the forefront of new methods of production to take advantage of the LP, which represented a marketing innovation no less than a technical one.

At around the same time he returned to Columbia, Avakian also met his wife-to-be,

In 1960, Avakian left Warners to sign on as manager of popular artists and repertoire for RCA, which gave him the opportunity to work once again with jazz musicians. His roster included Lambert, Hendricks, and Bavan; Paul Desmond; Sonny Rollins (signed by Avakian for an unprecedented sum for a jazz musician); Gary Burton; and, once again, Benny Goodman. In 1962, Avakian planned and accompanied the clarinetist's landmark tour of the USSR, which provided him with valuable experience dealing with the Russians that would come in handy within a few short years.

By late 1962, Avakian was once again feeling the pressure of administering a record label on top of his production work, and he negotiated an independent production deal with RCA Records in which he was hired on a per-project basis, relieving him of the busy work. At the same time, he began to manage and produce his own artists as well, beginning with John Lewis and Gunther Schuller's Orchestra U.S.A. ensemble; singer/songwriter Bob Morrison; and saxophonist Charles Lloyd.

Though most known for jazz and pop album production, Avakian notably involved himself in two theater projects. In 1947, he arranged for a group of musicians under the leadership of the saxophonist Eddie Barefield to perform incidental music for the play A Streetcar Named Desire during its Philadelphia and Broadway runs. In 1965, he was an associate producer of the first Off-Broadway revival of Marc Blitzstein's The Cradle Will Rock, and he personally financed the recording of the cast album (the first complete recording of that show).

As the recording industry moved further away from the music closest to his heart, Avakian left RCA in 1964 and never again held a full-time job at a record label. He began working at Avakian Brothers, and through the rest of the 60s and into the 1970s, he managed to hold down that job while launching and running the high-flying career of Charles Lloyd, as well as that of Lloyd's young pianist, Keith Jarrett. Avakian arranged for the Charles Lloyd Quartet, which also featured Jack DeJohnette and Ron McClure, to be the first small American jazz group to perform in the Soviet Union (at the Tallinn Jazz Festival, 1967); he also produced several very successful Lloyd albums for Atlantic Records. Avakian did even more for Jarrett, arranging record deals, managing tours, and producing albums on Columbia, Atlantic, and Impulse. He also negotiated a contract for Jarrett with Manfred Eicher, the founder of a new German label, ECM Records, for whom Jarrett still records as of 2017.

Throughout his career, Avakian worked hard to foster intercultural exchange between the United States and the Soviet Union. He was the first to record Soviet and American artists together (Pavel Lisitsian Sings Armenian Songs With Maro Ajemian At The Piano, New York Records, recorded in 1957, released in 1960). After organizing the

From the 1970s to the 2000s, Avakian continued to keep his hand in occasional record productions, and during the 1980s, he managed two vocalists, Helen Merrill and Datevik Hovanesian. In the 1990s and 2000s, Sony Legacy consulted him for the reissues of several Miles Davis and Louis Armstrong albums and compilations. Avakian also remained active in jazz research and writing and discovered several previously unknown Louis Armstrong compositions at the Library of Congress. In 1997, he produced performances and a recording of them by trumpeter Randy Sandke and other musicians (The Re-Discovered Louis and Bix, on Nagel-Heyer Records, 2000).

Avakian and Anahid Ajemian donated their extensive collection of Jazz recordings and memorabilia to the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center in 2014.^[2] A major exhibit was held there in 2016 entitled Music for Moderns: The Partnership of George Avakian and Anahid Ajemian. Once semi-retired, he became involved in harness racing, owning and breeding several racehorses. Avakian bred champion pacer Presidential Ball.

Avakian died on November 22, 2017, at the age of 98 at his home on the Upper West Side of Manhattan in New York City.^[2] The Avakians had three children: Maro, Anahid, and Gregory

Honors

He is a founding officer of the

• Honorary Doctor of Literature from Colgate University (May 2014)^[3]
• 2011 – Added to the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) Jazz Wall of Fame as a Living Legend Giant of Jazz
• 2011 – "The Louie" Award, Louis Armstrong House Museum
• 2010 – National Endowment for the Arts AB Spellman Jazz Advocacy Award. The nations highest honor in Jazz for his work as a Producer, Manager, Critic, Jazz Historian and Educator.
• 2009 – The Trustees Lifetime Achievement Award (Grammy) from the National Association of Recording Arts and Sciences for contributions to the music industry worldwide.
• 2008 – France awarded the rank of Commandeur des Arts et Lettres in recognition of his significant contributions to the arts
• 2006 – Europe's prestigious jazz award, the Django d'Or
• 2006 – The W.C. Handy Heritage Master & Legend Award
• 2005 – The Armenian Professional Society, Professional of the Year
• 2003 – Man of the Year Award, The Sidney Bechet Society
• 2000 – A Lifetime Achievement award from
  Down Beat
  magazine
• 1996 – Grammy Award for "Best Album Notes - Miles Davis & Gil Evans - The Complete Columbia Studio Recordings"
• 1998 – The Benny Carter Award from the American Federation of Jazz Societies
• 1990 – The Order of Lenin, the Soviet Union's highest state order.
• 1981 – President's Citation, New Jersey Jazz Society
• 1984 – Knighthood from the Knights of Malta

References

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to George Avakian.

• Article about Avakian
• Interview with Avakian in 5 parts
• George Avakian and Anahid Ajemian papers, 1908-2013 Music Division, The New York Public Library.
• Interview with George Avakian, December 2009
• George Avakian Interview NAMM Oral History Library (2009)