About Joe Dolny
Artist Biography
Not to be confused with the Joe Dolny who plays drums with the Time, this Joe Dolny did double duty as a trumpeter and arranger, his stylistic interests including Italian music and big bands. As an instrumentalist he played jazz in the '40s with, among others, drummer Buddy Rich; Dolny was also in an instrumental combo called the Quintones from 1947 through the end of that decade. Membership in the groups of Claude Thornhill and Jerry Wald in the early '50s preceded a period of intense studio recording for television, radio, and records, the results of which include an obligatory obligatto or two for crooner Dean Martin as well as some lounge sides.
Dolny led his own Joe Dolny Orchestra for a collection of Italian music standards released by the somewhat corny Era outfit in 1957. His treatments of songs such as "Come Back to Sorrento" and "Funiculi Funicula" are not the reason jazz arrangers admire Dolny, even assuming that the aforementioned Era side could even be located in the used record pile in the first place. He was both prolific and intelligent as an arranger for leaders such as Si Zentner and Ralph Mendez, continuing to keep up the instrumental side of the equation in later sideman gigs for Harry James, Ray Anthony, and others. Dolny's own large ensemble was mostly active as a rehearsal band but was considered to be one of the best of this sort on the West Coast in the '50s and '60s. ~ Eugene Chadbourne
Genre
Jazz
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