Williams, Cootie [Charles Melvin] (Mobile, AL, 10 July 1911 - New York, 15 Sept 1985)

Trumpeter and bandleader

He taught himself to play trumpet and toured with the Young Family band (which included Lester Young) when he was only 14. In 1928 he went to New York, where he made his first recordings (with James P. Johnson) and played briefly in the bands of Chick Webb and Fletcher Henderson. By February 1929 he had joined the Duke Ellington Orchestra as a replacement for Bubber Miley, beginning a long association which was to make him famous. In his first 11 years with Ellington his playing became an indispensable part of the band's sonority, and Ellington integrated solos for him into hundreds of compositions. Williams also took part in many excellent small-group recordings with Teddy Wilson, Billie Holiday, Lionel Hampton, Charlie Christian, and other leading jazz musicians of the swing period.

After leaving Ellington in November 1940, Williams played for a year in Benny Goodman's band and small groups, then formed his own successful big band, which was booked several times at the Savoy Ballroom, New York, and included some important aspiring bop musicians such as Charlie Parker and Bud Powell. Gradually, though still at the height of his powers, Williams faded from public view. Forced to reduce his band to a smaller ensemble in 1948, and finally to discontinue it altogether, he became active as a rhythm-and-blues musician in the 1950s and later led his own small jazz group, with which he took part in several important recording sessions with Rex Stewart in 1957-8. In 1962 he rejoined Ellington's band, where he remained, with brief interruptions, until the late 1970s.

Williams was a master of swing-style jazz trumpet playing, and achieved a range of tone and shading on his instrument that was unsurpassed in his day. Having quickly mastered the growl and plunger effects of Bubber Miley, his predecessor in Ellington's band, Williams extended these techniques to encompass an unprecedented variety of moods and timbres, from gentle nostalgia to searing vehemence. Although he remained supreme in the use of the growl and plunger mutes, Williams was equally adept on the open instrument, particularly as an accompanist to jazz singers and as an interpreter of the blues. His playing inspired Ellington to one of his greatest masterpieces, the Concerto for Cootie (1940), where Williams may be heard using straight mute, plunger mute, and open trumpet. In later years Williams's style lost some of its subtlety but none of its urgency and swing, as attested by his performance in the New Concerto for Cootie (1963), written by Ellington to celebrate his return to the band.

Williams was also an effective if reluctant jazz singer, and collaborated with Ellington on several pieces, such as Echoes of the Jungle, as well as with Thelonious Monk on his well-known ballad 'Round about Midnight.*

 J. Bradford Robinson

The New Grove Dictionary of Jazz, © Macmillan Reference Ltd 1988

*Whether Williams actually contributed to “’Round Midnight” remains a matter of dispute. Theloniousmusic.com Editors