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Roger Kellaway

Roger Kellaway’s discography runs to more than two hundred and fifty albums. He’s worked with everyone from Ellington to Elvis, Dizzy Gillespie to Yo-Yo Ma, Joni Mitchell to Mancini and Quincy Jones to Michael Tilson Thomas.

Kellaway is not only a major pianist, he is a composer of protean ability, writing in the music fields of jazz, classical and “pop”, also scoring for films and television. His acclaimed “Cello Quartet” albums are described by some as “crossover”, “chamber jazz” and by others as the beginning of “New Age” music. They were the first in an eclectic array of projects beginning in the 1960’s. Roger’s commissions include a ballet for George Balanchine and the New York City Ballet, orchestral pieces for the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the National Symphony, the New American Orchestra and a concerto, “Songs of Ascent,” commissioned by the New York Philharmonic, Zubin Mehta, conductor. He wrote a variety of chamber works for Carnegie Hall performances and served as musical director for Stephane Grappelli’s 80th Birthday Tribute, which included Yo-Yo Ma’s first entry into Jazz. Later, Stephane, Yo-Yo and Roger traveled to Paris together. Kellaway played on and wrote all the arrangements for their album, “Anything Goes”.

Roger fell in love with the piano at the age of 7 and began studying. By the time he was 12, he was already listening equally to jazz and classical music and decided that he wanted to spend his life in music. He attended Newton High School, at that time ranked the number three high school in the United States, studying college level music theory and playing double bass and percussion in the school orchestra, performing works by Mozart, Beethoven, and Bach. (Meanwhile, he was playing bass in an extracurricular jazz band.) From high school, he went on to the New England Conservatory where he studied piano, double bass, and composition. After two years at the conservatory he left to go on the road, playing bass. In 1960, he settled in New York City and began freelancing on piano. By the age of 22, he was one of the busiest and most highly respected pianists in New York, playing record dates, jazz clubs, and working with singers such as Lena Horne. His favorite recordings during that period were with Sonny Rollins, Wes Montgomery, Oliver Nelson, Ben Webster, Clark Terry & Bob Brookmeyer.

In the mid ’60′s Kellaway moved to Los Angeles to continue doing studio work, which soon included playing on and then writing film scores. He became musical director for Bobby Darin and in 1968 arranged (and conducted) Darin’s album of songs from the film “Dr. Doolittle”. Writing songs and arrangements is a passion that sometimes expands into producing, as was the case for the Carmen McRae album, “I Am Music”. The relationship had started with Roger’s song “I Have The Feeling I’ve Been Here Before”, written especially for her, with a lyric by the legendary team Alan & Marilyn Bergman. Kellaway’s most prized television credit is, “Remembering You”, the closing theme for the groundbreaking, “All in the Family”. Composed in 1970, it is still being heard on TV around the world. In 1988, Kellaway was honored with a Grammy Award for his music on the album “Memos From Paradise” for Eddie Daniels. He has written (and conducted) twenty-nine film scores including Barbara Streisand’s “A Star is Born”, for which he received an Academy Award nomination.

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Radio & Podcasts

Slide Hampton & Dinah Washington

Read "Slide Hampton & Dinah Washington" reviewed by Joe Dimino


Our 673rd episode of Neon Jazz begins with the prolific pianist and composer Roger Kellaway. We talked to him about the COVID-19 lockdown as we have done with so many other musicians during 2020. Some other musicians interviewed or profiled during this hour of jazz is Scott Colley, Pete McGuiness and Robin McKelle. We pay our respects to 107-year old jazz drummer Viola Smith and listen to new music from Kansas City vocalist Molly Hammer. Cheers. Playlist Roger ...

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Album Review

Roger Kellaway: The Many Open Minds Of Roger Kellaway

Read "The Many Open Minds Of Roger Kellaway" reviewed by Jack Bowers


Criticize pianist Roger Kellaway? You must be kidding. Describe Roger Kellaway? That's a fair bet and far more advisable. Kellaway, who is eighty years old as this is being written, embodies the boundless exuberance, creative power and impeccable technique of any player half his age, all of which he displays unfailingly on The Many Open Minds of Roger Kellaway, recorded in concert nine years ago at the Jazz Bakery in Los Angeles and released on Kellaway's eightieth birthday, November 1, ...

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Album Review

Roger Kellaway: The Many Open Minds Of Roger Kellaway

Read "The Many Open Minds Of Roger Kellaway" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky


There's not a single category that can contain the wit and wonder that is Roger Kellaway. Over the past 60 years he's put his musical stamp on film, television, pop, rock, new age, ballet, and modern classical forms, garnering awards and acclaim wherever his pen and piano work happen to fall. And let's not forget jazz. While Kellaway has played with a laundry list of notables from the aforementioned realms, his jazz résumé is no less impressive. Sonny Rollins, Clark ...

