Al Hirt

Al Hirt possessed trumpet mastery that frequently left him seeming “overqualified” for the Dixieland and pop repertoire he favored. From 1940 to 1943 he trained in classical trumpet at the Cincinnati Conservatory, absorbing the style of Harry James along the way. After stints as a freelance sideman with swing orchestras led by Tommy Dorsey, Jimmy Dorsey, and Ray McKinley, he resettled in New Orleans late in the 1940s and immersed himself in the city’s resurgent Dixieland activity. Beginning in 1955 he collaborated intermittently with clarinetist Pete Fountain, attaining national prominence before the decade ended. An exceptional technician whose broad range was matched by a habit of crowding too many notes into every phrase, Hirt scored several instrumental pop successes in the 1960s. Although he occasionally recorded swing and country material, his concert work remained rooted in Dixieland. He stayed a familiar public figure throughout his career, even as observers often sensed that his gifts could have supported more ambitious projects. His earliest Audiofidelity sessions, cut between 1958 and 1960, and his partnerships with Fountain remain the most satisfying chapters of a lengthy discography. Hirt died at his New Orleans home on April 27, 1999.