Biography
Despite a mixed standing in some quarters, audiences of the era appreciated Dan Grissom’s performances when they first appeared. He gained widest recognition singing with the Jimmie Lunceford band, spent six years also providing vocals for Duke Ellington, and issued scattered solo singles on labels including Imperial. His Lunceford years represent the most substantial body of recordings, yet a cautious Grissom might have sought cover behind that tall stack of sides to evade the harsh judgments later directed at him by jazz listeners tracing the music’s past. Jazz purists coined the nickname “Dan Gruesome” because they objected to vocal numbers even at the height of Lunceford’s popularity; later writers expressed similar reservations more politely. Typical remarks include these observations: “. . .one can do without the occasional Dan Grissom vocals. . .including some dreary vocal features for Dan Grissom. . .the dated vocals of Dan Grissom.”
Grissom belonged to a fresh generation of jazz singers whose emergence owed more to technical progress than to any deliberate artistic shift. Once microphones entered regular use around 1933, artists such as Grissom and Orlando Robeson, frontman for Claude Hopkins, could be heard above a full ensemble without the powerful projection required of earlier “blues shouters.” Grissom’s style was gentle, marked by the “pinched-tones and heavy vibrato” noted in a survey of Ellington vocalists. He was not the sole big-band singer in this lineage; his uncle Jimmy Grissom likewise performed with Lunceford and logged a comparable number of recording sessions, though he drew somewhat less unfavorable comment.
Grissom joined the Lunceford organization in 1935 and remained through the early 1940s. The Sy Oliver arrangement of “By the River Sainte Marie” was reportedly his favorite among the many pieces he recorded with the band, even if that choice does little to soften its reputation. Roughly a decade later he entered Duke Ellington’s ranks, staying until 1957; one result of that association was his recording of the Ellington tune “Love (My Everything),” also known as “My Heart, My Mind, My Everything.” Johnny Mathis has cited Grissom’s work from this period as an influence. Recording under his own name in the mid-1940s, Grissom delivered “Poor Butterfly” with accompaniment from the Flennoy Trio led by pianist Lorenzo Flennoy. In 1955 Dan Grissom & the Ebb Tones released a single on the Million label that featured “Recess in Heaven,” and a scarce Imperial single preserves his tribute to the “King of Fools.” ~ Eugene Chadbourne
Grissom belonged to a fresh generation of jazz singers whose emergence owed more to technical progress than to any deliberate artistic shift. Once microphones entered regular use around 1933, artists such as Grissom and Orlando Robeson, frontman for Claude Hopkins, could be heard above a full ensemble without the powerful projection required of earlier “blues shouters.” Grissom’s style was gentle, marked by the “pinched-tones and heavy vibrato” noted in a survey of Ellington vocalists. He was not the sole big-band singer in this lineage; his uncle Jimmy Grissom likewise performed with Lunceford and logged a comparable number of recording sessions, though he drew somewhat less unfavorable comment.
Grissom joined the Lunceford organization in 1935 and remained through the early 1940s. The Sy Oliver arrangement of “By the River Sainte Marie” was reportedly his favorite among the many pieces he recorded with the band, even if that choice does little to soften its reputation. Roughly a decade later he entered Duke Ellington’s ranks, staying until 1957; one result of that association was his recording of the Ellington tune “Love (My Everything),” also known as “My Heart, My Mind, My Everything.” Johnny Mathis has cited Grissom’s work from this period as an influence. Recording under his own name in the mid-1940s, Grissom delivered “Poor Butterfly” with accompaniment from the Flennoy Trio led by pianist Lorenzo Flennoy. In 1955 Dan Grissom & the Ebb Tones released a single on the Million label that featured “Recess in Heaven,” and a scarce Imperial single preserves his tribute to the “King of Fools.” ~ Eugene Chadbourne
Albums