Join us this Friday, October 23, for an in-store Barnes & Noble interview with Jazz legend Chico Hamilton

Time: 4:00pm - 5:00pm

Barnes and Noble
150 East 86th Street
New York, NY 10028

About Chico Hamilton

Chico Hamiltons career has spanned over 60 years of amazing music. He had a fast track musical education in a band with his schoolmates Charles Mingus, Illinois Jacquet, Ernie Royal, Dexter Gordon, Buddy Collette and Jack Kelso. Engagements with Lionel Hampton, Slim & Slam, T-Bone Walker, Lester Young, Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Charlie Barnett, Billy Eckstine, Nat King Cole, Sammy Davis Jr., Billie Holiday, Gerry Mulligan and six years with Lena Horne established this young West Coast prodigy as a jazz drummer on the rise, before striking out on his own as a band leader in 1955. He recorded his first LP as leader in 1955 with George Duvivier and Howard Roberts for Pacific Jazz; in 1955 he formed an unusual quintet in L.A. featuring cello, flute, guitar, bass and drums. The group later included Eric Dolphy who marked his first recordings with Hamilton on With Strings Attached, Gongs East, The Three Faces of Chico, and That Hamilton Man.

Hamilton revamped the group in 1961 with Charles Lloyd, Gabor Szabo, George Bohanon and Albert Stinson; the group recorded for Columbia, Reprise and Impulse and also recorded the soundtrack for the industrial film Litho in 1962, the first American film to be shown behind the Iron Curtain. He formed a new group with Larry Coryell, Richard Davis and Arnie Lawrence in '66 and recorded The Dealer for Impulse.

Since then he has performed at numerous festivals including the Montreux and North Sea Jazz Festivals. He has also recorded for Blue Note, Mercury Records, Nautilus, Elektra, and Soul Note among others. Hamilton was one of the original faculty members in 1987 at the New School University Jazz & Contemporary Music Program. He was the subject of a documentary film by director Julian Benedikt, Dancing to a Different Drummer.

Hamilton has only become busier in the new millennium. He has recorded numerous albums, had some of his previous recordings used in contemporary mixes, and in 2002 he was awarded the WLIU-FM Radio Lifetime Achievement Award. At the IAJE in NYC January 2004, Hamilton was awarded a NEA Jazz Master Fellowship, presented to him by Roy Haynes. In December 2006, Congress confirmed the President's nomination of Chico Hamilton to the Presidents Council on the Arts. And in 2007, Hamilton received a Living Legend Jazz Award as part of The Kennedy Center Jazz in Our Time Festival, as well as receiving a Doctor of Fine Arts from The New School. Most recently, Hamilton released TWELVE TONES OF LOVE on Joyous Shout!, which included guest artists such as trombonist George Bohanon, who was in one of Chicos classic sixties ensembles, vocalist Jose James, who studied under Chico at The New Schools Jazz and Contemporary Music program, and multi-reedist Jack Kelso, Chicos lifelong friend.

About Dave Schroeder

As a performer, Dave Schroeder's main musical focus has been leading the eclectic New York City-based ensemble, Combo Nuvo, where he displays his skills on multiple woodwinds and composition. In addition to his own group, he has performed and/or recorded with a wide array of artists including Teo Macero, Larry Coryell, Airto Moreira, Oscar Castro-Neves, Lee Konitz, Don Friedman, and Kenny Werner.

As the Director of the Jazz Studies Program at New York University, Schroeder has developed an inspired jazz studies program whos world renowned faculty include John Scofield, Joe Lovano, Kenny Werner, George Garzone, Chris Potter, Richard Bona, Jean-Michel Pilc, Peter Bernstein, Gil Goldstein, Dafnis Prieto, Billy Drummond, Lenny Pickett, Antonio Sanchez, Stefon Harris, Brian Lynch, and Robin Eubanks, among others.

As a music producer, Schroeder created the Blue Note Jazz Club Jazz Masters Series, the NYU Jazz Masterclass DVD Series, Joe Lovano Jazz Standards DVD, and is currently the host of the Barnes & Noble/NYU Steinhardt Jazz Series.