Bob Dorough died. Why you should care.
Bob Dorough died this week, a day after turning 94. Dorough was an esteemed jazz vocalist whose career dates back to the 1950s. And when most jazz fans had forgotten about him, a Houston producer helped pull Dorough back with a sublime new album.
Take a minute, if you will, to consider how Dorough’s life and work extended well beyond his jazz recordings, which are wonderful. Dorough was a major voice in “Schoolhouse Rocks,” the educational, jazzy TV show that explained things like the life of a bill in “I’m Just a Bill.”
Dorough was born in Arkansas and raised in Texas, where he studied at University of North Texas. He left Texas for New York to immerse himself in the city’s jazz scene. Dorough released “Devil May Care” in 1956, which began a career that had him cross paths with Miles Davis and other jazz luminaries. But in the ’70s Dorough’s style of jazz had become antiquated. He took work at an ad agency and began a new phase in his career.
His “Three Is a Magic Number” became a portal to a second career, which would become the cornerstone of the TV series “Schoolhouse Rock!” which would put Dorough’s voice into the heads of a generation that had no idea of his history as a jazz great.
Dorough remained active, though, and mentored the young jazzy singer Nellie McKay.
But he also continued recording, including “Right on My Way Home” in 1997 and the lovely “Eulalia” in 2011, which was produced by Houston native Joseph Peine, who surrounded Dorough with local talent like trumpeter Dennis Dotson and saxophonist Warren Sneed.
And Dorough’s connections to Houston extend beyond his recordings. His daughter Aralee Dorough plays with the Houston Symphony.