Denny Zeitlin
Encyclopedia
Denny Zeitlin is an American jazz pianist and composer, and a clinical professor of psychiatry at University of California, San Francisco
. He has recorded more than 30 albums, including more than 100 original compositions, and was a first place winner of the Down Beat International Jazz Critics Poll in 1965 and 1974.
. He began improvising on the piano at age two and was composing before elementary school. His father was a radiologist who played piano by ear. His mother was a speech pathologist and his first piano teacher. He began formal study in Western classical music at age six, switching to jazz in the eighth grade. In high school, he played professionally in and around Chicago, and by college at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
, was playing with Ira Sullivan
, Johnny Griffin
, Wes Montgomery
, Joe Farrell
, Wilbur Ware
, and Bob Cranshaw
, among others. Mentors included pianist Billy Taylor
and George Russell, while pianist Bill Evans
, an early supporter, frequently recorded Zeitlin's composition "Quiet Now" and made it the title track of a 1970 album
.
Signed by Columbia Records
' John H. Hammond
, Zeitlin began his recording career in 1963 while studying medicine at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, debuting as the featured pianist on the Jeremy Steig
album Flute Fever. Four Denny Zeitlin Trio albums for Columbia followed in the period through 1967. Trio members included Charlie Haden
and Jerry Granelli. Zeitlin moved to San Francisco in 1964 to intern at the University of California, San Francisco
, followed by a psychiatric residency.
Jazz critic Leonard Feather
called Zeitlin "the most versatile young pianist to come to prominence in the early 1960s". Reflecting on Zeitlin's Columbia period, jazz historian Ted Gioia
wrote that the pianist "had assimilated the breakthroughs of the previous decade, from the impressionism of Bill Evans to the free-fall explorations of Ornette Coleman, and blended them into a personal style that anticipated the next fifteen years of keyboard advances. He stood out from the crowd for the unbridled creativity of his work, the richness of his harmonic palette, and the sheer beauty of his piano tone".
Between 1968 and 1978, Zeitlin integrated electronic keyboards, synthesizers, and sound-altering devices
with acoustic instruments, working in multiple musical genres. The results were first heard in 1969 when Zeitlin composed and performed music for the "Jazzy Spies" sequences on the first season of Sesame Street
, featuring vocal overdubs by Grace Slick
. The following year, he released Expansion, a trio album with George Marsh and Mel Graves, which Down Beat
magazine awarded its highest rating. The period culminated with Zeitlin's writing the score for the 1978 remake of Invasion of the Body Snatchers
, which turned out to be his only film score despite numerous offers afterward, because of the extreme workload of many 20-plus-hour days. While New Yorker
film critic Pauline Kael
thought the music occasionally overpowered the action, she called the score "generally dazzling" and a large contributor to both the humor and terror of the film.
Beginning in 1978, Zeitlin returned to a primary focus on acoustic music, continuing to play concerts internationally and recording some 22 albums. His projects include the solo album Soundings, the duo album Time Remembers One Time Once with Charlie Haden, and Denny Zeitlin Trio in Concert with bassist Buster Williams
and drummer Matt Wilson. Zeitlin has continued to draw strong reviews. Critic Doug Ramsey wrote that "Trio in Concert", released in 2009, "catches Dr. Zeitlin, at age 70, in his musical prime and his trio afire".
, where he is clinical professor of psychiatry. He has a private practice in San Francisco and Marin County. He had a 30-year mentorship with psychoanalyst Joseph Weiss, founder of Control-Mastery Theory. Zeitlin has combined his two disciplines in a lecture and workshop entitled "Unlocking the Creative Impulse: The Psychology of Improvisation".
In comparing his two careers, Zeitlin has said it would be a mistake to think that psychiatry served merely to support his passion for music, when in fact he has a passion for both. "In each setting, communication is utterly paramount. There has to be a depth of empathy that allows you to really inhabit the other person's world. It comes out as a collaborative journey in both settings."
University of California, San Francisco
The University of California, San Francisco is one of the world's leading centers of health sciences research, patient care, and education. UCSF's medical, pharmacy, dentistry, nursing, and graduate schools are among the top health science professional schools in the world...
. He has recorded more than 30 albums, including more than 100 original compositions, and was a first place winner of the Down Beat International Jazz Critics Poll in 1965 and 1974.
Biography
Zeitlin grew up in the Chicago suburb of Highland ParkHighland Park, Illinois
Highland Park is a suburban municipality in Lake County, Illinois, United States, about north of downtown Chicago. As of 2009, the population is 33,492. Highland Park is one of several municipalities located on the North Shore of the Chicago Metropolitan Area.-Overview:Highland Park was founded...
. He began improvising on the piano at age two and was composing before elementary school. His father was a radiologist who played piano by ear. His mother was a speech pathologist and his first piano teacher. He began formal study in Western classical music at age six, switching to jazz in the eighth grade. In high school, he played professionally in and around Chicago, and by college at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
The University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign is a large public research-intensive university in the state of Illinois, United States. It is the flagship campus of the University of Illinois system...
