One of Italy’s leading jazz pianists, Danilo Rea received a solid musical training, obtaining his degree from the Santa Cecilia Conservatory in Rome. Among the artists he has worked with on-stage and in the recording studios are Chet Baker, Lee Konitz, Steve Grossman, Bob Berg, Michael Breker, Billy Cobam, Aldo Romano, Dave Liebman, Joe Lovano and others. In the field of pop music his peerless credentials include Mina, Pino Daniele, Claudio Baglioni, Fiorella Mannoia and many others. He has worked with Giovanni Tommaso’s quintet “Lingomania” (Top jazz 1987). He has given concerts in Italy ,France, England, US, India, Senegal and China. Together with percussionist Roberto Gatto he recorded Improvvisi (Gala Records). He is currently co-leader of the trio “DOCTOR 3”(with Enzo Pietropaoli and Fabrizio Sferra), one of the most highly-acclaimed groups in Italy. Under the “Via Veneto” label he has recorded the solo CD Lost in Europe which brings together the highlights of his year 2000 tour. He is also much sought-after as a performer in classical music settings. Noteworthy among these are Roberto De Simone’s Requiem for PierPaolo Pasolini under the direction of Zoltan Pesko at the Teatro San Carlo in Naples. At the Teatro Rossini in Pesaro, in-ensemble , he performed in “Rossini, mon amour” production for the “Rossini Opera Festival”. He has also appeared with Roberto Gatto in the context of a jazz festival at the Teatro dell’Opera in Rome. In recent years he has dedicated himself to teaching and master classes in jazz and improvisation techniques.

Bill Evans was born in Plainfield, New Jersey on August 16, 1929 and began his music studies at age 6. Classically trained on piano; he also studied flute and violin as a child. He graduated with a degree in piano performance and teaching from Southeastern Louisiana College (now University) in 1950, and studied composition at Mannes College of Music in New York. After a stint in the Army, he worked in local dance bands, and with clarenetist Tony Scott, Chicago-area singer Lucy Reed and guitarist Mundell Lowe, who brought the young pianist to the attention of producer Orrin Keepnews at Riverside Records.

Evans’ first album was New Jazz Conceptions in 1956, which featured the first recording of his most loved composition, “Waltz for Debby”. It’s follow-up, Everybody Digs Bill Evans was not recorded for another two years; the always shy and self- deprecating pianist claiming he “had nothing new to say.” He gradually got noticed in the NYC jazz scene, for his original piano sound and fluid ideas, when in 1958, Miles Davis asked him to join his group (which also featured John Coltrane and Cannonball Adderley) He stayed for nearly a year, touring and recording, and subsequently playing on the all-time classic Kind of Blue album — as well as composing “Blue in Green”, now a jazz standard. His work with Miles helped solidify Bill’s reputation, and in 1959,

Evans founded his most innovative trio with the now-legendary bassist Scott LaFaro and with Paul Motian on drums. The trio concept of equal interplay among the musicians was virtually pioneered by Evans, and these albums remain the most popular in his extensive catalog. They did two studio albums together in addition to the famous ‘live” sessions at NYC’s Village Vanguard in 1961. LaFaro’s tragic death in a car accident a few weeks after the Vanguard engagement — an event which personally devastated Bill — sent the pianist into seclusion for a time, after which he returned to the trio format later in 1962, with Motian again, and Chuck Israels on bass.

His 1963 Conversations With Myself album , in which he double and triple-tracked his piano, won him the first of many Grammy® awards and the following year he first toured overseas, playing to packed houses from Paris to Tokyo, now solidifying a worldwide reputation. The great bassist Eddie Gomez began a fruitful eleven year tenure with Bill in 1966, in various trios with drummers Marty Morell, Philly Joe Jones, Jack DeJohnette and others — contributing to some of the most acclaimed club appearances and albums in Evans’s career. His recorded output was considerable — (for Riverside, Verve, Columbia, Fantasy and Warner Bros) over the years, and he also did sessions (especially early on) with some of the top names in jazz. Musicians like Charles Mingus, Art Farmer, Stan Getz, Oliver Nelson, Jim Hall, George Russell, Shelley Manne, Toots Theielmans, Kai Winding /J.J. Johnson, Hal McKusick and others all featured Evans. In the seventies, he recorded extensively– primarily trio and solo piano now and then, but also including several quintet albums under his own name as well two memorable dates with singer Tony Bennett.

His last trio was formed in 1978, featuring the incomparably sensitive Marc Johnson on bass and drummer Joe LaBarbera, which rejuvenated the often-ailing pianist, who was elated with his new line-up, calling it “the most closely related” to his first trio (with LaFaro and Motian). He suffered yet more family problems and upheavals in his personal life, (often due to bouts with narcotics addiction) and yet brought a new dynamic musical vitality, a surer confidence, fresh energy and even more aggressive interplay to the trio’s repertoire. Evans’ health was deteriorating, however, though he insisted on working until he finally had to cancel midweek during an engagement at Fat Tuesday’s in New York. A few days later, he had to be taken to Mount Sinai Hospital on September 15, 1980, where he died from a bleeding ulcer, cirrhosis of the liver and bronchial pneumonia . He is buried next to his beloved brother Harry, in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

While Evans was open to new musical approaches that would not compromise his musical and artistic vision — such as his occasional use of electric piano, and his brief associations with avant-garde composer George Russell — he always insisted on the purity of the song structure and the noble history of the jazz tradition. It was a point the highly articulate Evans was quite forthcoming about in the various interviews he gave throughout his career. Consistently true to his own pianistic standards, he continued to enhance his own singular vision of music until the very end.

In his short life, Bill Evans was a prolific and profoundly creative artist and a genuinely compassionate and gentle man, often in the face of his recurring health problems and his restless nature. His rich legacy remains undiminished, and his compositions have enjoyed rediscovery by jazz players and even some classical musicians. Even twenty-five years after his passing, Bill Evans’ music continues to influence musicians and composers everywhere and all those who have been deeply touched by his expressive genius and sensitive, lyrical artistry.

