Tony Russell (musician)

Keith Anthony Caesar Russell (24 May 1929 – 20 July 1970), known as Tony Russell, was an English jazz musician and composer, pianist and trombonist. Notably, he worked extensively with Johnny Dankworth and created the score for The Matchgirls, together with writing theme tunes and background music for TV series such as On the Buses and the children’s programme The Herbs. He also composed the music for The Herbs’ spin-off, The Adventures of Parsley. At the end of his life, he turned from the jazz idiom to write a setting of a Mass. Early life Tony Russell was born 24 May 1929 in Wanstead, Essex, England. As a youth, he became very interested in jazz, learning the trombone, baritone horn and piano. Russell was the half-brother of geologist Michael Russell, and the half-siblings are distantly related to German opera composer Giacomo Meyerbeer. Career Russell’s jazz career began at the age of 15, when he played as a New Orleans-style trombonist with the London-based Washington and Lee Swing, George Webb’s Dixilanders George Webb. In 1946 he formed the pioneering trad band, the Russell-Wickham Hot Six, which he led with the trumpeter Alan Wickham. At this time he was known as Rag’s Russ