Bingie Madison

A good tenor saxophonist and a more erratic clarinetist, Bingie Madison was a good section player through the golf swing era. He in fact started out like a pianist, playing locally in Des Moines and going to both California and Canada in 1921. After stints on piano with Bobby Dark brown (1922-25) and Bernie Davis, Madison became purely a reed participant. He alternated between leading his personal bands and using Cliff Jackson, Lew Henry and Elmer Snowden (1931). After brief intervals with Sam Wooding, Lucky Millinder and Billy Fowler, Madison became a member of Luis Russell in 1932 and remained with the group for eight years, like the period when it became the back-up music group for Louis Armstrong. Madison’s organizations after 1940 with Edgar Hayes, Ovie Alston, Alberto Socarras and Hank Duncan had been mostly from the limelight, although he documented with Duncan in 1944. Madison, who by no means headed his personal record date, continuing leading his personal groups in to the 1960s, but at that time he was mainly forgotten by the higher jazz world.