Sabby Lewis was a piano player and band leader.

Biography

He started taking piano lessons when he was 5, and organized his first band in Boston in 1936.
He later performed on Broadway and in ballrooms and clubs in Manhattan. He performed with Dinah Washington

Dinah Washington

Dinah Washington, born Ruth Lee Jones , was an American blues, R&B and jazz singer. She has been cited as "the most popular black female recording artist of the '50s", and called "The Queen of the Blues"...

 and Billy Eckstine

Billy Eckstine

William Clarence Eckstine was an American singer of ballads and a bandleader of the swing era. Eckstine's smooth baritone and distinctive vibrato broke down barriers throughout the 1940s, first as leader of the original bop big-band, then as the first romantic black male in popular...

.

During World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

, Lewis' orchestra included long-time Ellington

Duke Ellington

Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington was an American composer, pianist, and big band leader. Ellington wrote over 1,000 compositions...

 tenor saxophonist Paul Gonsalves

Paul Gonsalves

Paul Gonsalves, was an American jazz tenor saxophonist best known for his association with Duke Ellington. At the 1956 Newport Jazz Festival, Gonsalves played a 27-chorus solo in the middle of Ellington's "Diminuendo and Crescendo in Blue"...

, and drummer Alan Dawson

Alan Dawson

Alan Dawson was a respected jazz drummer and widely influential percussion teacher based in Boston. He was born in Marietta, Pennsylvania and raised in Roxbury, MA. Serving in the Army for Korean War duty, Dawson played with the Army Dance Band while stationed at Fort Dix from 1951-1953...

spent much of the 1950s in the band.