Daily Pulse

Gene Norman Dies

Gene Norman, a promoter, club owner and record producer who helped introduce many legends of jazz to the West Coast, died Nov. 2 in Los Angeles at the age of 93.

Norman got his start as a disc jockey and founded the label GNP Crescendo.

He began promoting jazz concerts in Los Angeles venues and eventually opened Crescendo on the Sunset Strip, where artists and comedians including Billie Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald, Count Basie, Johnny Mathis, Lenny Bruce, Bob Newhart, Don Rickles, and Woody Allen took the stage before the venue was sold in the 1960s.

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