ArtistInfo

Boo Frazier

Producer
A.k.a. Marion Leroy Frazier

Record producer who worked with Chuck Berry, the Shirelles, Janet Jackson, Louis Armstrong and most famously, his cousin Dizzy Gillespie. Founded the label Booman Records. Born 1930 in South Carolina Died Sept. 13, 2014 in New Jersey It was John Birks Dizzy Gillespie, 13 years older, who gave him the nickname 'Boo' which he would carry through life. At 16, Mr. Frazier went to work as Gillespie’s band boy and valet and served eventually as tour manager. He traveled the world with the jazz trumpet great and took part in a 1956 State Department tour that spread the gospel of jazz in South America, the Middle East and elsewhere. The experiences with Gillespie, coupled with a stint as the first black radio announcer in Winston-Salem, N.C., helped launch Mr. Frazier’s career as a record producer. He was associated with such labels as Capitol Records, Mercury Records, Perception Records and PolyGram. Mr. Frazier and Gillespie, who lived in Englewood, New Jersey, were as close as brothers, and Mr. Frazier handled various affairs for Dizzy, who died in 1993, and Dizzy’s widow, Lorraine, who died in 2004.

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