Foster, Frank, b. 1928

Frank B. Foster, III was born in Cincinnati, Ohio on September 23, 1928. He attended Wilberforce University and in 1949 moved to Detroit and began playing in jazz clubs with musicians such as Wardell Gray. He was drafted into the military in 1951 and served in Korea.

In the early 1950s his first two solo albums were released on Blue Note Records: Here Comes Frank Foster (1953) and New Faces, New Sounds (1954). He was a member of the Count Basie Orchestra from 1953-1964, contributing both arrangements and original compositions including the well-known Shiny Stockings, Down for the Count, Blues Backstage, Back to the Apple, and Discommotion, as well as arrangements for the band's Easin’ It album. Foster has also performed in bands including The Lloyd Price Big Band, Lionel Hampton and his Orchestra, Woody Herman and his Orchestra, The Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Orchestra, and Elvin Jones's Jazz Machine. By the 1970s Foster formed several groups on his own, including The Non-Electric Company, Living Color and The Loud Minority. In 1980, Foster's Lake Placid Suite was performed as a part of the Winter Olympic Games, and in 1983 Dizzy Gillespie personally commissioned Foster to orchestrate one of the jazz icon’s compositions, Con Alma, for a scheduled performance and recording with The London Philharmonic Orchestra directed by Robert Farnon. In 1986 Foster succeeded Thad Jones as the leader of the Count Basie Orchestra, and remained with the band until 1995. During that time he won two Grammy Awards for his arrangements of Deedles' Blues (1987) and Basie's Bag (1988).

...