Jamal, Ahmad

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Ahmad Jamal

Pianist, composer

Regarded as an outstanding conceptualist with a distinctive style, pianist and composer Ahmad Jamal has made a significant impact on the jazz idiom. His lean style, complex use of space, and simple embellishments have served as a model for many other artists, most notably Miles Davis. "I live until he makes another record," the legendary trumpeter once said of Jamal, as quoted by Down Beat's Owen Cordle. But despite his impact on jazz, Jamal feels uncomfortable with the label "jazz musician." Instead, he prefers to call himself an "American classical" musician. "I started the phrase ‘American classical music,’" he told American Visions contributor Eugene Holley. "The term ‘jazz’ is certainly not sufficient; it was used to try and downgrade the music, but the music was so viable and it was so potent, nothing could keep it down."

Over the course of his professional career, Jamal, who converted to Islam in 1950, led several trios and made some 50 recordings, including the 1958 landmark album Ahmad Jamal at the Pershing. His ensemble peaked in popularity during the 1950s and 1960s, when he performed mostly jazz standards. Since the 1980s Jamal has focused his attention on his own compositions. While less accepted later in his career by the mainstream, Jamal has continued to draw criti- cal accolades. In recognition of his achievements, he received a $20,000 Jazz Masters Award from the National Endowment for the Arts in 1994. That same year, Yale University named Jamal a Duke Ellington Fellow. In 1996, for his album The Essence, Part 1, Jamal won the prestigious Django d'Or award in France. His follow-up projects The Essence, Part 2 and The Essence, Part 3, released in 1997 and 1998, respectively, further illustrated Jamal's ever-evolving musicianship.

Jamal was born Frederick Russell Jones on July 2, 1930, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, a city that also produced such jazz greats as Kenny Clarke, Mary Lou Williams, Erroll Garner, and Art Blakey. A child prodigy, Jamal immersed himself in European classical music early in life. At the age of three he started playing the piano, and when he was seven, Jamal's mother arranged for her son to take formal lessons. A domestic, she walked to work in order to save enough money to pay for Jamal's training. By the age of eleven, the pianist was already skilled enough to begin playing professionally at a local club. "I can't remember the place," he said in an interview with Boston Globe staff writer Marian Christy. "I only remember that people threw loads of money on the bandstand. Maybe it was only a few dollars total. But it sure seemed like a lot of money then."

In high school, Jamal further pursued classical studies with noted concert singer Mary Caldwell and pianist James Miller, completing with his instructors the equivalent of college graduate classes. To this day, Jamal's classical background remains influential. "There are very few people playing European classical music that also know Art Tatum and Duke Ellington," Jamal told Holley. "However, it's not the same position with the so-called jazz musician, who has to be twice as good as the so-called classical musician and know both worlds in order to get work."

During his teen years Jamal also explored his growing interest in jazz and was greatly inspired by Art Tatum, Teddy Williams, and, especially, a local bebop pianist named Erroll Garner. "Erroll was my major inspiration," he said in an interview with Greg Fitzgerald for National Public Radio's Jazz Profiles. In fact, critics would later compare Jamal's technique to that of Garner, though many have cited Jamal as a more intricate player. Because he used the full range of the keyboard in a more simple manner, Jamal was later able to present his trio as a scaled down orchestra of sorts.

At age 14, Jamal joined the musicians' union. Upon graduating from Westinghouse High School in Pittsburgh in 1948, he joined the George Hudson Orchestra in Atlantic City and embarked on a national tour. Winning significant critical acclaim for his solos, Jamal nonetheless learned a certain truth about playing before an audience. As he commented to Christy, "Performing is like being the matador in the bullring. You have to be constantly concerned about what you're doing or you get gored."

In 1949 Jamal started playing with violinist Joe Kennedy, Jr., and his group the Four Strings. Kennedy, who grew up with Jamal, had always regarded the pianist as immensely talented. "When he was 13 or 14, his harmonic sense even way back then was beyond his years," Kennedy recalled to Holley. "One night we heard Art Tatum, and Ahmad played a tune for him, and Tatum said that that boy is a coming great." Led by Jamal's tight arrangements and minimalist approach, the quartet brought the "chamber jazz" sound into being. Jamal, by taking the popular standards of the day and adding to them Latin and blues rhythms and orchestral voicings, captured the attention of many within the jazz community.

For the Record …

Born Frederick Russell Jones on July 2, 1930, in Pittsburgh, PA. Education: Studied music with concert singer Mary Caldwell and pianist James Miller.

Began playing piano at age three and taking classical music lessons at age seven; toured with the George Hudson Orchestra, 1948; joined Joe Kennedy, Jr.'s the Four Strings, 1949; worked as accompanist for the Caldwells, formed his first trio, the Three Strings, 1950; released Ahmad Jamal at the Pershing, 1958; Digital Works, 1981; The Essence: Part 1, 1996; Olympia 2000, 2001; In Search of Momentum, 2003; appeared at Carnegie Hall, June 2003; released After Fajr, 2005; planned European tour, 2008.