When Horace Silver once wrote out his rules for musical composition (in the liner notes to the 1968 record, Serenade to a Soul Sister), he expounded on the importance of “meaningful simplicity.” The pianist could have just as easily been describing his own life. For more than fifty years, Silver has simply written some of the most enduring tunes in jazz while performing them in a distinctively personal style. It’s all been straight forward enough, while decades of incredible experiences have provided the meaning.

Silver was born in Norwalk, Connecticut on September 2, 1928. His father had immigrated to the United States from Cape Verde—and that island nation’s Portuguese influences would play a big part in Silver’s own music later on. When Silver was a teenager, he began playing both piano and saxophone while he listened to everything from boogie-woogie and blues to such modern musicians as Bud Powell and Thelonious Monk. As Silver’s piano trio was working in Hartford, Connecticut, the group received saxophonist Stan Getz’s attention in 1950. The saxophonist brought the band on the road and recorded three of Silver’s compositions.

In 1951, Silver moved to New York City where he accompanied saxophonists Coleman Hawkins, Lester Young and many other legends. In the following year, he met the executives at Blue Note while working as a sideman for saxophonist Lou Donaldson. This meeting led to Silver signing with the label where he would remain until 1980. He also collaborated with Art Blakey in forming the Jazz Messengers during the early 1950s (which Blakey would continue to lead after Silver formed his own quintet in 1956).

During these years, Silver helped create the rhythmically forceful branch of jazz known as “hard bop” (chronicled in David H. Rosenthal’s 1992 book, Hard Bop: Jazz and Black Music, 1955-1965). He based much of his own writing on blues and gospel—the latter is particularly prominent on one of his biggest tunes, “The Preacher.” While his compositions at this time featured surprising tempo shifts and a range of melodic ideas, they immediately caught the attention of a wide audience. Silver’s own piano playing easily shifted from aggressively percussive to lushly romantic within just a few bars. At the same time, his sharp use of repetition was funky even before that word could be used in polite company. Along with Silver’s own work, his bands often featured such rising jazz stars as saxophonists Junior Cook and Hank Mobley, trumpeter Blue Mitchell, and drummer Louis Hayes. Some of his key albums from this period included Horace Silver Trio (1953), Horace Silver and the Jazz Messengers (1955), Six Pieces of Silver (1956) and Blowin’ The Blues Away (1959), which includes his famous, “Sister Sadie.” He also combined jazz with a sassy take on pop through the 1961 hit, “Filthy McNasty.”

But it was a few years later when Silver would record one of his most famous songs, the title track to his 1964 album, Song For My Father. That piece combined his dad’s take on Cape Verdean folk music (with a hint of Brazilian Carnival rhythms) into an enduring F-minor jazz composition. Over the years, it has become an American popular music standard, covered not only by scores of instrumentalists, but also such singers as James Brown.

As social and cultural upheavals shook the nation during the late 1960s and early 1970s, Silver responded to these changes through music. He commented directly on the new scene through a trio of records called United States of Mind (1970-1972) that featured the spirited vocals of Andy Bey. The composer got deeper into cosmic philosophy as his group, Silver ‘N Strings, recorded Silver ‘N Strings Play The Music of the Spheres (1979).

After Silver’s long tenure with Blue Note ended, he continued to create vital music. The 1985 album, Continuity of Spirit (Silveto), features his unique orchestral collaborations. In the 1990s, Silver directly answered the urban popular music that had been largely built from his influence on It’s Got To Be Funky (Columbia, 1993). On Jazz Has A Sense of Humor (Verve, 1998), he shows his younger group of sidemen the true meaning of the music.Now living surrounded by a devoted family in California, Silver has received much of the recognition due a venerable jazz icon. In 2005, the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences (NARAS) gave him its President’s Merit Award. Silver is also anxious to tell the world his life story in his own words as he just completed writing his autobiography, Let’s Get To The Nitty Gritty (University of California Press, scheduled for fall 2006 release).