Album Review

Eddie Daniels, Roger Kellaway: Just Friends

Read "Just Friends" reviewed by Angelo Leonardi


Dall'archivio personale di George Klabin --il fondatore e presidente della Resonance Records --esce questa registrazione di un concerto di vent'anni fa, dato al Village Vanguard dal clarinettista Eddie Daniels e dal pianista Roger Kellaway con Buster Williams al contrabbasso e Al Foster alla batteria. Documento scintillante sia dal punto di vista della qualità acustica (nonostante l'incisione su cassetta con un singolo microfono Sony) che da quello artistico. All'età di 47 anni Eddie Daniels era nel pieno della ...

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Album Review

Roger Kellaway Trio: New Standards Vol. 3

Read "New Standards Vol. 3" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky


Trumpeter Carl Saunders is best known for his contributions to jazz orchestras, having put his mighty horn to good use for Stan Kenton, Bill Holman, Maynard Ferguson, Benny Goodman, Gerald Wilson, and numerous other big band leaders of note over the past half-century. Yet his work as a composer may end up being his lasting legacy. Saunders has amassed a considerable body of work--more than three hundred of his tunes appear in a Real Book-style collection titled New Jazz Standards--and ...

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Album Review

Eddie Daniels and Roger Kellaway: Just Friends: Live at the Village Vanguard

Read "Just Friends: Live at the Village Vanguard" reviewed by C. Michael Bailey


Resonance Records has dramatically improved the respective discographies of Bill Evans (Live At Art D'Lugoff's Top of The Gate (2012), Some Other Time: the Lost Session From the Black Forest (2016), Another Time: The Hilversum Concert (2017)); Wes Montgomery (Echoes of Indiana Avenue (2012), Wes Montgomery: In The Beginning-Early Recordings from 1949-1958 (2015), Smokin' in Seattle: Live at the Penthouse (1966) (2017)); and Gene Harris (Live in London (2008), Another Night In London (2010), Three Sounds: Groovin' Hard -Live at ...

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Album Review

Eddie Daniels & Roger Kellaway: Just Friends

Read "Just Friends" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky


Clarinetist Eddie Daniels and pianist Roger Kellaway are more than just friends; they're musical soulmates, connected in pulse and impulse, focused on the same syncretic sum of sounds and styles, and bound by a telepathic rapport. Both men are virtuosos of the highest order, but that's beside the point. The real measure of their artistic collaborations is tied to the way they communicate and connect, not how fast they can go or how many notes each can cram into a ...

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Recording

Recent Listening: “New” Ones By Anne Phillips And Roger Kellaway

Recent Listening: “New” Ones By Anne Phillips And Roger Kellaway

Source: Rifftides by Doug Ramsey

Until recently, it may have seemed that the singer and songwriter Anne Phillips had resigned as a performer. She had not. Those who remember her 1959 debut album, Born To Be Blue, may be delighted to know that her years below the radar as a writer, arranger, conductor and studio musician did nothing to dilute her impact as a performer. She has buoyed her undiminished presence with a follow-up to her second rare album, Gonna Lay My Heart On The ...

Interview

Interview: Roger Kellaway

Interview: Roger Kellaway

Source: JazzWax by Marc Myers

On Thursday, March 23, at 7:30 p.m., pianists Roger Kellaway and Peter Beets will be appearing together as a duet at New York's Sheen Center as part of producer Pat Philips' Jazz on Bleecker Street concert series. They will be performing The Many Moods of McCartney. For more information and to buy tickets, go here. The concert will be held at the Loreto Theater at 18 Bleecker St. Here's how the concept sounded with the Asheville Symphony at the Thomas ...

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Recording

Eddie Daniels, with Roger Kellaway - Live at the Library of Congress (2012)

Eddie Daniels, with Roger Kellaway - Live at the Library of Congress (2012)

Source: Something Else!

Clarinetist Eddie Daniels, appearing last February at the Library of Congress' Coolidge Auditorium, displays an almost telepathic symbiosis alongside pianist Roger Kellaway. Making good on 2009's pleasant and compulsively listenable Duet of One, the two charge into the evening with an explorative, polyrhythmic remake of Gershwin's “Strike Up The Band," stretching it out into an eight-minute rumination. Later, Daniels (a founding member of the Thad Jones-Mel Lewis Orchestra) and Kellaway (Al Cohn and Zoot Sims, Clark Terry, Bob Brookmeyer, Ben ...

