Ron Sunshine

Ron Sunshine and Full Swing stood among the strongest retro-swing ensembles to surface during the 1990s, attracting a modest audience with their recreation of 1940s jump blues, jive, and small-group swing. Frontman Sunshine, who separately fronted the New York blues outfit Ron Sunshine and the Smoking Section, had already been performing 1940s repertoire before the broader swing resurgence took hold; the concurrent breakthrough of the Cherry Poppin' Daddies, the Squirrel Nut Zippers, and Big Bad Voodoo Daddy nonetheless proved advantageous. A Denver native, Sunshine relocated to New York in 1981 to enroll at Columbia University and received his BA in 1985. He subsequently performed and recorded alongside Dr. John, Charles Brown, Tower of Power, Wilson Pickett, Blues Traveler, and Joan Osborne. After settling in Brooklyn, he assembled Full Swing in the early 1990s; by the close of the decade the group comprised bassist Andres Villamil, guitarist Don Hovey, pianist Paul Tillotson, tenor saxophonist Craig Dreyer, and drummer James Wormworth IV. Drawing from Louis Jordan, Louis Prima, and the Nat "King" Cole Trio, Full Swing first distributed cassette copies of Sumpin' Jumpin' and later issued the CD Straight Up on Daddy-O/Royalty in 1998.