A thorough examination of Kenny Barron’s musical accomplishments over a span of 50 years necessitates a discography of more than 200 pages. That’s because in addition to a distinguished career as soloist and leader he has served as one of the most dependable sidemen in all of post-bop mainstream modern jazz. More than 40 albums have appeared under his name, and his presence on literally hundreds of recordings by other musicians paints a panoramic picture of Kenny Barron’s lifelong devotion to the music. Born in Philadelphia, PA, on June 9, 1943, he took on the piano at the age of 12, with a little help from Ray Bryant’s sister, known today as the mother of guitarist Kevin Eubanks. Three years later, on the recommendation of his own big brother saxophonist Bill Barron (1927-1989), he joined Mel Melvin’s rhythm & blues band. The aspiring pianist gained more experience while working with drummer Philly Joe Jones and saxophonist Jimmy Heath as well as multi-instrumentalist Yusef Lateef in Detroit. Lateef’s album The Centaur and the Phoenix (1960) was Kenny Barron’s first modern jazz recording project — not as a performer (Joe Zawinul was the pianist on this date) but as composer and arranger. His recording debut as an improvising artist took place shortly after he moved to New York in 1961 and cut the first of many albums with his brother, who often aligned himself with two graduates of the Charles Mingus Jazz Workshop, trumpeter Ted Curson and saxophonist Booker Ervin. A session in 1962 found Barron working with trumpeter Dave Burns, onetime member of sax and flute man James Moody’s exciting bop orchestra. Moody himself played an important role in Barron’s career, first hiring him to perform at the Village Vanguard, then bringing him into Dizzy Gillespie’s band. Barron stuck with Diz and Moody until 1966, performing at clubs and festivals on both coasts and touring through France and England. Kenny Barron’s first great year of independent recording activity was 1967. In addition to co-leading a band with trumpeter Jimmy Owens, the pianist made records with trumpeter Freddie Hubbard and saxophonists Joe Henderson, Stanley Turrentine, Tyrone Washington, Booker Ervin, and Eric Kloss. Barron seldom recorded with anyone just once. His discography is thickly woven with inspiring names that recur with the regularity of intricate and colorful patterns that invite further scrutiny. Examples of artists who made a lot of records with Barron during the 1970s are sax and flute men James Moody and Yusef Lateef and bassists Ron Carter and Buster Williams, with people like Earl and Carl Grubbs, Marion Brown, and Marvin “Hannibal” Peterson expanding the range of expression beyond perceived parameters of predictability and accessibility. This healthy combination of freedom and discipline would continue to bear fruit as Barron worked regularly with saxophonists Chico and Von Freeman, John Stubblefield, Nick Brignola, and Stan Getz (with whom he toured extensively during Getz’s twilight years). The stylistic range continued to widen as Barron sat in with violinists Michal Urbaniak and John Blake, drummer Elvin Jones, and singing trombonist Ray Anderson. During the ’80s, Kenny Barron composed the score for Spike Lee’s film Do the Right Thing, appeared on multi-performer tribute albums honoring composers Nino Rota and Thelonious Monk, and became a founding member (with Charlie Rouse, Buster Williams, and Ben Riley) of the definitive Monk legacy band, known as Sphere. Later developments continued to illustrate Barron’s remarkable ability to blend with and complement a broad spectrum of artists, such as trumpeters Lee Morgan, Johnny Coles, Chet Baker, Woody Shaw, Eddie Henderson, Rebecca Coupe Franks, Terence Blanchard, and Wallace Roney; clarinetists Perry Robinson and Alvin Batiste; saxophonists Benny Carter, Gary Bartz, Lee Konitz, Eddie Harris, Bobby Watson, Frank Morgan, and Ernie Watts; guitarists George Freeman, Larry Coryell, Ted Dunbar, Jim Hall, and Joshua Breakstone; organist Jimmy McGriff; violinist Regina Carter; bassists Red Mitchell, Dave Holland, and Santi Debriano; vibraphonists Milt Jackson, Bobby Hutcherson, and Charlie Shoemake; drummers Louis Hayes, Roy Brooks, and Roy Haynes; percussionist Babatunde Lea; and bandleader Gerald Wilson. Barron’s history of collaborations with vocalists begins with nonchalant scatter Jackie Paris and includes Joe Lee Wilson, Michael Franks, Janis Siegel, Roseanna Vitro, Maria Muldaur, Sheila Jordan, Sathima Bea Benjamin, Teresa Brewer, Mark Murphy, Jimmy Scott, Roberta Flack, Jane Monheit, Jon Lucien, Abbey Lincoln, and Ann Hampton Callaway. A respected educator who has taught at Rutgers, Juilliard, and the Manhattan School of Music, Kenny Barron continues to create music of exceptionally high quality and substantial depth, something he has done for half a century, whether using the Fender Rhodes electromechanical keyboard, a plugged-in harpsichord, a synthesizer, or his lifelong companion, that fundamental jazz instrument, the piano.

Oscar Emmanuel Peterson, CC, CQ, O.Ont. (August 15, 1925 – December 23, 2007) was a highly regarded Canadian jazz pianist and composer. He was called the “Maharaja of the keyboard” by Duke Ellington, “O.P.” by his friends and was a member of jazz royalty.[4] He released over 200 recordings, won seven Grammy Awards, and received other numerous awards and honours over the course of his career. He is considered to have been one of the greatest pianists of all time,[5] who played thousands of live concerts to audiences worldwide in a career lasting more than 65 years.

Biography

Peterson grew up in the neighbourhood of Little Burgundy, Montreal. It was in this predominantly black neighbourhood that he found himself surrounded by the jazz culture that flourished in the early 20th century. At the age of five, Peterson began honing his skills with the trumpet and piano. However, a bout of tuberculosis aged seven prevented him from playing the trumpet again, and so he directed all his attention to the piano. His father, Daniel Peterson, an amateur trumpeter and pianist, was one of his first music teachers, and his sister Daisy taught young Oscar classical piano. Young Oscar was persistent at practising scales and classical etudes daily, and thanks to such arduous practice he developed his astonishing virtuosity.

As a child, Peterson also studied with Hungarian-born pianist Paul de Marky, a student of Istvan Thomán who was himself a pupil of Franz Liszt, so his training was predominantly based on classical piano. Meanwhile he was captivated by traditional jazz and learned several ragtimes and especially the boogie-woogie. At that time Peterson was called “the Brown Bomber of the Boogie-Woogie.”

At age nine Peterson played piano with control that impressed professional musicians. For many years his piano studies included four to six hours of practice daily. Only in his later years did he decrease his daily practice to just one or two hours. In 1940, at age fourteen, Peterson won the national music competition organized by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. After that victory, he dropped out of school and became a professional pianist working for a weekly radio show, and playing at hotels and music halls.

Peterson resided in a two-storey house on Hammond Road in Mississauga, Ontario, Canada, until his death in 2007 of kidney failure.
Influences

Some of the artists who influenced Peterson’s musicianship during the early years were Teddy Wilson, Nat “King” Cole, James P. Johnson and Art Tatum, to whom many have tried to compare Peterson in later years.[8] One of his first exposures to Tatum’s musical talents came early in his teen years when his father played Art Tatum’s Tiger Rag for him, and Peterson was so intimidated by what he heard that he became disillusioned about his own playing, to the extent of refusing to play the piano at all for several weeks. In his own words, “Tatum scared me to death” and Peterson was “never cocky again” about his mastery at the piano.[9] Tatum was a model for Peterson’s musicianship during the 1940s and 1950s. Tatum and Peterson eventually became good friends, although Peterson was always shy about being compared with Tatum and rarely played the piano in Tatum’s presence.

Peterson has also credited his sister Daisy Sweeney — a noted piano teacher in Montreal who also taught several other noted Canadian jazz musicians — with being an important teacher and influence on his career. Under his sister’s tutelage, Peterson expanded into classical piano training and broadened his range while mastering the core classical pianism from rigorous scales to such staples of every pianist’s repertoire as preludes and fugues by Johann Sebastian Bach.

