Louis Stewart (guitarist)
Louis Stewart ( born January 5, 1944 in Waterford, Ireland) is an Irish jazz guitarist and composer.
Stewart took piano lessons and played guitar at the age of 15. He played in various show bands and in the band of Jim Doherty, with whom he toured in the U.S. in 1961. He was a member in the trio of pianist Noel Kelahan and in a trio with organist Dick Keating and saxophonist Jim O'Reilly and received a special prize at the 1968 Montreux Jazz Festival. Right after that he was from 1969 for three years at Benny Goodman. He played in 1968/69 in the Quartet and Big Band Tubby Hayes, worked as a freelancer in Dublin, where he also composed a lot and spent a few years between 1975 and 1979 Member of combos of Ronnie Scott. In 1975 he released his first album Louis the First ( Hawk Records), which many others followed, among others, Peter Ind (with whom he played in a duo since about 1978), Red Mitchell, Spike Robinson, Bill Charlap and Peter King. In 1979 he toured Australia with Blossom Dearie and Don Burrows, occasionally played with the big band of Harry South and the Scandinavian pianist Per Husby.
End of the 1970s, he began touring with George Shearing (including South America) and record it. He played in the 1980s, often with Stephane Grappelli, but worked mainly as a freelancer with own quartet and trio. He also took up with Joe Williams, Carol Kidd, Eileen Farrell and JJ Johnson.
Since 1994 he plays a lot in a trio with bassist Peter Washington and drummer Lewis Nash and he also occurs much solo.
He also composed, among others, is inspired by James Joyce's Ulysses Joyce notes, which he recorded in Oslo. It occurs far in Norway and Germany. Stewart has lived since the 1970s in Dublin.
He holds an honorary doctorate from Trinity College, Dublin.
Lexical entry
- Ian Carr, Digby Fairweather, Brian Priestley, Jazz Rough Guide. Stuttgart: Metzler 1999
- John Chilton Who's who of British jazz, Continuum 2004