Name Jay Leonhart Role Bassist · jayleonhart.com | ||
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Children Carolyn Leonhart, Michael Leonhart Albums Great Duets, Life Out On The Road Similar People Carolyn Leonhart, Eddie Higgins, Bill Charlap, Michael Leonhart, Mike Renzi | ||
Education Berklee College of Music Grandchildren Milo Quincy Leonhart | ||
Jay leonhart concert window 2 5 2015
Jay Leonhart (born December 6, 1940, Baltimore, Maryland) is a bassist and songwriter working and singer in jazz and popular music. He has performed with diverse artists including Judy Garland, Carly Simon, Bucky Pizzarelli, Sting, and Frank Sinatra. Leonhart is noted for his clever songwriting, often laced with dry humor, and his compositions have been recorded by such notable artists as Blossom Dearie, Lee Konitz and Gary Burton. Leonhart's poetry is published both in, and outside of, the venue of song.
Contents
- Jay leonhart concert window 2 5 2015
- Basses loaded jay leonhart 14 yr old daryl johns and nikki parrott blues in the closet
- Biography
- As frontman
- As sideman
- References
Basses loaded jay leonhart 14 yr old daryl johns and nikki parrott blues in the closet
Biography
Jay Leonhart grew up in a musical family. His parents and six siblings were all musically inclined. Everyone played the piano. By the age of seven, Jay and his older brother Bil were playing banjos and guitars and mandolins and basses. They played country music, jazz—anything with a beat. In their early teens, Jay and Bil were television stars in Baltimore and were touring the country performing on their banjos.
When Jay was fourteen he started playing the bass in The Pier Five Dixieland Jazz Band in Baltimore. After studying at The Peabody Institute (1946–1950), Jay attended The Berklee College of Music (1959–1961) and The Advanced School of Contemporary Music in Toronto, before leaving school to start touring with the traveling big bands of the late 1950s and early 1960s.
At twenty one, Leonhart moved to New York City to start his career. He played lots of funky road gigs with big bands, small bands and singers and visited many little jazz joints around the world. In 1968, he met and married a singer named Donna Zier and settled down in New York. Jay and Donna Leonhart have two children, Michael and Carolyn, who have performed with Steely Dan, among others.
Upon moving to New York, Jay eventually began playing for many of the great jazz musicians, big bands, and singers who were to be found there - artists like Thad Jones and Mel Lewis, Lou Marini, Tony Bennett, Marian McPartland, and Jim Hall. Leonhart has continued to work with many of the great jazz musicians of the twentieth century.
Jay also became a very busy studio musician in New York City, visiting every musical genre from James Taylor to Ozzy Osbourne and Queen Latifah. Between 1975 and 1995 he was named The Most Valuable Bassist in the recording industry three times by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences.
Jay Leonhart has now recorded fifteen solo albums and is also performing a one-man show called "The Bass Lesson" about his life in the music business and song. He has toured worldwide for more than forty years.
Jay now performs regularly with trombonist Wycliffe Gordon in a duo which began as a result of their recording "This Rhythm on My Mind".
As frontman
As sideman
With Kenny Barron
With Barbara Carroll
With Peggy Lee
With Eddie Higgins and Terry Clarke
With Eddie Higgins Trio
With Lee Konitz
With Gerry Mulligan
With Donnie O'Brien
With Bucky Pizzarelli
With Daryl Sherman
With Bluesiana Triangle