Bill Caldwell, a gifted musician who brightened the lives and the musical arrangements of jazz enthusiasts all over the country, died this week at his home in Wichita. He was 49.
Tim Henry, Mr. Caldwell's Wichita-based business partner and fellow jazz musician, found him dead in his home early Monday after he missed a rehearsal Sunday night.
Henry and Richard Couch, who owns Couch Music at 131 S. Hydraulic, said Mr. Caldwell was a world-class musician who could play all the reed instruments brilliantly, and who could hold his own in performances with the best jazz artists anywhere. “I was always just in awe of his musicianship," Couch said. “Everybody who ever played with him felt the same way."
Henry, a keyboardist and singer, said he and Mr. Caldwell had spent the last two years putting together a CD called “Prime Numbers," a collection of their new interpretations of the best known jazz compositions from the 1940s and 1950s, with arrangements written by Mr. Caldwell, and with Mr. Caldwell playing sax, flute and clarinet. They had just made plans to go to Los Angeles to finish recording tracks with some of the better jazz artists in the country. Henry said jazz musicians who planned to finish the CD with them were “blown away" by what they heard in what was already recorded, and were asking in phone calls, “Who's that playing sax? Who's that playing clarinet?" It was Mr. Caldwell.
Henry, grief-stricken, said he hopes to complete the album someday, “but right now is too soon."
Tim Henry, Mr. Caldwell's Wichita-based business partner and fellow jazz musician, found him dead in his home early Monday after he missed a rehearsal Sunday night.
Henry and Richard Couch, who owns Couch Music at 131 S. Hydraulic, said Mr. Caldwell was a world-class musician who could play all the reed instruments brilliantly, and who could hold his own in performances with the best jazz artists anywhere. “I was always just in awe of his musicianship," Couch said. “Everybody who ever played with him felt the same way."
Henry, a keyboardist and singer, said he and Mr. Caldwell had spent the last two years putting together a CD called “Prime Numbers," a collection of their new interpretations of the best known jazz compositions from the 1940s and 1950s, with arrangements written by Mr. Caldwell, and with Mr. Caldwell playing sax, flute and clarinet. They had just made plans to go to Los Angeles to finish recording tracks with some of the better jazz artists in the country. Henry said jazz musicians who planned to finish the CD with them were “blown away" by what they heard in what was already recorded, and were asking in phone calls, “Who's that playing sax? Who's that playing clarinet?" It was Mr. Caldwell.
Henry, grief-stricken, said he hopes to complete the album someday, “but right now is too soon."
