Joe Albany

Joe Albany (born Joseph Albani; January 24, 1924 – January 12, 1988) was an American modern jazz pianist who played bebop with Charlie Parker as well as being a leader on his own recordings.^[1][2]

Joe Albany
Birth name	Joseph Albani
Born	(1924-01-24)January 24, 1924 Atlantic City, New Jersey, U.S.
Died	January 12, 1988(1988-01-12) (aged 63) New York City
Genres	Jazz
Occupation	Musician
Instrument	Piano
Formerly of	Benny Carter Charlie Parker Miles Davis

Life and career

Born in Atlantic City, New Jersey, Albany studied piano as a child and, by 1943, was working on the West Coast in Benny Carter's orchestra.^[3] In 1946, Lester Young recorded with Albany as his pianist, for Aladdin Records.^[4] Also that year, he played at least once with Parker and then 20-year-old Miles Davis.^[5] He continued for a few years afterward, and in 1957 recorded an album for Riverside with an unusual trio line-up with saxophonist Warne Marsh and Bob Whitlock on bass, omitting a drummer. Despite that, most of the 1950s and 1960s saw him battling a heroin addiction, or living in seclusion in Europe. He also had several unsuccessful marriages in this period. He returned to jazz in the 1970s and played on more than ten albums. He died of respiratory failure and cardiac arrest in New York City at the age of 63.^[6]

Albany was the focus of a 1980 documentary titled, Joe Albany... A Jazz Life.^[3] His daughter Amy-Jo wrote a memoir about her father called Low Down: Junk, Jazz, and Other Fairy Tales from Childhood.^[7] The book was adapted for the screen and released in 2014 as the biopic Low Down.^[8] Joe was also the biological father to Benjamin David Goldberg, who was adopted by another family shortly after being born. Benjamin David was also a musician, who studied percussion at Juilliard, played for Broadway shows and was in the US Army Band.

Discography

Year recorded	Title	Label	Notes
1957	The Right Combination	Riverside	Trio, with Warne Marsh (tenor sax), Bob Whitlock (bass)
1966	Portrait of a Legend	Fresh Sound	Trio, with Leroy Vinnegar (bass), Frank Capp (drums)
1971	Joe Albany at Home	Spotlite	Solo piano
1972	Proto-Bopper	Revelation	Trio, with Bob Whitlock (bass), Nick Martinis and Jerry McKenzie (drums; separately)
1973	Birdtown Birds	SteepleChase	Trio, with Hugo Rasmussen (bass), Hans Nymand (drums); in concert
1974	Two's Company	SteepleChase	Duo, with Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen (bass); also released by Inner City in 1976
1974	Joe Albany & Joe Venuti	Horo	Quintet, with Joe Venuti (violin), Joe Cusumano (guitar), Giovanni Tommaso (bass), Bruno Biriaco (drums); also released by Parlophone in 1977
1976	This Is for My Friends	Musica
1976	Epiphany	Blue Jack	Solo piano
1977	Plays George Gershwin & Burton Lane	Musica
1977	The Albany Touch	Sea Breeze	Solo piano
1977	Live in Paris	Fresh Sound	Trio, with Alby Cullaz (bass), Aldo Romano (drums)
1979	Bird Lives!	Interplay	Trio, with Art Davis (bass), Roy Haynes (drums)
1982	Portrait of an Artist	Elektra/Musician	Trio/Quartet, with George Duvivier (bass), Charlie Persip (drums), Al Gafa (guitar)

References

1. Barbera, André (2002). "Albany, Joe". In Barry Kernfeld (ed.). The new Grove dictionary of jazz, vol. 1 (2nd ed.). New York: Grove's Dictionaries Inc. pp. 24–45. ISBN 1561592846.
2. Cook, Richard (2005). Richard Cook's Jazz Encyclopedia. London: Penguin Books. pp. 6. ISBN 0-141-00646-3.
3. Feather, Leonard & Gitler, Ira (2007). The Biographical Encyclopedia of Jazz. Oxford University Press, p. 9.
4. The Complete Aladdin Recordings Of Lester Young at Discogs
5. A recording from a live set at the Final Club in Los Angeles from May 1946 was released as Yardbird in Lotus Land in 1976 on Spotlight Records in the UK. Cf. Charlie Parker discography on Jazzdisco.org. and Yardbird in Lotus Land at Discogs
6. "Joe Albany, 63, Dies; Master of Jazz Piano". The New York Times. 16 January 1988.
7. Albany, A. J. (2003). Low Down: Junk, Jazz, and Other Fairy Tales from Childhood. Bloomsbury Publishing. ISBN 978-1582343334.
8. Rapold, Nicolas (23 October 2014). "A Daughter's View of Dad, the Jazz Pianist and Addict". The New York Times. p. C8.

Further reading

• Russell, Ross (April 1959) "The Legendary Joe Albany". The Jazz Review. pp. 18–19, 40.

External links

• Joe Albany at AllMusic
• Joe Albany discography at Discogs
• Joe Albany at IMDb