Walt Yoder was an American jazz

Jazz

Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...

 double-bassist, best known for his association with Woody Herman

Woody Herman

Woodrow Charles Herman , known as Woody Herman, was an American jazz clarinetist, alto and soprano saxophonist, singer, and big band leader. Leading various groups called "The Herd," Herman was one of the most popular of the 1930s and '40s bandleaders...

.

A piano player from age ten, Yoder switched to bass as a teenager. He worked in the bands of Joe Haymes

Joe Haymes

Joseph Lawrence Haymes was an American jazz bandleader and arranger.Born in Marshfield, Missouri, Haymes relocated with his family to Springfield, Missouri, after his railroader father was killed in an accident. Joe attended Greenwood Laboratory School in Springfield and was a drummer in the local...

, Tommy Dorsey

Tommy Dorsey

Thomas Francis "Tommy" Dorsey, Jr. was an American jazz trombonist, trumpeter, composer, and bandleader of the Big Band era. He was known as "The Sentimental Gentleman of Swing", due to his smooth-toned trombone playing. He was the younger brother of bandleader Jimmy Dorsey...

, and Jimmy Dorsey

Jimmy Dorsey

James "Jimmy" Dorsey was a prominent American jazz clarinetist, saxophonist, trumpeter, composer, and big band leader. He was known as "JD"...

 early in the 1930s. Yoder played with Herman in Isham Jones

Isham Jones

Isham Jones was a United States bandleader, saxophonist, bassist and songwriter.-Career:Jones was born in Coalton, Ohio, to a musical and mining family, and grew up in Saginaw, Michigan, where he started his first band...

's band in the middle of the 1930s. After this ensemble dissolved in 1936, Herman formed a new group with five of Jones's former sidemen, including Yoder. He remained with Herman through 1942 and played with him again in 1947-48.

Following his tenure with Herman, Yoder played with Ben Pollack

Ben Pollack

Ben Pollack was a drummer and bandleader from the mid 1920s through the swing era. His eye for talent led him to either discover or employ, at one time or another, musicians such as Benny Goodman, Jack Teagarden, Glenn Miller, Jimmy McPartland and Harry James...

, Russ Morgan

Russ Morgan

Russ Morgan was a big band orchestra leader and musical arranger in the United States during the 1930s and 1940s.-Early life:...

, Bob Crosby

Bob Crosby

George Robert "Bob" Crosby was an American dixieland bandleader and vocalist, best known for his group the Bob-Cats.-Family:...

, and Red Nichols

Red Nichols

Ernest Loring "Red" Nichols was an American jazz cornettist, composer, and jazz bandleader.Over his long career, Nichols recorded in a wide variety of musical styles, and critic Steve Leggett describes him as "an expert cornet player, a solid improviser, and apparently a workaholic, since he is...

. He did some works as a bandleader and in the studios near Los Angeles

Los Ángeles

Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...

later in his life, playing into the 1970s.