Danny Barcelona

Drums

Born: August 23, 1929 in Honolulu, Hawaii

Died: April 1, 2007 in San Gabriel, California

Armstrong All-Star

by James Hale

Copyright © 2007 James Hale

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Danny Barcelona, who was playing with Trummy Young at 18 and was with Louis Armstrong during the later years of the trumpeter's career, died of cancer on April 1, 2007.

A native Hawaiian, Barcelona joined Young's Hawaii All-Stars in the early 1950s, and then assumed leadership of the band when Young left to join Armstrong in 1952. He toured the Hawaiian Islands and Japan, and joined Armstrong's All-Stars in 1958.

With Armstrong, Barcelona recorded more than 130 times, including the trumpeter's late-career hits "Hello, Dolly!" and "What A Wonderful World." As T. Dennis Brown described in The New Grove Dictionary of Jazz, Barcelona's style was "characterized by extensive use of the ride cymbal, crisp, clean fills and breaks, and solos that exploit asymmetrical phrasing."

Following Armstrong's death in 1971, Barcelona returned to Hawaii and became a fixture at the Hilton Hawaiian Village hotel, playing with Bernie Halmann.

Barcelona moved to Monterey Park, California, in 1979. He is survived by his wife Dee, once a member of the Morgan Sisters singing trio, and two daughters.

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James Hale
Editor of Jazzhouse.org.

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