Benny Carter: ‘The King’

           …he is a king, man!  You got Duke Ellington, Count Basie, and my man the Earl

            of Hines, right?  Well, Benny’s right up there with all them cats.  Everybody

            that knows who he is call him King!  He is a King!

                                                                                               Louis Armstrong

Generations of jazz fans grew up in the firm belief that the three greatest alto saxophone players were Johnny Hodges, Benny Carter and Charlie Parker.  Of this wondrous trio, only one could claim to be multi-talented; he was Benny Carter. His principal instruments were the alto sax and trumpet, which prompted someone with the pen-name of Snooty McSiegle to wax poetic:

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