He was an amazing guitar player. Before Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, Muddy Waters, Robert Johnston and a host of others became known as innovators on the guitar, Django was known throughout Europe. He played in all styles - in fact, he invented the styles. There are hundreds of recordings available and I defy anyone to say just what genre he was residing in... ok, it was kind of jazz, lots of improv... but, there is blues, there is gypsy (he was Roma), there is classical, there is just so much... and his virtuosity. Plus, he was missing the use of several of his fingers ...!
He played and recorded a lot with another unbelievable great, Stephane Grappelli, violinist - who stands tall in his own right.
Listen and enjoy.
Here is some background from Winamp.com:
Django Reinhardt was the first hugely influential jazz figure to emerge from Europe. A free-spirited gypsy, Reinhardt wasn’t the most reliable person in the world, frequently wandering off into the countryside on a whim. Yet Reinhardt came up with a unique way of propelling the humble acoustic guitar into the front line of a jazz combo in the days before amplification became widespread. He would spin joyous, arcing, marvelously inflected solos above the thrumming base of two rhythm guitars and a bass, with Stephane Grappelli’s elegantly gliding violin serving as the perfect foil. His harmonic concepts were startling for their time -- making a direct impression upon Charlie Christian and Les Paul, among others -- and he was an energizing rhythm guitarist behind Grappelli, pushing their groups into a higher gear.
Not only did Reinhardt put his stamp upon jazz, his string band music also had an impact upon the parallel development of Western swing, which eventually fed into the wellspring of what is now called country music. Although he could not read music, with Grappelli and on his own, Reinhardt composed several winsome, highly original tunes like "Daphne," "Nuages" and "Manoir de Mes Reves," as well as mad swingers like "Minor Swing" and the ode to his record abel of the ’30s, "Stomping at Decca." As the late Ralph Gleason said about Django’s recordings, "They were European and they were French and they were still jazz."
A violinist first and a guitarist later, Jean Baptiste "Django" Reinhardt grew up in a gypsy camp near Paris where he absorbed the gypsy strain into his music. A disastrous caravan fire in 1928 badly burned his left hand, depriving him of the use of the fourth and fifth fingers, but the resourceful Reinhardt figured out a novel fingering system to get around the problem that probably accounts for some of the originality of his style.
According to one story, during his recovery period, Reinhardt was introduced to American jazz when he found a 78 RPM disc of Louis Armstrong’s "Dallas Blues" at an Orleans flea market. He then resumed his career playing in Parisian cafes until one day in 1934 when Hot Club chief Pierre Nourry proposed the idea of an all-string band to Reinhardt and Grappelli. Thus was born the Quintet of the Hot Club of France, which quickly became an international draw thanks to a long, splendid series of Ultraphone, Decca and HMV recordings.
In 1946, Reinhardt took up the electric guitar and toured America as a soloist with the Duke Ellington band. Starting in Jan. 1946, Reinhardt and Grappelli held several sporadic reunions where the bop influences are more subtly integrated into the old, still-fizzing swing format. In the 1950s, Reinhardt became more reclusive, remaining in Europe, playing and recording now and then until his death from a stroke in 1953.
His Hot Club recordings from the `30s are his most irresistible legacy; their spirit and sound can be felt in current groups like Holland’s Rosenberg Trio. ~ Richard S. Ginell, All Music Guide
YouTube Blue Drag - Django Reinhardt
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a5ahaXnO_tE
Saturday, January 16, 2010
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
Art Tatum - The Greatest Piano Player
Art Tatum, played the piano like no one before and no one since.
To hear him is to wonder: How does he do that? Luckily, there are many recordings that have been left behind.
He played tunes from popular songs, Broadway shows, whatever and then turned them into his own particular forms of virtuosity. And he knew how to swing. Whether he played solo or with supporting players.
Dizzy Gillespie, the great jazz trumpet player said "First you speak of Art Tatum, then take a long deep breath, and you speak of the other pianists."[45]
The elegant pianist Teddy Wilson observed, "Maybe this will explain Art Tatum. If you put a piano in a room, just a bare piano. Then you get all the finest jazz pianists in the world and let them play in the presence of Art Tatum. Then let Art Tatum play ... everyone there will sound like an amateur."[45]
Here is a short synopsis:
Arthur "Art" Tatum Jr. (October 13, 1909 – November 5, 1956) was an American jazz pianist and virtuoso. He was nearly blind.
Tatum is widely acknowledged as one of the greatest jazz pianists of all time.[1] Critic Scott Yanow wrote, "Tatum's quick reflexes and boundless imagination kept his improvisations filled with fresh (and sometimes futuristic) ideas that put him way ahead of his contemporaries ... Art Tatum's recordings still have the ability to scare modern pianists."[2]
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Art Tatum
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(born Oct. 13, 1909, Toledo, Ohio, U.S. — died Nov. 5, 1956, Los Angeles, Calif.) U.S. jazz pianist. Tatum was blind from birth. Influenced by Fats Waller and Earl Hines, his playing represents a synthesis of stride and swing piano traditions. He developed an unprecedented technical and harmonic control on the instrument and was capable of astonishing speed and intricate elaborations of melody. By 1937 he was recognized as the outstanding pianist in jazz. He formed a trio with guitar and bass in 1943 but frequently made solo performances that showcased his unique mastery.
