Tex Beneke was a big band saxophonist and singer who joined the Glenn Miller Orchestra in 1941, and remained with him until Miller broke up his band the following year to join the Army Air Forces, with Beneke also enlisting in the Navy. He started playing saxophone when he was nine, going from soprano to alto to tenor saxophones and staying with the latter.

His first professional work was with bandleader Ben Young in 1935, but it was when he joined the Glenn Miller Orchestra three years later that his career hit its stride. Having performed on all Miller’s big hits of that era, and with Miller having died over the English Channel in 1944, Beneke got permission from Miller’s estate to form a “ghost band” in 1946. Initially called Tex Beneke With The Glenn Miller Orchestra, the collective eventually became Tex Beneke & His Orchestra a year or two later.

This 48-track, 2CD, collection features selected A- and B-sides of his releases leading the Glenn Miller Orchestra and his own orchestra during these years on the RCA-Victor, MGM and Coral labels through to the mid-1950s. It includes all his 12 hits under his own name from these years, including the Top 10 hits Hey! Ba-Ba-Re-Bop, I Know, Give Me Five Minutes More, Passe, A Gal In Calico, Anniversary Song and St. Louis Blues March. As well as his own featured spots as vocalist, it also has performances by Garry Stevens, Artie Mann, Lillian Lane, Glenn Douglas, Gwen Bari and Ray Eberle, along with the vocal groups The Crew Chiefs and Moonlight Serenaders.

It‘s an entertaining set that sees Beneke recapturing the spirit of the Miller band, but also establishing a style of his own.

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