Earle Warren

Who was Earle Warren?

Earle Warren was an alto saxophonist and occasional singer with Count Basie.

He was born in Springfield, Ohio.

Warren played 1st Alto Saxophone in the Basie orchestra throughout its formative years and its heyday, from 1937 to the end of the 1940s. After the break-up of Basie's 1940s band, in 1949, he worked with former Basie trumpeter, Buck Clayton.

Earle Warren also played some rock´n roll, working for Alan Freed in Alan Freed's Christmas Jubilee, December 1959, which was the very last big Alan Freed show before the payola scandal put an end to the legendary Freed's career. He also appeared in the 1970s jazz film of Count Basie and his band, Born to Swing.

In his later years, Warren performed often at the West End jazz club at 116th and Broadway in New York City, helming a band called The Countsmen, which also featured fellow former Basie-ite Dicky Wells on trombone and Peck Morrison on bass. He lived part of the time in Switzerland where he fathered a child in a May/September romance.