Building on Art Tatum’s pianism and aesthetics, Peterson also absorbed Tatum’s musical influences, notably from piano concertos by Sergei Rachmaninoff. Rachmaninoff’s harmonizations, as well as direct quotations from his 2nd Piano Concerto, are thrown here and there in many recordings by Peterson, including his work with the most familiar formulation of the Oscar Peterson Trio, with bassist Ray Brown and guitarist Herb Ellis. During the 1960s and 1970s Peterson made numerous trio recordings highlighting his piano performances that reveal more of his eclectic style that absorbed influences from various genres of jazz, popular and classical music.
Norman Granz
An important step in his career was joining impresario Norman Granz’s labels (especially Verve) and Granz’s “Jazz at the Philharmonic” project. Granz discovered Peterson in a peculiar manner. As the impresario was being taken to the Montreal airport by cab, the radio was playing a live broadcast of Peterson at a local night club. Granz was so smitten by what he heard that he ordered the driver to take him to the club so that he could meet the pianist. In 1949, Granz introduced Peterson at a Carnegie Hall Jazz at the Philharmonic show in New York.

So was born a lasting relationship and Granz remained Peterson’s manager for most of his career. One poignant illustration: in the last two years of his life, Peterson doted on a boxer dog that he named “Smedley,” Peterson’s nickname for Granz. On the day of Peterson’s death, Smedley lay on the bed with him and would not leave.

This was more than a managerial relationship; Peterson praised Granz for standing up for him and other black jazz musicians in the segregationist south of the 1950s and 1960s. For example, in the Canadian Broadcasting Company’s two-part documentary video Music in the Key of Oscar, Peterson tells how Granz stood up to a gun-toting southern policeman who wanted to stop the trio from using “white-only” taxis. The entire documentary is a fascinating account of Peterson’s life from his Montreal childhood, to his career, to his family relations and includes interviews with Peterson, Herbie Hancock, Quincy Jones and Ella Fitzgerald. Its narrative ends in 1993, just before Peterson’s debilitating stroke.

In the course of his career, Peterson developed a reputation as a technically brilliant and melodically inventive jazz pianist and became a regular on Canadian radio from the 1940s. His name was already recognized in the United States. However, his 1949 debut at Carnegie Hall, New York City, arranged by Norman Granz, was uncredited; owing to union restrictions, his appearance could not be billed.[citation needed]

Through Granz’s Jazz at the Philharmonic he was able to play with the major jazz artists of the time. Some of his musical associates included Ray Brown, Coleman Hawkins, Ben Webster, Milt Jackson, Herb Ellis, Barney Kessel, Ed Thigpen, Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen, Louis Armstrong, Stéphane Grappelli, Ella Fitzgerald, Clark Terry, Joe Pass, Anita O’Day, Fred Astaire, Count Basie, Dizzy Gillespie, and Stan Getz.
Duets
Peterson made numerous duo performances and recordings with bassists Ray Brown, Sam Jones, and Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen, guitarists Joe Pass, Irving Ashby, Herb Ellis, and Barney Kessel, pianists Count Basie, Herbie Hancock, Benny Green, and Keith Emerson, trumpeters Clark Terry and Louis Armstrong, and many other important jazz players. His 1950s duo recordings with bassist Ray Brown mark the formation of one of the longest lasting partnerships in the history of jazz. Peterson’s 1970′s duo with guitarist Joe Pass has been considered one of the highest standards in the genre.

According to pianist/educator Mark Eisenman, some of Peterson’s best playing was as an understated accompanist to singer Ella Fitzgerald and trumpeter Roy Eldridge.
Trio

Joe Pass and Oscar Peterson at Eastman Theatre Rochester in N.Y.Peterson redefined the jazz trio by bringing musicianship of all three members to the highest level. The definitive trio with Ray Brown and Herb Ellis was, in his own words “the most stimulating” and productive setting for public performances as well as in studio recordings. In the early 1950s, Peterson began performing with Ray Brown and Charlie Smith as the Oscar Peterson Trio. Shortly afterward the drummer Smith was replaced by guitarist Irving Ashby, formerly of the Nat King Cole Trio. Ashby, who was a swing guitarist, was soon replaced by Barney Kessel.[15] Kessel tired of touring after a year, and was succeeded by Herb Ellis. As Ellis was white, Peterson’s trios were racially integrated, a controversial move at the time that was fraught with difficulties with segregationist whites and blacks.

“Oscar Peterson Trio at the Stratford Shakespearean Festival” is widely regarded as the landmark album in Peterson’s career, and one of the most influential trios in jazz. Their last recording, “On The Town with the Oscar Peterson Trio”, recorded live at the Town Tavern in Toronto, captured a remarkable degree of emotional as well as musical understanding between three players. All three musicians were equal contributors involved in a highly sophisticated improvisational interplay. When Herb Ellis left the group in 1958, Peterson and Brown believed they could not adequately replace Ellis. Ellis was replaced by drummer Ed Thigpen in 1959. Brown and Thigpen worked with Peterson on his famous albums Night Train and the successful Canadiana Suite. The two guys in 1965 left and were replaced by Sam Jones and Bobby Durham. The trio had performed together until 1970. The albums that they had done were a bunch of pop songs like The Beatles’ Yesterday and Eleanor Rigby. In the fall of 1970, Peterson’s trio were successful in their album Tristeza on Piano which was a eulogy of the recently deceased Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin, the Monterey Pop Festival stars. This record was released on CD in 1999, went out of print, and then came back remastered in 2005 as an anniversary edition. Selections from this trio’s work have been incidentally used for Japanese anime and other live action films. Jones and Durham left in 1970.

In the 1970s Peterson formed another landmark trio with virtuoso guitarist Joe Pass and Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen on bass. This trio emulated the success of the 1950s trio with Brown and Ellis, gave acclaimed performances at numerous festivals, and made best-selling recordings, most notably the 1978 double album recorded live in Paris. In 1974 Oscar added British drummer, Martin Drew, and this quartet toured and recorded extensively worldwide.

Quartet
A quartet was a less permanent setting for Peterson, after the trio or duo, as it was hard to find equally powerful musicians available for a tightly knit arrangement with him. After the loss of Ellis his next trio eventually turned into a quartet after he added a drummer — first Gene Gammage for a brief time, then Ed Thigpen. In this group Peterson became the dominant soloist. Later members of the group were Louis Hayes, Bobby Durham, Ray Price, Sam Jones, George Mraz, Martin Drew and Lorne Lofsky.

