May 23: Begin the Beguine — with Eight Wives

Clarinetist and big-band leader Artie Shaw (Arshawsky) was born in New York on this date in 1910. Shaw played with numerous bands and orchestras in the 1920s and ’30s before launching his own band in the late 1930s and making enormous hits out of Cole Porter’s “Begin the Beguine” and Hoagy Carmichael’s “Stardust,” among other tunes. Shaw was a subtle, innovative instrumentalist and arranger who introduced elements from classical music into jazz, including the use of only a rhythm section and string quartet on his “Interlude in B-flat.” He also explored be-bop jazz as early as 1949. “I did all you can do with a clarinet,” he said in a 1994 interview. “Any more would have been less.” Shaw became the first white big band leader to tour the segregated South with a black singer when he signed Billie Holiday in 1938. Drummer Buddy Rich, guitarist Barney Kessel, and vocalist Mel Tormé were among musicians brought to prominence by Artie Shaw. Always impatient with the demands and philistinism of show biz, he retired from performing at the age of 43. He also “retired” in the course of his life from eight marriages. “No matter how carefully and assiduously and how deeply you bury shit, the American public will find it and buy it in large quantity, It’s true, absolutely true.” —Artie Shaw Watch Artie Shaw and his orchestra play Cole Porter’s “Begin the Beguine” (1938):