Bob Erdos, 86, Championed Traditional Jazz

Bob Erdos (1930-2017) Traditional jazz lost one of its greatest champions when Bob Erdos passed away on March 25 at the age of 86. Erdos, a lifelong resident of York, Pennsylvania, was the proprietor of the Stomp Off record label which he founded in 1980. Stomp Off was a proposition dedicated to recording and preserving the best traditional and hot jazz as kept alive in performance by a new generation of artists. Over the years, and over the course of more than 430 albums, Erdos recorded such artists as Dan Levinson, the West End Jazz Band, John Gill, Hal Smith, Christopher Tyle, Butch Thompson, Duke Heitger, Vince Giordano, Andy Stein, Connie Jones, Terry Waldo, Keith Nichols, Marty Grosz, the New Black Eagle Jazz Band, the Back Bay Ramblers, George Probert, Keith Ingham, James Dapogny, Ian Whitcomb, Howard Alden, Barbara Rosene, Eli Newberger, and many others. Stomp Off LPs and CDs featured not only the finest trad jazz musicians working in New York, Chicago, New Orleans, and Chicago, but the company recorded excellent hot bands from England, Sweden, France, and elsewhere. Born in York in 1930, Bob Erdos received his B.A. from the University of Pennsylvania in 1952 and a J.D. from Yale Law School in 1955. He served in the United States Army from 1955 to 1957. Following his military service, Bob joined his father Henry at Danskin, Inc., where he served as Plant Manager. In 198