Top Ten Jazz Pianists of History

Let’s go through the top ten Jazz pianists of history. Did you know who are the Best Jazz Pianists in History? Let’s go through them!

A shortlist (and counting) with some of the most fantastic jazz pianists from past and present.

The art of the jazz pianists is truly inspiring, the talent it takes to improvise and pull off a jazz piece is something only the minority can do, and a lot of people only dream of.

Jazz pianists are known for their improvisation skills and their creative minds that manage to merge different keys, rhythms, and styles, creating a musicality extremely rich, dense, and memorable. Jazz is truly a language itself, and today we will talk about the life of some of its best “speakers”.

 

Thelonious Monk (1917-1982)

Thelonious Monk was American, considered one of the very best jazz pianists, that was known for his flat fingers, angular melodies and trance-like state on stage. His daring way of playing was not universally appreciated, but his long hesitations and abrupt key switches are what has allowed him to become the second-most recorded jazz composer.

It was surprising for some to see him even get up from the piano, sometimes mid-performance, and dance with the rest of the band before carrying on. His uniqueness is why he is one of five jazz musicians to make it to the cover of Time magazine. Some of his most famous pieces include Locomotive and Blue Monk.

 

 

Art Tatum (1909 – 1956)

Art Tatum is known to be one of the most virtuosic players of his time, so much so that some pianists questioned their own ability when trying to play his compositions, which is incredible considering he was legally blind and mostly self-taught! This meant that he played the piano almost entirely through muscle memory and utilised techniques he invented. This is why he felt playing with other musicians slowed him down.

Art Tatum began his piano career in his teens while having his radio show and was a solo pianist at clubs in major urban centres such as New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles. Paid performances was usually followed by long after-hours playing, all accompanied by prodigious consumption of alcohol. Unfortunately, there is very little footage of Art Tatum playing, but it was often said that he made playing look effortless, a truly natural performer.

 

 

Herbie Hancock (1940 – To Date)

Herbie Hancock is an American pianist, keyboardist, bandleader, composer, and actor, but most of all was a child prodigy. His career began when he joined Miles Davis‘ Quintet in 1963. It was said that Miles Davies said, “Don’t play the bottom notes” but Herbie misheard him and thought he had said, “Don’t play the butter notes.” This made Herbie adapt his outlook on harmonic development as he believed Miles was telling him not to play common chord tones. This transition played a large part in the birth of “jazz-fusion“.

Since 2012, Hancock has served as a professor at the University of California and is also the chairman of the Herbie Hancock Institute of Jazz. Some of his most famous pieces include Watermelon Man and Chameleon.

 

 

Bill Evans (1929 – 1980)

Bill Evans was a composer and jazz pianist who spent most of his time playing in trios. He was classically trained and studied composition and classical piano at Southeastern Louisiana University. His classical training gave him a unique approach to his jazz performances and fuelled the modal jazz and bebop playing he later became well known for. In late 1959, Evans left the Miles Davis band and began his career in a group now known as the seminal modern jazz trio.

In 1961, ten days after they formed, at the New York Village Vanguard jazz club, LaFaro (his bassist) died in a car accident. After months of seclusion, Evans reemerged with a new trio, featuring bassist Chuck Israels. Some of his most famous pieces include Waltz For Debby and Minority.

 

 

Keith Jarrett (1945 – To Date)

In his teens, Jarrett learned jazz and became proficient in it, which led to the development of his strong interest in contemporary jazz.

After his graduation from Emmaus High School in 1963, Jarrett moved from Allentown to Boston, where he started studying at the Berklee College of Music and played cocktail piano in local clubs. After a year, he moved to New York City, where he played at the Village Vanguard.

In 1968 Jarrett was asked to join the Miles Davis group. During this period, he played alongside Chick Corea switching between electronic organs and pianos. They’re actually playing together in some 1970 recordings, like the Isle of Wight Festival featured in the film “Miles Electric”, “Bitches Brew Live” or “A Different Kind of Blue”.

He recorded some piano solo albums timidly successful: We can name “Staircase” in 1976, “Invocations/The Moth and the Flame” in 1981 or The Melody at Night, With you in 1999. What gave him his major popularity were his improvised concerts, the majority of them recorded. His album “Solo Concerts: Bremen/Lausanne” from 1973 won Jazz Album of the Year according to Time Magazine and “The Koln Concert” of 1975 became the best selling piano recording in history.

