Mel Lewis
E608671
Mel Lewis was an influential American jazz drummer and bandleader best known for co-leading the Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Orchestra, a cornerstone of modern big band jazz.
All labels observed (1)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| Mel Lewis canonical | 10 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T6655630 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Mel Lewis Context triple: [Joe Williams, associatedAct, Mel Lewis]
-
A.
Lenny Cooke
Lenny Cooke is a 2013 documentary film chronicling the rise and unfulfilled NBA dreams of high school basketball phenom Lenny Cooke, co-directed by Josh and Benny Safdie.
-
B.
Jerry Lester
Jerry Lester was an American comedian and television personality best known as an early late-night TV pioneer in the 1950s.
-
C.
Phil Harris
Phil Harris was an American bandleader, singer, comedian, and radio personality best known for his wisecracking persona on classic radio shows and his later voice work in Disney animated films.
-
D.
Sam Jones
Sam Jones was a Hall of Fame shooting guard who won 10 NBA championships with the Boston Celtics during the 1950s and 1960s, making him one of the most decorated players in league history.
-
E.
Sam Jones
Sam Jones is the widowed farmer and central protagonist of the television sitcom "Mayberry R.F.D.," who continues the small-town stories spun off from "The Andy Griffith Show."
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Mel Lewis Target entity description: Mel Lewis was an influential American jazz drummer and bandleader best known for co-leading the Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Orchestra, a cornerstone of modern big band jazz.
-
A.
Lenny Cooke
Lenny Cooke is a 2013 documentary film chronicling the rise and unfulfilled NBA dreams of high school basketball phenom Lenny Cooke, co-directed by Josh and Benny Safdie.
-
B.
Jerry Lester
Jerry Lester was an American comedian and television personality best known as an early late-night TV pioneer in the 1950s.
-
C.
Phil Harris
Phil Harris was an American bandleader, singer, comedian, and radio personality best known for his wisecracking persona on classic radio shows and his later voice work in Disney animated films.
-
D.
Sam Jones
Sam Jones was a Hall of Fame shooting guard who won 10 NBA championships with the Boston Celtics during the 1950s and 1960s, making him one of the most decorated players in league history.
-
E.
Sam Jones
Sam Jones is the widowed farmer and central protagonist of the television sitcom "Mayberry R.F.D.," who continues the small-town stories spun off from "The Andy Griffith Show."
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (44)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
American musician
ⓘ
bandleader ⓘ human ⓘ jazz drummer ⓘ |
| activeYearsEnd | 1990 ⓘ |
| activeYearsStart | 1940s ⓘ |
| associatedAct | Thad Jones ⓘ |
| awardReceived | Grammy Award for Best Large Jazz Ensemble Album ⓘ |
| birthName | Melvin Sokoloff ⓘ |
| causeOfDeath | melanoma ⓘ |
| coLeaderOf | Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Orchestra ⓘ |
| countryOfCitizenship | United States of America ⓘ |
| dateOfBirth | 1929-05-10 ⓘ |
| dateOfDeath | 1990-02-02 ⓘ |
| ethnicOrigin | Jewish-American ⓘ |
| fieldOfWork | big band arranging and performance ⓘ |
| genre |
big band jazz
ⓘ
jazz ⓘ post-bop ⓘ |
| influenced | modern big band drumming ⓘ |
| influencedBy | big band drummers of the swing era ⓘ |
| instrument | drum set ⓘ |
| knownFor |
subtle, ensemble-oriented drumming style
ⓘ
use of dark, complex cymbal sounds ⓘ |
| legacy | helped define sound of modern big band jazz in the late 20th century ⓘ |
| memberOf | Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Orchestra ⓘ |
| name | Mel Lewis ⓘ |
| notableFor | co-leading the Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Orchestra ⓘ |
| notableWork |
Central Park North (with Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Orchestra)
ⓘ
Live at the Village Vanguard (with Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Orchestra) ⓘ |
| occupation |
bandleader
ⓘ
drummer ⓘ |
| performedAt | Village Vanguard, New York City ⓘ |
| placeOfBirth |
Buffalo, New York, United States
ⓘ
linked to:
Buffalo
|
| placeOfDeath |
New York City, New York, United States
ⓘ
linked to:
New York City
|
| recordLabel |
Blue Note Records
ⓘ
Fantasy Records ⓘ Solid State Records ⓘ |
| regularEngagement | Monday night big band at the Village Vanguard ⓘ |
| residence |
New York City, New York, United States
ⓘ
linked to:
New York City
|
| style | small-group-inspired big band drumming ⓘ |
| teacherOf | various younger jazz drummers ⓘ |
| usedInstrumentBrand |
Gretsch drums
ⓘ
linked to:
Gretsch
Istanbul cymbals ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: Mel Lewis Description of subject: Mel Lewis was an influential American jazz drummer and bandleader best known for co-leading the Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Orchestra, a cornerstone of modern big band jazz.
Referenced by (10)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.