Norman Mason (American musician)

Norman Kellogg Mason (born 25 November 1895 – 6 July 1971 St. Louis) was a Bahamian-born American jazz clarinetist, multi-instrumentalist, and bandleader.

Early life and career
Mason was born in Nassau, Bahamas, to Ellis and Alice Leanora (née Bartlett) Mason.

He began playing trumpet at age eight, as did his brother, Henry Mason.

He immigrated to the United States in 1913, initially living in Miami. He toured with revues such as the Rabbit Foot Minstrel Show while still in his teens, and soon after became active on the New Orleans jazz scene. Soon after he played in bands in Chicago and St. Louis.

Career
At the end of the 1910s, Mason was playing with Fate Marable, when he began playing alto saxophone.

Toward the beginning of the next decade, Mason was a member of Ed Allen's Whispering Gold Band, and soon after led his own ensemble, the Carolina Melodists (though they had no actual connection to North or South Carolina). For one year, he and the Melodists played on radio stations WIL and KMOX in St. Louis.

From 1927 to 1933 Mason returned to duty under Marable, and after leaving his employ Mason began playing clarinet in Chicago and St. Louis bands.

In the mid-1950s, Mason headed the Dixie Stompers band in St. Louis. The group's April 6, 1957, performance at Westminster College's annual jazz concert was recorded by Blue Note Records and released as Jazz st Westminster College on a 12-inch LP by Delmar Records (catalog no. DL-201; matrix runout nos.: DL-201-A & DL-201-B). Bob Koester, founder of Delmar, wrote the liner notes.

Mason was a clarinetist with Singleton Palmer's Dixieland Six, which, after two years as the regular band at the Opera House in Gaslight Square, recorded a live session there in 1961. It was released as Dixie by Gaslight on an LP by Norman Records (NL 101), a St. Louis-based jazz label founded a year earlier by Norman Wienstroer ( Norman Henry Wienstroer; 1916–1999). The album was Palmer's first recording as a leader.

Mason lived in St. Louis for the next several decades, playing often with Singleton Palmer but his career ended in 1969 after a stroke.

Personal life
One of Mason's sisters, Mary 'May' Ingraham was a co-founder and the first president of the Bahamian Women's Suffrage Movement. In 2012, she was featured on one of six postage stamps issued by the Bahamas Post Office on the 50th Anniversary of the Granting of Universal Suffrage to Women in the Bahamas.

General references
 [ Norman Mason] at Allmusic