Like many legendary figures, the "real" Charlie Christian has all but disappeared within a cloud of shoddy research, misinformation, speculation, "embellishments," and outright lies. Even the simple facts of the place and date of his birth have been misreported over the years. One common -- but incorrect -- assertion was that Charlie was born in 1919 in Dallas. Even his death certificate mistakenly records 1917 as his year of birth.
We now know that Charles Henry Christian was born July 29, 1916 in Bonham, Texas to a thoroughly musical family. At the time of Charlie's birth, his mother and father were eking out a living playing accompaniment to silent movies. His mother played piano, his father (who would soon become blind) sang and played both trumpet and guitar, and Charlie's brothers, Clarence and Edward, played professionally.
After the family moved to Oklahoma City (probably in 1918), it was inevitable that Charlie would follow his brothers' musical lead. He began by learning the trumpet, a choice which no doubt contributed to the fluid single-note guitar style for which he would later become famous. By the time Charlie was twelve, he had switched to the guitar, making his own out of cigar boxes in manual training class, as novelist and family friend Ralph Ellison recalls.
Throughout his early teens, he played in the family band and performed in Oklahoma City clubs. It was in one such club that Christian, as a very young man, met tenor great Lester Young. The meeting marked the beginning of Charlie's lifelong fascination with Lester's style, clearly a shaping force in the guitarist's own development.
During the early 1930s, Charlie doubled on bass and guitar with a band fronted by his brother Eddie. After a brief stint fronting his own band, he played bass and/or guitar with a variety of well-known regional bands, possibly including Anna Mae Winburn's band, trumpeter James Simpson, the Leslie Sheffield Band, the Jeter-Pillars band, and Alphonso Trent. It's also around this time that Charlie Christian discovered the instrument with which he would be forever associated: the electric guitar.
The amplified electric guitar was still an experimental novelty in 1935, when trombonist and arranger Eddie Durham began playing it as a solo instrument in Jimmie Lunceford's band. Essentially an amplified "f-hole," this new invention made the jazz guitar solo a practical reality for the first time. Previously relegated to a chordal rhythm style by the limitations of the acoustic instrument, jazz guitarists could now revel in the volume, sustain, and tonal flexibility provided by amplification. Charlie was quick to realize the potential of the electric guitar, and soon developed a style which made the most of the unique properties of the instrument.
Armed with his now-famous Gibson ES-150 (the 1936 Gibson catalogue lists the ES-150 at $77.50, including a 15-foot cord), Charlie began to make a name for himself. By 1939, Charlie Christian's innovative guitar style was admired by many influential musicians in the jazz circuit, including Teddy Wilson and Norma Teagarden. After pianist Mary Lou Williams recommended him to John Hammond Sr. in August, 1939, Charlie was approached by the legendary producer. Hammond, convinced of Christian's talent, arranged an audition with Benny Goodman.
Charlie and the Goodman Sextet
According to Hammond, Goodman was hardly enthusiastic about introducing an unknown musician on an electric instrument into the combo. When Charlie arrived in Los Angeles, the clarinetist gave him only a brief audition, asking him to comp on "Tea for Two" without allowing him time to plug in his amp. Not surprisingly, Benny wasn't impressed. Undaunted, the persistant producer attempted to overcome Goodman's objections by sneaking Christian onstage later that night during a concert at the Victor Hugo. An angry Goodman responded by launching into "Rose Room," a number he assumed Charlie would be unfamiliar with. Fortunately for jazz history, Christian easily breezed through an impressive extended solo on the piece. Goodman was impressed, and Charlie was in.
Charlie's presence soon invigorated the group, which had been depleted when Teddy Wilson and Gene Krupa left to form their own bands, and Goodman made the most of the guitarist's new sound. His first studio recordings with the band were on October 2, 1939, in a session which included "Rose Room," "Flying Home," and Charlie's memorable, unusual chord soloing on "Stardust." "Stardust" was a planned solo, a rarity for Charlie, and he would play nearly identical choruses on later studio recordings and broadcasts.
Charlie Christian would go on to make numerous recordings with the sextet and septet, but his contribution included more than his imaginative solos. As is often the case in jazz, a catchy riff stumbled upon during improvisation may turn into the head of a new piece. Benny Goodman was notorious for taking complete or partial credit for melodies actually composed by his musicians. Nonetheless, Christian is given partial credit for several classics: "Seven Come Eleven," "Air Mail Special," and "Solo Flight," as well as lesser known numbers, such as "AC-DC Current" and "Shivers."
Charlie at Minton's
The sextet gave Charlie Christian fame and a stable income, and helped to legitimize and popularize the electric guitar as a jazz instrument. Nonetheless, Charlie's real jazz education may have occurred outside of the studios and touring halls, in the informal jam sessions that many jazz historians hail as the first tentative signs of bebop.
The most famous of these sessions took place in a club called Minton's on New York's West 118th Street. The club, located in a former dining room in the Hotel Cecil, was established by a retired sax player named Henry Minton. In a stroke of genius, Minton hired fellow saxophonist and former bandleader Teddy Hill to manage the place. Hill hired a rhythm section including Thelonious Monk and Kenny Clarke, and the now-legendary nightly jam sessions began.