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Radio

The Jazz Session #149: Roger Kellaway

The Jazz Session #149: Roger Kellaway

Source: Michael Ricci


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Video / DVD

Roger Kellaway Trio: Review and Bonus Video

Roger Kellaway Trio: Review and Bonus Video

Source: Rifftides by Doug Ramsey

Washington, DC, correspondent John Birchard attended Kellaway's Saturday night performance in the nation's capital. Here is his report.

KELLAWAY AT THE KENNEDY CENTER

By John Birchard

The 2008-2009 season at the Kennedy Center's KC Jazz Club in Washington, DC finished with a flourish last night. In a tribute to the late Oscar Peterson, Roger Kellaway's Trio showed two sell-out crowds why he is so highly regarded among musicians and insiders.

Setting a tone of relaxed swing from ...

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Performance / Tour

Roger Kellaway Shines on Live at the Jazz Standard Set

Roger Kellaway Shines on Live at the Jazz Standard Set

Source: Jim Eigo, Jazz Promo Services

New York, New York-November 24, 2008- No one can make a piano sing like Roger Kellaway, and nowhere is that more true than on his new release, Live at the Jazz Standard. Beautifully performed and recorded at New York’s legendary Jazz Standard, Kellaway and his usual cast of virtuosos – including guitarist Russell Malone and vibist Stefon Harris – bring to life the classics of Nat King Cole, Art Tatum, Oscar Peterson, and many others with ferocity. Clearly, Live at ...

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Recording

CD: Roger Kellaway

CD: Roger Kellaway

Source: Rifftides by Doug Ramsey

 Roger Kellaway, Live at the Jazz Standard (IPO). For the pianist's stand at the New York club, he continues his drumerless ways of recent years but, as usual, has plenty of rhythm. He is abetted by guitarist Russell Malone and bassist Jay Leonhart. Vibraharpist Stefon Harris is also aboard, fitting into Kellway's conception of a group modeled on the Nat Cole Trio. Cellist Borislav Strulev makes a moving contribution to Kellaway's “All My Life." The exuberant blowing is on familiar ...

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Event

Music & Conversations March 15th in Los Angeles with Roger Kellaway

Music & Conversations March 15th in Los Angeles with Roger Kellaway

Source: All About Jazz

We're delighted to announce that our seventh Music & Conversations will be presented on Mar. 15th at a custom performance space in the Mt. Washington district of Los Angeles. Besides the pleasure of hearing performers of international stature in an intimate setting, audiences enjoy wine and hors d'oeuvres, with a view of city lights. Our world-class performers, violinist Mark Menzies (Ensemble Sospeso), cellist John Walz (Principal Cellist, Los Angeles Opera Orchestra), and Douglas Masek (extraordinary saxophone) will join Music & ...

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Award / Grant

Roger Kellaway Receives "Le Prix Du Jazz Classique" Award for Best Record of the Year

Roger Kellaway Receives "Le Prix Du Jazz Classique" Award for Best Record of the Year

Source: Jim Eigo, Jazz Promo Services

IPO Recordings is pleased to announce that Roger Kellaway's “Heroes" CD has been awarded the “Best Record Of The Year" in the “Classic Jazz" category by the French Jazz Academy. The French Jazz Academy Awards is the oldest and most serious music awards ceremony in France (it was created in 1955 !) The college of voters is made up of 60 independent journalists, photographers, writers, radio and TV producers. The award ceremony event, similar to the Grammy Awards, will take ...

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Performance / Tour

Roger Kellaway Trio 67th Birthday Celebration @ The Vic, Santa Monica, California, 11/2/06

Roger Kellaway Trio 67th Birthday Celebration @ The Vic, Santa Monica, California, 11/2/06

Source: Jim Eigo, Jazz Promo Services

Birthdays are blessed events - here comes 67!

This year Roger Kellaway will be celebrating with Bruce Forman and Bob Magnusson

On Thursday - November 2, 2006

Friendship, family, jazz, great atmosphere, great food & drink --we must be at The Vic

The jazz will be mostly swing but knowing Roger, the boundaries will be stretched!

The Vic is located in Santa Monica, California, 2640 Main Street at Ocean Park, the back door entrance to The Victorian

For information and ...

Photos

Music

Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson

Live At Mezzrow

Cellar Music Group
2024

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The Many Open Minds...

IPO Recordings
2019

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New Jazz Standards...

Summit Records
2018

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Just Friends: Live at...

Resonance Records
2017

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Live At The Jazz...

IPO Recordings
2008

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Heroes

IPO Recordings
2006

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Videos

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