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An acquaintance of mine (very friendly acquaintance - not a close friend) passed away.
He fought off cancer (either that, or has been dealing with it all along) several years ago.

His name was Jim Gambill.

He really impressed me when I was in beginner band, as he played the Rimsky Korsakov Trombone Concerto with the senior high band. (I'm sure that he had received no private instruction, at that time.) Notice that he is playing a King 3B trombone in this recent picture. Our high school band director was a working trombonist, and also played a King 3B.

Here's a picture of Jim with a band with which he had currently been played (covers Chicago, BST, etc.)



Here's a snip from the 1971 Notre Dame Jazz Festival Program (google helped me with this).
He was either a sophomore or junior playing in the Memphis State A Jazz Band (at that time, easily the equivalent of the NTSU 1 o'clock).

There are several google-able names, found here:



(As just one example, Donnie Patterson was soon to become Charlie Rich's drummer.)

I'm fortunate to currently be able to watch his funeral online (and old various "band stories" - he mostly played bass/vocals, over the years, but in this last band he played trombone/vocals), but he played bass, if a place couldn't afford to hire the entire band. He was also a great tax accountant who saved musicians lots of money with legitimate/very-unlikely-audit deductions...

...stories of incredible kindness, incredible humor, incredible talent, and incredibly l-o-n-g drives to gigs - one day apart - that were over a thousand miles apart (and pulling a huge trailer, etc.)

' endless parade of testimonials/stories...

Jim was in James Brown's band for a while, beginning when he was 18 (probably would have been around 1969 or so).

I can't see this band continuing without Jim...We'll see...



For those of you who've heard about Memphis Drum Shop from your percussionist friends. The drummer is the owner of that place.
Before _ _ _ _ _ cancelled our cruise-boarding gig on Saturdays, he was the drummer in that band.