I just heard that Herman Leonard, the great jazz photographer died on August 14th.
Most of his work was in black and white, and he shot all of the great jazz musicians of the day, including Dexter Gordon, Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Billie Holiday, Duke Ellington, Miles Davis, Ella Fitzgerald, Frank Sinatra, Lena Horne, and many others.
I have most of his famous shots in my living room. They are all great !
Leonard's jazz photographs, now collector's items, are a unique record of the jazz scene of the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s, and his collection is now in the permanent archives of American Musical History in the Smithsonian Museum in Washington, D.C.
His book 'The Eye of Jazz' was published in France in 1985 (I have a signed copy !)
Rest well Herman, and thanks for the awesome photographs !
