He was born in Davenport, Iowa in 1903, the youngest of three children in a white middle-class family. His full name was Leon Bismarck Beiderbecke, but was always known by the abbreviated version of his middle name: Bix.
His mother played the organ at the local Presbyterian Church and young Bix seemed to have a gift for music. He began playing the piano at an early age and his mother seems to have encouraged him.
But Bix had a wild streak. At about age 10, he began to visit the waterfront to play the calliopes on the riverboats, rather than returning home for dinner.
Bix’s older brother returned after World War I bringing a phonograph and some jazz records.
Bix became entranced with jazz. He taught himself to play coronet and listened to music from the Mississippi riverboats.
In high school, Bix would sit in and play with several bands, which caused problems with the local musician’s union.
In an attempt to earn a union card, he was given a sight-reading test, but failed. He never did receive a union card.
Bix was never a star student and his parents decided to enroll him in a college prep school in North Chicago in an unsuccessful attempt to set him on the right path. But Bix went to Chicago at every opportunity to listen to jazz bands. In a letter to his brother, Bix wrote, “I’d go to hell to listen to a band.”
Bix and the prep school didn’t mesh well.
He formed a band and almost immediately got in trouble for drinking and violating curfew. After being expelled, he returned to Davenport, but soon left to pursue a career in music.
In 1923, he joined a band named the Wolverines and played in Ohio and in Indiana, where some recordings were made. Bix was acquiring a reputation as a first-class coronet player who couldn’t sight-read, but who could drink.
Eventually, Bix landed a plum gig: playing with the Paul Whiteman orchestra, considered one of the best bands in the country. For Bix, it was an exhilarating new world of learning and growing professionally. But it came at a price. Constant touring increased both his stress level and his drinking. After suffering a collapse due to alcoholism, Bix returned to Davenport in February 1929.
His parents never supported his musical career. Throughout the years, Bix would send copies of his records to his parents. While recovering at his parent’s house, he discovered the records in a closet, still in the mailing envelopes, unopened and unplayed.
After a year, Bix rejoined the Whiteman band but was fired in October 1930 because of his inability to play a solo during a live radio performance due to alcohol impairment.
Bix once again returned to Davenport in the fall of 1930 and attempted a comeback the following February. But in August 1931, he was found dead in his New York City apartment. The official verdict was pneumonia, but alcoholism was a major contributor.
Bix was not yet 29 years old.
Bix’s story is a classic tale of an individual with extraordinary talents but who also carried the seeds of his own destruction. He joins a long line of celebrities, most recently Whitney Houston, who have had their lives or talents cut short due to substance abuse.
The stress of being a celebrity no doubt played a part in their downfall.
We all have talents, but we also have flaws that can impede or derail our success.
Our future depends not only on those talents and abilities, but also on a continued awareness and monitoring of our hidden faults and defects, as well as our ability to manage stress.
Each August, the Bix Beiderbecke Memorial Society holds a series of seminars, tours and concerts in Davenport commemorating his life and talents.
No doubt, Bix looks down on these festivities, gratified and happy. And sober.
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