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| Duke Heitger's Big Four |
 Duke Heitger was born in Toledo, Ohio on May 10, 1968. His father Ray is the leader of the Cakewalking Jazz Band in Toledo and so Duke has heard the music he plays (both on record and in performance) since infancy. He worked the summer of 1990 with Jacques Gauthe and his Creole Rice Band in New Orleans and moved to the Crescent City in April of 1991. He joined the Hot Jazz of Banu Gibson in 1993 and left the band the spring of 1999. There have been countless freelance jobs in the city but his first job as a leader came when he inherited the job of leader of the Steamboat Stompers on the riverboat Natchez on its daily trips up and down the Mississippi River.Regardless of all the other fine work he has accumulated over the past decade, Duke Heitger is probably best known as the trumpet player on the hot album by the Squirrel Nut Zippers. That band came to New Orleans looking for a trumpet player with a broad knowledge of Twenties and Thirties Music. Duke was recommended, a common ground established, and a million-selling album was the result. The band has been enthusiastic in praising Duke''s work and he has stayed in touch with the band since that inital venture. |
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