Biography
Avery Parrish gained lasting renown through his 1940 performance of “After Hours” alongside Erskine Hawkins’ Orchestra, yet his time as an active pianist proved tragically short. While studying at Alabama State Teachers College he joined the ’Bama Street Collegians in 1934, a group that later evolved into the Erskine Hawkins Big Band. He remained with Hawkins throughout the ensemble’s most celebrated period, departing only in 1941 after contributing to every one of its early recordings. The classic blues solo he created on “After Hours” would later establish itself as a lasting standard. After leaving the band he relocated to California, but in 1942 a bar altercation left him partially paralyzed at the age of twenty-four, ending his performing life. Never having issued any material under his own name, Parrish thereafter supported himself through ordinary employment until his unexplained death at forty-two.