Peterson often formed a quartet by adding a fourth player to his existing trios. He was open to experimental collaborations with jazz stars, such as saxophonist Ben Webster, trumpeter Clark Terry, and vibraphonist Milt Jackson among others. In 1961, the Peterson trio with Jackson recorded a highly praised album, Very Tall.

Further career
From the late 1950s, when Peterson gained worldwide recognition as one of the leading pianists in jazz, he played in a variety of settings: solo, duo, trio, quartet, small bands, and big bands. However, his solo piano recitals, as well as his solo piano recordings were rare, until he chose to make a series of solo albums titled “Exclusively for my friends.” These solo piano sessions, made for the Musik Produktion Schwarzwald (MPS) label, were Peterson’s response to the emergence of such stars as Bill Evans and McCoy Tyner.

Some cognoscenti assert that Peterson’s best recordings were made for MPS in the late 1960s and early 1970s. For some years subsequently he recorded for Granz’s Pablo Records after the label was founded in 1973.[citation needed] In the 1990s and 2000s he recorded several albums accompanied by a combo for Telarc.

In the 1980s he played successfully in a duo with pianist Herbie Hancock. In the late 1980s and 1990s, after the stroke, Peterson made performances and recordings with his protégé Benny Green.

Composer and teacher
Peterson wrote pieces for piano, for trio, for quartet and for big band. He also wrote several songs, and made recordings as a singer. Probably his best-known compositions are “Canadiana Suite” and “Hymn to Freedom,” the latter composed in the 1960s and inspired by the U.S. civil rights movement.

Peterson taught piano and improvisation in Canada, mainly in Toronto. With associates, he started and headed the Advanced School of Contemporary Music in Toronto for five years during the 1960s, but it closed because concert touring called him and his associates away, and it did not have government funding. Later, he mentored the York University jazz program and was the Chancellor of the entire university for several years in the early 1990s. He also published his original jazz piano etudes for practice. However, he asked his students to study the music of Johann Sebastian Bach, especially the Well Tempered Clavier, the Goldberg Variations, and the The Art of Fugue, considering these piano pieces essential for every serious pianist. Pianists Benny Green and Oliver Jones were among his students.
Stroke and later years
Peterson had arthritis since his youth, and in later years could hardly button his shirt. Never slender, his weight increased to 125 kg (275 pounds), hindering his mobility. He had hip replacement surgery in the early 1990s. Although the surgery was successful, his mobility still was not good. Somewhat later, in 1993, Peterson suffered a serious stroke that weakened his left side and sidelined him for two years. Also in 1993 incoming Prime Minister and longtime Peterson fan and friend Jean Chrétien offered Peterson the position of Lieutenant-Governor of Ontario, but according to Chrétien he declined, citing the health problems from his recent stroke.

After the stroke, Peterson recuperated for about two years. He gradually regained mobility and some control of his left hand. However, his virtuosity was never restored to the original level, and his playing after his stroke relied principally on his right hand.[21] In 1995 he returned to public performances on a limited basis, and also made several live and studio recordings for Telarc. In 1997 he received a Grammy for Lifetime Achievement and an International Jazz Hall of Fame Award, another indication that Peterson continued to be regarded as one of the greatest jazz musicians ever to play. Canadian politician, friend, and amateur pianist Bob Rae contends that “a one-handed Oscar was better than just about anyone with two hands”.

In 2003, Peterson recorded the DVD A Night in Vienna for Verve, with Niels Pedersen, Ulf Wakenius and Martin Drew. He continued to tour the U.S. and Europe, though maximally one month a year, with a couple of days’ rest between concerts to recover his strength. His accompanists consisted of Ulf Wakenius (guitar), David Young (bass),] and Alvin Queen (drums), all leaders of their own groups.

Peterson’s health declined rapidly in 2007. He had to cancel his performance at the 2007 Toronto Jazz Festival and his attendance at a June 8, 2007 Carnegie Hall all-star performance in his honour, owing to illness. On 23 December 2007, Peterson died of renal failure at his home in Mississauga, Ontario. He left seven children, his fourth wife Kelly, and their daughter, Celine (born 1991).
Awards and recognition

Musical awards and recognition
Begone Dull Care is an abstract film presentation of Oscar’s music, released in 1949.

His work earned him seven Grammy awards over the years and he was elected to the Canadian Music Hall of Fame in 1978. He also belongs to the Juno Awards Hall of Fame and the Canadian Jazz and Blues Hall of Fame.

Peterson received the Roy Thomson Award (1987), a Toronto Arts Award for lifetime achievement (1991), the Governor General’s Performing Arts Award (1992), the Glenn Gould Prize (1993), the award of the International Society for Performing Artists (1995), the Loyola Medal of Concordia University (1997), the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award (1997), the Praemium Imperiale World Art Award (1999), the UNESCO Music Prize (2000), the Toronto Musicians’ Association Musician of the Year award (2001,)and an honorary LLD from the University of the West Indies (2006).

In 1999, Concordia University in Montreal renamed their Loyola-campus concert hall Oscar Peterson Concert Hall in his honour.

In 2005, Peterson celebrated his 80th birthday at the HMV flagship store in Toronto, where a crowd of about 200 gathered to celebrate with him. Long time admirer, and fellow Canadian Diana Krall, sang “Happy Birthday” to him and also performed a vocal version of one of Peterson’s songs “When Summer Comes”. The lyrics for this version were written by Elvis Costello, Krall’s husband. Canada Post unveiled a commemorative postage stamp in his honour. The event was covered by a live radio broadcast by Toronto jazz station, JAZZ.FM.

Peterson received the BBC-Radio Lifetime Achievement Award, London, England.

“Technique is something you use to make your ideas listenable,” he once told jazz writer Len Lyons. “You learn to play the instrument so you have a musical vocabulary, and you practice to get your technique to the point you need to express yourself, depending on how heavy your ideas are.”

