Woodrow Charles Herman, better known as Woody Herman, was an American jazz clarinetist, alto and soprano saxophonist, singer, and big band leader. Leading a group called "The Herd," Herman was one of the most popular of the 1930s and '40s bandleaders.

Woody Herman's first band became known for its orchestrations of the blues and was sometimes billed as "The Band That Plays The Blues" (a name preserved as a cultural reference in Bull Moose Jackson's single, "Big Ten Inch Record"). "The numbering of the early Herman bands has caused much confusion among fans and musicians.

A few individuals consider Woody's first band or 'The Band That Plays The Blues,' the 'First Herd,' but among the majority of music critics and writers, the 'First Herd' refers to the band of 1944-1946."

"At the end of 1944 Woody signed a contract with Columbia records. He said later that he liked the sound the company's engineers got in Liederkrantz Hall in New York City." Liederkrantz Hall was a "former church and had a very high ceiling."

The Columbia contract coincided with a change in the band's repertoire. The First Herd's music was heavily influenced by Duke Ellington and Count Basie. Its lively, swinging arrangements, combining bop themes with swing rhythm parts, were greatly admired.

As of February, 1945 the personnel included Sonny Berman, Pete Candoli, Billy Bauer (later replaced by Chuck Wayne), Ralph Burns, Davey Tough and Flip Phillips. On February 26, 1945 in New York City, the Woody Herman band recorded "Caldonia". "Ralph [Burns] caught Louis Jordan [singing "Caldonia"] in an act and wrote the opening twelve bars and the eight bar tag.","But the most amazing thing on the record was a soaring eight bar passage by trumpets near the end." These eight measures have wrongly been attributed to a Dizzy Gillespie solo, but were in fact originally written by Neal Hefti.

In 1946 the band won Downbeat, Metronome, Billboard and Esquire polls for best band, nominated by their peers in the big band business. Along with the high acclaim for their jazz and blues performances, classical composer Igor Stravinsky wrote the Ebony Concerto, one in a series of compositions commissioned by Woody with solo clarinet, for this band.

Woody Herman would record this work in the Belock Recording Studio at Bayside New York in 1959, and released in January 1959 as SDBR 3009. The recording has been released on a CD by Everest EVC 9049.

Woody Herman said about the Concerto: "What we were doing then, the First Herd [...] were heavy, strong, jazz things, with lots of open brass and so forth [...]. [...] [Ebony Concerto is a] very delicate and a very sad piece." Stravinsky felt that the jazz musicians would have a hard time with the various time signatures. Saxophonist Flip Philips said "during the rehearsal [...] there was a passage I had to play there and I was playing it soft, and Stravinsky said 'Play it, here I am!' and I blew it louder and he threw me a kiss!'" Ebony Concerto opened March 25, 1946 at Carnegie Hall.

Despite the Carnegie Hall success and other triumphs, Herman was forced to disband the orchestra in 1946 at the height of its success. This was his only financially successful band; he left it to spend more time with his wife and family. During this time, he and his family had just moved into the former Hollywood home of Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall.

One reason Herman may have disbanded was his wife Charlotte's growing problems with alcoholism and pill addiction. "[After Woody Herman broke up his band] Charlotte joined Alcoholics Anonymous. [...] Charlotte gave up even wine[...].[...] Woody said, laughing, 'I went to an AA meeting with Charlotte and my old band was sitting there.'"

Many critics cite December of 1946 as the actual date the big band era ended and eight other bands in addition to Herman's, called it quits.