*
*
American jazz pianist. He played in nightclubs and on radio before going to New York in 1932 and made many recordings. He worked with bands and his own trio but usually appeared as a soloist in clubs. His technical abilities, lightness of touch and control of the instrument's range were unprecedented; he had an unerring sense of rhythm and swing, a seemingly unlimited capacity to expand and enrich a melody and a profound grasp of substitute harmonies.
Career
Won amateur contest which led to appearance on WSPD radio, 1927; worked clubs and speakeasies in Toldeo and Cleveland; moved to New York City in 1932 as accompanist for singer Adelaide Hall; Onyx Club, soloist, 1933; recorded for Brunswick label, 1933-34; performed in Cleveland, 1935; appeared on the "Fleischman Hour" radio program, 1935; performed at Three Dueces in Chicago and formed a small band at the club, 1936; played Los Angeles clubs and Hollywood parties, 1936-37; performed and recorded in Los Angeles and New York City; toured England and recorded for Decca, 1938; played Los Angeles and New York, 1939-40; hit record, "Wee Wee Baby Blues," 1941; formed trio, 1943-45; concert stage debut, 1945; continued to play concert dates until mid-1950s; recorded for Verve records 1953-56.
Life's Work
Idolized by jazz instrumentalists and lauded by musicians such as Vladimir Horowitz and composer George Gerschwin, jazz pianist Art Tatum possessed a name synonymous with genius. Like trumpeter Louis Armstrong, Tatum had an impact on the entire strata of jazz instrumentation. As A.B. Spellman observed in the liner notes to Giants of Jazz, Art Tatum, Tatum was "blessed with fingers that moved almost as fast as his endless stream of ideas." Tatum's repertoire consisted primarily of a few original compositions, popular songs, jazz standards, and concert music pieces by such composers as Antonin Dvorak and Jules Massenet. Despite gaining popularity with a trio during the 1940s, Tatum's numerous solo performances still awe listeners and represent some of the finest music of the twentieth century America.
Arthur Tatum Jr. was born partially blind on October 13, 1909, in Toledo, Ohio. Tatum's father, Art Sr., a mechanic, and his mother, Mildred Hoskins, were members of the Grace Presbyterian Church. Art Sr. played the guitar and Mildred played the piano. Family members later recalled three year old Tatum playing melodies on piano. Tatum studied violin and later, around age 13, took up the piano. He learned to read Braille at Toledo's Jefferson School. In 1924, 15-year-old Tatum attended The School For the Blind in Columbus. As Tatum's biographer, James Lester, asserted in Too Marvelous For Words, "Clearly, the Tatum's wanted to do everything they could for their son, and the move to Columbus was made easier by the fact that a cousin was there who would keep tabs on him." In 1925 Tatum enrolled at the Toledo School (Conservatory) of Music where he studied with a classically trained African American instructor, Overton G. Rainey. At home he listened to a wide range of music including jazz piano rolls and recordings of concert pianists.
With end of his formal education in 1927, 16-year-old Tatum embarked on a professional music career in the jazz idiom which offered creative and lucrative opportunities. As Lester wrote, "Within jazz [Tatum] could improvise a career, make a career out of improvising, invent a path for himself, take advantage of fast-changing musical developments, and even influence the course of those developments." He first played in local dance bands, and around 1927 won a local amateur contest which led to his regular appearance on Toledo radio station WSPD. The broadcast was eventually picked up nationally on NBC Blue Network. Tatum's weekday fifteen minute show sometimes featured his playing duets with another young pianist, Teddy Wilson. In the liner notes to Giants of Jazz, Art Tatum, Wilson recounted that Tatum already employed, "flatted fifths and all the added tones, and improvising these wonderful progressions in the middle of a tune....No other pianist had, even remotely, that conception of playing."
Tatum's employment in Toledo speakeasies and premiere nightclubs allowed him to work out the music he had formally learned by instruction and by listening to records and radio. Even as a teenager Tatum astounded fellow musicians. Noting Tatum's impact on musicians, Benny Green stressed in The Reluctant Art, "Tatum shattered everyone; Tatum caused all other musicians to lose confidence; Tatum terrified those who thought they knew how far jazz could be taken." In 1929, the "father of the tenor saxophone" Coleman Hawkins, then a member of Fletcher Henderson's Orchestra, heard Tatum at a small Toledo club and immediately incorporated the pianist's harmonic ideas into his playing. Around this time, Duke Ellington encountered Tatum in Cleveland and encouraged him to move to New York City.
Relocated To New York City
Tatum went to New York City in 1932 as the accompanist for singer Adelaide Hall. He recorded four sides with Hall and toured with her, until landing jobs as a solo pianist in New York City. "His first visit to New York," recounted Duke Ellington in his memoir, Music is My Mistress, "stirred up quite a storm. In a matter of hours, it got to all piano players--and musicians who played other instruments, too--that a real Bad Cat had arrived...." Not long after his arrival, Tatum agreed to meet Harlem's three leading pianists--James P. Johnson, Willie "The Lion" Smith, and Fats Waller--at Morgan's, a Harlem bar with a suitable piano. Pitted in a piano battle against these musical giants, Tatum, overwhelmed his challengers. Looking back on that evening Waller confessed, as quoted in Fats Waller, "That Tatum, he was just too good....He had too much technique. When that man turns on the powerhouse don't know one play him down. He sounds like a brass band." Tatum had bested his rivals and thus established himself as one of the greatest pianists on the New York City jazz scene.