“Some may criticize Peterson for not advancing, for finding his niche and staying with it for an entire career, but while he may not be the most revolutionary artist in jazz, [the documentary] Music in the Key of Oscar demonstrates that breaking down barriers can be accomplished in more ways than one.” “He was a crystallizer, rather than an innovator.”

“”His hands could do things few piano players can do,” said pianist Bill King who studied with Peterson at his music school. Because Peterson was a big man — six feet three inches — he could stretch his hands over a keyboard in a way few musicians can match.

Ray Charles, in Martin Scorsese Presents the Blues – Piano Blues (2003), said “Oscar Peterson is a mother fucking piano player!”

Recognition in Canada
While Peterson was recognized as a great jazz pianist both at home in Canada and internationally, he was also regarded in Canada as a distinguished public figure. His notable personage is evident in the acclaim and awards he received, particularly in the latter two decades of this life.

He was made an Officer of the Order of Canada (the country’s highest civilian order for talent and service) in 1972, and promoted to Companion of the Order of Canada (the highest degree of merit and humanity), in 1984. He was also a member of the Order of Ontario, a Chevalier of the National Order of Quebec and an officer of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres of France.

From 1991 to 1994, Peterson was chancellor of York University in Toronto. The chancellor is the titular head of the university. Weeks after his death, the Province of Ontario announced a C$4 million scholarship for the “Oscar Peterson Chair” for Jazz Performance at York University with an additional C$1 million to be awarded annually in music scholarships to underprivileged York students in tribute to Peterson.

Peterson’s niece, television journalist Sylvia Sweeney, produced an award-winning documentary film, In the Key of Oscar, about Peterson in 1992.

Unlike most other jazz musicians, Oscar Peterson was networked with Canadian elites in the later years of his life. For example, former Ontario premier Bob Rae recalled that in 2007, himself, Ontario Chief Justice Roy McMurtry, and former Ontario premier Bill Davis celebrated McMurtry’s retirement with Peterson, his wife, and their wives.

Peterson received honorary doctorates from many Canadian universities: Carleton University, Queen’s University, Concordia University, McMaster University, Mount Allison University, the University of Victoria, the University of Western Ontario, York University, the University of Toronto, and the Université Laval, as well as from Northwestern University in the United States.

In 2004, the City of Toronto named the courtyard of the Toronto-Dominion Centre “Oscar Peterson Square”.

In 2005, the Peel District School Board in suburban Toronto opened the Oscar Peterson school in Mississauga, Ontario, two miles from his home. Peterson said, “This is a most unexpected and moving tribute.” He visited the school several times and donated electronic musical equipment to it Soon after Peterson’s death, the University of Toronto Mississauga opened a major student residence in March 2008 as “Oscar Peterson Hall”.
Former Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chrétien wanted to appoint Peterson to the titular post of Lieutenant-Governor of Ontario in 1993, but Peterson felt that his health could not stand up to the many ceremonial duties that this position would require. “He was the most famous Canadian in the world,” said Chrétien. Chrétien also said that Nelson Mandela glowed when meeting Peterson. “It was very emotional. They were both moved to meet each other. These were two men with humble beginnings who rose to very illustrious levels.”[

A major memorial concert, held on January 12, 2008, filled the 2500-seat Roy Thomson Hall in Toronto. People had queued for more than three hours to get in. Canadian Governor General Michaëlle Jean reported at the concert that "thousands" more could not get in. Among the performers were Grégory Charles, Herbie Hancock, Quincy Jones, Phil Nimmons and singers Audrey Morris and Nancy Wilson. The "Oscar Peterson" quartet played key pieces; they are Monty Alexander, Jeff Hamilton, Ulf Wakenius and Dave Young. All toured with Peterson during his late "one-handed" period" except Alexander. The Nathaniel Dett Chorale, University of Toronto Gospel Choir] and Sharon Riley & the Faith Chorale, under the direction of Andrew Craid along with opera soprano Measha Brueggergosman closed the show, singing an excerpt from Peterson’s “Hymn to Freedom”. The show was made available for download

A movement was begun on Facebook to rename the Lionel-Groulx Metro station, a transfer station between Montreal’s Green Line and Orange Line, in honour of Oscar Peterson. The Montreal Transit Corporation, however, has refused to end its moratorium on renaming Metro stations. The city’s policy on landmark tributes is to wait at least a year after a public figure’s death.

Henry “Hank” Jones (born July 31, 1918) is an American jazz pianist, bandleader, and composer. Critics and musicians have described Jones as eloquent, lyrical, and impeccable.

In 1989, The National Endowment for the Arts honored Hank Jones with its highest honor in jazz, the NEA Jazz Masters Award. He was also honored in 2003 with the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) Jazz Living Legend Award. In 2008, he was awarded the National Medal of Arts. On April 13th, 2009, the University of Hartford presented Hank Jones with a Doctorate Degree for his musical accomplishments.

Hank Jones has recorded over sixty albums under his own name, and countless others as a guest.

Biography

Born in Vicksburg, Mississippi, Henry “Hank” Jones moved to Pontiac, Michigan, where his father, a Baptist deacon and lumber inspector, bought a three-story brick home. One of seven children, Jones was raised in a musical family. His mother sang; his two older sisters studied piano; and his two younger brothers—Thad, a trumpeter, and Elvin, a drummer—also became world famous jazz musicians. He studied piano at an early age and came under the influence of Earl Hines, Fats Waller, Teddy Wilson and Art Tatum. By the age of 13 Jones was performing locally in Michigan and Ohio. While playing with territory bands in Grand Rapids and Lansing in 1944 he met Lucky Thompson, who invited Jones to work in New York City at the Onyx Club with Hot Lips Page.

In New York, Jones regularly listened to leading bop musicians, and was inspired to master the new style. While practicing and studying the music he worked with John Kirby, Howard McGhee, Coleman Hawkins, Andy Kirk, and Billy Eckstine. In autumn 1947 he began touring in Norman Granz’s Jazz at the Philharmonic package, and from 1948 to 1953 he was accompanist for Ella Fitzgerald, and accompanying her in England in the Fall of 1948, developed a harmonic facility of extraordinary taste and sophistication. During this period he also made several historically important recordings with Charlie Parker, which included “The Song Is You”, from the Now’s the Time album, recorded December 1952, with Teddy Kotick on bass and Max Roach on drums.

