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Trumpet player, bandleader, composer, arranger Bobby Hales is at Vancouver's forefront of big band jazz. Growing up near Regina, Saskatchewan, Hales began trumpet lessons at age 10 and listened to jazz on his crystal set. "What's that?" he asked when he heard Stan Kenton for the first time. "It's a big band," he was told. And Hales said, "Gee, I love it."

Moving to Chilliwack, BC at age 14 and attending high school there, Hales remembers hitchhiking to Vancouver to see his first concert: Louis Armstrong at the old Georgia Auditorium near Stanley Park. It was a sold-out show and Hales got his way in with the doorman by telling him he had to go in and find his brother. Instead of coming right back out as he was told, Hales ended up watching the entire concert sitting on the edge of the stage six feet away from Louis Armstrong. "I was so thrilled," Hales remembers. "I couldn't believe it. To hear this guy play after hearing him for so many years on his recordings."

Looking back on his teenage years, Hales "never even thought of writing music." He took classical lessons with teachers who taught strictly out of the book, but "I didn't have any patience for that," says Hales. "I wanted to learn things faster. I wanted to move faster than they wanted to teach me." After high school, Hales quit his job at the bank and pursued jazz studies at Westlake College of Modern Music in Los Angeles. "I get to Westlake College and I could hear this cookin' band," Hales recalls. "I went, 'what's that? They must be playing a recording somewhere.'" It turns out Hales was listening to the Westlake "A" Band, which he started playing in at the end of his first year.

In the summer of 1956, playing trumpet in a dance band at Sylvan Lake, Alberta directed by Paul Perry (father of saxophonist PJ Perry) led to Hales' first gig in Vancouver at the Cellar in 1957. "I didn't know what the Cellar was," says Hales, who knew no one in Vancouver except for Chris Gage. "The place was packed with what we would call "local heavies" coming to hear this trumpet player from L.A.," Hales laughs. "I didn't know I was supposed to knock everybody out. I just played the way I played."

Hales decided to move to Vancouver where he connected with local legends Ray Sikora and Dave Robbins. "Dave was a really good teacher as he always was," remembers Hales. Robbins, whose big band played regularly on the CBC radio series "Jazz Canadiana," encouraged Hales to bring in his own arrangements for the band. Around this time, Hales also started his own band at Isy's Supper Club, and in 1965 put together a rehearsal band with "all the good players" including Ian McDougall, Stew Barnett, and Donny Clark.

The Bobby Hales Big Band was very busy for three years as a regular feature on the CBC series "Jazz Radio Canada" which was broadcast nationally every two weeks in alternation with Phil Nimmons in Toronto. The band also recorded albums, toured western Canada giving concerts and workshops, and performed at the PNE for several years where Hales was Music Director. Following in Dave Robbins' footsteps, Hales understood it was now his turn to have "the best big band in town." His band also did a lot of commercial work as jazz "disappeared" during the late 70s and 80s due to the dominating popularity of rock 'n roll. "Jazz was the most difficult thing," says Hales. "To be a jazz player, you gotta play. You have to play. To be a businessman, you have to do business."

Bobby Hales is currently the President of the Vancouver Musicians' Association (American Federation of Musicians, Local 145).

VIDEO

Bobby Hales - first gig in Vancouver at the Cellar

Bobby Hales on big bands

Bobby Hales - gig at Isy's Supper Club (part 1)

Bobby Hales - gig at Isy's Supper Club (part 2)