Jazz piano legend, Oscar Peterson died on Dec. 23 in a suburb of Toronto. The highly honored recipient of innumerable awards and accolades, Peterson is considered one of the greatest Jazz pianists ever.
A Canadian child prodigy who was tutored by a student of Franz Liszt, Peterson was often compared to Jazz originator Art Tatum in that he combined tremendous technique and rhythmic power with astonishing melodic creativity, sometimes taking elements of Western classical music like Rachmaninoff or Chopin and combining them with traditional Jazz styles like ragtime or boogie.
Peterson played with most of the top artists of the day (Ella Fitzgerald, Louis Armstrong, Count Basie, Dizzy Gillespie, Stan Getz, Coleman Hawkins, Barney Kessel and Ben Webster among other) and also recorded many albums as a leader that influenced nearly every Jazz pianist who followed. Peterson’s trio works with bassists Ray Brown and Niels-Henning Orsted Pedersen, and guitarists Joe Pass and Herb Ellis, along with his duets with Pass are perhaps his best known, but he also recorded quartets and stellar solo works, and also contributed well-regarded piano studies for educational purposes.
Peterson broke color barriers by touring with white musicians in his bands and was considered an ambassador of Jazz worldwide. Among other honors, Canada issued a postage stamp with Peterson’s likeness. Already suffering from arthritis, Peterson suffered a stroke in the early ’90s that left him unable to play. Peterson was eventually able to return to playing later in the decade and even into the new millennium, but had experienced further health deterioration in 2007 before succumbing to kidney failure.
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