Engagements with Artie Shaw and Benny Goodman followed, and recordings with such artists as Lester Young, Cannonball Adderley and Wes Montgomery, as well as being for a time, ‘house pianist’ on the Savoy label. From 1959 through 1975 Jones was staff pianist for CBS studios. This included backing such guests as Frank Sinatra on The Ed Sullivan Show. With his rare combination of talents as a strong soloist, sensitive accompanist, and adept sight-reader, Jones has always been in great demand for recording sessions of all kinds, and may be heard on thousands of albums. By the late 1970s his involvement as pianist and conductor with the Broadway musical Ain’t Misbehavin’ (based on the music of Fats Waller) had informed a wider audience of his unique qualities as a musician.

During the late 1970s and the 1980s Jones continued to record prolifically, as an unaccompanied soloist, in duos with other pianists (including John Lewis and Tommy Flanagan), and with various small ensembles, most notably the Great Jazz Trio. The group took this name in 1976, by which time Jones had already begun working at the Village Vanguard with its original members, Ron Carter and Tony Williams (it was Buster Williams rather than Carter, however, who took part in the trio’s first recording session in 1976); by 1980 Jones’ sidemen were Eddie Gomez and Al Foster, and in 1982 Jimmy Cobb replaced Foster. The trio has also recorded with other all-star personnel, such as Art Farmer, Benny Golson, and Nancy Wilson. In the early 1980s Jones held a residency as a solo pianist at the Cafe Ziegfeld and made a tour of Japan, where he performed and recorded with George Duvivier and Sonny Stitt. Jones’ versatility has been more in evidence with the passage of time. He collaborated on recordings of Afro-pop with an ensemble from Mali and on an album of spirituals, hymns and folksongs with Charlie Haden called Steal Away (1995).

Some of his recent recordings are For My Father (2005) with bassist George Mraz and drummer Dennis Mackrel, a solo piano recording issued in Japan under the title Round Midnight (2006), and as a side man on Joe Lovano’s Joyous Encounter (2005). Jones has recently made his debut on Lineage records, recording with Frank Wess and with guitar player Eddie Diehl, but also appears on West of 5th (2006) with Jimmy Cobb and Christian McBride on Chesky Records. He has also accompanied Diana Krall for “Dream a Little Dream of Me” on the album compilation, “We all Love Ella” (2007 Verve Music Group). He’s one of the musicians who test and talk about the piano in the documentary Note by Note: The Making of Steinway L1037, released in November 2007.

Early 2000 saw the Hank Jones Quartet accompanying jazz singer Salena Jones at the Lionel Hampton Jazz Festival in Idaho, and in 2006 at the legendary Monterey Jazz Festival with both jazz singer Roberta Gambarini and the Oscar Peterson Trio.

Hank Jones lives in upstate New York.

Thomas Lee Flanagan (16 March 1930, – † 16 November 2001, New York City) was an American jazz pianist born in Detroit, Michigan, particularly remembered as an accompanist of Ella Fitzgerald. He played on a number of critically acclaimed recordings, such as John Coltrane’s Giant Steps, Sonny Rollins’ Saxophone Colossus, The Incredible Jazz Guitar of Wes Montgomery, and Art Pepper’s Straight Life.

The Tommy Flanagan Trio (with bassist Wilbur Little and drummer Elvin Jones) released their first album, Tommy Flanagan Trio Overseas, in 1957. As an accompanist, Flanagan worked with Ella Fitzgerald from 1963–65 and 1968–78. But beginning in 1975, Flanagan began once again to perform and record as a leader. He continued to work with other players, however, forming a trio with Tal Farlow and Red Mitchell, among other projects.

Flanagan’s style was both modest and exceptionally musical. He embodied many of the most important qualities associated with jazz: swing, harmonic sophistication, melodic invention, bluesy feel and humour. Interestingly, he appeared on a number of highly innovative albums. (His awkward solo on the extremely fast and harmonically complex title-track of Giant Steps is a rare [if famous] instance on record of the usually unflappable pianist being caught off-guard.)

Tommy Flanagan is mentioned by Japanese Author Haruki Murakami in the short story, Chance Encounter, he describes his experiences at a Tommy Flanagan performance.

During his career, Flanagan was nominated for four Grammy Awards — two for Best Jazz Performance (Group) and two for Best Jazz Performance (Soloist). He died on November 16, 2001, of an arterial aneurysm.

  Horace Parlan has overcome physical disability and thrived as a pianist despite it. His right hand was partially crippled by polio in his childhood, but Parlan’s made frenetic, highly rhythmic right hand phrases part of his characteristic style, contrasting them with striking left-hand chords. He’s also infused blues and R&B influences into his style, playing in a stark, sometimes somber fashion. Parlan has always cited Ahmad Jamal and Bud Powell as prime influences. He began playing in R&B bands during the ’50s, joining Charles Mingus’ group from 1957 to 1959 following a move from Pittsburgh to New York. Mingus aided his career enormously, both through his recordings and his influence. Parlan played with Booker Ervin in 1960 and 1961, then in the Eddie “Lockjaw” Davis-Johnny Griffin quintet in 1962. Parlan played with Rahsaan Roland Kirk from 1963 to 1966, and had a strong series of Blue Note recordings in the ’60s. He left America for Copenhagen in 1973, and gained international recognition for some stunning albums on Steeplechase, including a pair of superb duet sessions with Archie Shepp. He also recorded with Dexter Gordon, Red Mitchell, and in the ’80s Frank Foster and Michal Urbaniak. He also has recorded extensively for SteepleChase, Enja, and Timeless. ~ Ron Wynn, All Music Guide

Pianist, composer and arranger, Enrico Pieranunzi was born in Rome (Italy) in 1949.
When he was only five and half years old, he began studyng piano.
At the same time, his father started introducing him to the wonders and challeriges of jazz improvisation as well. From then on Enrico kept on following a double road in music. In fact he developed his jazz style while studying classical piano.

