Dubbed "the String Quartet of Dance Bands" by composer
Jerome Kern,
the Leo Reisman Orchestra also gained fame as a launching pad for talents including
Fred Astaire,
Eddy Duchin,
Harold Arlen, and
Dinah Shore. According to the Big Bands Database,
Reisman was born in Boston in 1897 and began violin studies at age ten; within just two years, he was already performing professionally. A series of stints in local hotel bands predated a tenure with
the Baltimore Symphony, and in 1919
Reisman formed his own big band, which soon after accepted a residency at New York's Hotel Brunswick. The orchestra remained at the Brunswick for a decade, in 1929 moving to the Central Park Casino; at this point the lineup included
Duchin and fellow pianist Nat Brandywynne, as well as vocalist
Lee Wiley. Upon taking up residency at the famed Waldorf Astoria, by 1932
the Reisman Orchestra's lineup swelled to include
Astaire and
Arlen; other alumni of note include cornetist
Johnny Dunn as well as trumpeters
Max Kaminsky and
Bubber Miley, the latter a future member of
Duke Ellington's group.
Shore, meanwhile, sang with the band during its 1939 stay at the Strand Theatre. By the following decade, however,
Reisman's lush, sophisticated style had fallen out of favor in the wake of swing's new popularity.
Leo Reisman died on December 18, 1961. ~ Jason Ankeny