Meet… Bill Charlap
PHOTO: Bill Charlap by Ken Kitchings
Time magazine said of West Orange pianist Bill Charlap that “no matter how imaginative or surprising his take on a song is, he invariably zeroes in on its essence.” Dude needs no band. Under his hands, the piano sounds like a symphony. He’ll prove it July 17-21 when he sits at the bench by himself at the SMOKE jazz club in New York City. The event will be livestreamed.
Charlap, 53, has learned his lessons well. He’s won a Grammy. He’s performed with Barbra Streisand, Wynton Marsalis and Tony Bennett. According to downbeat magazine, “his solo piano outings in the city are rare, a true event” and “he applies his expansive outlook and encyclopedic knowledge to the demands of the solo format with as much rigor as he does to his other endeavors.”
He started playing piano at the age of three. His dad was a Broadway composer. His mom was a singer who toured with Benny Goodman. He can take the music of Bernstein, Gershwin, Berlin, Porter and Ellington and make it his own. He produces concerts at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center in Newark, and he’s currently the Director of jazz Studies at William Paterson University in Wayne.
For tickets or information on live-streaming, visit https://smokejazz.com/. To hear him right now, simply check out this month’s “Visual Sound” section.
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