Oscar Peterson Dead at 82

He was a very young 24, when producer Norman Granz was in a taxi heading for the Montreal airport to head back to New York.

Granz asked the cabbie who was playing the piano on the radio.

He quickly had the cabbie turn around and head back to town.

The next thing the world knew, Oscar Peterson was playing on the stage at Carnegie Hall.

Not long afterwards, Oscar was playing in a club and Art Tatum came in. Oscar, having worshipped and adored Tatum since forever, froze. Couldn't play a note.

Tatum came to the lip of the band stand and said, "Oscar, just play!"

And, until very recently, that's exactly what Oscar has been doing - magnificently, thrillingly.

When I was a teen, my mother (May she rest in peace.) and I were watching Oscar play live on the Ed Sullivan Show. With tears in her eyes, my mom (not a bad Sunday player herself) said, "David, Bach would have loved this!"

I was so blessed to grow up around that kind of sensibility.

Norman Granz became, among many, many other things in jazz, the agent for Ella and Oscar at the same time. How's that for a little talent pool?

Here is the NY Times obituary.

Below is one of his typically inventive in-the-moment highly complex, structured and beautiful pieces.

Thank God for the modern technologies that have captured these sounds and hold them for us.