Bobby Stark

Who was Bobby Stark?

Bobby Stark was an American jazz trumpeter.

Stark played piano, clarinet, saxophone, and alto horn before deciding on trumpet. In the mid-1920s he played with June Clark, Edgar Dowell, Leon Abbey, Duncan Mayers, Bobbie Brown, Bobby Lee, Billy Butler, Charles Turner, McKinney's Cotton Pickers, and Chick Webb, the last in 1926-27. From 1927 to 1933 he played in Fletcher Henderson's Orchestra as a featured soloist. He returned to duty under Chick Webb behind Taft Jordan from 1934 to 1939; after Webb's death he remained in the orchestra, now under the direction of Ella Fitzgerald. In 1940 he left the group to freelance. In 1942-43 he served in the Army, then played with Garvin Bushell and Benny Morton shortly before his death. He never led his own recording session.