, was playing with Ira Sullivan
Ira Sullivan
Ira Sullivan is a bop jazz trumpeter, flugelhornist, flautist, saxophonist and composer born in Washington, D.C.. An active musician since the 1950s, he may be best known for his extensive work with Red Rodney and Lin Halliday among others....
, Johnny Griffin
Johnny Griffin
John Arnold Griffin III was an American bop and hard bop tenor saxophonist.- Early life and career :Griffin studied music at DuSable High School in Chicago under Walter Dyett, starting out on clarinet before moving on to oboe and then alto sax...
, Wes Montgomery
Wes Montgomery
John Leslie "Wes" Montgomery was an American jazz guitarist. He is widely considered one of the major jazz guitarists, emerging after such seminal figures as Django Reinhardt and Charlie Christian and influencing countless others, including Pat Martino, George Benson, Russell Malone, Emily...
, Joe Farrell
Joe Farrell
Joseph Carl Firrantello , known as Joe Farrell, was an American jazz saxophonist and flutist. He is best known for a series of albums under his own name on the CTI record label and for playing in the initial incarnation of Chick Corea's Return to Forever.-Biography:Farrell was born in Chicago...
, Wilbur Ware
Wilbur Ware
Wilbur Ware was an American jazz double-bassist known for his hard bop percussive style.Born in Chicago, Ware taught himself to play banjo and bass. In the 1940s, he worked with Stuff Smith, Sonny Stitt and Roy Eldridge. In the 1950s, Ware played with Eddie Vinson, Art Blakey, and Buddy DeFranco...
, and Bob Cranshaw
Bob Cranshaw
Melbourne R. "Bob" Cranshaw is an American jazz bassist. His career spans the heyday of Blue Note Records to his recent involvement with the Musicians Union. He is perhaps best known for his long association with Sonny Rollins...
, among others. Mentors included pianist Billy Taylor
Billy Taylor
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 since 1994, he was the artistic director for jazz at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in...
and George Russell, while pianist Bill Evans
Bill Evans
William John Evans, known as Bill Evans was an American jazz pianist. His use of impressionist harmony, inventive interpretation of traditional jazz repertoire, and trademark rhythmically independent, "singing" melodic lines influenced a generation of pianists including: Chick Corea, Herbie...
, an early supporter, frequently recorded Zeitlin's composition "Quiet Now" and made it the title track of a 1970 album
Quiet Now
Quiet Now is an album by jazz pianist Bill Evans, released in 1969.In 1999, Polygram issued a compilation titled Quiet Now: Never Let Me Go which, aside from the title track, has a completely different track listing.-Track listing:...
.
Signed by Columbia Records
Columbia Records
Columbia Records is an American record label, owned by Japan's Sony Music Entertainment, operating under the Columbia Music Group with Aware Records. It was founded in 1888, evolving from an earlier enterprise, the American Graphophone Company — successor to the Volta Graphophone Company...
' John H. Hammond
John H. Hammond
John Henry Hammond II was an American record producer, musician and music critic from the 1930s to the early 1980s...
, Zeitlin began his recording career in 1963 while studying medicine at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, debuting as the featured pianist on the Jeremy Steig
Jeremy Steig
-Biography:Steig is the son of New Yorker cartoonist William Steig,At age 19 Steig was involved in a motorcycle accident which left him paralyzed on one side...
album Flute Fever. Four Denny Zeitlin Trio albums for Columbia followed in the period through 1967. Trio members included Charlie Haden
Charlie Haden
Charles Edward Haden is an American jazz musician. He is a double bassist, probably best known for his long association with saxophonist Ornette Coleman...
and Jerry Granelli. Zeitlin moved to San Francisco in 1964 to intern at the University of California, San Francisco
University of California, San Francisco
The University of California, San Francisco is one of the world's leading centers of health sciences research, patient care, and education. UCSF's medical, pharmacy, dentistry, nursing, and graduate schools are among the top health science professional schools in the world...
, followed by a psychiatric residency.
Jazz critic Leonard Feather
Leonard Feather
Leonard Geoffrey Feather was a British-born jazz pianist, composer, and producer who was best known for his music journalism and other writing.-Biography:...
called Zeitlin "the most versatile young pianist to come to prominence in the early 1960s". Reflecting on Zeitlin's Columbia period, jazz historian Ted Gioia
Ted Gioia
Ted Gioia is a noted jazz critic and music historian, best known for his books The History of Jazz and Delta Blues, both selected as notable books of the year by The New York Times. He is one of the editors in chief of the Encyclopedia of Jazz Musicians. He is also a jazz musician and one of the...
wrote that the pianist "had assimilated the breakthroughs of the previous decade, from the impressionism of Bill Evans to the free-fall explorations of Ornette Coleman, and blended them into a personal style that anticipated the next fifteen years of keyboard advances. He stood out from the crowd for the unbridled creativity of his work, the richness of his harmonic palette, and the sheer beauty of his piano tone".
