Jim Hall (musician)
| Jim Hall | |
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Jim Hall in 2010
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| Background information | |
| Birth name | James Stanley Hall |
| Born |
December 4, 1930 Buffalo, New York, U.S. |
| Origin | Cleveland, Ohio |
| Died | December 10, 2013 (aged 83) New York City, U.S. |
| Genres | Jazz, cool jazz, post-bop |
| Occupation(s) | Musician, composer, arranger |
| Instruments | Guitar |
| Years active | 1955–2013 |
| Labels | CTI, Concord, Telarc, ArtistShare |
| Associated acts | Chico Hamilton Quintet, Jimmy Giuffre Three, Art Farmer Quartet, Sonny Rollins, Paul Desmond, Bill Evans |
| Website |
www www |
| Notable instruments | |
| Jimmy D'Aquisto | |
James Stanley Hall (December 4, 1930 – December 10, 2013) was an American jazz guitarist, composer and arranger.Premier Guitar magazine stated that "It could be argued that the jazz guitar tree is rooted in four names: Django [Reinhardt], Charlie [Christian], Wes [Montgomery], and Jim [Hall]".
Born in Buffalo, New York, before moving to Cleveland, Ohio, Hall was from a musical family, his mother played the piano, his grandfather violin, and his uncle guitar. He began playing the guitar at age ten when his mother gave him an instrument as a Christmas present. At 13 he heard Charlie Christian play on a Benny Goodman record, which he calls his "spiritual awakening". As a teenager in Cleveland, he performed professionally, and also took up the double bass. Hall's major influences since childhood were tenor saxophonists Coleman Hawkins, Lester Young, Paul Gonsalves, and Lucky Thompson. While he copied out solos by Charlie Christian, and later Barney Kessel, it was horn players from whom he took the lead.
In 1955, Hall attended the Cleveland Institute of Music where he majored in composition, studying piano and bass in addition to theory. About a year later, he moved to Los Angeles, where cool jazz was prominent at the time. He studied classical guitar with Vincente Gomez, and, from 1955 to 1956, played in Chico Hamilton's quintet. It was at this time that he began to gain attention.
In the Jimmy Giuffre Three, Hall developed some of his own personal musical preferences, including "challenging arrangements and interactive improvisation in duos and trios." He taught at the Lenox School of Jazz in 1959; toured with Jazz at the Philharmonic; and worked with Ben Webster (1959), Bill Evans (1959), Paul Desmond (1959–65), Ella Fitzgerald in Europe (1960), Lee Konitz (1960–61), Sonny Rollins (1961-2, 1964), and Art Farmer (1962-1964). Working with all of these prominent and established artists furthered Hall's career and aided in producing his own bands and own styles.
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