In 1933 Tatum played the Onyx Club on 52nd Street. In March of that same year, he recorded his first official solo session, which included "Tiger Rag," "Tea For Two," "St. Louis Blues," and Duke Ellington's "Sophisticated Lady." In assessing these first sides recorded for the Brunswick label, Leonard Feather, in the liner notes to Art Tatum, Piano Starts Here, observed "The characteristics that were to remain Tatum's trademarks until the day he died were already evident: the incessantly creative left hand, now striding, now playing four different chords to the bar; the use of substitute chords and unprecedented harmonic subtlety; the sixteenth note runs at tempos that gave most pianists trouble maintaining an even flow of eighth notes."
In August and September of 1934 Tatum returned to the studio, and in the following year, without steady work in New York City, he performed in Cleveland. In 1935 he performed on the "Fleischman Hour" radio program hosted by Rudy Valee. He also played the Three Dueces in Chicago, and eventually formed a quartet at the club. After the end of his stint at the Three Deuces in 1936, Tatum traveled to Los Angeles, where his reputation had already been established. He played Hollywood parties and venues like the Tracadero, Paramount, and the Club Alabam on Central Avenue in the heart of Los Angeles's black entertainment scene. After several months in Los Angeles Tatum returned to New York City in 1936, and then, during the following year, returned to the west coast and recorded with a group, Art Tatum and His Swingsters. In 1937 he also recorded for the Brunswick label in New York City, producing the numbers "Stormy Weather," "The Sheik of Araby," "Chlo-e," and "Gone With the Wind."
Traveled Overseas
In 1938 Tatum left for England on the Queen Mary, and played a three month engagement in various English clubs and appeared on the BBC. As Lester explained in Too Marvelous For Words, "Art's appearances in England were not concerts," but the quiet attentiveness of the audiences "made them something closer to concerts than anything Tatum had experienced at home." By 1938 Tatum's music began to be transcribed and notated in publications, and his bookings resulted in residencies at various clubs. His recordings for Decca included Jules Massenet's "Elegie" (1938) and eighteen numbers in 1939, including "Get Happy" and Atonin Dvorak's "Humoresque." His 1940 output for Decca included a more popular version of "Humoresque," "Cocktails For Two," and "Begin the Beguine."
Between 1939 and 1940 Tatum worked in New York City and made frequent trips to Los Angeles where he made seventeen sides for Decca. A recently issued live recording, Art Tatum, California Melodies, captures the pianist in a series of Los Angeles (KHJ) broadcasts that aired from April to July of 1940. Tatum's recordings from this weekly program "is perhaps the most valuable and historically important addition to [Tatum's] recorded legacy," noted Stephen C. LaVere in the liner notes to California Melodies.
Art Tatum Trio
During January of 1941 Tatum recorded a Decca session under the title Art Tatum and His Band, a small pickup group including blues vocalist Joe Turner. The session produced four numbers including the big-selling number, "Wee Wee Baby Blues." The success of "Wee Wee Baby Blues" prompted another recording session with Turner, and in June of 1941, four sides were cut, including "Corrine Corina." His next commercial recordings did not emerge until 1943, when he won Esquire's first jazz popularity poll. Without steady bookings as a solo artist, Tatum looked to other opportunities to support himself; in 1943 he formed a trio with guitarist Tiny Grimes and bassist Leroy "Slam" Stewart. The trio, observed Lyons in The Great Jazz Pianists, "was celebrated for the inventive communication among the players as well as for Tatum's blistering speed, as they achieved a unity of sound that was rare at any tempo." Tatum's 1944 recordings were entirely made up of his trio work. During 1945 he appeared on the radio, attended only two studio sessions, and finally decided to quit working in a trio format.
At end of the Second World War in 1945, observed Lester in Too Marvelous For Words, Tatum's "standing and reputation were established beyond challenge, but his popularity," primarily due to the emergence of bebop, "faded seriously in the remainder of the 1940s." Tatum's music did not follow this modernist jazz trend, but it did have profound influence on its leading musicians, like Charlie Parker who, for one year, washed dishes in a Harlem restaurant just to listen to Tatum's playing in the front room, and bebop piano genius Bud Powell idolized the keyboard master from Toledo.
In the spring of 1949 Tatum performed at Los Angeles' Shrine Auditorium. That same year, Tatum signed with Capitol Records and recorded several critically acclaimed numbers. He made his concert stage debut in 1945, and subsequently played a circuit of university and community halls across the country, while continuing to play club and concert dates into the mid 1950s, including San Francisco's Black Hawk Club in 1955, and the Hollywood Bowl in August 1956.
Recorded For The Verve Label
In 1953 Tatum signed with Norman Granz's Clef/Verve label, for which he recorded over 120 piano solos. Discussing Tatum's recorded repertoire that included many of the same selections, Lyons, noted that, even during the 1950s, he "rarely repeated himself in his treatment of material. His harmonic variations were startling, especially when he soloed. Where another pianist might go directly from one chord to the next, Tatum's left hand would walk crablike through a cycle of four to six new chords between the original two. Meanwhile, his right hand would spin out a web of interconnecting lines of thirty-second notes."
