Bechet, Sidney (bəshā`), 1897–1959, American jazz musician, b. New Orleans, La. He began his professional career with his brother Leonard's band in 1911. Later he played with many other bands, including that of King Oliver Oliver, King (Joseph Oliver), 1885–1938, American jazz musician, b. Abend, La. Oliver began his professional career in 1904 with the Onward Brass Band.
..... Click the link for more information. . Although Bechet played clarinet with vigorous elegance, his most remarkable achievement was his approach to the most difficult of the saxophones, the soprano. His style was marked by a trumpetlike attack, a broad, flaring tone, and a rich vibrato. He lived in Europe for the last 20 years of his life.

Bibliography

See his autobiography, Treat It Gentle (1959).

Bechet, Sidney

(born May 14, 1897, New Orleans, La., U.S.—died May 14, 1959, Paris, France) U.S. saxophonist. He took up the clarinet at age six, later switching to the more powerful soprano saxophone. His emergence as a soloist from the New Orleans tradition of collective improvisation (see Dixieland) established his reputation in the mid-1920s. He produced a large, warm tone with a wide and rapid vibrato. His mastery of drama and his use of critically timed deviations in pitch (“note bending”) had a long-lasting influence, because they were absorbed by his disciple Johnny Hodges. From the late 1940s he was based in Paris.

Bechet, Sidney (1897–1959) jazz musician; born in New Orleans. As a clarinetist and saxophonist, he was a pioneer in establishing jazz as a solo idiom. In 1919, he became the first jazz musician to receive critical attention; in 1926, as a sideman, he made a strong impression on Duke Ellington's emerging style. After spearheading a traditional jazz revival in the 1940s, he settled in France where he was widely honored.