Leon Breeden

Harold Leon Breeden (3 October 1921 Guthrie, Oklahoma – 11 August 2010 Dallas, Texas), known as Leon Breeden, was a jazz studies educator at the collegiate level, a classical and jazz clarinetist, a saxophonist, a prolific composer and arranger, a music clinician, and jazz festival judge. The Associated Press release of Breeden's death referred to him as, "legendary director of the University of North Texas' jazz program who made its 'One O'Clock Lab Band' internationally famous."^[1][2]

Career as jazz education pioneer

Breeden was the chairman of Jazz Studies — and director of the One O'Clock Lab Band — at the University of North Texas College of Music from 1959 to 1981. From early in his tenure at North Texas, Breeden led its Jazz Studies division to rapid rise in international prominence.

The One O'Clock Lab Band is the highest level of nine big bands at the College of Music. The College of Music is a comprehensive music school with the largest enrollment of any music institution accredited by the National Association of Schools of Music^[3] and the first in the world to offer a degree in jazz studies at the collegiate level.

Breeden's tenure at the University of North Texas College of Music

Breeden took the One O'Clock Lab Band to London, Paris, Portugal, Russia, Mexico, Germany, Spain, and Switzerland. The band played in most major cities throughout the U.S. and the Spoleto Music Festival.

The band performed at the White House for the parties of Presidents Johnson, Carter and Reagan. They played for the U.S. visit of the King and Queen of Thailand.

The One O'Clock has accompanied Ella Fitzgerald and has produced members for the Stan Kenton and Woody Herman bands.

Breeden’s former students include Marvin Stamm, Lou Marini, Bobby Knight, Lyle Mays, Galen Jeter, Sparky Koerner, Marc Johnson, Byron Parks, Paul Guerrero, Lanny Steele, Dee Barton, Neal Ramsay, Jim Riggs and Herb Ellis. There are more than 600 recordings of the jazz band’s performances in the North Texas School of Music archives.

Breeden and Jazz Studies, particularly the One O'Clock Lab Band, elevated the academic notoriety of the university on an international scale, perhaps more so than any other person or program at the university in its history.

Entire career overview

During the early part of World War II, Breeden served in the military in the 69th Infantry Division Band as Music Librarian and played in the band at Ft. Bliss.

In 1944, after military duty, he became the Director of Bands at Texas Christian University, and later served as Director of Bands at Grand Prairie High School from 1953 to 1959.

In 1959, M.E. "Gene" Hall, Founding Director of Jazz Studies at the University of North Texas College of Music, urged and recommended Breeden to replace Hall as Director of Jazz Studies, where Breeden remained until his retirement in 1984.

A classically trained clarinetist, Breeden also played saxophone and studied composition and arranging at TCU. He was a teaching assistant under Don Gillis, Director of Bands at Texas Christian University, whom he later worked with in New York from 1950 to 1952, serving as his assistant.

Gillis was the Producer of the NBC Symphony, conducted by Arturo Toscanini. During this time, Breeden met with and wrote arrangements for Arthur Fiedler, conductor of the Boston Pops. It was Gillis who recommended Breeden for work. In 1950, upon hearing his first arrangements for the group, Fiedler offered Breeden a permanent spot as the staff writer and arranger for the orchestra, but with an ill father, Breeden declined the highly prized offer and moved back to Texas. Upon returning to Texas, Breeden worked as music coordinator for KXAS-TV in Fort Worth— then known as WBAP-TV.

• 1945 — Bachelor of Arts degree, Texas Christian University
• 1948 — Master of Music Education, Texas Christian University
• 1944–49 — Director of Bands at Texas Christian University
• 1950–52 — Composition and Arranging Assistant to Don Gillis in New York
• 1953–59 — Director of Bands at Grand Prairie High School
• 1959–81 — Director of Jazz Studies at the University of North Texas College of Music and Musical Director of the One O'Clock Lab Band
• 1981–84 — Professor of Jazz Studies at the University of North Texas College of Music^[4]

Honors

Later appearances

In the last several years of his life, Breeden frequently soloed on clarinet with The Official Texas Jazz Orchestra.^[6]

Growing up

Breeden used his first given name, "Harold," only while serving in the Army. When he was three years of age his parents moved to Wichita Falls, Texas, where he grew up and graduated from high school. He attended Texas Wesleyan College in Ft. Worth on a scholarship and later transferred to Texas Christian University where he completed both his Bachelor’s and Master's degrees. While doing graduate work at Columbia University in New York City, he studied clarinet with Sir Reginald Kell, an internationally acclaimed clarinetist who had immigrated to the U.S. in 1948. Benny Goodman began studies with Kell in 1949.

Family

• 1945 — Leon Breeden married Bonna Joyce McKee (25 October 1926 Bynum, Texas – 7 September 1988 Denton, Texas), whom he had met while working on his master's degree at TCU.^[7] They had three children:

1. David McKee Breeden (19 July 1946 Fort Worth, Texas – 22 June 2005 San Mateo, California)
2. Daniel Leon Breeden (16 April 1948 Fort Worth, Texas – 11 February 1968 Dallas, Texas)
3. Vicki Lynn Breeden (born October 2, 1951, Fort Worth, Texas)

• June 18, 1990 (Denton, TX) — Leon remarried a childhood sweetheart:

Bennye Wayne (née "Nobles," name from former marriage, "Reid," – "Ms. Billy Ray Reid;" 24 December 1921 Decatur, Texas – 29 April 2010 Denton, Texas). Breeden and Bennye met while in the fourth grade in Wichita Falls, Texas.^[8] Bennye divorced Billy Ray Reid June 29, 1978 in Fort Worth; but from Bennye's marriage with Billy Ray Reid, aka "Slick" (1923–2007), Leon has stepchildren:

1. Michael Victor Reid (born 1945)
2. Melinda Ray Reid (born 1950), who, in 1973, married to David Lane Shockley (1952) in Fort Worth
3. Jimmy Browning of Fort Worth
4. LeAnna Sharp of Arlington, Texas
5. Barry Browning of Arlington, Texas

Death

Leon Breeden died of natural causes on August 11, 2010 in a Dallas, TX hospital.^[9]

Videos Honoring Leon Breeden (1921–2010)

• In Memory of Leon Breeden on YouTube
• More of Leon Breeden on YouTube

See also

• One O'Clock Lab Band
• Texas Bandmasters Hall of Fame
• David Breeden, son

External links

• University of North Texas Music Library, Special Collections

Leon Breeden, 1940–2010 (240 boxes) (2002)

References

General references

Inline citations