Apart from his solo recordings the Verve label recorded Tatum in several small group settings with jazzmen such as Benny Carter, clarinetist Buddy DeFranco, vibraphonist Lionel Hampton, and tenor saxophonist Ben Webster. His session with Webster, recorded in September of 1956, is considered by most critics as the finest of these small group recordings. In his review of The Art Tatum-Ben Webster Quartet for Jazz Review, critic Dick Katz, stated, as reprinted in the book Jazz Panorama, how "Tatum's and Webster's respective conceptions complement each other beautifully....Art Tatum and Ben Webster represent to me a kind of romanticism in jazz which has now itself become classic. Theirs is a an artistry rarely matched in any era of jazz."
But this session would be Tatum's last. For years Tatum, a heavy beer drinker, had, later in his life, suffered from diabetes. By the mid 1950s he fell ill with uremia. He died in Queens Hospital in Los Angeles, on November 5, 1956. In tribute to the keyboard master, Leonard Feather wrote, in the liner notes to Art Tatum the Piano Starts Here, "How many frustrations Tatum had to suffer during his forty six years, none of us can ever quite know. He was black in a society that awarded honors to white musicians with a tenth of his talent." But Tatum's legacy is one of a committed brilliant musician. Not long after Tatum's death, Benny Green, wrote in his collected work of essays, The Reluctant Art, that "Tatum has been the only jazz musician to date who has made an attempt to conceive a style based upon all styles, to master the mannerisms of all schools and then synthesize those into something personal." In the liner notes to Giants of Jazz, Art Tatum, Spellman also emphasized that "Tatum conceived a style based on all styles...No one more than Tatum summarized the art of his generation, and no one more than he pointed the way to the generation of pianists who followed him."
Awards
Esquire jazz popularity poll 1943; Esquire gold medal, 1945, silver medal, 1947.
Works
Selected Discography
* Giants of Jazz, Art Tatum, Time-Life, 1982.
* Art Tatum, Piano Starts Here, Columbia, 1995.
* The Complete Brunswick....1931-1941 (box set), Affinity.
* Art Tatum, Classic Early Sides (1934-1937), Decca, 1991.
* Art Tatum Solos (1940), Decca, 1990.
* Art Tatum, California Melodies, (rec 1940) Memphis Archives, 1994.
* Art Tatum Solo Masterpieces Vol. I - Vol. 8, Pablo.
* The Complete Pablo Solo Masterpieces, (box set) Pablo.
* Art Tatum Group Masterpieces Vol. I - Vol. 8, Pablo.
* Art Tatum Twentieth Century Genius, Verve, 1996.
* God is in the House, High Note, 1998.
* Art Tatum Selected by Hank Jones, Verve, 1999.
* Art Tatum's Finest Hour, Verve, 2000.
Further Reading
Books
* Ellington, Edward Kennedy, Music is My Mistress, Da Capo, 1973.
* Green, Benny, The Reluctant Art: Five Studies in the Growth of Jazz, Da Capo, 1992.
* Jazz Panorama: From The Pages of The Jazz Review, Collier Books, 1964.
* Lester, James, Too Marvelous For Words: The Life and Genius of Art Tatum, Oxford University Press, 1994.
* Lyons, Len, The Great Jazz Pianists, Da Capo, 1983.
* Waller, Maurice, with Anthony Calabrese Fats Waller.
Other
* Additional information for this profile was obtained from the liner notes to Giants of Jazz, Art Tatum, Time-Life Records, 1982; Art Tatum, California Melodies, Memphis Archives, 1994; and Art Tatum, Piano Starts Here, Columbia, 1995; and from the films The Famous Dorsey's, 1947; and Jazz, (episode four: "A True Welcome"), 2000.
— John Cohassey
Columbia Encyclopedia:
Worked With:
Roy Eldridge, Billie Holiday, Ben Webster, Red Callender, Oscar Pettiford, Coleman Hawkins, Edmond Hall, Norman Granz, Al Casey, Big Sid Catlett, Barney Bigard
Formal Connection With:
Tiny Grimes, Slam Stewart
*
Art Tatum was among the most extraordinary of all jazz musicians, a pianist with wondrous technique who could not only play ridiculously rapid lines with both hands (his 1933 solo version of "Tiger Rag" sounds as if there were three pianists jamming together) but was harmonically 30 years ahead of his time; all pianists have to deal to a certain extent with Tatum's innovations in order to be taken seriously. Able to play stride, swing, and boogie-woogie with speed and complexity that could only previously be imagined, Tatum's quick reflexes and boundless imagination kept his improvisations filled with fresh (and sometimes futuristic) ideas that put him way ahead of his contemporaries.
To hear him is to wonder: How does he do that? Luckily, there are many recordings that have been left behind.
He played tunes from popular songs, Broadway shows, whatever and then turned them into his own particular forms of virtuosity. And he knew how to swing. Whether he played solo or with supporting players.
Dizzy Gillespie, the great jazz trumpet player said "First you speak of Art Tatum, then take a long deep breath, and you speak of the other pianists."[45]
The elegant pianist Teddy Wilson observed, "Maybe this will explain Art Tatum. If you put a piano in a room, just a bare piano. Then you get all the finest jazz pianists in the world and let them play in the presence of Art Tatum. Then let Art Tatum play ... everyone there will sound like an amateur."[45]
Here is a short synopsis:
Arthur "Art" Tatum Jr. (October 13, 1909 – November 5, 1956) was an American jazz pianist and virtuoso. He was nearly blind.
