Pittsburgh Jazz Network
Billy Kuhn
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
United States
Profile Information:
- Pittsburgh Connection
- I've lived, studied, taught and performed in Pittsburgh all my life. I began playing professionally in 1968.
- Favorite Pittsburgh musicians/performers
- There are too many to mention, and if I forgot someone, I'd feel bad that I left them out! If you know the history of Pittsburgh jazz, you know this is true.
- Favorite Jazz Radio or media station
- WHAM from Rochester, NY, with Harry Abrams, long since gone. I recall late late nights, driving to Mt. Washington just to pick up that AM signal!
- Favorite Pittsburgh Jazz Venue
- My favorite was a venue that's long since gone - The Tender Trap on the border of Shadyside and East Liberty. It had the look, the vibe, the scene...I was sorry to see that go. Can't forget the original Crawford Grill; I caught the tail end of that. Sonny Day's Stage Door in Oakland, where Spider provided the place for alot of us young guys to grow. And the Humphrie Bros. Manteca in Manchester.
- About Me:
- I had the great fortune to come up at a time when there still were alot of places to play and sit in. Ther are very few jazz musicians I haven't shared a stage with here in Pittsburgh, and I'm sorry to say some of them have passed on without the recognition they deserve.
For off the cuff bios, you can look up some CD's I perform on: 'Sly On Life' with Duquesne University's Catch 22; 'At Last' with Bobby Negri; 'Ventana' with Ken Karsh; 'on Fire' with Amanda Ford. I'm also a clinician and drummer for Duquesne's annual Guitar and Bass Workshop - every July, I'm blessed to perform with the world's greatest guitarists - come check it out...it's a great annual Pittsburgh music event that, to my continued amazement, gets absolutely no media coverage! It's more than jazz now...the 2008 Lifetime Achievement Award went to Motown's Funk Brothers bassist Bob Babbitt, who left Pittsburgh in his late teens and soon ended up recording "Signed, Sealed, Delivered" with Stevie Wonder.
Cool and 'Tasty' are nice, but I always had some fire and The Funk, too. It is also a blessing, this many years into my passion for music, that music is so emotionally, spiritually, and sometimes physically overwheling as to lift me above and beyond the mundane - to find deeper ways and means of subconscious emotional expression...the fine art of Spontaneous Musical Composition...Improvisation! - Artist or Fan
- artist
Michael A. Constable
Please feel free to keep me updated (even privately) as I have so many memories from the 60's of all of these guys - I just need someone to jog them!
mconstable@cox.net
Thanks again.
Feb 25, 2009
Jerry Butler
Feb 27, 2009
Andrea Hodges
Mar 22, 2010