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Artists
Arkansas Jazz Hall of Fame
2000 Candidates
Doug Stiles (1921 - 2002)
The Year 2000 Lifetime Achievement Award recipient is worthy of such recognition if for no other reason than the fact that he’s dedicated his entire life to absorbing as much musical knowledge and history (past and present) as one individual possibly could.
“I started out as a guitar man when I was a teenager in high school in Monroe, La.,” said local bassist, band leader and music aficionado Doug Stiles, this year’s recipient of the Arkansas Jazz Heritage Foundation’s Lifetime Achievement Award and the Arkansas Jazz Hall of Fame inductee. “My first performance was at the Hotel St. Francis with a college band. But I was the rhythm guitarist, mind you.” To this day he will say time and time again that he is ‘closer to a talented amateur rather than a pro.’
A true Southerner, Stiles enjoys tracing the roots of jazz, in particular to its womb inside country music, where tinges of folk and borderline yodels are accompanied by jazzy time signatures and syncopated rhythms. “I’m from Warren, Arkansas, a real country boy,” Doug said. “And I guess you could say I got the music bug listening to bands on riverboats floating up and down the Mississippi River. My parents would take me to Star City when I was about 4 or 5 years old and they’d let me sit next to the guitar player. I would pick up his broken strings.”
But to persuade Stiles to discuss accomplishments and milestones throughout his career is not unlike pulling teeth; he’d much rather offer visitors a tour of his home’s musical library while spinning records from his collection, which easily numbers in the thousands. Or he’ll waste no time whatsoever describing the characteristics and elements to be found in the various genres of popular music. He may even tell the listener who he considers to be among his most influential performing artists.
He will, however, tell anyone who asks what he believes to be his finest achievement in the music realm. “The pinnacle for me? Watching the Fuller kids,” Doug said. “My most successful piece of work was writing for and training those guys,” referring to The Fuller Brothers Band, who played to a nationwide audience on ABC in mid-1960s and survived three incarnations before disbanding in 1972. “They did what I never did; they rehearsed.”
His tenure as a local jazz bassist has stretched nearly half a century, but his command of the music’s history spans much further, as one visit to his home will prove. He can rattle off facts and artists’ names artist from any given genre - especially ones he’s experienced. Doug’s services have been sought after for decades - from writing and arranging numbers for dozens of artists, to serving as house bassist at countless galas, balls, weddings - practically any gig imaginable.
A recent job in Fall 2000 was playing a Wednesday luncheon at the Gov’s mansion, defying his doc’s advice to minimize his physical activity. But above all, Stiles has earned the respect and admiration of the musicians he’s trained, taught, coached, encouraged, inspired and supported. His wife, Arlene, has served the music community along with her husband as well. She, too, also deserves a note of thanks and recognition for tireless participation in all her and Doug’s endeavors.
Stiles is in the holiday spirit this year. “I’ve got my Bose speakers on the front porch and my CD player with Glen Miller Christmas tunes blaring,” he said laughing. “My neighborhood seems to like it. And I go to bed fairly early.” Of those riverboat days as a young fan, Stiles said of performers he witnessed, “I wish I knew who they were.” But the odds suggest that those very musicians he experienced as a boy could be found lurking somewhere in his ever-expanding, countless stash of music recordings.
[Arkansas Jazz Hall of Fame: 2014 | 2012 | 2010 | 2008 | 2006 | 2004 | 2002 | 2000 | 1998 | 1996 | 1995 | 1994]
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