Frank Traynor
Encyclopedia
Frank Traynor was an Australian jazz musician, trombonist and entrepreneur based in Melbourne. He led Australia’s longest continuously running jazz band, The Jazz Preachers from 1956 until his death in 1985. He founded the Victorian Jazz Club in 1956. He founded and ran Frank Traynor's Folk and Jazz Club (1963–1975) which played a central role in the Australian folk revival. The club featured performers including Martyn Wyndham-Read
, Danny Spooner
, Brian Mooney, David Lumsden, Graham Dodsworth
, Trevor Lucas
and Margret RoadKnight
.
He formed his first band, the Black Bottom Stompers, in 1949. In 1951 he joined the Len Barnard Band and that same year was voted best trombonist in the ‘Make Way for the Bands’ poll. He also made his first recordings with this band. He and his band were also a regular "feature" at Athol's Abbey, an underground bar and grill on the corner of St Kilda Road and Park Street (known now as the "Domain" beneath the late Domain Hotel, now a commercial complex during the '70's. Frank and the Jazz Preachers were also a prominent feature of the Melbourne City Council's FEIP program - Free Entertainment in the Parks lunchtime activities during the '70's under the MC of Mr Robert King Crawford, with sound (amplification provided by H.C.McLean and Son Public Address.
Another regular venue during this period was the Dick Whittington Tavern in Hotham Street, St Kilda, on a Saturday afternoon.
Martyn Wyndham-Read
Martyn Wyndham-Read is an English folk singer, notable as a collector and singer of Australian folk songs. He lived and worked in Australia from 1960 to 1967 and has been a regular visitor to the country since then....
, Danny Spooner
Danny Spooner
Danny Spooner is a traditional folk singer and social historian. Born in England, he left school at the age of 13 and worked as a salvage tug and trawler skipper before moving to Australia in 1962...
, Brian Mooney, David Lumsden, Graham Dodsworth
Graham Dodsworth
Graham Dodsworth is a folklorist, performer of folk songs in Australia and an oral history interviewer for The and the .Born in the Yallourn Hospital in Gippsland, Victoria, he lived his first five years in Moe, Gippsland after which his family moved to Vermont in the outer eastern suburbs of...
, Trevor Lucas
Trevor Lucas
Trevor George Lucas was an influential folk artist, a member of Fairport Convention and one of the founders of Fotheringay...
and Margret RoadKnight
Margret RoadKnight
Margret RoadKnight is an Australian singer. In a career spanning more than four decades, she has sung in a wide variety of styles including blues, jazz, gospel, and folk....
.
He formed his first band, the Black Bottom Stompers, in 1949. In 1951 he joined the Len Barnard Band and that same year was voted best trombonist in the ‘Make Way for the Bands’ poll. He also made his first recordings with this band. He and his band were also a regular "feature" at Athol's Abbey, an underground bar and grill on the corner of St Kilda Road and Park Street (known now as the "Domain" beneath the late Domain Hotel, now a commercial complex during the '70's. Frank and the Jazz Preachers were also a prominent feature of the Melbourne City Council's FEIP program - Free Entertainment in the Parks lunchtime activities during the '70's under the MC of Mr Robert King Crawford, with sound (amplification provided by H.C.McLean and Son Public Address.
Another regular venue during this period was the Dick Whittington Tavern in Hotham Street, St Kilda, on a Saturday afternoon.