Between 1968 and 1978, Zeitlin integrated electronic keyboards, synthesizers, and sound-altering devices
Effects unit
Effects units are electronic devices that alter how a musical instrument or other audio source sounds. Some effects subtly "color" a sound, while others transform it dramatically. Effects are used during live performances or in the studio, typically with electric guitar, keyboard and bass...
with acoustic instruments, working in multiple musical genres. The results were first heard in 1969 when Zeitlin composed and performed music for the "Jazzy Spies" sequences on the first season of Sesame Street
Sesame Street
Sesame Street has undergone significant changes in its history. According to writer Michael Davis, by the mid-1970s the show had become "an American institution". The cast and crew expanded during this time, including the hiring of women in the crew and additional minorities in the cast. The...
, featuring vocal overdubs by Grace Slick
Grace Slick
Grace Slick is an American singer and songwriter, who was one of the lead singers of the rock groups The Great Society, Jefferson Airplane, Jefferson Starship, and Starship, and was a solo artist, for nearly three decades, from the mid-1960s to the mid-1990s...
. The following year, he released Expansion, a trio album with George Marsh and Mel Graves, which Down Beat
Down Beat
Down Beat is an American magazine devoted to "jazz, blues and beyond" to indicate its expansion beyond the jazz realm which it covered exclusively in previous years. The publication was established in 1934 in Chicago, Illinois...
magazine awarded its highest rating. The period culminated with Zeitlin's writing the score for the 1978 remake of Invasion of the Body Snatchers
Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978 film)
Invasion of the Body Snatchers is a 1978 science fiction film based on the novel The Body Snatchers by Jack Finney. It is a remake of the 1956 film of the same name. It was directed by Philip Kaufman and starred Donald Sutherland, Brooke Adams and Leonard Nimoy.A San Francisco health inspector and...
, which turned out to be his only film score despite numerous offers afterward, because of the extreme workload of many 20-plus-hour days. While New Yorker
The New Yorker
The New Yorker is an American magazine of reportage, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons and poetry published by Condé Nast...
film critic Pauline Kael
Pauline Kael
Pauline Kael was an American film critic who wrote for The New Yorker magazine from 1968 to 1991. Earlier in her career, her work appeared in City Lights, McCall's and The New Republic....
thought the music occasionally overpowered the action, she called the score "generally dazzling" and a large contributor to both the humor and terror of the film.
Beginning in 1978, Zeitlin returned to a primary focus on acoustic music, continuing to play concerts internationally and recording some 22 albums. His projects include the solo album Soundings, the duo album Time Remembers One Time Once with Charlie Haden, and Denny Zeitlin Trio in Concert with bassist Buster Williams
Buster Williams
Charles Anthony Williams is an American jazz bassist.-Biography:Williams has gained prestige among jazz musicians as a solid supportive player. Since the early 1960s, he has made subtle swing, a precise rhythm and superb technique the landmark of his playing...
and drummer Matt Wilson. Zeitlin has continued to draw strong reviews. Critic Doug Ramsey wrote that "Trio in Concert", released in 2009, "catches Dr. Zeitlin, at age 70, in his musical prime and his trio afire".
Dual careers
Since 1968, Zeitlin has been on the teaching faculty at the University of California, San FranciscoUniversity of California, San Francisco
The University of California, San Francisco is one of the world's leading centers of health sciences research, patient care, and education. UCSF's medical, pharmacy, dentistry, nursing, and graduate schools are among the top health science professional schools in the world...
, where he is clinical professor of psychiatry. He has a private practice in San Francisco and Marin County. He had a 30-year mentorship with psychoanalyst Joseph Weiss, founder of Control-Mastery Theory. Zeitlin has combined his two disciplines in a lecture and workshop entitled "Unlocking the Creative Impulse: The Psychology of Improvisation".
In comparing his two careers, Zeitlin has said it would be a mistake to think that psychiatry served merely to support his passion for music, when in fact he has a passion for both. "In each setting, communication is utterly paramount. There has to be a depth of empathy that allows you to really inhabit the other person's world. It comes out as a collaborative journey in both settings."
As Leader
- 1964 Cathexis
- 1964 Carnival
- 1965 Live At The Trident
- 1967 Zeitgeist
- 1970 & 1973 Expansion
- 1977 Syzygy
- 1978 Soundings
- 1978 Invasion Of The Body Snatchers
- 1984 Tidal Wave
- 1986 Homecoming
- 1988 Trio
- 1989 In The Moment
- 1993 Live At Maybeck Recital Hall
- 1998 As Long As There’s Music
- 2004 Slickrock
- 2005 Solo Voyage
- 2009 The Columbia Studio Trio Sessions
- 2009 Trio In Concert
- 2010 Precipice
- 2011 Labyrinth
As Co-Leader with David Friesen
- 1992 In Concert
- 1995 Live At Maybeck Recital Hall, Concord Duo Series, Vol. 8
- 1999 Live At The Jazz Bakery
As Featured Artist
- 1963 Jeremy Steig: Flute Fever
- 1983 Bill Evans- A Tribute
- 1983 Conrad Silvert Presents Jazz At The Opera House
- 1989 David Friesen: Other Times, Other Places
- 1993 David Friesen: Two For The Show
- 1996 Jazz Celebration: A Tribute To Carl Jefferson
- 1999 David Grisman: Dawg Duos