St Clair, Cyrus
St Clair, Cyrus
St. Clair, Cyrus, jazz sousaphone player; b. Cambridge, Mass., 1890; d. N.Y, 1955. His father and uncle were tuba players. He began playing cornet in the Merry Concert Band in Md., later switching to tuba. Around 1925, he moved to N.Y.C., and worked with the Wilbur de Paris Band and Bobby Lee’s Cotton Pickers, along with doing club work. From 1926–31, he worked with Charlie Johnson’s band; during this period, he also played on many of Clarence Williams’s recording sessions, including accompanying Bessie Smith and many other pop-blues singers. St. Clair worked in Cozy Cole’s Hot Cinders (1930) and gigged in N.Y. He was musically inactive for several years, and then returned to regular playing on Rudi Blesh’s This Is ]azz radio series in 1947; he also recorded with Tony Parenti’s Ragtimers. St. Clair worked for the Buildings and Grounds Department of Columbia Univ. until shortly before his death.
—John Chilton , Who’s Who of Jazz/Lewis Porter