Billy Mitchell | |
---|---|
Birth name | William Allen Mitchell |
Born | Tarrytown, New York, U.S. | November 23, 1943
Genres | Jazz, smooth jazz, swing |
Occupation(s) | Musician, producer, arranger, author, community activist |
Instrument(s) | Piano, keyboards |
Years active | 1970–present |
Labels | Pausa, Vista, Optmism, PRC |
Website | www |
William Allen Mitchell (born November 23, 1943) is an American jazz pianist, music producer, composer, and author. He is also known for his community work with at-risk youth.
Mitchell was born November 23, 1943, in Tarrytown, New York, [1] and raised in Buffalo. His father was a Baptist minister and community activist. He is the younger brother of comedian and actor Scoey Mitchell. Mitchell was introduced to the piano as a child by his mother but resisted all formal instruction. Instead he learned to play the piano by listening to the music and jazz recordings of the day.
Mitchell attended Morehouse College [2] in the early 1960s, where he majored in history and political science. Between classes he would sneak into the music department to play jazz. He joined an off-campus jazz group, performing before an audience for the first time in a local talent show. In search of a career in music, he moved to Los Angeles in 1970.
He formed the Billy Mitchell Trio in the 1970s, which later became the Billy Mitchell Group. [3] During the 1980s and 1990s he performed at clubs and festivals, including the Sedona Jazz Festival. [4]
During the 1980s, Mitchell wrote a monthly column for Gig magazine that advised musicians about work and career. His book The Gigging Musician (Hal Leonard Publishing) is based on his Gig magazine articles, as well as interviews with industry professionals. [5]
Mitchell appeared in the Bird (1988) directed by Clint Eastwood film, playing the part of Charlie Parker's pianist. [6] He also appeared in Jazz, a docudrama about the lives and experiences of black musicians. [7]
In 2002, Mitchell founded The Scholarship Audition Performance Preparatory Academy (SAPPA) [8] to increase participation of inner-city students in music and art scholarship competitions. SAPPA also sponsors music workshops that provide free music instruction in various programs throughout the Los Angeles area. Mitchell established the Watts-Willowbook Conservatory and Youth Symphony.
Round Midnight is a 1986 American musical drama film directed by Bertrand Tavernier and written by Tavernier and David Rayfiel. It stars Dexter Gordon, with a soundtrack by Herbie Hancock. The title comes from Thelonious Monk's 1943 composition "'Round Midnight", which is featured in this film in a Hancock arrangement.
Henry Jones Jr. was an American jazz pianist, bandleader, arranger, and composer. Critics and musicians described Jones as eloquent, lyrical, and impeccable. In 1989, The National Endowment for the Arts honored him with the NEA Jazz Masters Award. He was also honored in 2003 with the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP) Jazz Living Legend Award. In 2008, he was awarded the National Medal of Arts. On April 13, 2009, the University of Hartford presented Jones with an honorary Doctorate of Music for his musical accomplishments.
Billy Taylor was an American jazz pianist, composer, broadcaster and educator. He was the Robert L. Jones Distinguished Professor of Music at East Carolina University in Greenville, and from 1994 was the artistic director for jazz at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C.
Rai Thistlethwayte is an Australian rock, pop and jazz musician and songwriter. Thistlethwayte is an accomplished pianist, guitarist, and vocalist. He is the lead singer and primary songwriter in the Australian pop rock band Thirsty Merc. From 2004, Thirsty Merc released a string of hits in the Australian charts including "In the Summertime", "Someday, Someday", "20 Good Reasons", "Emancipate Myself", "My Completeness", "When the Weather Is Fine" and "Mousetrap Heart". He is currently based in Los Angeles. As a solo artist, Thistlethwayte performs under the name 'Sun Rai'.
Thomas Lee Flanagan was an American jazz pianist and composer. He grew up in Detroit, initially influenced by such pianists as Art Tatum, Teddy Wilson, and Nat King Cole, and then by bebop musicians. Within months of moving to New York in 1956, he had recorded with Miles Davis and on Sonny Rollins' album Saxophone Colossus. Recordings under various leaders, including Giant Steps of John Coltrane, continued well into 1962, when he became vocalist Ella Fitzgerald's full-time accompanist. He worked with Fitzgerald for three years until 1965, and then in 1968 returned to be her pianist and musical director, this time for a decade.
