Bob Dorough

Bob Dorough has been one of those jazz musicians who is little known by the masses, but much respected by jazz musicians everywhere. Bob was born in the mid-1920's and raised in Texas. He played clarinet in his high school band. Drafted into the army in 1942, he played various woodwinds and some piano with an army band, and got interested in arranging and writing songs. The director of the army band gave him a Rogers & Hart songbook to study, and that gave him his start.

After his army service, he went to the college that eventually became North Texas State University, where he minored in piano and majored in music composition. He describes the school as being a hotbed of bebop activity at the time. In 1949 he moved to New York and threw himself into the jazz scene there.

His first album, "Devil May Care," was released in 1956, with many to follow. Possibly his best known music - to at least one generation - is the music he wrote and recorded for the Schoolhouse Rock series that ran on ABC TV in the 1970's, '80's, and 90's. Two notable recent releases, on Blue Note, are "Too Much Coffee Man" and, with Dave Frishburg, "Who's on First?" Both were released in 2000. His most recent releases are "Sunday at Iridium" (Arbors, 2005) and "Small Day Tomorrow" (Candid, 2006).