Editing Roy Eldridge (section)

==== Touring, freelancing, and small group work ====
After leaving Krupa's band, Eldridge freelanced in New York during 1943 before joining [[Artie Shaw]]'s band in 1944. Owing to racial incidents that he faced while playing in Shaw's band, he left in October 1945 to form a big band,<ref name=Robinson692 /> but this eventually proved financially unsuccessful, and Eldridge returned to small group work.<ref name=Robinson692 />

In the postwar years, he became part of the group which toured under the [[Jazz at the Philharmonic]] banner.<ref name=Robinson692 /> and became one of the stalwarts of the tours. The JATP's organiser [[Norman Granz]] said that Roy Eldridge typified the spirit of jazz. "Every time he's on he does the best he can, no matter what the conditions are. And Roy is so intense about everything, so that it's far more important to him to dare, to try to achieve a particular peak, even if he falls on his ass in the attempt, than it is to play safe. That's what jazz is all about."<ref>Quoted in Steve Voce, [https://web.archive.org/web/20100423125846/http://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/norman-granz-729533.html Obituary Norman Granz], ''The Independent'', November 26, 2001. Retrieved November 20, 2008.</ref>

Eldridge moved to [[Paris]], France, in 1950 while on tour with [[Benny Goodman]], before returning to New York in 1951 to lead a band at the [[Birdland (jazz club)|Birdland]] jazz club. He additionally performed from 1952 until the early 1960s in small groups with [[Coleman Hawkins]], [[Ella Fitzgerald]] and [[Earl Hines]] among others, and also began to record for Granz at this time.<ref name=Robinson692 /> By 1956, his recordings were showcased on national radio networks by [[Ben Selvin]] as part of the [[RCA Thesaurus]] transcriptions library.<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=iwoEAAAAMBAJ&dq=Ben+Selvin+RCA+Thesaurus&pg=PA39 The Billboard Music-Radio - "Thesaurus in Pact for Granz Transcriptions" 18 August 1956 p. 39 Ben Selvin RCA Thesaurus on Google Books.com]</ref> Eldridge also toured with Ella Fitzgerald from late 1963 until March 1965 and with Count Basie from July until September 1966 before returning to freelance playing and touring at festivals.<ref name=Robinson692 />

In 1960, Eldridge participated, alongside [[Abbey Lincoln]], [[Charles Mingus]], [[Eric Dolphy]], [[Kenny Dorham]] and others, in recordings by the [[Jazz Artists Guild]], a short-lived grouping formed by Mingus and [[Max Roach]] as a reaction to the perceived commercialism of the Newport Festival.<ref>Referred to in the liner notes of the LP by [[Nat Hentoff]], [http://www.elusivedisc.com/JAZZ-ARTISTS-GUILD-NEWPORT-REBELS-180g-LP/productinfo/PPRLP9022/ quoted here:]</ref> These resulted in the ''Newport Jazz Rebels'' LP.