Horace Silver (born Horace Ward Martin Tavares Silva, September 2, 1928 – June 18, 2014) was an American jazz pianist and composer.

WIKIPEDIA BIO Silver is known for his distinctive playing style and pioneering compositional contributions to hard bop. He was influenced by a wide range of musical styles, notably gospel music, African music, and Latin American music, and sometimes ventured into the soul jazz genre.

  

Jazz singer Jaimee Paul former backup singer for country music legend Wynonna Judd

“I was always involved with music,” the fair-haired Southern Illinois native reports. Her parents are both musical: her mom taught music and piano in the public school system for 30 years, and her dad studied music in college before deciding on a career in engineering. “I like to think I use both sides of the brain,” she says, “mathematics and science from my dad and music and art from my mother.”

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Toots Thielemans (born Jean-Baptiste Frédéric Isidor, Baron Thielemans on 29 April 1922, Brussels, Belgium) is a Belgian jazz guitarist

Thielemans is also credited as one of the greatest harmonica players of the 20th century. He has worked as a bandleader (scoring an international hit in the 1960s with his song "Bluesette") and as a sideman (notably on many projects with composer/arranger Quincy Jones), and has appeared on dozens of film soundtracks. In 2009 he became NEA Jazz Master, the highest honour for a jazz musician in the United States. He may be best known to some as the performer whistling the melody in commercials for Old Spice cologne, and to others for performing the Sesame Street theme on harmonica. He announced his retirement, at the age of 91, on 12 March 2014. He took the stage since once, as a surprise act on 17 August 2014, at the Jazz Middelheim Festival in Antwerp, to perform an intimate version of Louis Armstrong's "What a Wonderful World".

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George Van Eps (August 7, 1913 – November 29, 1998) was an American swing and mainstream jazz guitarist.

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Noted for his recordings as a leader, and his work as a session musician, Van Eps was also the author of instructional books that explored his approach to guitar-based harmony. He was well known as a pioneer of the seven-string guitar, which allowed him to incorporate sophisticated bass lines into his improvisation. He was a strong influence on later seven-string players such as Howard Alden (with whom he recorded four CDs for Concord Records in the early 1990s), Bucky Pizzarelli, and John Pizzarelli (Bucky's son). His father was the legendary classic banjo player Fred Van Eps. Van Eps died of pneumonia in Newport Beach, California at the age of 85

Robert Marshall (Bobby) Rosengarden (April 23, 1924 – February 27, 2007, Sarasota, Florida) was a jazz drummer, percussionist and bandleader.

A native of Elgin, Illinois, he was a solid and versatile contributor on countless recording sessions and playing in TV network orchestras and talk-show bands. Rosengarden began playing drums when he was 12, and later studied at the University of Michigan. After playing drums in Army bands in World War II, he moved to New York City, working in several groups between 1945 and 1948 before becoming a busy studio musician. He played at NBC-TV (1949–1968) and ABC (1969–1974) on The Steve Allen Show, The Ernie Kovacs Show, Sing Along With Mitch, Johnny Carson's The Tonight Show Band, and led the band for The Dick Cavett Show.

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Carmen Mercedes McRae (April 8, 1920 – November 10, 1994) was an American jazz singer

Considered one of the most influential jazz vocalists of the 20th century, it was her behind-the-beat phrasing and her ironic interpretations of song lyrics that made her memorable. McRae drew inspiration from Billie Holiday, but established her own distinctive voice. She went on to record more than 60 albums, enjoying a rich musical career, performing and recording in the United States, Europe, and Japan.
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Mel Lewis (May 10, 1929 – February 2, 1990) was the stage name of an American drummer

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During his life, Lewis was a prominent solo performer, and a professor at William Paterson University, during which time he also authored a book on the art of drumming. In addition, Lewis extended his talents as session musician. Throughout his life he garnered fourteen Grammy nominations.

John Paul "Bucky" Pizzarelli (born January 9, 1926) is an American Jazz guitarist

Pizzarelli has also worked as a staffman for Dick Cavett, ABC TV, with Bobby Rosengarden. The list of musicians Pizzarelli has collaborated with over his career includes Les Paul, Stephane Grappelli, and Benny Goodman. Pizzarelli acknowledges Django Reinhardt, Freddie Green, and George Van Eps for their influences on his style and mode of play.WIKIPEDIA

Charles Crawford is a jazz pianist

Charles Crawford is a professional jazz musician who has been playing jazz piano for 9 years. He is now the jazz piano master at the age of 19. WEBSITE

Kim Waters, sax

OFFICIAL WEBSITE...|...BIO 

A Baltimore native from a musical family, Kim’s primary influences were jazz icons Duke Ellington, Charlie Parker, Coleman Hawkins, Herbie Hancock, George Benson, Paul Desmond, and Cannonball Adderley. His first instrument - at age 8 - was the violin (“That didn’t go over well with the fellas” says Waters) and within five years he found his true calling on the alto and soprano saxophones. Soon after, Kim organized his first professional band with his brothers, James (who still performs with him) and Eric, and his hometown friend (and soon-to-be jazz piano legend) Cyrus Chestnut. Subsequently, KIM WATERS shared stages with manyof the best including Ray Charles, Al Green, Isaac Hayes, Phyllis Hyman and Grover Washington, Jr. to name a very few. Kim now makes his home in the Austin, Texas area and, when he’s frequently on the road, at the important music venues throughout the world.

