St. Louis jazz legend Don Cunningham and his wife Alicia performed their annual show at the Sheldon Concert Hall last August 5. For those who do not know about Don, he has an interesting history that illustrates how many people and breaks brought him to his success today.
Don was born in St. Charles in 1931. Apparently, he was intrigued with music as young as age three. When he was very young, he was always banging on pots and pans and making drums out of oatmeal boxes. The piece that really piqued him was a recording of Glenn Miller’s “In the Mood.” His father liked saxophone and had a friend, Thieron Slaughter, a music teacher who played in the Eddie Randle Blue Devils. Don really wanted to play drums, but found he also enjoyed playing saxophone when he was in elementary school. He introduced a boyhood friend, Oliver Nelson, to his teacher. Nelson became one of the most significant composer-arrangers in jazz. Cunningham fondly remembers practice sessions with Nelson in the bathroom, which they used as a sound chamber.
Stay up-to-date with the local arts scene
Subscribe to the weekly St. Louis Arts+Culture newsletter to discover must-attend art exhibits, performances, festivals, and more.
At Vashon High, under the tutelage Paul Overby, Don was in the marching band and loved Sousa marches. He was also learning saxophone solos from records, and occasionally gigged in the neighborhood. With the Korean War going on, Don decided to enlist in the armed services. He ended up in an artillery battalion at Camp Polk, La., although he was promised a band job. After six months firing a 155 mm howitzer, he despaired that he would never join an army band. One day, Don remembered a cousin telling him that the most powerful man in the army was the chaplain. He went to the chaplain, who called the bandmaster. It so happened that due to rotations and people mustering out, the band needed musicians. Don asked to audition and went to a room where he was given a saxophone. The Sargent in charge of his audition was none other than O’Hara Spearman, later the head of instrumental music instruction in the St. Louis City Schools. Spearman, incidentally, was a boyhood friend of Cannonball and Nat Adderley and they were always trying to get him to join their groups.
The music that Spearman put in front of Don was not Sousa marches, but French marches. They were very difficult and Don was struggling. He finally broke down and cried because he couldn’t cut the music. Don said that Spearman put his arm around him and told him that it was all right and asked if he knew anything by ear. Don said he played Gene Ammons’ solo on “My Foolish Heart,” as if his life depended on it—and it did. Spearman heard his phrasing and breathing and told him he was in the band. He gave Don a clarinet and six months to learn to play it. Don eventually shipped out to Korea, where he joined the motor pool, and was one of the drivers bringing top-secret documents to the peace talks in Panmunjon.
Returning to St. Louis, Don Cunningham worked at Falstaff Brewing and began the study of percussion with help of several other players, including St. Louis Symphony percussionist Rich O’Donnell, who made him a set of boo-bams that Don still uses today. He worked with tenor saxophonist Chuck Tilman and many others. In 1954, he auditioned on congas for a Johnny Mathis show at the Chase. Mathis hired him and took him all over the country and out into the Far East, where he became enamored of exotic music like that of vibes player Arthur Lyman and his recording “Quiet Village” with Martin Denny. When he returned to St. Louis, he founded a group consisting of four black men playing Midcentury Exotica music. The group opened The Dark Side on Gaslight Square. When Don had to go back on the road with Mathis, he recommended the Quartette Tres Bien for the Dark Side gig. Several months, later, Decca Records discovered this group. They spent the next 13 years on the road.
When he finished his stint with Mathis, Don came back to St. Louis and eventually got a job at the Playboy Club. His quartet was himself on reeds, vibes and percussion, Marion Miller on keyboards, John Mixon on bass and cello and Manny Quintero on drums and percussion. They recorded an album called Something for Everyone in 1961. Only 500 copies of the album were pressed.
By 1970, Don moved to Los Angeles and began working with the likes of Harry Belafonte. His manager told him he would do better if he had a female vocalist. He hired Alicia Rodriguez, a classically trained pianist and vocalist, who was working with the Brazillian Moacir Santos. They eventually married and developed a style based on rapid-fire scat vocal duets and became very popular internationally, but not here. Jazz critic Leonard Feather was instrumental in getting The Cunninghams on Discovery Records. One of their recordings was the Grammy-nominated album, Strings ‘N Swing.
Like many American jazz artists, The Cunninghams continued to work internationally most of the year. In 2003, an unusual thing happened: one of the tunes on Something for Everyone, “Tabu,” became very popular with the jazz-dance club crowd. This brought about renewed interest in this forgotten recording. The album was reissued on the Luv ‘N Haight label. The recording has sold well, and has provided opportunities for Don and Alicia to continue their music projects, most recently in Brazil with their musicians.
Successful people have a lot mentors on their journey through life. The humble ones acknowledge every one of these people.
Dennis Owsley has broadcast a weekly jazz show for St. Louis Public Radio (KWMU-FM) continuously since April 1983. Professionally, he holds a Ph.D. in organic chemistry and is a retired Monsanto Senior Science Fellow and college teacher. His current show, “Jazz Unlimited,” is heard every Sunday night from 9 p.m. to midnight.