Tatum is widely acknowledged as one of the greatest jazz pianists of all time.[1] Critic Scott Yanow wrote, "Tatum's quick reflexes and boundless imagination kept his improvisations filled with fresh (and sometimes futuristic) ideas that put him way ahead of his contemporaries ... Art Tatum's recordings still have the ability to scare modern pianists."[2]
There is a lot to discover. Here is more from Answers.com:
Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Email
On this page
Answers.com
Art Tatum
Britannica Concise Encyclopedia:
Art Tatum
Sponsored Links
Art Tatum CDs
Huge selection of Art Tatum CDs in stock at discount prices!
(born Oct. 13, 1909, Toledo, Ohio, U.S. — died Nov. 5, 1956, Los Angeles, Calif.) U.S. jazz pianist. Tatum was blind from birth. Influenced by Fats Waller and Earl Hines, his playing represents a synthesis of stride and swing piano traditions. He developed an unprecedented technical and harmonic control on the instrument and was capable of astonishing speed and intricate elaborations of melody. By 1937 he was recognized as the outstanding pianist in jazz. He formed a trio with guitar and bass in 1943 but frequently made solo performances that showcased his unique mastery.
*
*
American jazz pianist. He played in nightclubs and on radio before going to New York in 1932 and made many recordings. He worked with bands and his own trio but usually appeared as a soloist in clubs. His technical abilities, lightness of touch and control of the instrument's range were unprecedented; he had an unerring sense of rhythm and swing, a seemingly unlimited capacity to expand and enrich a melody and a profound grasp of substitute harmonies.
Career
Won amateur contest which led to appearance on WSPD radio, 1927; worked clubs and speakeasies in Toldeo and Cleveland; moved to New York City in 1932 as accompanist for singer Adelaide Hall; Onyx Club, soloist, 1933; recorded for Brunswick label, 1933-34; performed in Cleveland, 1935; appeared on the "Fleischman Hour" radio program, 1935; performed at Three Dueces in Chicago and formed a small band at the club, 1936; played Los Angeles clubs and Hollywood parties, 1936-37; performed and recorded in Los Angeles and New York City; toured England and recorded for Decca, 1938; played Los Angeles and New York, 1939-40; hit record, "Wee Wee Baby Blues," 1941; formed trio, 1943-45; concert stage debut, 1945; continued to play concert dates until mid-1950s; recorded for Verve records 1953-56.
Life's Work
Idolized by jazz instrumentalists and lauded by musicians such as Vladimir Horowitz and composer George Gerschwin, jazz pianist Art Tatum possessed a name synonymous with genius. Like trumpeter Louis Armstrong, Tatum had an impact on the entire strata of jazz instrumentation. As A.B. Spellman observed in the liner notes to Giants of Jazz, Art Tatum, Tatum was "blessed with fingers that moved almost as fast as his endless stream of ideas." Tatum's repertoire consisted primarily of a few original compositions, popular songs, jazz standards, and concert music pieces by such composers as Antonin Dvorak and Jules Massenet. Despite gaining popularity with a trio during the 1940s, Tatum's numerous solo performances still awe listeners and represent some of the finest music of the twentieth century America.
Arthur Tatum Jr. was born partially blind on October 13, 1909, in Toledo, Ohio. Tatum's father, Art Sr., a mechanic, and his mother, Mildred Hoskins, were members of the Grace Presbyterian Church. Art Sr. played the guitar and Mildred played the piano. Family members later recalled three year old Tatum playing melodies on piano. Tatum studied violin and later, around age 13, took up the piano. He learned to read Braille at Toledo's Jefferson School. In 1924, 15-year-old Tatum attended The School For the Blind in Columbus. As Tatum's biographer, James Lester, asserted in Too Marvelous For Words, "Clearly, the Tatum's wanted to do everything they could for their son, and the move to Columbus was made easier by the fact that a cousin was there who would keep tabs on him." In 1925 Tatum enrolled at the Toledo School (Conservatory) of Music where he studied with a classically trained African American instructor, Overton G. Rainey. At home he listened to a wide range of music including jazz piano rolls and recordings of concert pianists.
With end of his formal education in 1927, 16-year-old Tatum embarked on a professional music career in the jazz idiom which offered creative and lucrative opportunities. As Lester wrote, "Within jazz [Tatum] could improvise a career, make a career out of improvising, invent a path for himself, take advantage of fast-changing musical developments, and even influence the course of those developments." He first played in local dance bands, and around 1927 won a local amateur contest which led to his regular appearance on Toledo radio station WSPD. The broadcast was eventually picked up nationally on NBC Blue Network. Tatum's weekday fifteen minute show sometimes featured his playing duets with another young pianist, Teddy Wilson. In the liner notes to Giants of Jazz, Art Tatum, Wilson recounted that Tatum already employed, "flatted fifths and all the added tones, and improvising these wonderful progressions in the middle of a tune....No other pianist had, even remotely, that conception of playing."
Tatum's employment in Toledo speakeasies and premiere nightclubs allowed him to work out the music he had formally learned by instruction and by listening to records and radio. Even as a teenager Tatum astounded fellow musicians. Noting Tatum's impact on musicians, Benny Green stressed in The Reluctant Art, "Tatum shattered everyone; Tatum caused all other musicians to lose confidence; Tatum terrified those who thought they knew how far jazz could be taken." In 1929, the "father of the tenor saxophone" Coleman Hawkins, then a member of Fletcher Henderson's Orchestra, heard Tatum at a small Toledo club and immediately incorporated the pianist's harmonic ideas into his playing. Around this time, Duke Ellington encountered Tatum in Cleveland and encouraged him to move to New York City.
