Jim Hall - Biography

Born Decenber 4th, 1930; Buffalo, NY

Looking for a picture of an artist who is forever questing, refusing to stand on his laurels, always on the lookout for the experimental edge and for placing himself amidst challenging younger players? Guitarist Jim Hall is your man. His more recent challenges have ranged from original work for jazz quartet and chamber ensembles, choral ensembles, on up to orchestral settings. In his own bands and engagements he often features special guests, like of pianist Kenny Barron, saxophonists Joe Lovano and Greg Osby, the New York Voices, trombone man Slide Hampton, and his duet collaborations with Pat Metheny.

Born in Buffalo, Jim Hall spent much of his youth in New York, Columbus, and Cleveland, OH. He was raised amidst a family of string aspirants, including his violin-playing mother, and a grandfather and uncle who played the guitar. He started on guitar at age 10, and by 13 he was playing around Cleveland as a professional. His professional inspirations included Charlie Christian and Django Reinhardt. After high school he began studying guitar in earnest, at the classically-oriented Cleveland Institute of Music, where he majored in music theory.

Hall's first significant professional affiliation came as a member of fellow 2004 Jazz Master Chico Hamilton's unique mid-'50s cello-bass-saxophone/flute-guitar-drums band, which established a kind of chamber jazz sensibility with its unique sonic textures. It was in this assemblage that Jim Hall began to garner notice for his sensitive, assured playing. This wouldn't be the last time Jim Hall found himself in unusual instrumental settings. His 1957 affiliation with saxophonist Jimmy Giuffre, himself a restless experimenter, eventually connected Hall with valve trombonist Bob Brookmeyer. Beyond the fact that Giuffre had hired Brookmeyer to replace his bassist, which established the largely unprecedented prospect of a jazz band sans piano, bass or drums, Giuffre sought an atmosphere which encouraged collective improvisation. This proved to be a rewarding challenge for Hall, who later performed duet dates with Brookmeyer.

In the early 1960s Hall moved to New York, where he took advantageous work in the bands of Sonny Rollins and Art Farmer. The Rollins gig proved to be quite a broadening experience for Hall as he marveled at how the enormously inventive saxophonist could strip a song to its bare essence. It was with Rollins that Jim Hall made one of his greatest sideman recordings, The Bridge, a classic date for RCA Records. In the mid-'60s he found a home in the Merv Griffin television show orchestra. Around 1966 he established yet another solid duet partnership, this time with bassist Ron Carter. Later his classical grounding stood up well in collaborations with classical masters Itzhak Perlman and Andre Previn in something of a third-stream setting. Jim Hall's composing skills, which have become more vivid and apparent in more recent times, have found a home in places ranging from small bands to large orchestras here and abroad. His writing for jazz band and string quartet, Quartet Plus Four, debuted in Denmark when the renowned Jazzpar Prize was bestowed upon this master of the jazz guitar.

NEA Jazz Masters 2004 Fellowships Recipients