The Apollo Stompers was a jazz big band led by Jaki Byard.
Accounts vary on when the Apollo Stompers was formed. These range from the 1950s[1] to the mid-1970s.[2]
For a time, two versions of the band existed: one of New York musicians, and the other of students from the New England Conservatory of Music, where Byard taught.[1] He commented that he was "running up and down the road between Boston and New York and I said why not get a band together in New York, too?"[1]
For one concert, Byard used the two ensembles together, on either side of a stage at the New England Conservatory.[1] He referred to it as his "Stereophonic Ensemble", because of the effects that could be created by having the bands playing together but separated spatially.[1]
The band played a diverse range of material, including compositions by Stevie Wonder in 1978,[3] Eubie Blake, Fats Waller, Duke Ellington, and Charles Mingus.[1] Vocalists and tap dancers were also sometimes featured.[1] Central, however, where Byard's own compositions;[4] he also wrote all of the band's arrangements.[5]
As "Jaki Byard and the Apollo Stompers":