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During the l920’s, Ray Miller was a well-known, highly respected bandleader whose orchestra made many recordings for various companies; it was featured on-the-air for most of that decade. Like Paul Whiteman, Ted Lewis and a few others he usually had top jazz musicians amongst his personnel. Despite all this very little is known about Ray Miller himself.

His musical career started in 1916 when he was a singing waiter at the Casino Gardens in Chicago. This restaurant happened to be the place where the Original Dixieland Jazz Band appeared before they went to New York. Ray decided to try his luck and he followed them. In NYC he started his first band called the Black and White Melody Boys that was six pieces including himself on drums. As long as the jazz craze stayed on, they played in the style of the Original Dixieland Jazz Band. By 1922 Miller moved away from the old sound to a style that was in-line with the newer, larger bands. By the end of 1923, his band was playing the newest hits in the latest style and was offered an exclusive recording contract by Brunswick, then one of the three largest recording companies in the USA. That first band included well-known names like Earl Oliver, Ray Lodwig and Andy Sanella and from its very beginning it produced many jazz-flavored recordings.

In 1924 Miff Mole and Frank Trumbauer joined Ray’s orchestra, when he had an engagement in the Paradise Club in Newark, New Jersey. This period proved to be an important one for Ray Miller. Not only did he hire these important musicians for his band, but he also got a year later a permanent engagement at “Broadway’s new million dollar ballroom, The Arcadia”, This New York dance spot was formerly called the Blue Bird and owned by Miller’s aforementioned business partner, I. Jay gan. gan is one of those backgrounders in jazz history: not only did he have the Arcadia, but at various other moments during the decade, he owned such famous ballrooms as the New York Roseland and Harlem’s Savoy ballroom, as well as other ballrooms in Brooklyn, Philadelphia and Chicago. He opened the rebuilt Arcadia on October 2nd, 1924 with the help of the orchestras of Ray Miller, Harry Reser and Carl Fenton.

In 1926, Ray Miller made his final recording in New York. His whereabouts till October 1927 are unknown but by that time he had moved to Cincinnati for an engagement at the Hotel Gibson. Ray recorded several times while at the Gibson under the name of Ray Miller’s Hotel Gibson Orchestra. This new band actually made records in Cincinnati too, and they turned out to be some of Miller’s best. From January 1929, the band started a recurring series of special Brunswick transcriptions for the National Advertising Company, promoting Meadows washing machines. The next six months he had two more recording sessions which did not produce anything jazz-worthy. At a relatively young age he disappeared from the scene. Presently, nothing is known of his further exploits. He may have lost a lot of money as a result of the economic depression or maybe he lost it at gambling, one of his passions.

Recording:
Ray Miller & His Orchestra - Sorry(Klages-Quicksell), Brunswick 1927

Duration : 0:2:59

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