One of the great jazz keyboard players and singers, Les McCann's performance at the 1969 Montreux Jazz Festival is one of the most legendary in jazz history, resulting in one of the most influential jazz albums of all time, Swiss Movement. Merging swing and gospel music, he was regarded as one of jazz's most visionary talents, pioneering electronic ideas, which helped create jazz rock. Born on September 23, 1935, in Lexington, Kentucky, he had a few piano lessons as a child but was largely self-taught and his exuberant style was strongly influenced by Erroll Garner. In the early 1950s, he served in the Navy and, stationed in California, spent his leave-time hanging out in San Francisco jazz clubs. He won a Navy talent show for singing which earned him a spot on The Ed Sullivan Show. After leaving the Navy, he settled in Los Angeles, California and formed a trio which played regularly on Sunset Strip. His fearless performances both as a singer and pianist gained plenty of attention and Miles Davis recommended him to the Cannonball Adderley Quintet, an opportunity he declined because he wanted to form his own band and do things his own way. The gamble paid off as Les McCann was signed to the label Pacific Jazz and became its biggest star after releasing his groove-laden first album, Plays the Truth, in 1960. He went on to play with some of the leading jazz musicians of the day including Richard Holmes, Ben Webster, The Jazz Crusaders, and The Gerald Wilson Orchestra and shared stages with personal heroes Ray Charles and Count Basie. He also discovered Roberta Flack after hearing her in a nightclub in Washington and embarked on the most successful phase of his career in 1967 when he signed to Atlantic Records. It was at the Montreux Jazz Festival that he first met and started working with sax player Eddie Harris, resulting in the best-selling album Swiss Movement (1969) and a hit single with “Compared to What.” Successful collaborations with Harris continued on Second Movement (1971), Invitation to Openess (1972) and the groundbreaking 1973 improvisational album Layers, on which Les McCann pioneered electric piano and explored the idea of electric jazz. Through the 1980s, he worked with Les McCann's Magic Band on a series of albums, and he teamed up with German pianist Joja Wendt in 1997, which resulted in another important album, Pacifique (1998). A stroke in the 1990s curtailed him for a while but he was back in 2002 with the album Pump It Up, while publishing a book of his photographs of many of jazz's most iconic musicians. Les McCann continued to release albums including 2011’s The Shout and 2018’s 28 Juillet. On December 29, 2023, Les McCann died from pneumonia at the age of 88.
