Bob Crosby began singing in the early 1930s with the Delta Rhythm Boys, which included vocalist Ray Hendricks and guitarist Bill Pollard, and with Anson Weeks (1931–34) and the Dorsey Brothers (1934–35). He led his first band in 1935 when the former members of Ben Pollack's band elected him their titular leader. In 1935 he recorded with the Clark Randall Orchestra led by Gil Rodin and featuring singer Frank Tennille, whose pseudonym was Clark Randall. Glenn Miller was a member of that orchestra, which recorded the Glenn Miller novelty composition "When Icky Morgan Plays the Organ" in 1935.[1] Crosby's "band-within-the-band," the Bob-Cats, was an authentic New Orleans Dixieland-style jazz octet featuring soloists drawn from the larger orchestra, many of whom were from New Orleans or were heavily influenced by the music of the Crescent City. In the mid 1930s, with the rise of "swing" music and the popularity of the swing bands ever increasing, the Crosby band managed to authentically combine the fundamental elements of the older jazz style with the then-rising-in-popularity swing style; the resulting music they produced as a big band had a sound and style that few if any other big bands even attempted to emulate. By unapologetically ignoring most of the pop tunes that were the de facto repertoire of most of the swing bands of the mid-to-late 1930s and stubbornly sticking to playing many older jazz standards with zeal and in the spirit of their tradition—all brilliantly translated into a big-band context—the band, and especially the Bob-Cats, presaged the traditional jazz revival of the 1940s.
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