Relocated To New York City
Tatum went to New York City in 1932 as the accompanist for singer Adelaide Hall. He recorded four sides with Hall and toured with her, until landing jobs as a solo pianist in New York City. "His first visit to New York," recounted Duke Ellington in his memoir, Music is My Mistress, "stirred up quite a storm. In a matter of hours, it got to all piano players--and musicians who played other instruments, too--that a real Bad Cat had arrived...." Not long after his arrival, Tatum agreed to meet Harlem's three leading pianists--James P. Johnson, Willie "The Lion" Smith, and Fats Waller--at Morgan's, a Harlem bar with a suitable piano. Pitted in a piano battle against these musical giants, Tatum, overwhelmed his challengers. Looking back on that evening Waller confessed, as quoted in Fats Waller, "That Tatum, he was just too good....He had too much technique. When that man turns on the powerhouse don't know one play him down. He sounds like a brass band." Tatum had bested his rivals and thus established himself as one of the greatest pianists on the New York City jazz scene.
In 1933 Tatum played the Onyx Club on 52nd Street. In March of that same year, he recorded his first official solo session, which included "Tiger Rag," "Tea For Two," "St. Louis Blues," and Duke Ellington's "Sophisticated Lady." In assessing these first sides recorded for the Brunswick label, Leonard Feather, in the liner notes to Art Tatum, Piano Starts Here, observed "The characteristics that were to remain Tatum's trademarks until the day he died were already evident: the incessantly creative left hand, now striding, now playing four different chords to the bar; the use of substitute chords and unprecedented harmonic subtlety; the sixteenth note runs at tempos that gave most pianists trouble maintaining an even flow of eighth notes."
In August and September of 1934 Tatum returned to the studio, and in the following year, without steady work in New York City, he performed in Cleveland. In 1935 he performed on the "Fleischman Hour" radio program hosted by Rudy Valee. He also played the Three Dueces in Chicago, and eventually formed a quartet at the club. After the end of his stint at the Three Deuces in 1936, Tatum traveled to Los Angeles, where his reputation had already been established. He played Hollywood parties and venues like the Tracadero, Paramount, and the Club Alabam on Central Avenue in the heart of Los Angeles's black entertainment scene. After several months in Los Angeles Tatum returned to New York City in 1936, and then, during the following year, returned to the west coast and recorded with a group, Art Tatum and His Swingsters. In 1937 he also recorded for the Brunswick label in New York City, producing the numbers "Stormy Weather," "The Sheik of Araby," "Chlo-e," and "Gone With the Wind."
Traveled Overseas
In 1938 Tatum left for England on the Queen Mary, and played a three month engagement in various English clubs and appeared on the BBC. As Lester explained in Too Marvelous For Words, "Art's appearances in England were not concerts," but the quiet attentiveness of the audiences "made them something closer to concerts than anything Tatum had experienced at home." By 1938 Tatum's music began to be transcribed and notated in publications, and his bookings resulted in residencies at various clubs. His recordings for Decca included Jules Massenet's "Elegie" (1938) and eighteen numbers in 1939, including "Get Happy" and Atonin Dvorak's "Humoresque." His 1940 output for Decca included a more popular version of "Humoresque," "Cocktails For Two," and "Begin the Beguine."
Between 1939 and 1940 Tatum worked in New York City and made frequent trips to Los Angeles where he made seventeen sides for Decca. A recently issued live recording, Art Tatum, California Melodies, captures the pianist in a series of Los Angeles (KHJ) broadcasts that aired from April to July of 1940. Tatum's recordings from this weekly program "is perhaps the most valuable and historically important addition to [Tatum's] recorded legacy," noted Stephen C. LaVere in the liner notes to California Melodies.
Art Tatum Trio
During January of 1941 Tatum recorded a Decca session under the title Art Tatum and His Band, a small pickup group including blues vocalist Joe Turner. The session produced four numbers including the big-selling number, "Wee Wee Baby Blues." The success of "Wee Wee Baby Blues" prompted another recording session with Turner, and in June of 1941, four sides were cut, including "Corrine Corina." His next commercial recordings did not emerge until 1943, when he won Esquire's first jazz popularity poll. Without steady bookings as a solo artist, Tatum looked to other opportunities to support himself; in 1943 he formed a trio with guitarist Tiny Grimes and bassist Leroy "Slam" Stewart. The trio, observed Lyons in The Great Jazz Pianists, "was celebrated for the inventive communication among the players as well as for Tatum's blistering speed, as they achieved a unity of sound that was rare at any tempo." Tatum's 1944 recordings were entirely made up of his trio work. During 1945 he appeared on the radio, attended only two studio sessions, and finally decided to quit working in a trio format.
At end of the Second World War in 1945, observed Lester in Too Marvelous For Words, Tatum's "standing and reputation were established beyond challenge, but his popularity," primarily due to the emergence of bebop, "faded seriously in the remainder of the 1940s." Tatum's music did not follow this modernist jazz trend, but it did have profound influence on its leading musicians, like Charlie Parker who, for one year, washed dishes in a Harlem restaurant just to listen to Tatum's playing in the front room, and bebop piano genius Bud Powell idolized the keyboard master from Toledo.
In the spring of 1949 Tatum performed at Los Angeles' Shrine Auditorium. That same year, Tatum signed with Capitol Records and recorded several critically acclaimed numbers. He made his concert stage debut in 1945, and subsequently played a circuit of university and community halls across the country, while continuing to play club and concert dates into the mid 1950s, including San Francisco's Black Hawk Club in 1955, and the Hollywood Bowl in August 1956.
