A rendezvous with Stan Kenton

June Casagrande

The year was 1941. An already renowned pianist stood on the verge of

proving to the world that he could also become a world-renowned band

leader. That’s when the name Stan Kenton became a permanent fixture

on the country’s jazz landscape and a local legend synonymous with

the glory days of Balboa Peninsula’s famed Rendezvous Ballroom.

“Balboa is where Stan Kenton and the orchestra really established

themselves,” said Ken Poston, spokesman for the L.A. Jazz Institute,

which will bring a four-day celebration of this musical heritage to

Newport Beach this month.

“Balboa Rendezvous: Celebrating the Musicians and the Music that

Created the Stan Kenton Orchestra Legacy” is a weekend of live

musical performances, presentations, films and symposia centered

around the phenomenon that was the Stan Kenton Orchestra.

The event, which will take place Oct. 23 through 26 at the Hyatt

Newporter resort, is expected to draw a wide range of musicians,

music scholars, aficionados and even music lovers who attended Stan

Kenton performances in the 1940s, ‘50s and ‘60s.

“Musically, Kenton was very restless,” Poston said. “Every few

years, he would change the musical focus of the band or the style.

... Literally hundreds of musicians and composers got their start in

the Stan Kenton Orchestra.”

Howard Rumsey, former bass player for the orchestra, will give the

welcoming address at “Balboa Rendezvous,” recalling his front-row

seat for the musical rise of Kenton.

“We played an audition at the Rendezvous during Easter week 1941,

and the band was selected for the summer season. And at the same

time, the band was selected to do a nationwide broadcast from there

by auditioning over a little AM radio station in Santa Ana,” Rumsey

recalled. “That was the start of the Stan Kenton era.”

Rumsey, a Newport Beach resident now 86 years old, still likes to

visit the Balboa Village area on the ocean side just north of Main

Street where the Rendezvous Ballroom once stood.

“I enjoy driving down to the peninsula and reminiscing about the

1941 band at the Rendezvous Ballroom,” Rumsey said. “It was a very

exciting and formative time for all of the musicians connected with

that band.”