Results for "piano"

Georgia Tom Dorsey

Born: July 1, 1899

Georgia Tom" Dorsey first gained recognition as a blues pianist in the 1920s and later became known as the father of gospel music for his role in developing, publishing, and promoting the gospel blues. Thomas Andrew Dorsey was born in Villa Rica on July 1, 1899, to Etta Plant Spencer and Thomas Madison Dorsey, an itinerant preacher and sharecropper. Dorsey was first exposed to music in church, where he heard shape-note singing and emotional, moaning spiritual songs. His mother was a respected organist, and Dorsey began playing the instrument at a young age. In 1908 the family relocated to Atlanta, where Dorsey was introduced to a broader spectrum of secular music, especially on the Decatur Street scene

Dorothy Donegan

Born: April 6, 1924

Dorothy Donegan - piano More than fifteen years have passed since the flamboyant jazz pianist Dorothy Donegan died. Sadly, few jazz fans, either then or now, are aware of what enormous orchestral capacity she had at the keyboard (1). Dorothy was born in Chicago in 1924. Heeding her mother’s encouragement, she studied classical music at the Chicago Conservatory and the Chicago Music College. At eighteen, she became the first African-American to be asked to perform at Orchestra Hall in Chicago. The event created enough interest to lead to some work in a film (Sensations of 1945) (2). At the age of fourteen and studying classical piano she was also beginning her own jazz career, playing for a dollar a night at the city’s South Side bars (1) During a performance at the Hi-Jinx Club one evening, she met up with Art Tatum, who was so impressed with her abilities he became one of her champions

Armen Donelian

Born: 1950

For fifty years, pianist, composer and Fulbright Scholar ARMEN DONELIAN has distinguished himself in 25 countries as a performer, recording artist, producer, educator and with his published writings. Donelian’s music is a distinctive blend of influences including his Armenian origin, his Classical technique, and his association with some of the biggest names in Jazz. And, according to Metronom, he achieves this fusion “in such a natural way that one can tell it’s a master’s work.”

As a child, Armen absorbed the sound of Armenian, Turkish, Greek and Middle Eastern music at social gatherings and from records his father played at home.

Fats Domino

Born: February 26, 1928

A genial and prolific musician, Fats Domino was the most commercially successful of a long line of New Orleans rhythm-and- blues pianists and vocal performers. Coming to prominence at the dawn of rock and roll in the middle 1950s, Domino is often named as one of that music's originators and classic figures. He was a gifted and entirely self-taught composer who parlayed his multiple talents into a long period of popularity with music fans of all races, and he stands perhaps as the most enthusiastic exponent of the Crescent City's great musical tradition. Fats Domino was born Antoine Domino on February 26, 1928, in New Orleans, one of nine children

Floyd Dixon

Born: February 8, 1929

Floyd Dixon - Blues pianist, vocalist ( 1929 - 2006) This critically acclaimed performer - best known for his 1954 song "Hey Bartender" - stood alongside Charles Brown, Ray Charles and Louis Jordan as one of a few artists who helped transform swing music into Rhythm & Blues. A wonderful exponent of what is often referred to as West Coast blues, more piano based and jazz influenced than much of the blues and R&B referenced in the Primer, Floyd is a leading practitioner of this 'California style'. Both the state and the style played host to a great many post war Texas bluesmen, and the jazzy T-Bone Walker approach became a mainstay of the genre. Born J Riggins Jr., Dixon began playing piano and singing as a child and in Texas he was exposed to a range of blues and gospel influences, as well as a little jazz and hillbilly. His family moved to Los Angeles in 1942 when Floyd was thirteen and it was here that Dixon came into contact with Charles Brown, a major musical influence throughout his working life

Neville Dickie

Born: January 1, 1937

Neville Dickie is one of the World’s finest exponents of Stride piano and Boogie Woogie. Equally respected in Britain and the United States of America, he is one of a rare breed of British musician who has managed to make a name for himself on both sides of the pond. Neville, and his wife Pat, also ran Sutton Jazz Club in Surrey, England, for 27 years, finally closing its doors at the Thomas Wall Centre in September 2016.

Garry Dial

Born: July 2, 1954

Garry was born in Montclair New Jersey where at the age of 10 he began piano lessons. His 7th grade teacher gave him his first jazz record “The Oscar Peterson Trio” which instilled in him the love of jazz. For a few years he played the standards and some light classical pieces. He entered high school at St. Benedict’s Prep in Newark, New Jersey where his musical life would change forever. In church at St Benedict’s Garry met The “Queen Of Jazz “Mary Lou Williams”. She offered him lessons for free and took him under her wing. For the next few years Garry went into NY City, up to 145th St

Blind John Davis

Born: December 7, 1913

Blind John Davis, a Blues piano legend on Chicago’s West Side, accompanied many great blues musicians on their records, but released few of his own. Born in 1913, in Hattiesburg, Mississippi, his family moved to Chicago in 1916 making that his home since the age of three. He lost his sight at age nine and was playing piano by his early teens. His father ran several speakeasies during the 1920s. As a teenager, he begged to play the piano and to be an entertainer. He learned blues, jazz and boogie woogie from the performers in his father`s establishments, he also became a fixture at the now famous rent parties

Anthony Davis

Born: February 20, 1951

The music of pianist, improvisor and composer Anthony Davis eludes easy categorization. Active in a variety of media, including operatic, symphonic, choral, chamber, dance, theater, and improvised musics, Davis has focused upon the integration of improvised and notated expressive resources. His work embodies an intercultural approach, drawing not only upon traditional and current African-American sources, but upon the Javanese gamelan, American Minimalism, and the European and Euro-American avant-garde.

His fourth and most recent opera, AMISTAD, based on the slave ship uprising of 1839 and the subsequent trial, premiered at the Lyric Opera of Chicago in November of 1997, with libretto by Thulani Davis and direction by New York Public Theater artistic director George C. Wolfe. His first and best-known opera, X: THE LIFE AND TIMES OF MALCOLM X, with libretto by Thulani Davis, premiered at the New York City Opera in 1986.

Charles "Cow Cow" Davenport

Born: April 23, 1894

Cow Cow Davenport was one of the most distinctive and influential blues pianists of his era. His walking bass lines combined with his ragtime influences helped to create the style known as barrelhouse or boogie-woogie, a term that Davenport claimed to have invented in 1924. His 1928 hit “Cow Cow Boogie” has endured as a standard for blues pianists. Born in Anniston, Alabama in 1884, Chrales Edward Davenport was the son of a preacher who wanted him to follow in that profession. Instead, after learning piano from his mother, a church organist, he chose the path of a musician. At an early age he joined Barhoot's Traveling Carnival as a medicine show musician where his rag-time piano style was influenced by Bob Davis