Sadly, Jarrett has been unable to perform since suffering a stroke in February 2018, and the second stroke in May 2018 left him partially paralysed and unable to play with his left hand.

 

Oscar Peterson (1925 – 2007)

Oscar Peterson was a flamboyant Canadian Jazz pianist, although his earlier training was in Classical piano. Despite this, he was soon captivated by traditional jazz and Boogie-Woogie and learned several ragtime pieces.

At the age of nine, Peterson played the piano with technical control that impressed the most professional musicians. For many years after this, he would study the piano for our – six hours a day. His classical training marked some influence from JS Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier and Rachmaninoff’s piano concertos. Oscar Peterson’s playing was filled with extremely fast and swinging 32nd-note melodic improvisations. He released over two hundred recordings and won seven Grammy Awards as well as a lifetime achievement award from the Recording Academy.

Some of his most famous pieces include Blues For Birds and Cherokee.

 

 

Brad Mehldau (1970 – To Date)

Mehldau studied music, toured and recorded whilst still a student. He was also part of Joshua Redman’s Quartet.

Mehldau is known for incorporating different genres into his music. Aspects of pop, rock and classical music are some examples, especially in his albums “Largo” which was released in 2002, and contains electronics and input from rock and classical musicians. His playing included some traditional elements of jazz whilst simultaneously playing different melodies in separate hands and incorporating pop and rock pieces. Mehldau has become an influence for several musicians in and beyond jazz in their approaches to writing, playing, and choice of repertoire. Some of his most famous pieces include I didn’t Know What Time It Was and Blame It On My Youth.

 

 

Hiromi Uehara (1979 – To Date)

Uehara is s a Japanese jazz pianist and composer. She is well-known for her virtuosic technique, energetic live performances and blends of musical genres such as stride, post-bop, progressive rock, classical and fusion.

She started learning piano and writing music at the age of six and was introduced to jazz by her piano teacher when she was eight. At age 14, she played with the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra and when she was 17 years old, she met Chick Corea by chance in Tokyo and was invited to play with him at his concert the next day. Some of her most famous pieces include Notes From The Past and Spectrum.

 

 

Dave Brubeck (1920 – 2012)

Dave Brubeck’s career lasted over six decades and was popular for his experimental curiosity in odd time signatures, improvised counterpoint, polyrhythm and polytonality.

Born into a musical family (where his two older brothers were also professional musicians) he began piano lessons with his mother at the young age of four years old. But this didn’t last long, as he moved to a farm at age twelve and had to give up his music lessons. It wasn’t until college when he decided he couldn’t resist jazz any longer, that he changed his major to music. in 1946, he went to California to study composition with French composer Darius Milhaud who encouraged him to pursue a career in jazz which led him to find like-minded students and form the Dave Brubeck Octect; (which later became the quartet following an almost fatal diving accident). Throughout his career, Brubeck experimented with integrating jazz and classical music. In 1959 his Quartet premiered and recorded “Dialogues for Jazz Combo and Orchestra” with the New York Philharmonic, which Leonard Bernstein was conducting. His interest in mixing the two genres grew even further, and he later performed with most of the orchestras in the EE.UU. as well as with prestigious choral groups and orchestras in Europe and America. Some of his most famous pieces include Take Five, Lofty Thought Blues and Dad Plays The Harmonica.

 

 

Vince Guaraldi (1928 – 1976)

Guaraldi was an American Jazz Pianist who was known for writing songs for animations and comics.

At the age of seven, he started learning piano with his mother and continued to play throughout his high school years. After graduation and a tour in Korea, Guaraldi apprenticed at the San Francisco Daily News. While working, he sadly suffered an accident in which he almost lost a finger, an event that proved to be a transcendental point in Guaraldi’s life. It can be said that the incident, along with his family’s encouragement and his own desire to develop his talent, made him commit to the music world full-time.

Guaraldi’s musical style at that time was bright and energetic, influenced by Boogie Woogie, but late in the 1950s, he was more interested in samba and cool jazz with subtle harmonies and light syncopation.

His greatest achievement was winning a Grammy Award for Best Original Jazz Composition for “Cast Your Fate to the Wind”, but he struggled to make as successful records after, so he decided to go back to performing in smaller venues.

 

 

Learn Jazz Piano with WKMT.

Hoping this has provided you with a better idea of the main Best Jazz Pianists in history!