Kenny Drew Junior
Kenny Drew junior (born June 14, 1958 in New York City , † August 3, 2014 ) was an American classical and jazz pianist .
Live and act
He was the son of the jazz pianist Kenny Drew , but did not count him as one of his influences, since he grew up with his aunt and his grandparents, where, like his mother, he received classical piano lessons as a child. As a teenager he played in clubs, mostly rhythm and blues . He said they always played jazz when almost nobody was around. But then he switched completely to jazz. He made his recording debut in 1987 with the Japanese Jazz City label with bassist Charnett Moffett . Further recordings for the labels Antilles, Concord and Claves followed soon until 1994. He appeared with musicians like Stanley Jordan , was a member of the band Out of the Blue , then with Stanley Turrentine , Slide Hampton and the Jazz Masters, the Mingus Big Band ( Gunslinging Birds 1994), Steve Grossman , Yoshiaki Masuo , Eddie Gomez , Sadao Watanabe , Smokey Robinson , Frank Morgan and Daniel Schnyder and won the Great American Jazz Piano Competition in Jacksonville in 1990 . He directed several jazz festivals, including a. the Kyoto Jazz Festival , the Clearwater Jazz Festival, and the Newark Jazz Festival .
In addition, he later increasingly turned to classical music. At the Barossa Music Festival in Australia in 1996 and 1997 he performed with both jazz and classical music. He joined Daniel Schnyder's classical and chamber jazz trio (with Dave Taylor ), with whom he recorded several compositions by Schnyder. In 2000 he performed a piano concerto by Mozart with the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra under Andreas Delfs and played works by Bach at the International Bach Competition in Leipzig with Daniel Schnyder and David Taylor . In 2001 he performed Schnyder's piano concerto with the Norrlands Opera Orchestra under the direction of Krystian Jarvi .
He continued to work with jazz musicians such as Steve Turré , Jack Walrath , David Sánchez , Jack Wilkins , Michael Mossman , Ronnie Cuber , Steve Slagle , Marlena Shaw , Jon Faddis , Slide Hampton , Jimmy Heath and Charles Mingus and played more than twenty albums as a band leader or Soloist a.
Drew had had diabetes for the past few years ; one of his toes had to be amputated.
Discographic notes
- Kenny Drew Jr. (Antilles, 1991) with Ralph Moore , Wallace Roney, Christian McBride , Winard Harper , George Mraz and Al Foster
- Secrets (TCB, 1998) with Lynn Seaton and Marvin Smitty Smith
- Live at the Montreux Jazz Festival '99 (TCB, 1999) solo
- Winter Flower (Milestone, 1999) with Lynn Seaton and Tony Jefferson
- Rememberence (TCB, 2001) with Santi Debriano , Tony Jefferson , Stefon Harris and Wallace Roney
- Another Point of View (Tokuma, 2002) with Eddie Gomez and Bill Stewart
Web links
- Literature by and about Kenny Drew junior in the catalog of the German National Library
- Kenny Drew Jr. with short music samples
- Discography on All Music Guide
Individual evidence
- ↑ Obituary at WUSF News
- ↑ a b JazzTimes obituary
- ↑ Info on his homepage ( Memento of the original from February 20, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ a b biography of Scott Yanow on All Music Guide
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Drew, Kenny Jr. |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | American classical and jazz pianist |
| DATE OF BIRTH | June 14, 1958 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | New York City , New York |
| DATE OF DEATH | 3rd August 2014 |