Awards: National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), Master of Jazz Award, 1994; Yale University, Duke Ellington Fellow, 1994; Django d'Or award (France), for The Essence, Part 1, 1996; inducted into Order of the Arts and Letters by French Culture Minister Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres, 2007.

Addresses: Ellora Management—P.O Box 755, 11 Brook St., Lakeville, CT 06039. Web site—Ahmad Jamal Official Web site: http://www.ahmadjamal.net/.

Miles Davis, in particular, greatly admired Jamal's style. "Miles really listened and what he heard from Ahmad was the orchestra that Ahmad had under his fingers," bassist Jamil Nasser told Fitzgerald. "Miles was one of those sharp people who wasn't too hip to say ‘this is the way I want to go.’" Throughout his own career, Davis recorded many of the same standards that Jamal played, including "A Gal in Calico," "My Funny Valentine," and "Surrey With the Fringe on Top." And on his 1959 Miles Ahead recording with Gil Evans, Miles transcribed "New Rumba," an original composition by Jamal, note for note. In addition to borrowing from Jamal's repertoire, he insisted that his accompanying pianist, Red Garland, try to sound like Jamal.

In 1950 Jamal worked as accompanist for the Caldwells, a popular song and dance team. He also formed his first trio, the Three Strings, with guitarist Ray Crawford (from the Four Strings) and bassist Eddie Calhoun. The group won extended engagements at such venues as the Blue Note in Chicago and the Embers club in New York City. Producer John Hammond heard the Three Strings perform and signed them to Columbia's Okeh Records.

In 1956 Jamal constructed a new trio consisting of bassist Israel Crosby, who replaced Calhoun in 1955, and a drummer instead of a guitarist, and they took up residence as the house group at Chicago's Pershing Hotel. In 1958 drummer Vernell Fournier joined Jamal and Crosby, and the trio made a live recording. Ahmad Jamal at the Pershing featured his famous version of "Poinciana," and the album earned recognition as a milestone in jazz recordings. Winning praise from jazz music listeners as well as critics, Ahmad Jamal at the Pershing rose to the top of the Billboard charts, where it remained for an astounding 108 weeks.

Spurred by the success of his trio's recording, Jamal recorded and toured non-stop in the late 1950s and early 1960s. He also opened his own non-alcoholic club, the Alhambra, in Chicago, which closed in 1962. Some years later, Jamal moved to New York and formed another trio with bassist Jamil Nasser and drummer Frank Gant. During the 1970s and 1980s, several other noted jazz players received their start from Jamal. Bassist Richard Davis, composer/arranger Richard Evans, and drummer Walter Perkins, among others, all "graduated" from Jamal's trio.

Following the release of Digital Works in 1981, featuring new versions of "But Not for Me" and "Poinciana," Jamal concentrated increasingly on original compositions. "I believe that we've done enough adaptation of popular songs," he said to Holley. "Now is the time for the musician to write his own repertoire rather than to keep resurrecting the things that are in somebody else's head." Although less accessible than his reworkings of popular standards, Jamal's own songs were decidedly more complex and evolved.

Jamal has continued to record and perform. In 2000 the Chess label reissued Ahmad Jamal at the Pershing as a two-CD set under the title Cross Country Tour. Now in his seventies, he still plays with the same enthusiasm and brilliancy of a young man. "I've been described as intense," he told Christy. "Maybe it's true. You can't separate the man and the music. There are always tunes floating in my head. … I'm drawn to my music more deeply than ever before. When I pass a piano anywhere, I have to touch it or play it."

Jamal issued a new album, Olympia 2000, in 2001, a recording that celebrated his 70th birthday. Joined by bassist James Cammack and drummer Idris Muhammad, the trio offered lengthy versions of classics like "How Deep Is the Ocean?" and "Autumn Leaves," along with a Jamal original, "Aftermath." Speaking of his craft in Jazzine.com, Jamal said: "I don't believe in going to a studio to make a record—that's stupid. You go to a studio when you have something to say that means something! You have nothing to say—don't go to the studio!"

Jamal released In Search of Momentum in 2003, another trio recording. "This is a beautiful offering by one of the true jazz masters of our time," wrote Thom Jurek in All Music Guide. "At 72, Jamal is even more of a pianistic enigma than he was as a young man." On June 6, 2003, he made an appearance at Carnegie Hall in New York City to celebrate the 150th anniversary of Steinway (his piano of choice). In 2005 Jamal issued After Fajr, an album divided between originals and classic jazz compositions.

In 2007 Gambit Records issued two historic recordings by Jamal, Complete Live at the Pershing Lounge 1958 and Complete Live at the Spotlight Club 1958. Jamal was also inducted into the Order of the Arts and Letters by French Culture Minister Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres in 2007. Between albums he continued to maintain a busy touring schedule, planning a tour in France and Italy in the spring of 2008. Recalling his long career, Jamal told All About Jazz, "Music chose me. I didn't choose it. I was playing at three years old. When you are that young, you don't make choices. Choices are made for you. The instrument was in my mother's house. It was already there, so I passed by it one day and sat down. The rest is history."