Daughter of San Marcos jazz musician continues work on book series on her father's legacy

Topsy M. Durham — daughter of San Marcos-based jazz musician, Eddie Durham — is currently writing her third book in a series about her father’s life, legacy, and contributions to jazz music.

The book, titled “Eddie Durham & The Ladies of Jazz,” chronicles Durham’s work with the All-Star Girl Orchestra, an African-American all female swing band that toured the United States and Canada during the 1940s. The book, spanning a 60-year period of Durham’s life from 1927 to 1887, chronicles the female jazz musicians with whom Durham and his brother worked over their long careers.

“There were some really big surprises,” Topsy said. “Like Ella Fitzgerald. My father’s all girl band was opening for her when Ella had let her band go, but she was still touring.”

Because the idea of an all-girl swing band was so ahead of its time, Topsy Durham felt like the subject would make for an important and interesting part of her book series about her father’s life. However, due to the historical constraints of the time, Topsy had to do some investigative digging to get to the heart of the story.

“From news articles, my father’s all-girls band was with Fitzgerald for that whole year,” Topsy said. “People couldn’t believe it was women playing. They had to look behind the curtain to see that it was all women. The year was 1943, and they did the Apollo together. But there’s no record of it anywhere. You have to read it and discern.”

Eddie Durham was known among his contemporaries — band leaders such as Jimmie Lunceford, Count Basie and Glenn Miller, to name a few — as an innovator who could be counted upon to make a big band a success. Throughout his career, band leaders scouted Durham as a hit-maker, a man who could arrange six-part harmony for brass in the 1930s and knew countless show-stopping tricks he and his brother had learned in the 1920s while traveling with circuses throughout the southwest. Durham is also credited as the pioneer of the electric guitar, having experimented in the 30s and 40s with resonators and megaphones to enhance the sound of his guitar.

However, due a combination of Durham’s mercurial nature and the political status of the era, much of Durham’s credit has disappeared into the background.

“My father was the ‘secret weapon’ the band leaders hired,” Topsy said. “He could arrange for a band to make them competitive with Basie. But he didn’t talk about what he did, really. He barely took credit for what he did.”

This is where his daughter, Topsy, comes in to set the record straight. In addition to the “Swinging the Blues” book series — which includes “Vol. One: The Virtuosity of Eddie Durham,” “Vol Two: Eddie Durham with the Harlem Blues & Jazz Band,” and the upcoming release “Eddie Durham & The Ladies of Jazz” — Topsy has taken over the coordination of the Eddie Durham Jazz Festival, set for Saturday, Oct. 15, from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Originally started in 2004 by Johnnie Armstead, Topsy and The Calaboose Museum resumed the festival this year after a two-year Covid-19 related hiatus. Now scheduled on the newly-proclaimed Eddie Durham Day, the festival will feature all-day jazz music, food trucks, and arts and crafts vendors. The musical lineup will include the Texas State Jazz Ensemble, The Pamela Hart Quintet, Jazzbonez and the Calaboose Players led by Morris Nelms.

The festival, which will take place at Durham Park, is Topsy’s way of celebrating the legacy of her father as a gifted jazz legend whose contributions to music deserve global recognition.

“I’ve long since wanted to promote this into an international festival,” Topsy said. “This festival is now my baby. It’s historic, and I hope everyone will be there.”

To learn more about Eddie Durham, visit DurhamJazz.com. For more information about the Eddie Durham Jazz Festival, check out event page on Facebook at Eddie Durham Jazz Fest or by visiting calaboosemuseum.org/