Don Friedman
Don Friedman ( born May 4, 1935 in San Francisco) is an American jazz pianist.
Life and work
Friedman took piano lessons from the age of four years ( private lessons with Katherine Swint ). At the age of 15 he moved with his family to the San Fernando Valley.
At 17, Don attended the Hollywood Palladium to hear bands like Les Brown, Stan Kenton and Billy May. The Kenton soloists Lee Konitz, Conte Candoli and Frank Rosolino proved to be a major influence on his music. He studied at Los Angeles City College. The mid-50s he played in the Los Angeles area with various groups, including Shorty Rogers, Chet Baker, Buddy Collette, Ornette Coleman and Scott LaFaro. He made his first recording with the trumpeters Hank DEMANO and Jack Millman. Buddy DeFranco 1956 dedicated Friedman for a tour, including appearances at Birdland and Basin Street in New York City.
Friedman moved back to California and lived there for about a year. In Los Angeles, he made acquaintance with bassist Scott LaFaro. In 1958 he went to New York City and toured with DeFranco. Next Friedman played in many compositions, including his own trio and with artists such as Pepper Adams, Booker Little, Jimmy Giuffre, Charles Lloyd, Chuck Wayne, Herbie Mann and Dave Pike. He made his first recordings as leader for the producer Orrin Keepnews at Riverside Records offered by 1961 to 1964. The first three plates were with his trio and the fourth was a quartet ( " Dreams and Explorations " ) with guitarist Attila Zoller ( at the in Berlin realized recording Beyond The Horizon, he was also involved). The recordings were given a very good review: Three of them won five stars, the top rating in Down Beat, while the fourth received 4 stars. 1965 Friedman won a new " Star Award " in Down Beat's annual Critics' Poll. In the 60s, Friedman began a connection with Clark Terry, to work in his big band. Friedman also taught at New York University and led a jazz ensemble there.
Since the 60s, where he worked in New York City, as a jazz pianist and teacher, he toured with many different groups frequently by the U.S., Europe and Japan. He received positive reviews for his lyrical style, and technical virtuosity. Friedman plays in wide stylistic breadth of mainstream jazz with Ruby Braff, Clark Terry on Modern Creative Jazz with Attila Zoller and Lee Konitz or tape with Urs Leimgruber project reflections and Bobby Burri. In the U.S., mostly undervalued, it has in Japan with a high level of awareness. So many recordings were released exclusively there. Younger recordings and concerts Friedman realized with the German -born American bassist Martin Wind.
For the German label ACT he took over in 2005 as part of the series " Piano Works " a devoted Attila Zoller solo album ("A to Z " ) on.
Friedman is an annual guest of the German "Jazz Baltica ' festival in Salzau, where he presented in 2009 his own compositions with a string quartet. Also in 2009, he entered the first time in Ukraine.