Recorded For The Verve Label
In 1953 Tatum signed with Norman Granz's Clef/Verve label, for which he recorded over 120 piano solos. Discussing Tatum's recorded repertoire that included many of the same selections, Lyons, noted that, even during the 1950s, he "rarely repeated himself in his treatment of material. His harmonic variations were startling, especially when he soloed. Where another pianist might go directly from one chord to the next, Tatum's left hand would walk crablike through a cycle of four to six new chords between the original two. Meanwhile, his right hand would spin out a web of interconnecting lines of thirty-second notes."
Apart from his solo recordings the Verve label recorded Tatum in several small group settings with jazzmen such as Benny Carter, clarinetist Buddy DeFranco, vibraphonist Lionel Hampton, and tenor saxophonist Ben Webster. His session with Webster, recorded in September of 1956, is considered by most critics as the finest of these small group recordings. In his review of The Art Tatum-Ben Webster Quartet for Jazz Review, critic Dick Katz, stated, as reprinted in the book Jazz Panorama, how "Tatum's and Webster's respective conceptions complement each other beautifully....Art Tatum and Ben Webster represent to me a kind of romanticism in jazz which has now itself become classic. Theirs is a an artistry rarely matched in any era of jazz."
But this session would be Tatum's last. For years Tatum, a heavy beer drinker, had, later in his life, suffered from diabetes. By the mid 1950s he fell ill with uremia. He died in Queens Hospital in Los Angeles, on November 5, 1956. In tribute to the keyboard master, Leonard Feather wrote, in the liner notes to Art Tatum the Piano Starts Here, "How many frustrations Tatum had to suffer during his forty six years, none of us can ever quite know. He was black in a society that awarded honors to white musicians with a tenth of his talent." But Tatum's legacy is one of a committed brilliant musician. Not long after Tatum's death, Benny Green, wrote in his collected work of essays, The Reluctant Art, that "Tatum has been the only jazz musician to date who has made an attempt to conceive a style based upon all styles, to master the mannerisms of all schools and then synthesize those into something personal." In the liner notes to Giants of Jazz, Art Tatum, Spellman also emphasized that "Tatum conceived a style based on all styles...No one more than Tatum summarized the art of his generation, and no one more than he pointed the way to the generation of pianists who followed him."
Awards
Esquire jazz popularity poll 1943; Esquire gold medal, 1945, silver medal, 1947.
Works
Selected Discography
* Giants of Jazz, Art Tatum, Time-Life, 1982.
* Art Tatum, Piano Starts Here, Columbia, 1995.
* The Complete Brunswick....1931-1941 (box set), Affinity.
* Art Tatum, Classic Early Sides (1934-1937), Decca, 1991.
* Art Tatum Solos (1940), Decca, 1990.
* Art Tatum, California Melodies, (rec 1940) Memphis Archives, 1994.
* Art Tatum Solo Masterpieces Vol. I - Vol. 8, Pablo.
* The Complete Pablo Solo Masterpieces, (box set) Pablo.
* Art Tatum Group Masterpieces Vol. I - Vol. 8, Pablo.
* Art Tatum Twentieth Century Genius, Verve, 1996.
* God is in the House, High Note, 1998.
* Art Tatum Selected by Hank Jones, Verve, 1999.
* Art Tatum's Finest Hour, Verve, 2000.
Further Reading
Books
* Ellington, Edward Kennedy, Music is My Mistress, Da Capo, 1973.
* Green, Benny, The Reluctant Art: Five Studies in the Growth of Jazz, Da Capo, 1992.
* Jazz Panorama: From The Pages of The Jazz Review, Collier Books, 1964.
* Lester, James, Too Marvelous For Words: The Life and Genius of Art Tatum, Oxford University Press, 1994.
* Lyons, Len, The Great Jazz Pianists, Da Capo, 1983.
* Waller, Maurice, with Anthony Calabrese Fats Waller.
Other
* Additional information for this profile was obtained from the liner notes to Giants of Jazz, Art Tatum, Time-Life Records, 1982; Art Tatum, California Melodies, Memphis Archives, 1994; and Art Tatum, Piano Starts Here, Columbia, 1995; and from the films The Famous Dorsey's, 1947; and Jazz, (episode four: "A True Welcome"), 2000.
— John Cohassey
Columbia Encyclopedia:
Worked With:
Roy Eldridge, Billie Holiday, Ben Webster, Red Callender, Oscar Pettiford, Coleman Hawkins, Edmond Hall, Norman Granz, Al Casey, Big Sid Catlett, Barney Bigard
Formal Connection With:
Tiny Grimes, Slam Stewart
*
Art Tatum was among the most extraordinary of all jazz musicians, a pianist with wondrous technique who could not only play ridiculously rapid lines with both hands (his 1933 solo version of "Tiger Rag" sounds as if there were three pianists jamming together) but was harmonically 30 years ahead of his time; all pianists have to deal to a certain extent with Tatum's innovations in order to be taken seriously. Able to play stride, swing, and boogie-woogie with speed and complexity that could only previously be imagined, Tatum's quick reflexes and boundless imagination kept his improvisations filled with fresh (and sometimes futuristic) ideas that put him way ahead of his contemporaries.
