Tex Beneke - Working With The Miller Estate

Working With The Miller Estate

Glenn Miller went missing on December 15, 1944 while flying to France from England. After World War Two, the United States Army Air Force decommissioned the Glenn Miller-led Army Air Force band. The Miller estate authorized an official Glenn Miller "ghost band" in 1946. This band was led by Tex Beneke who as time went on had more prominence in the band's identity. It had a make up similar to Glenn Miller's Army Air Force Band: it had a large string section. The orchestra's official public début was at the Capitol Theatre on Broadway where it opened for a three week engagement on January 24, 1946. Henry Mancini was the band's pianist and one of the arrangers. Another arranger was Norman Leyden, who also previously arranged for the Glenn Miller Army Air Force Band. This ghost band played to very large audiences all across the United States, including a few dates at the Hollywood Palladium in 1947, where the original Miller band played in 1941. The movie short Tex Beneke and the Glenn Miller Band was released by RKO pictures in 1947 with Lillian Lane, Artie Malvin and The Crew Chiefs vocal group performing. In a slightly sarcastic article in Time magazine from June 2, 1947, the magazine notes that the Beneke led Miller orchestra was playing at the same venue the original Miller band played in 1939, the Glen Island Casino. Beneke's quote about the big band business at the time closes the article, "I don't know whether Glenn figured that times would be as tough". By 1949, economics dictated that the string section be dropped.

This band recorded for RCA Victor, just as the original Miller band did. Beneke felt that Glenn Miller promised him his own band in the early 1940s and this was his chance to have that promise fulfilled. Beneke wanted a band with Beneke's musical identity. Larry Bruff, an announcer for the earlier Glenn Miller radio shows says, "Beneke would even set wrong tempos so as not to sound too much like Glenn." The Miller estate wanted a band that was primarily associated with Glenn Miller, playing the Glenn Miller songs in the Glenn Miller style. By 1950, Beneke and the Miller estate parted ways.