When he was nineteen, he began his professional career in Italy and since then he worked with an abundance of bands, both italian units and groups led by Americans.
He rremarkably wide-ranging experiences include collaborations with jazz luminaries such as Johnny Griffin, Chet Baker, Art Farmer, Lee Konitz, Jim Hall.

Since 1975, Pieranunzi has led his own groups, mostly trios, with wich he has played clubs and festivals all over Europe (Zurich, Ravenna, Berlin, Umbria Jazz, Madrid, Copenhagen, Montreal, Jerusalem).
He also used to perform as unaccompanied pianist and still does to this very day.

In 1984, Pieranunzi formed an american Trio with Marc Johnson and Joey Baron.
After their first album together (New Lands, Timeless), McCoy Tyner described Pieranunzi as “a new addition to the top-jazz pianoworld”. In 1986, another highly aprreciated album (Deep Down, Soul Note) was recorded by them.
No Man’s Land (1989 with Marc Johnson and Steve Houghton) and First Song (1990 with Charlie Haden and Billy Higgins), both for Soul Note, made Pizeranunzi?s experience with american trios even richer and wider. As a close to his liner notes of the latter, well-know jazz writer Nat Hentoff stated “these three have created music here that will last long beyond trends and fads because it is basic as your life”.

Voted Musician of the Year in the Musica Jazz critics poll (1989), Pieranunzi has been said “to reveal himself as a very original musician and a talented composer, able to travel the high road with his own ideas and remarkable musical sensitivity”.

His main influences come from jazz, from classical composers and from his very deep italian roots: Charlie Parker, Chet Baker, McCoy Tyner, Chick Corea, Bill Evans, Gabriel Fauré, Claude Debussy, Darius Milhaud, Aaron Copland, Johannes Brahms, Paul Himdemith, roman and mediteranean popular music.

He has written more than 150 compositions, including “Night Bird” recorded several times by Chet Baker and performed by many others.

Musician of the Year by italian Jazz revue Musica jazz, in 1989
* The album “The Night Gone by” received a Choc JazzMan 1996, as the best international
jazz album
* Django d’Or Prize in 1997, as the Best european Jazz musician

The highly regarded bebop and hard-bop pianist Hampton Hawes was born and raised in Los Angeles, California. His father, Hampton Hawes, Sr., was minister of Westminster Presbysterian Church, and the first African-American to be voted into the National Presbyterian Senate. His mother, Gertrude, was the church pianist.

Hawes’ first experience with the piano was as a toddler sitting on his mother’s lap while she practiced; he was reportedly able to pick out fairly complex tunes by the age of two. Entirely self-taught, by his teens Hawes was playing with some of the leading jazz musicians on the West Coast, including Dexter Gordon, Wardell Gray, Art Pepper, Shorty Rogers, and Sonny Criss. His second professional job, at 19, was playing for eight months with the Howard McGhee Quintet at the Hi De Ho club, in a group that included Charlie Parker.After serving in the U.S. army in Japan from 1952-1954, Hawes formed his own trio, with the bassist Red Mitchell and drummer Chuck Thompson. The three-record Trio sessions made by this group in 1955 on Contemporary Records were considered some of the finest records to come out of the West Coast at the time. The next year, Hawes added guitarist Jim Hall for the All Night Sessions – three records made during a non-stop recording session at the Contemporary Studios in Los Angeles. After a six-month national tour in 1956, Hawes won the ‘New Star of the Year’ award in a Down Beat magazine poll, and ‘Arrival of the Year’ in Metronome. The following year, Hawes would record in New York with Charles Mingus, on the album Mingus Three (1957, Roulette.)Struggling for many years with a heroin addiction, Hawes was arrested in 1958 on his 30th birthday, after being coerced by an undercover federal agent to sell a small amount of heroin. Despite pleading guilty, Hawes was sentenced to 10 years – twice the mandatory minimum – in a federal prison hospital. In the months between his arrest and sentencing, Hawes recorded an album of spirituals and gospel songs, The Sermon, for Contemporary Records. After three years at Fort Worth Federal Medical Facility, in 1961 Hawes was watching President Kennedy’s inaugural speech on television when he became convinced that Kennedy would pardon him. In an almost miraculous turn, Kennedy in fact granted Hawes Executive Clemency in 1963, the 42nd of only 43 such pardons issued in the final year of Kennedy’s presidency.After his release, Hawes resumed playing and recording. During a world tour in 1967-68, he was surprised to discover that he had become a legend among jazz listeners in Europe and Japan. During a ten-month period overseas Hawes recorded nine albums, including two duo records with the virtuoso French pianist Martial Solal. In the 1970s, Hawes experimented with electronic music (Fender-Rhodes made a special instrument for him), although eventually he returned to making acoustic music.Raise Up Off Me, Hawes’ autobiography (written with Don Asher) was published in 1974, and shed light on his heroin addiction, the bebop movement, and his friendships with some of the best jazz musicians of his time. The book won the prestigious ASCAP Deems-Taylor Award for music writing in 1975; the Penguin Guide to Jazz calls Raise Up Off Me, “one of the most moving memoirs ever written by a musician, and a classic of jazz writing.” A 128-page Hampton Hawes biography/discography was published in England in 1987, co-authored by Roger Hunter and Mike Davis.As a pianist Hawes’s style is instantly recognizable – for its almost unparalleled swing, complex and distinctive approach to harmony, and range of emotional expression, particularly in a blues context. Hawes influenced a great number of other pianists including André Previn, Oscar Peterson, Claude Williamson, Pete Jolly, Toshiko Akiyoshi and others. Hawes’ own influences came from a number of sources, including the spirituals he heard in his father’s church as a child, and the boogie-woogie piano of Earl Hines. He also learned much from pianists Bud Powell and Nat King Cole among others; his principal source of influence though, was his friend Charlie Parker.Hampton Hawes died suddenly of a brain hemorrhage in 1977, at only 48 years old. In 2004, the City Council of Los Angeles passed a resolution declaring November 13th ‘Hampton Hawes Day’ throughout the City of Los Angeles. A feature film about Hawes’ life, based on his autobiography, is currently in development.