Thomas Wright "Fats" Waller (May 21, 1904 – December 15, 1943) was an influential American jazz pianist

Waller's best-known compositions, "Ain't Misbehavin'" and "Honeysuckle Rose", were inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame posthumously, in 1984 and 1999. Waller ultimately became one of the most popular performers of his era, finding critical and commercial success in his homeland and in Europe. He was also a prolific songwriter and many songs he wrote or co-wrote are still popular, such as "Honeysuckle Rose", "Ain't Misbehavin'" and "Squeeze Me". Fellow pianist and composer Oscar Levant dubbed Waller "the black Horowitz". Waller is believed to have composed many novelty tunes in the 1920s and 1930s and sold them for relatively small sums, the attributions of which, on becoming widely known, went only to a later composer and lyricist.

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William Thomas "Billy" Strayhorn (November 29, 1915 – May 31, 1967) was an American jazz composer, pianist, lyricist, and arranger

Strayhorn is best known for his successful collaboration with bandleader and composer Duke Ellington, lasting nearly three decades. His compositions include "Take the 'A' Train", "Chelsea Bridge", and "Lush Life". Strayhorn was born in Dayton, Ohio. His family soon moved to the Homewood section of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. However, his mother's family was from Hillsborough, North Carolina, and she sent him there to protect him from his father's drunken sprees. Strayhorn spent many months of his childhood at his grandparents' house in Hillsborough. In an interview, Strayhorn said that his grandmother was his primary influence during the first ten years of his life. He first became interested in music while living with her, playing hymns on her piano, and playing records on her Victrola record player.

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Bola Sete (born Djalma de Andrade) (July 16, 1923 – February 14, 1987)

Sete was a Brazilian guitarist. Sete played jazz with Vince Guaraldi as well as with Dizzy Gillespie. His song "Bettina" was featured on the "Tribe Vibes" breakbeat compilation, as it had been sampled by the musical group A Tribe Called Quest.

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Jean "Django" Reinhardt (French: [dʒãŋɡo ʁɛjnaʁt] or [dʒɑ̃ɡo ʁenɑʁt]; 23 January 1910 – 16 May 1953) was a Belgian-born guitarist

Reinhardt is often regarded as one of the greatest guitar players of all time; he was the first important European jazz musician who made major contributions to the development of the guitar genre. After his third and fourth fingers were paralyzed when he suffered burns in a fire, Reinhardt used only the index and middle fingers of his left hand on his solos. He created an entirely new style of jazz guitar technique (sometimes called 'hot' jazz guitar), which has since become a living musical tradition within French Gypsy culture. With violinist Stéphane Grappelli, Reinhardt co-founded the Quintette du Hot Club de France, described by critic Thom Jurek as "one of the most original bands in the history of recorded jazz." Reinhardt's most popular compositions have become jazz standards, including "Minor Swing", "Daphne", "Belleville", "Djangology", "Swing '42", and "Nuages".

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Jay Jay Johnson...James Louis "J. J." Johnson (January 22, 1924–February 4, 2001) was an American jazz trombonist, composer and arranger.

Johnson was one of the first trombonists to embrace bebop music. He has long been regarded as one of the leading trombonists of the post-swing era, exerting a pervasive influence on other jazz musicians.

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Stanley Getz (February 2, 1927 – June 6, 1991) was an American jazz saxophonist.

Playing primarily the tenor saxophone, Getz was known as "The Sound" because of his warm, lyrical tone, his prime influence being the wispy, mellow timbre of his idol, Lester Young. Coming to prominence in the late 1940s with Woody Herman's big band, Getz is described by critic Scott Yanow as "one of the all-time great tenor saxophonists". Getz went on to perform in bebop, cool jazz and third stream, but is perhaps best known for popularizing bossa nova, as in the worldwide hit single "The Girl from Ipanema" (1964).

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Louis Armstrong (August 4, 1901 – July 6, 1971), nicknamed Satchmo or Pops, was an American jazz trumpeter

Coming to prominence in the 1920s as an "inventive" trumpet and cornet player, Armstrong was a foundational influence in jazz, shifting the focus of the music from collective improvisation to solo performance. With his instantly recognizable gravelly voice, Armstrong was also an influential singer, demonstrating great dexterity as an improviser, bending the lyrics and melody of a song for expressive purposes. He was also skilled at scat singing (vocalizing using sounds and syllables instead of actual lyrics).

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Bessie Smith (April 15, 1894 – September 26, 1937) was an American blues singer.

Nicknamed The Empress of the Blues, Smith was the most popular female blues singer of the 1920s and 1930s. She is often regarded as one of the greatest singers of her era and, along with Louis Armstrong, a major influence on other jazz vocalists
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