John Coltrane
Listen to John Coltrane playing ballads & fall under a spell like no other. There was no one quite like him, although com temporaries like Charlie Parker & Sonny Rollins also elevated the saxophone to similar, but differing new levels.
Coltrane played various styles & forms, within jazz. He died tragically young at age 40. He is closely associated with Miles Davis (trumpet) & others of the so-called Bebop movement.
You don't have to "understand" his original compositions & improvisations to "get him". The recording "A Love Supreme" is considered a masterpiece - but, give a listen to his unbelievable rendition of "My Favorite Things".
There is a recent book out about him....
Coltrane: The Story of a Sound (Paperback)
Ben Ratliff (Author)
Here is an excerpt from Wikpedia:
John William "Trane" Coltrane (September 23, 1926 – July 17, 1967[1]) was an American jazz saxophonist and composer.
Working in the bebop and hard bop idioms early in his career, Coltrane helped pioneer the use of modes in jazz and later was at the forefront of free jazz. He was prolific, making about fifty recordings as a leader during his recording career, and appeared as a sideman on many other albums, notably with trumpeter Miles Davis and pianist Thelonious Monk. As his career progressed, Coltrane's music took on an increasingly spiritual dimension.
He influenced innumerable musicians, and remains one of the most significant tenor saxophonists in jazz history.
Coltrane played various styles & forms, within jazz. He died tragically young at age 40. He is closely associated with Miles Davis (trumpet) & others of the so-called Bebop movement.
You don't have to "understand" his original compositions & improvisations to "get him". The recording "A Love Supreme" is considered a masterpiece - but, give a listen to his unbelievable rendition of "My Favorite Things".
There is a recent book out about him....
Coltrane: The Story of a Sound (Paperback)
Ben Ratliff (Author)
Here is an excerpt from Wikpedia:
John William "Trane" Coltrane (September 23, 1926 – July 17, 1967[1]) was an American jazz saxophonist and composer.
Working in the bebop and hard bop idioms early in his career, Coltrane helped pioneer the use of modes in jazz and later was at the forefront of free jazz. He was prolific, making about fifty recordings as a leader during his recording career, and appeared as a sideman on many other albums, notably with trumpeter Miles Davis and pianist Thelonious Monk. As his career progressed, Coltrane's music took on an increasingly spiritual dimension.
He influenced innumerable musicians, and remains one of the most significant tenor saxophonists in jazz history.
Monday, January 11, 2010
Louis Armstrong
It is difficult to say that he has been underestimated, but Louis Armstrong was so great that he ought to be elevated into a unique Hall of Music that includes but a very few. Then again, we have the fact that there are so many his recordings from throughout his career. Whenever, Louis (LOO ISS apparently was his preferred pronunciation), played, the angels sang.
Here is a snippet from Wikipedia:
"Coming to prominence in the 1920s as an "inventive" cornet and trumpet player, Armstrong was a foundational influence on jazz, shifting the music's focus from collective improvisation to solo performers. With his distinctive gravelly voice, Armstrong was also an influential singer, demonstrating great dexterity as an improviser, bending the lyrics and melody of a song for expressive purposes. He was also greatly skilled at scat singing, or vocalizing using syllables instead of actual lyrics.
Renowned for his charismatic stage presence and deep, instantly recognizable voice almost as much as for his trumpet-playing, Armstrong's influence extended well beyond jazz, and by the end of his career in the '60s, he was widely regarded as a profound influence on popular music in general: critic Steve Leggett describes Armstrong as "perhaps the most important American musician of the 1900's."
My purpose here is to introduce, let you discover - regardless of biases - throw out the "genre" label. Without Louis (aka "Satchmo", "Pops"), the world would be a lesser place.
Lots more to write - on him - on many others.
Next? Hey, how about someone like the unbelievable pianist, Art Tatum - a big guy, who was virtually blind ... yeah, like Ray Charles and Stevie Wonder afterward... but, no one played those keys like Tatum. Well, maybe, Oscar Peterson ... another great.
And, hey, I don't know "everything" ... I know what I know and am always discovering... so, if anyone has something to add... I'm all ears.
Here is a snippet from Wikipedia:
"Coming to prominence in the 1920s as an "inventive" cornet and trumpet player, Armstrong was a foundational influence on jazz, shifting the music's focus from collective improvisation to solo performers. With his distinctive gravelly voice, Armstrong was also an influential singer, demonstrating great dexterity as an improviser, bending the lyrics and melody of a song for expressive purposes. He was also greatly skilled at scat singing, or vocalizing using syllables instead of actual lyrics.
Renowned for his charismatic stage presence and deep, instantly recognizable voice almost as much as for his trumpet-playing, Armstrong's influence extended well beyond jazz, and by the end of his career in the '60s, he was widely regarded as a profound influence on popular music in general: critic Steve Leggett describes Armstrong as "perhaps the most important American musician of the 1900's."
My purpose here is to introduce, let you discover - regardless of biases - throw out the "genre" label. Without Louis (aka "Satchmo", "Pops"), the world would be a lesser place.
Lots more to write - on him - on many others.
Next? Hey, how about someone like the unbelievable pianist, Art Tatum - a big guy, who was virtually blind ... yeah, like Ray Charles and Stevie Wonder afterward... but, no one played those keys like Tatum. Well, maybe, Oscar Peterson ... another great.
And, hey, I don't know "everything" ... I know what I know and am always discovering... so, if anyone has something to add... I'm all ears.
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