FM
Biography
Leonard Joseph Tristano (19 March 1919 – 18 November 1978) was a jazz pianist, composer and teacher of jazz improvisation. He performed in the cool jazz, bebop, post bop and avant-garde jazz genres. He remains a somewhat overlooked figure in jazz history, but his enormous originality and dazzling work as an improviser have long been appreciated by knowledgeable jazz fans. In addition, his work as a jazz educator meant that he has exerted a substantial influence on jazz through figures such as Lee Konitz and Bill Evans.
Tristano was born in Chicago into an Italian immigrant family from Aversa. At six years of age he suffered an attack of the measles. His eyesight, weakened at birth by influenza, grew weaker. Adept at mathematics and placed in classes where finally he studied piano and music theory from pre-teen years, he graduated with a bachelor's degree from his home town's American Conservatory of Music in 1943.
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