Stringsinger:"Whiteman didn't turn jazz into classical music but he did give Eddie Lang, (the world's first notable acoustic jazz guitarist), Joe Venuti, Bix and other jazz musicians work that they wouldn't have gotten easily otherwise."

Looks like a duplicate of what Jean Goldkette did. All of them mentioned by you and some others have had jobs in several bands of Goldkette: Bix, Trumbauer, Venuti, Lang, J. and T. Dorsey...and so on.

Originally, Goldkette came from the classical angle and has had an abition to become a concert pianist. And indeed, in the 50's he made concert appearances, including solo performances with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra.

Without a doubt, he was a real musician, born in Greece.

Although this is a thread about Whiteman, I would like to underline Goldkette's place in jazz history. Especially his Victor Recordings (from 1924 to 1928) are really great documents of jazzy dance music.

That's it!