Results for "piano"

Professor Longhair

Born: December 19, 1918

"Fess" One of the principal pioneers of New Orleans rhythm & blues, his influence can be heard in Fats Domino, Allen Toussaint, James Booker and Dr. John, among many others. Known for his unique mix of blues, jazz, calypso, ragtime, and zydeco, "Fess" (as he was known) defined and captured the essence of New Orleans in his music. Born Henry Roeland Byrd in Bogalusa, Louisiana 1918, and raised in New Orleans, Fess started performing at an early age, often dancing down Bourbon Street for tips. In addition to piano, he learned to play guitar and drums in the early 1930s and was in and out of numerous bands. He soon found there were better ways to make money than music

Sammy Price

Born: October 6, 1908

From Honey Grove, Texas, Samuel Blythe Price grew up in Waco, where he learned to play alto saxophone. Portia Pittman, the daughter of Booker T. Washington was his piano teacher in Dallas. His career began in 1925 when he joined the Alphone Trent Orchestra as a Charleston dancer, soon after he was leading his own big band in Dallas. In the twenties, he performed with Benny Long, Lem Johnson, Leonard Chadwick, and in 1927, he toured with the Let’s Go Show. Price lived in Kansas City, Chicago, and Detroit before settling in New York where he began a long relationship with Decca Records. As a recording supervisor and arranger he worked with many top artists of the time including Sister Rosetta Tharpe, Peetie Wheatstraw, and Blue Lu Baker

Andre Previn

Born: April 6, 1929

André Previn started playing jazz as a teenager, having studied classical piano for many of his formative years. In the early 1950s, he was blown away by the bebop of Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker. By 1954, he was performing with some of those bebop masters. In 1956, Previn made his own jazz history. Along with drummer Shelley Manne and bass player Leroy Vinegar, he recorded the first jazz version of a Broadway score for “My Fair Lady.” It was the first jazz album to sell one million copies. Conductor, composer, and pianist André Previn has received a number of awards and honors for his outstanding musical accomplishments

Bud Powell

Born: September 27, 1924

Bud Powell is generally considered to be the most importantpianist in the history of jazz. Noted jazz writer and criticGary Giddins, in Visions of Jazz, goes even further, sayingthat "Powell will be recognized as one of the mostformidable creators of piano music in any time or idiom."

His first recordings were made in 1944, when he was a 20year old pianist in the Cootie Williams Band, and his lastrecordings were made in 1964 when he returned fromseveral years in Europe to play at Birdland.

Between those dates Bud Powell played with the greatestjazz musicians of his generation including Charlie Parker,Dizzy Gillespie, Miles Davis, Sonny Rollins, Dexter Gordon,Charlie Mingus and Max Roach. The recordings he madefor the forerunners of the Verve label and for Blue Note, aswell as many lesser known labels, are among the greatestjazz recordings of all time.

Nat Pierce

Born: July 16, 1925

Nat Pierce had a long, distinguished, somewhat low-profile career as a champion of latter-day big-band swing, serving as the co-leader of Los Angeles' crack Frank Capp-Nat Pierce Juggernaut and an arranger for several well-known big bands and solo artists. His scores created an irresistible force when allied with a swinging, pushing drummer like Capp, often hewing tightly to the loping drive and tight ensemble of the post-1950s Count Basie orchestra. Likewise, Pierce's spare, tasty piano style not only has been compared to that of Basie, he also subbed very capably — indeed, almost indistinguishably — for the great man off and on from the late 1950s until Basie's death in 1984

Enrico Pieranunzi

Born: December 5, 1949

Enrico Pieranunzi was born in Rome in 1949 and has for many years been among the most significant and well-known protagonists of the international jazz scene. A pianist, composer, and arranger, he has recorded more than 70 albums under his own name, ranging from piano solo to trio, from duo to quintet.

He has collaborated, either live or in the studio, with Chet Baker, Lee Konitz, Paul Motian, Charlie Haden, Chris Potter, Marc Johnson, and Joey Baron. Pieranunzi has been named Artist of the Year three times by the Musica Jazz magazine critics’ poll (in 1989, 2003, 2008). He also won the French Django d’Or prize as “Best European Musician” in 1997 and the German Echo Jazz Award in 2014 as “Best International Keyboard Artist”.

Piano Red

Born: October 19, 1911

Willie Lee Perryman, who performed during his career as "Piano Red" and as "Dr. Feelgood," was a self-taught pianist who played in the barrelhouse blues style. (The term barrelhouse was used to describe a loud percussive type of blues piano suitable for noisy bars or taverns.) His performing and recording careers emerged during the period of transition between completely segregated "race music" and "rhythm and blues," which was marketed to white audiences. Perryman was born on October 19, 1911, on a farm where his parents, Ada and Henry Perryman, sharecropped near Hampton

Fats Pichon

Born: April 3, 1906

Walter “Fats” Pichon was born and raised in New Orleans, and began playing piano in his childhood. He also played baritone horn in brass bands in his youth, already a professional musician by 1920. He first went north about 1922, playing at various venues in New York City and New Jersey before settling in Boston for a few years where he studied at the New England Conservatory of Music. After touring the United States and Mexico with various bands in the mid 1920’s, he settled again his home town of New Orleans for the later part of the decade, playing with trumpeter Sidney Desvigne, and leading bands under his own name at dance halls and on river boats on the Mississippi River

Michel Petrucciani

Born: December 28, 1962

Piano virtuoso Michel Petrucciani was born on December 28th 1962 in Orange France to Italian parents. He grew up surrounded by music as his father was a guitarist and his brothers were a bassist and a guitarist. He discovered the piano very young and one of his early influences was Duke Ellington. Because he was born with osteogenesis imperfecta; a condition that stunts growth and causes fragile bones and respiratory disorders, he had to have special extensions made for him to reach the pedals of the piano. The condition did not affect his hands, however, and he was able to study classical piano for 8 years

Oscar Peterson

Born: August 15, 1925

One of the most admired pianists in jazz, Oscar Peterson has rightfully claimed the same sort of status as earlier greats such as James P. Johnson, Art Tatum, Teddy Wilson, Fats Waller, Thelonious Monk, Bud Powell, and Bill Evans. Possibly the most successful artist produced by Canada, he appeared on well over 200 albums spanning six decades and won numerous awards, including eight Grammys. During his career he performed and recorded with, among others, Louis Armstrong, Count Basie, Ella Fitzgerald, Dizzy Gillespie, Duke Ellington, and Charlie Parker. He was beyond doubt an authentic jazz piano virtuoso, with a remarkable and prolific legacy of recordings and performances.