Alphonse Lee Mouzon was an American musician and vocalist, most prominently known as a jazz fusion drummer. He was also a composer, arranger, producer, and actor. Mouzon gained popularity in the late 1960s and early 1970s. He was the owner of Tenacious Records, a label that primarily released Mouzon's recordings.
Horace Elva Tapscott was an American jazz pianist and composer. He formed the Pan Afrikan Peoples Arkestra in 1961 and led the ensemble through the 1990s.
James Forman, known professionally as Mtume or James Mtume, was an American jazz and R&B musician, songwriter, record producer, activist, and radio personality.
Shelton "Shelly" Glen Berg is an American classical and jazz pianist and music educator. He is the dean of the Frost School of Music at the University of Miami in Coral Gables, Florida and the school's Patricia L. Frost Professor of Music.
William Edward Childs is an American composer, jazz pianist, arranger and conductor from Los Angeles, California, United States.
Joseph Leslie Sample was an American jazz keyboardist and composer. He was one of the founding members of The Jazz Crusaders in 1960, after which its name was shortened to "The Crusaders" in 1971. He remained a part of the group until its final album in 1991, and also the 2003 reunion album Rural Renewal.
The Colburn School is a private performing arts school in Los Angeles with a focus on music and dance. It consists of four divisions: the Conservatory of Music, Music Academy, Community School of Performing Arts and the Trudl Zipper Dance Institute. Founded in 1950, the school is named after its principal benefactor, Richard D. Colburn.
Paul Thatcher Smith was an American jazz pianist. He performed in various genres of jazz, most typically bebop, but is best known as an accompanist of singers, especially Ella Fitzgerald.
Joseph Alan Gilman is an American jazz pianist from Sacramento, California. He has taught at American River College and Sacramento State University in Sacramento and the Brubeck Institute in Stockton, California.
The Herbie Hancock Institute of Jazz is a non-profit music education organization founded in 1986. Before 2019, it was known as the Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz, but was then renamed after its longtime board chairman, Herbie Hancock.
Robert Mitchell was an American organist and choir director whose career spanned 85 years, from 1924 to 2009. He was one of the last original silent film accompanists, having accompanied films from 1924 to 1928. Mitchell revived the art from 1992 until his death in 2009, usually to wild acclaim. During the 1930s, he organized the Robert Mitchell Boys Choir, who were cast in many films from the 1930s to the 1960s.
The Bob Cole Conservatory of Music is the school of music at California State University, Long Beach. In March 2008, the music department was renamed the Bob Cole Conservatory of Music in honor of an endowment gift of $16.4 million from the estate of Robert "Bob" Cole. Cole, a Long Beach real estate investor, long-time music lover, and amateur pianist, died in 2004. Following its disbursement, the gift will benefit the students of the conservatory in the form of scholarships and other awards.
Scott Routenberg is an American composer, jazz pianist, arranger and orchestrator. Currently Associate Professor of Jazz Piano at Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana, he has published both full-length compositions for jazz ensembles and several studio albums. His 2003, 2006, and 2020 releases "explore jazz-influenced electro-acoustic hybrids." He has won a number of songwriting contests, including the John Lennon Songwriting Contest Maxell Song of the Year in 2004 for his song "Bandwidth", which also won the JLSC's Grand Prize in the Jazz Category.
Shawn Michael Patterson is an American composer and songwriter. He wrote the song "Everything Is Awesome" for the Warner Brothers feature film The Lego Movie (2014).
Michael Eckroth is an American jazz pianist, arranger, and composer from Phoenix, Arizona, particularly known for his work in Latin jazz. He was a member of jazz-rock guitarist John Scofield's New Quartet from 2010-2012. Currently, he is the co-writer, arranger, and pianist for Cuban and American mambo big band Orquesta Akokán, whose self-titled debut album from Daptone Records was nominated in the 61st Annual Grammy Awards.