Jazz band but a few early jazz musicians such as Alcide Nunez preferred the C soprano clarinet, and many New Orleans jazz brass bands have used an E soprano clarinet. Swing clarinetists such as Benny Goodman, Artie Shaw, and Woody Herman led successful big bands and smaller groups from the 1930s onward. Band leader Duke Ellington, active from the 1920s to the 1970s, used the clarinet as the lead instrument in his works, with several players of the instrument (Barney Bigard, Jimmy Hamilton and Russell Procope) spending a significant portion of their careers in his orchestra. Harry Carney, primarily Ellington's baritone saxophonist,
Benny Kalama Kainapau, Alvin Isaacs Sr and Tommy Castro. In between his participation with the McDiarmid band, Benny played with the Wally Lavque's band, also at the Royal Hawaiian Hotel. He toured the mainland with the Royal Hawaiian Serenaders, appearing in movies and on recordings. Benny Kalama was with Andy Bright's band the years 1952–1955 at the Moana Hotel in Waikiki. In 1955, he began working with Alfred Apaka in Las Vegas, followed by 15 years with Henry Kaiser's Hawaiian Village. Kalama's arrangements are credited with helping Apaka's success. On radio, Kalama was a director and arranger on KGU's "Voice of Hawaii"