ART BLAKEY (b. 1919 – d. 1990).
Born in Pittsburgh, PA, Blakey began his career at the piano. He jumped to the drums where he worked with Mary Lou Williams and Fletch Henderson prior to establishing himself, along with Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker, in Billy Eckstine’s bebop band in 1943. Together with Kenny Clarke and Max Roach, Blakey invented the modern bebop style of drumming. In the late 1940s and through the 1950s he played on many Blue Note tracks, frequently with Thelonius Monk and Horace Silver, with whom he founded the Art Blakey University at Birdland in New York, 1954. Blakey took over The Jazz Messengers in 1955. He pioneered acoustic jazz in the 1970s and guided the band's changes up through the 1980s. Blakey developed a reputation as a premier talent scout of up and coming musicians, including Wynton Marsalis. Blakey may have been the first drummer to combine traditional African rhythms with jazz in his performances.
BARRY HARRIS (b. 1929)
Harris played piano with Miles Davis and Max Roach during his teenage years in Detroit. He moved to New York in the 1960s where he met Thelonius Monk; they lived together in Nica de Koenigswarter’s house in Weehawken NJ, where Harris still lives. He has played with Cannonball Adderley, Coleman Hawkins and Max Roach, as well as recording over a dozen records as the lead artist. Since the 1980s, Harris has run the Jazz Cultural Theater out of a former restaurant storefront on Eighth Ave near 23rd Street in Manhattan. He teaches group music and piano lessons, hosts performances, and his album For the Moment was recorded there. In October 2003 he was awarded the Living Jazz Legacy award from the Mid-Atlantic Arts Association and an American Jazz Masters Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts.
Barry Harris still lives in Nica's house in Weehawken and has declined to be interviewed for this film.
THELONIUS MONK (b.1917 - d. 1982)
One of only three jazz musicians to appear on the cover of Time Magazine, Monk was born in North Carolina. His family moved to New York when he was still young. In 1944, Monk played as a member of the Coleman Hawkins Quartet and in the same year his jazz standard Round about Midnight was recorded by Cootie Williams. Monk is often regarded, along with Charlie Parker and Louis Armstrong, as a founder of bebop although his rhythmic playing style evolved throughout his career. He and Bud Powell were arrested for alleged possession of narcotics in 1951, and the police confiscated his New York City Cabaret Card. Without the card he was unable to play in any New York venue where liquor was served. Nica de Koenigswarter helped him get his card back and became his patron and friend; Thelonius wrote several songs for her such as ‘Panonica’ and ‘Bolivar Blues’. He and his family lived out his final years at Nica’s house in Weehawken.
CHARLIE PARKER (b.1920- d.1955)
One of the preeminent American jazz musicians and composers, early in his career Parker was dubbed "Yardbird" later shortened to "Bird"; the nickname inspired the titles of his and other artists' works. Born in Kansas City, Parker began teaching himself the saxophone age at eleven. He moved to New York in 1939 and began hanging out on 52nd Street with Dizzy Gillespie, Thelonious Monk, Charlie Christian and Max Roach and Kenny Clarke, a group that founded the bebop movement. By 1950 Parker's innovative approach had helped him become one of the most influential jazz musicians in the world, playing with Charlie Mingus, Bud Powell, Louis Armstrong and other stars. He pioneered the character of the jazz artist as legitimate artist, and became a touchstone for a generation. Parker died in 1955, in the suite at the Stanhope Hotel belonging to his friend Nica de Koenigswarter.
HORACE SILVER (b. 1928) Silver began studying saxophone and piano in high school in Connecticut, listening to his father play Cape Verdean folk music from an early age. His other musical influences include Bud Powell and Thelonius Monk as well as boogie-woogie, blues and gospel. He was discovered by Stan Getz and in 1951 he performed with Coleman Hawkins and Art Blakey, with who he formed the Jazz Messengers. Silver's 1954 gospel-inspired hit ‘The Preacher’ gave birth to the soul movement in jazz, moving away from the more cerebral be-bop. He influenced countless artists and in 1963 he recorded one of his most famous tracks, Song for My Father, which has been covered by many artists including James Brown. In 2005, The National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences gave Silver the President’s Merit Award and his autobiography Let's Get to the Nitty Gritty was released in March 2006. He records almost exclusively his own material.
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