Paul Knopf (musician)

Paul Knopf (born February 3, 1927 in the Bronx ) is an American jazz pianist and composer .

Knopf, who was an acquaintance of Herbie Nichols (he stood in for him at the Metropole at Cootie Williams ), played - heavily influenced by Thelonious Monk and Elmo Hope - his own compositions of modern jazz ; he played his debut album in 1958 with bassist Richard Davis and drummer Jim Olin. The recordings appeared on Playback Records under the title The Outcat , the nickname introduced by Knopf himself, which also became the term for the musical outsider. Another session with brass ensued, but it was not published. Despite benevolent reviews of his music in magazines such as Downbeat , Metronome and Playboy , he did not make a breakthrough and was initially forgotten. In 1977, Knopf again produced a trio session with Jack Six and Joe Cocuzzo on his own label . From 1964 he turned to church music ; he gave concerts at Judson Memorial Church in Manhattan and combined Christian liturgy with jazz when he performed a jazz program at the Evangelical Lutheran Church of St. Peter. From 1985 until the late 1990s, he was musical director and composer-in-residence at Washington Square Methodist Episcopal Church in New York's Greenwich Village .

Discographic notes

• The Outcat (playback, 1958), with Richard Davis, Jim Olin
• Enigma of a Day (playback, 1959)
• Outcat Comes Back (1977), with Jack Six, Joe Cocuzzo
• The Music of Paul Knopf: Chamber Compositions and Jazz Improvisations (Iris, 1998)

Web links

• Web presence
• Paul Knopf at Allmusic (English)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Bill Lee, People in Jazz: Jazz Keyboard Improvisors of the 19th & 20th Centuries
2. ^ Francis Davis : Jazz and its discontents: a Francis Davis reader